Furthermore, they had brought in quite a few professional landscapers when redesigning and renovating the courtyard house.
At this time of year, the climbing roses by the entrance were in full bloom. The variety, Juliet, was a classic David Austin cutting rose, its beauty reigning supreme in the world of roses. The color was soft and lovely—the outer petals were white, while the center was a gentle apricot yellow. The blossoms themselves were enormous.
The landscapers hired by the Morgan family had done an exceptional job planting them. The space above the main gate, which was about five or six meters wide, was almost completely covered by these large, bowl-shaped blossoms. They extended along the walls on either side, creating a flower wall nearly ten meters long that drew the gazes of many passersby.
However, Victor Morgan hadn't expected such a coincidence. The moment Jessie Sterling opened the door, she ran right into a group of tourists taking photos for their social media at the front gate.
By the time the two of them had left the hutong, the group of people who had been taking pictures at the gate still hadn't quite snapped out of their surprise.
"The door... it just opened..."
"I'm not blind. I saw it."
"Holy crap, people actually live in there! Who is that, some kind of tycoon? The courtyard houses around here, even the rundown, shared-courtyard ones, have to be worth tens of millions, right?"
"Dream bigger. Does that look like a normal courtyard house to you? This one residence takes up half the street. How can you even compare it to one of those shared-courtyard places?"
The group huddled together, all four of them looking completely stunned.
"The influencers who posted about this place online never said anyone actually lived here! Didn't some people even livestream from the gate? I've never heard anything about the owners coming out to shoo anyone away," a tall young woman said.
The girl who had been posing for photos with her covered her face. "And the young woman who came out didn't say anything, either. I think she looked as shocked as we were. That surprised little look on her face... oh man, why do I think she's so adorable?"
The young man holding the camera, who had been taking their picture, said as he reviewed the photos, "It must be fine to take pictures. Look, they have seven or eight cameras by the gate. If they didn't allow people to take photos here, someone would have come out to stop us long ago."
Jessie had no idea she was still the subject of their discussion. She was now sitting in a different, antique-style courtyard house, stirring the bird's nest soup in her bowl. She looked at Victor Morgan in surprise, repeating what he had just said. "You'll take me to the Forbidden City this afternoon? But isn't that summit still going on? Will you be able to get away?"
Victor Morgan replied, "It's fine."
'It's his fiancée's first time in Aethelburg. Even if he's busy, he has to make time to be with her.'
"Never mind, then. How about I go with you to the summit?" Jessie suggested.
Victor Morgan made a questioning sound. "Hm?" He was a bit surprised. "The summit will probably be very boring."
"Besides, the sun is scorching right now, and I hate it," Jessie said, already regretting her suggestion. Although it wasn't a long walk from the Four Joys Courtyard, even a few extra steps in the summer heat were enough to make one feel gross. She hated the feeling of being sticky all over.
Victor Morgan let out a faint laugh.
Still, he didn't actually let Jessie tag along to the summit.
"Why don't you rest at home this afternoon," Victor Morgan said. "I'll come get you after sunset. We can go see the Aethelburg skyline at night. It won't be as hot as it is during the day."
Jessie, of course, would much rather stay home. 'If her parents hadn't already promised the Morgan family last week that she would come to Aethelburg to see the new house, she would never, ever have agreed to travel in July or August.'
But...
"Rest... at home?" Jessie asked hesitantly.
"Home," of course, meant their marital home in the hutong.
Victor Morgan nodded, seeming to read her mind. "The deed is in your name, so it's your house. The Four Joys Courtyard is fully furnished with everything you could need, so it'll be convenient for you to stay there. I usually live in my apartment near the office. I'll move in after the wedding."
Jessie's face instantly turned bright red.
'When did I ask him when he was moving in?!'
But seeing Victor Morgan's dead-serious expression, Jessie felt like she was just letting her imagination run wild.
She forced the thought—'one day I'll have to sleep in the same bed as this man'—out of her mind and gave a stiff nod. "Oh, I see."
'It's not like he needs to report his living arrangements to me,' she thought.
"Actually, even after we're married, if it's more convenient for you to live near the office, you don't have to move in," Jessie said quietly.
'She was just trying to be considerate.'
But the moment the words left Jessie's lips, she felt a heavy, unignorable gaze settle on her, sizing her up.
Jessie looked up and met Victor Morgan's dark, intense eyes.
Victor Morgan was different from any man she had ever known. Her father, Seth Sterling, was a bank chairman, and she knew Julian Grant, who had handled major cases worth billions. Both were powerful men in high positions, but neither of them had ever looked at her with such a cold, heavy gaze, one that carried so much pressure.
Jessie's heart skipped a beat, but she refused to back down. "Is there a problem?"
'She felt she had just been considering things from his perspective.'
Victor Morgan said, "From the very beginning of this alliance, I never intended for it to be a marriage in name only."
Jessie was speechless. "..."
"The head of the Morgan Group needs to be married to maintain the company's public image," Victor Morgan said, his focus fixed on Jessie. "But for me, personally, a marriage can't be just a formality." He seemed to sense her nervousness, and his tone softened slightly, losing some of its earlier cold edge. The meaning behind his words, however, remained non-negotiable.
"My bottom line," Victor Morgan added slowly, completing his thought, "is that both parties remain faithful to the marriage."
The Morgan family's rules were strict, forbidding their children from engaging in messy affairs.
For one, it demonstrated poor character; for another, it would damage the Morgan Group's reputation.
Therefore, if any of the Morgan children were to cause a scandal due to a private affair, it would affect their year-end bonuses, and potentially even their stock holdings.
As the next head of the Morgan family—or more accurately, the current de facto head—it was even more unthinkable for Victor to become a laughingstock over a moment of indulgence. By the same token, he did not want his wife to have any... messy ideas in that regard either.
After saying this, Victor Morgan's gaze remained locked firmly on Jessie.
A single sentence echoed in Jessie's mind—
"A marriage can't be just a formality."
Jessie couldn't help but wonder, what exactly did he mean by that?
'If it wasn't a marriage in name only, that naturally meant he expected her, as his wife, to fulfill her marital duties.'
'Including the physical side of marriage.'
The blush on Jessie's face deepened, spreading across her cheeks. She instinctively looked away, avoiding Victor Morgan's gaze.
In that moment, his intense gaze, which had felt so oppressive just a second ago, seemed to have taken on a different quality entirely.