Bai Tao froze.
She’d just woken up and had no strength, mumbling subconsciously:
“Zuo…
Mubai?”
The man’s smile faltered for a split second.
“Little Taotao, you have the wrong person.
I’m Zuo Senye.”
“Really?” Bai Tao shot him a suspicious glance and couldn’t help but mutter, “That can’t be right…”
The man raised an eyebrow.
“You seem pretty confident about telling me and Mubai apart.”
Bai Tao leaned in.
“Let me double-check.”
Suddenly, she lowered her head, braced herself with both hands, closed her eyes, and began sniffing him carefully.
It was an aquatic, marine scent.
She leaned in closer.
Indeed, identical twins are hard to tell apart by sight alone.
But as long as they were two separate individuals, there would be differences.
Like unconscious habits or subtle dietary preferences.
She’d learned this from her time as a bodyguard for a pair of wealthy twin ladies.
She had noticed back on the cheering platform that Zuo Senye had a pure, unadulterated marine fragrance.
It was like a damp, salty sea breeze, carrying the faint smell of sea salt and algae washing over her.
But in the Sky Garden, whenever Zuo Mubai got close, she could faintly detect an additional, unusual sweet and fruity note on him.
‘Could it be…
William Pear?’
“What are you doing?” His steady breathing was disrupted.
“I still think you’re Zuo Mubai,” Bai Tao replied earnestly.
She slowly opened her eyes.
She was practically half-lying on top of Zuo Mubai, her soft hair brushing against his slightly open collar.
A hint of amusement flashed in Zuo Mubai’s eyes.
“You’re that sure?”
Realizing this was inappropriate, Bai Tao got off of Zuo Mubai and moved to the other end of the seat.
“Unless you two switched identities from the very beginning just to fool me.”
“Otherwise, there’s no way I’d get it wrong.”
She stared out the car window, estimating they were only a few hundred meters from her dorm.
‘I don’t want to attract any attention right now.’
‘I’ll enjoy every quiet day I can get.’
“I can get out here,” she said, rubbing her stomach.
“I need to walk for a bit to digest.”
Zuo Mubai snapped out of it.
“Driver, stop the car.”
Bai Tao placed her hand on the door handle.
“Thanks for the ride back to my dorm, Zuo Mubai.”
With that, she gave a wave and got out of the car.
Zuo Mubai’s lips parted, but no words came out.
His throat felt unusually dry. Get faster updates on novelping.com.
The door on the other side of the car opened, and Zuo Senye appeared, leaning against the frame with his torso bent.
“Mu, what did she say?”
Zuo Mubai tugged lightly at his tie.
“She insisted on calling me Zuo Mubai.”
Zuo Senye’s interest was piqued.
“A lucky guess?
Or is there more to it?”
He recalled how, less than a minute ago, the girl’s warm, soft breath had felt hot and damp against his neck, tickling him.
‘Was it…
her sense of smell?’
He raised his arm and sniffed it, then felt ridiculous for doing so.
‘How is that possible?’
He and Sen weren’t just identical in appearance; even their height, weight, and muscle mass were astonishingly the same.
They even shared clothes, so there shouldn’t have been any difference in scent.
‘But what if…
it really was?’
Zuo Mubai shook his head.
“It was probably just a guess.”
“She just got lucky and guessed right.”
“That makes sense.” Zuo Senye’s eyebrow quirked as he got into the car.
“Let’s go.”
When Bai Tao got back to her dorm, she saw that the school forum had completely blown up.
Everyone was talking about “the girl in glasses,” and everyone was flaming her.
Bai Tao wasn’t scared, though.
She was just bummed about the 10,000 yuan for flag-waving that she’d just lost.
‘Speaking of which, this was all Jing Wang’s fault!’
‘He just had to rush over, ruin her payday, and mess up her plans.’
‘Wait!’
Bai Tao’s eyes widened in shock.
‘I still haven’t added Jing Wang’s KK contact info!’
‘She had planned to make him wait a little, but with everything that had happened, she’d completely forgotten.’
She quickly typed out a friend request message—”I’m Bai Tao from the finance department, Class 3″—and sent it.
Jing Wang accepted the request almost the instant she sent it.
[Bai Tao: Hey, Wang.]
The message status switched to “Read,” but as Bai Tao clutched her phone, a reply from Jing Wang was slow to come.
