In the Lin family garage, Lin Yanshu sat in the car reviewing the dashcam footage.
During the fifteen-minute drive from the prison back home, Lin Qian had kept her hands on her lap, her body pressed against the car window, holding that position the entire way.
Forget tampering with the gown—she hadn’t even given it a second glance.
He thought of how she had faced them down with an icy expression after they framed her.
Lin Yanshu felt a dull ache in his chest, guilt and self-reproach nearly drowning him.
He stared blankly ahead, Lin Qian’s cold, resolute eyes constantly surfacing in his mind.
In his memory, she had loved to smile.
Every time he came home, she would greet him with a smile, sweetly calling him “big brother,” pouring tea, bustling about, saying, ”You’ve worked hard at the office, big brother.”
But now, it was as if she had become a different person.
Lin Yanshu’s head ached. He closed his eyes and leaned back wearily against the leather seat.
After who knows how long, Lin Qian’s gentle voice suddenly drifted over from a distance. “Wu Ma, no need to see me off. Go back inside.”
“Miss, please be careful. If you run into any trouble, call me.”
Lin Yanshu’s eyes snapped open, and he immediately saw Lin Qian and Wu Ma standing in front of the villa.
The two exchanged a few parting words, and Lin Qian turned to leave.
Seeing this, Lin Yanshu hurriedly got out of the car and shouted at Lin Qian, “Lin Qian, where are you going?”
The roar exploded like thunder through the silent courtyard. Wu Ma flinched all over. “Young Master, what are you doing here? Didn’t you—”
Lin Yanshu shot her a cold glare, frightening Wu Ma into silence. Then he barked a cold command at Lin Qian, “Lin Qian, stop right there.”
However, Lin Qian acted as if she hadn’t heard, limping forward.
Her refusal to acknowledge him made Lin Yanshu’s heart tighten.
A thought immediately flashed through his mind: Lin Qian is leaving the Lin family.
Anxious and frantic, he strode over and grabbed her arm. “Are you deaf? I told you to stop—didn’t you hear me?”
Lin Qian turned around, and seeing it was Lin Yanshu, her expression shifted.
Yes, she really hadn’t heard.
During her first year in prison, her left ear had been beaten deaf, and from years of slaps, even her right ear’s hearing had deteriorated.
Unless someone spoke to her face-to-face at close range, she often couldn’t hear clearly.
Lin Qian looked away and stubbornly tried to pull her hand back. “Let go of me.”
Seeing Lin Qian so stubborn, the guilt in Lin Yanshu’s heart was instantly replaced by a nameless fury. “Are you done yet? Today is Wan’er’s birthday. You didn’t cause enough of a scene in the banquet hall, and now you’re running away from home? Why are you so immature?”
With that, ignoring Lin Qian’s resistance, he grabbed her arm and began dragging her along. “You’re coming back with me right now.”
Lin Yanshu’s grip was like an iron clamp, tightening harder and harder. Lin Qian felt a sharp pain shoot through her arm, as if her bones were about to be crushed.
Filled with grievance, her eyes reddened, tears swirling in them. Her voice cracked with sobs as she cried out again, “I’m not going back. Let me leave.”
Her body swayed with Lin Yanshu’s pulling, every step a struggle. Her injured leg could barely bear the strain, going weak again and again.
Wu Ma anxiously urged from the side, “Young Master, please be gentle—the Young Miss is still injured.”
At those words, a flash of tenderness crossed Lin Yanshu’s eyes, and he loosened his grip on Lin Qian slightly, though he did not let go.
He looked at Lin Qian, brow furrowed. “Come home with me.”
“I’d rather die out here than go back to the Lin family.” Lin Qian stubbornly shook him off.
Lin Yanshu was completely enraged by Lin Qian, his reason swallowed whole by fury in an instant.
In his anger, he lifted his foot and kicked Lin Qian’s leg. “Are you coming home or not!”
He had only meant to give Lin Qian a small punishment, but to his shock, she let out a miserable cry and crashed heavily to the ground.
She clutched her injured leg tightly with both hands, her body curled into a ball, her face deathly pale, beads of cold sweat streaming from her forehead. Tears poured from her eyes like a bursting dam, and all that escaped her throat were pained whimpers—she was in too much pain to say a single word.
Seeing her in such agony, a dull ache spread through Lin Yanshu’s heart. He said in a fluster, “I only gave you a light kick. Stop playing the victim.”
But there was an unmistakable tremor of guilt in his voice.
Wu Ma’s face went pale with horror, and she hurriedly crouched down. “Young Miss, Young Miss, what’s wrong?”
The bone-deep pain in her leg instantly dragged Lin Qian back three years in time—to her second year in prison.
She could no longer remember what she had been beaten for, but she clearly remembered those people raising their thick wooden clubs high, bringing them down on her lower leg again and again with vicious, cruel faces.
She had cried and begged for mercy, but they had beaten her madly all the same, snapping six arm-thick clubs one after another, smashing her leg clean in two before they finally stopped.
The woman leading them had grabbed her by the hair and warned her, “Don’t even think about reporting this to the guards. Let me tell you—you’ve offended someone you shouldn’t have. Someone paid us to take special care of you.”
Lin Qian’s eyes began to glaze over, her body trembling violently as she kept muttering, “I was wrong, spare me… I was wrong, spare me…”
Her voice was full of terror and despair, like a wounded little animal wailing helplessly.
Wu Ma was already in tears, asking frantically, “Young Miss, what on earth is wrong with you?”
“It hurts… it hurts so much.”
Those few short words pierced Lin Yanshu’s heart like steel needles. “I barely used any force. How could it hurt?”
Wu Ma had no time for Lin Yanshu. She hurriedly and carefully rolled up Lin Qian’s pant leg.
In an instant, a horrifying sight was laid bare before their eyes.
Lin Qian’s lower leg was severely deformed. The bone that had once been straight was now twisted at a grotesque angle. Her skin was covered in a crisscrossing web of old and new scars—some wounds not yet fully healed, red and swollen; others already scarred over, leaving ugly marks.
After years of torment, the muscle in her entire leg had partially wasted away, leaving it thin and fragile—like a withered branch compared to a healthy leg.
Lin Yanshu’s gaze locked onto Lin Qian’s mangled leg, too horrible to look at.
His body froze in place as if under a spell, his mind reeling as if struck a heavy blow, plunged instantly into a daze.
“How could this happen? She was fine when she went in. Only five years—how could she…” he murmured to himself.
Then, as if suddenly realizing something, he could not speak another word.
That place was a prison—a place where criminals were locked away. How could eighteen-year-old Lin Qian have any easy life once inside?
His heart shattered inch by inch, and his eyes quickly reddened.
Gritting his teeth, he forced down the searing pain inside, strode forward, scooped Lin Qian up in his arms, and rushed into the villa without a second thought.
His footsteps were hurried and frantic, but only when he reached the living room did he realize, to his shock, that he didn’t even know which room Lin Qian lived in.
All these years, he had shown so little care for this younger sister of his.
Lin Yanshu closed his eyes briefly. “Wu Ma, where is Qianqian’s room?”
“Master Lin, this way.” Wu Ma hurried ahead to lead the way.
Lin Yanshu followed closely behind Wu Ma, but the farther they walked, the deeper his brow furrowed.
He had never known there was such a remote corner of the house.
When Wu Ma pushed open the door to the storage room, what Lin Yanshu saw was a cramped, dark, damp space piled with clutter—a room without even a window.
His pupils dilated, his eyes full of disbelief. “Qianqian… lives here?”