Marry the villain and the whole court kneels down and calls her the queen

Jiang Jiu came to a store with a better location and first stood at the corner of the street to look around.

The first house in the alley has a three-way intersection at the door.

The main road ahead is next to the river, and there is a bridge over the river. It is very lively with people coming and going.

Going further into the alley, it is also very lively, with mostly food stalls, restaurants, teahouses, and pharmacies.

However, if you look closely, you will find that almost all the shops in this alley belong to the Lu family.

It was quite good that Madam Lu left the first shop to Lu Yunyang.

It’s a pity that the business account of this store is even worse than that of the grain store. It’s a pity to waste such a good location.

Xia Zhi, who had been observing the flow of customers in secret, followed Jiang Jiu as soon as he saw him.

"Miss, you are here, would you like some snacks? The ones you buy from that shop are not as good as Miss Haitang's, but they are much better than the ones from the Jiang Mansion."

Jiang Jiu chuckled and followed Xia Zhi to the tea stall by the river.

"Miss, I've been observing for two days. The shop selling snacks here and the shop selling wine over there are doing good business. Only the shop selling spices in the middle is not doing well."

The places selling alcohol and snacks are all rented from other people.

This shop belongs to the Lu family and there is no rent. However, if it is rented for a shop in the same location, with such a large area and such a good location, the rent would be at least ten taels per month.

However, the silver given by the shop owner was basically four or five taels.

Xia Zhi continued, "I asked around. The family selling snacks gets three taels of silver per month in rent, and the family selling wine gets two taels of silver per month. Shopkeeper Zhao only gets one tael of silver per month. So, it seems like he's making all the profit from the spices himself."

Jiang Jiu calculated: "About the same. The total amount on the books is five taels of silver. The rent for both families is enough. Although spices are expensive, they are used in cooking. The sales volume is not small."

"He did take the profits from the spices."

Xia Zhi was so angry that he pinched his waist with both hands, rolled up his sleeves and was ready to fight.

"Miss, this cunning slave, wait for me to teach him a lesson?"

Jiang Jiu stopped Xia Zhi and said, "Wait, as far as I know, this Shopkeeper Zhao is a relative of Madam Lu. Even if we send him to the government, it will be useless. We'd better think of a permanent solution."

Shopkeeper Zhao is old, and it is obvious that Madam Lu asked him to manage this unoccupied shop so that he could earn some money for his retirement and take care of himself at the same time.

But she shouldn't have given this shop to Lu Yunyang.

Lu Yunyang was in urgent need of money and had to reorganize his unprofitable shop.

There is another possibility. Madam Lu probably didn't know that Jiang Jiu was capable of doing business. This shop was half-dead and couldn't generate much value, but it wasn't losing money either. She probably assumed that Lu Yunyang wouldn't find out.

Jiang Jiu thought about it and decided that to catch a thief, one must have evidence.

"Xia Zhi, I'll go in later and distract his attention. You go and steal his real account book. We can't hand this matter over to the authorities, so we can only let the Lu family decide for themselves."

Xia Zhi rolled his eyes and understood what Jiang Jiu meant.

"Young lady, are you planning to go directly to Old Madam Lu to seek justice and ask her to replace Manager Zhao?"

Jiang Jiu nodded. If she didn't replace the old shopkeeper, she would not be able to reorganize the store.

The master and servant made a plan, and Jiang Jiu brought Chunxiao and Xiazhi to the store.

Although Manager Zhao is old, he is still very good at judging people.

The shop sells spices, which most poor families cannot afford. But when they saw Jiang Jiu dressed gorgeously, they hurriedly greeted him with a smile.

"Ma'am, please come in and look at the spices."

Jiang Jiu didn't say anything. He looked around the spices and then went to the snack shop and wine shop next door to take a look.

Although Chunxiao is a member of the Jiang Liu family, Jiang Liu has also ordered that only when Jiang Jiu has established a firm foothold in the Lu family can the Jiang family gain benefits from the Lu family.

She is already Jiang Jiu's personal maid, so she must do her best to help Jiang Jiu in the Lu family.

Chun Xiao noticed that Jiang Jiu's face was slightly unhappy and her voice rose.

"How dare you! This is your young master's wife. Come and meet her!"

Everyone knew that Lu Yunyang was getting married. Manager Zhao even went to the mansion to attend the wedding and met Jiang Jiu from afar.

But he didn't expect that Jiang Jiu would come to inspect the shop so soon.

His eyes panicked, and he quickly bowed and saluted: "Zhao Tiezhu greets the young lady."

The moment he stood up, his panicked look disappeared. He was Madam Lu's man, so why should he be afraid of a little young lady?

Jiang Jiu said with a cold face: "Such a good shop, why is it rented out? Can't you run it yourself?"

Zhao Tiezhu hurriedly served tea to Jiang Jiu, but Jiang Jiu refused to take it. He put the tea on the table and smiled foolishly.

"Of course the spices weren't selling well, so I rented it out only after the Madam agreed."

Chun Xiao snorted coldly: "Then you should let them go as soon as possible. This shop will belong to the young master and the young mistress from now on."

Zhao Tiezhu glanced at Jiang Jiu and started to cry about his poverty, "Young Madam, it's not that I don't want to drive them away. It's simply because our spice business is struggling and we're losing money year after year. I had no choice but to come up with this solution. Otherwise, I'd lose even my monthly salary."

Jiang Jiu smiled calmly: "The spice business is not easy to do, you can switch to other things. If you are not doing well in management, I can also replace you. Shopkeeper Zhao, I will give you three days. After three days, if they don't leave, you will leave."

Zhao Tiezhu didn't expect that Jiang Jiu, who looked weak and gentle, would be so difficult to talk to.

"Young Madam, we signed a contract. Even if we want to kick them out, we should at least wait until the contract expires."

Chunxiao asked: "When will it expire?"

Zhao Tiezhu: "At the end of next year, they will sign a three-year contract."

Jiang Jiu was so angry that he laughed: "The lease contract is for a maximum of one year, and the rent is collected monthly. Even if we evict them now, they will just have to pay an extra month's rent. How can it be until the end of the year?"

"Since the contract is signed until the end of the year, what about the monthly rent for the past few months? The account book only shows last month's rent, nothing more."

Zhao Tiezhu had no choice but to carry Madam Lu out.

"I don't know about this. The contracts were all signed by the Madam."

Jiang Jiu took out the shop contract and said, "The eldest lady has already given me the shop, and the account books are also here. If you can't explain it, don't blame me for handing you over to the authorities for corruption. You've probably heard that County Magistrate Jiang is my relative..."

Zhao Tiezhu heard that the woman Lu Yunyang married was the daughter of County Magistrate Jiang.

It seems that today, he has to teach her a lesson. She should just stay at home and be a good lady. It’s not that easy to do business outside.

Zhao Tiezhu suddenly started yelling at Jiang Jiu without waiting for him to leave.

"Xiao Luzi, you're from Wang Cheng's family. Stop doing business. Our young master is closing the shop and kicking you out."

This is Zhao Tiezhu's way of escalating the conflict and letting Jiang Jiu play the villain and face the merchants directly.

Sure enough, Xiao Luzi, who sold wine, and Wang Chengjia, who sold snacks, hurried over.

"What's going on? Who is the young master? Why is he so unreasonable? We agreed to rent it for three years..."

Zhao Tiezhu began to play the victim: "It's because the rent is too low, it's not worth it... If you don't move out, the young master will raise the rent. One shop... ten taels of silver..."