‘So petty!’
‘Still, he is the sugar daddy who gave me a phone and a uniform.
And I still need to figure out how to get that 10,000 yuan out of him.’
‘Better sweet-talk him a little.’
‘First, I’ll appeal to his reason, then to his emotions.’
[Bai Tao: Wang, you gave me a uniform and a phone this morning, and I haven’t had a chance to say thank you yet.]
[Bai Tao: So, thank you.]
[Bai Tao: I was busy working earlier, so I’m only adding you now.
Sorry about the delay.]
On the other end of the screen, Jing Wang was lounging on a sofa, his long legs stretched out over one armrest and one hand cradling the back of his head.
His hand, which had been about to turn off the screen, froze in midair as he read her messages.
‘So now she’s not calling me “Young Master Lingzhou” over and over?’
[Jing Wang: A part-time job?]
[Bai Tao: Yeah, waving that flag on the platform was a temp job I found.]
[Bai Tao: And…
the reason I pretended not to know you was because I thought I looked pretty embarrassing at the time.]
When he saw the word “embarrassing,” the corner of his lip curled into a slight, involuntary smirk, and he let out a cold huff.
‘That’s more like it.’
‘He knew it.
How could this bean sprout, who didn’t even know his name, possibly be a member of Zuo Senye’s cheer squad?’
[Jing Wang: You should be embarrassed.]
He started tapping on the screen with one finger, his speed picking up considerably.
[Jing Wang: Just how broke are you?
How much did they pay you to do that kind of dirty work?]
[Bai Tao: It’s probably not much to you…
but I didn’t even get paid in the end.]
[Jing Wang: Why?]
Bai Tao deliberately held back her reply, instead just typing and deleting nonsense in the chat box.
On Jing Wang’s end, all he saw was that she’d read the message, and the “…is typing” indicator was flashing, but no reply came through.
For some reason, it reminded him of how she looked when she was in front of him, head down and stammering.
‘Besides, he’d held that stupid cheer flag for a moment, and it had some heft to it.’
‘I really don’t know how that bean sprout managed to hold it up.’
TSK.
[Jing Wang: Are you trying to say it was my fault?]
Again, the message was marked “Read,” and a reply only came after a long moment.
[Bai Tao: No, my own body just gave out on me.
I hadn’t eaten in a few days, so I fainted.]
[Jing Wang: How much do they pay for waving the flag?]
[Bai Tao: You really don’t have to.]
[Jing Wang: [KK Transfer: 1,000,000]]
[Jing Wang: I don’t like owing people.
Take it.]
[Jing Wang: You’re dead if you send it back.]
KK transfers were deposited with a single click.
Bai Tao took a deep breath, savoring the sweet smell of money through the screen.
‘Her sugar daddy was arrogant, but damn, he paid well.’
She silently changed Jing Wang’s contact name to “Sugar Daddy Wang Wang.”
But Bai Tao knew the difference between a one-time feast and a steady income.
So she transferred the excess amount back to him.
[Bai Tao: The job was 10,000.
I’m sending the rest back.]
[Jing Wang: I didn’t realize you enjoyed doing shady, under-the-table work.
You’d even wave a flag for Zuo Senye for a mere 10,000.]
[Bai Tao: A girl’s gotta eat.]
[Bai Tao: [crying_kitten.jpg]]
Jing Wang’s gaze lingered on the cute sticker.
Those teary eyes in the picture were just as moist and pleading as the bean sprout’s.
[Jing Wang: Do you send this to everyone you talk to?]
[Bai Tao: Which one?]
Jing Wang saved the sticker and sent it back to her.
[Jing Wang: This one.]
[Bai Tao: Nah, I don’t really have many friends.
Right now it’s just you, Wang, along with Zuo Senye and Zuo Mubai.
Just you three.]
[Bai Tao: And I haven’t even talked to them at all.]
Jing Wang’s chest swelled slightly.
[Jing Wang: Don’t just send that to anyone from now on.]
[Jing Wang: It’s ugly.]
[Jing Wang: Your contact lenses will be ready at 9:00 AM tomorrow.]
Immediately after, his KK profile picture went gray.
He’d logged off.
Bai Tao scrolled up to look at the sticker again.
‘He has no taste.
It’s so cute.’