From CEO to Concubine

The first time Yan Zheyun caught his baby sister reading…well…a gay pornographic novel, he'd felt like his world had turned on its head. Lixin was—okay, she wasn't the apple of his eye, per se. That prestigious position was reserved for her sweeter twin, who was never mouthy, never rebellious, and most importantly, never lounged on his bed in her branded pyjamas and waved books titled 'Hurt Me in a Million Ways' in his face. 

'Caught' probably wasn't the right word to describe what had happened. Instead of feeling guilty, Lixin had practically been lying in wait for him, camping in his room just so she could wave the titillating cover in his face, the artwork of the blushing, trembling virginal boy so close to his nose that he had to go cross-eyed to take a proper look at it. 

"Big Brother, after you rejected Big Brother Xiu the other day, I decided that you need to embark on a journey of self-discovery!" 

…really, Yan Zheyun only had himself to blame. He'd been tipsy at his father's annual company function and had rejected the advances of the Mu Family's daughter by coming out of the closest to her in the bluntest fashion imaginable. 

He could have been a lot more gentlemanly about it but the girl had attempted to kiss him and somehow, slurring "I like dick" had seemed like a good idea at the time. 

It wasn't and would never be a good idea. Especially when he also had the dubious honour of being the older sibling of a little eavesdropping brat. Thankfully, only Lixin had been around to witness that spectacular disaster, all the way down to the handprint on his cheek that, even sober, he didn't think he deserved. 

Yan Zheyun had spent weeks fretting over the Mu daughter ratting on him to his parents about his sexuality. They were the most loving people he'd ever met but they were also conservative and he wasn't ready yet. 

Lixin had spent the same number of weeks trying to set him up with her friends. The brothers of her friends. The seniors in her future university who she swore were hotter than the brothers of her friends and even that one super cute delivery guy that had tempted her more than he'd tempted Yan Zheyun. 

And now, after Yan Zheyun had turned down Xiu Sheng—who was his father's intern, of all things, why he even thought it was appropriate to try and hook up with his boss' son, Yan Zheyun would never know—Lixin had apparently come to the new conclusion that her big brother had no idea what he wanted in a partner. 

"You need to have a type, Big Brother," she said patiently, with a smug superiority that was way too rich coming from her given that she'd been single since she was snug in their mother's womb (1) and if Yan Zheyun had his way, would continue to be until she settled into her university life next year. 

"I don't want to hear that from you."

"C'mon, just look at this novel, I'm only on chapter 2 and I can already tell that it's got all sorts of sexy potential!" 

"I don't want to hear that coming from you either." But he caved and took a look at the cover because there was no way to get rid of her otherwise and he wanted to take a shower and start looking through some market reports. 

The protagonist—or at least, he assumed that was who the boy was—was pretty. Everything on display, which was quite a lot of shoulder, skin, chest, and thighs, was fair and slender. But he didn't fit Yan Zheyun's aesthetic ideal. 

"What do you think?" Lixin asked excitedly. "Would Big Brother like to read it?" 

"Big Brother would not." Catching her off-guard, he snatched the novel out of her hands and held it above her head as she wailed and tried to clamber up his back to retrieve her juicy little read. 

"Big Brother, give it back! I'm at a cliffhanger, the protagonist just got bought into slavery by his childhood friend's family—"

Yan Zheyun frowned. "Can't you find something with more nutritional value to digest?" he muttered. 

"…this is why you're single, Brother. You don't have a romantic bone in your body, it's such a waste of that face of yours." 

"What you're reading isn't romantic, it's…" He cut himself short, not willing to bring himself to say the word 'kinky' in front of his younger siblings. Even though the twins had turned eighteen last month and had already sat for their high school entrance examinations for university, he couldn't unsee the two pudgy lumps that used to toddle after his legs. 

He tugged on his tie to loosen it before tiptoeing and opening the topmost cabinet in his room, where he stored his luggage when he wasn't travelling. Lixin was a good twenty centimetres shorter than he was and unless she managed to recruit her taller twin to assist her, she wasn't getting that book back without borrowing a ladder from the helpers. 

"Aww, Big Brother, you're horrid!" 

Yan Zheyun was counting on Lixin's skin, which was sometimes thicker than the Great Wall, to still be too thin to ask the old housekeeper Auntie Peng—who was so traditional she was already asking Lixin when she was going to bring home a nice young man—to help her retrieve the weepy boy book. 

Confident that Liheng would know better than to rummage through his big brother's stuff without permission, Yan Zheyun soon forgot about the novel. 

Until Lixin started complaining about it one day. 

"That disgusting crown prince scumbag, oh my god, Big Brother, let me  tell you what he did to poor Yan Yun—"

A quick check of his cabinet revealed that the book was still there. He turned around in time to see Lixin grinning at him like a cat that had eaten the canary and was ready to boast about it. 

"I bought the hard copy just for you, Big Brother," she said with a cheeky grin. "But what day and age is it? Of course there's an app version." 

…the 7 year age gap felt like a chasm sometimes. 

Yan Zheyun's head hurt. Not only did he have to hear her chatter incessantly about the most horrific plot to ever afflict itself on his ears, but the protagonist's name was also too close to his for comfort. 

He especially disliked the way Lixin eyed him thoughtfully now and then like she was reevaluating some preconceptions she had of him. 

"Say, Big Brother," she asked one day, out of the blue. "Are you a gong or a shou?" 

"…" 

"You don't understand the question? How about are you a 0 or a 1? A top or a bottom? A—"

"YAN LIXIN!" 

Her delighted laughter echoed down the hallway of their house. At that time, it had grated on his nerves. 

Now, he found there was little else that he missed more.