Gu Xia’s gaze was evasive.
Just a moment ago, she’d only dared to meet Lu Shaoting’s gaze for a split second.
She didn’t dare hold it any longer.
She was afraid that a man as shrewd as Lu Shaoting would see right through her pretense at a glance.
Had she not died once before, Gu Xia would truly have been innocent and harmless.
She would still be that girl who smiled cheerfully every day and, whenever she ran into Lu Shaoting, would obediently greet him with, “Hello, Uncle Lu.”
He would respond with a perfunctory “Mm-hmm.”
And Gu Xia would vent to her friends, saying things like, “Uncle Lu is so mean—no wonder he can’t find a wife,” and other such casual remarks.
But now that she had died once, she could no longer trust anyone so naively.
She knew Lu Shaoting responded better to kindness than to harshness, so she played along with his preferences.
If she were to actually register their marriage with Lu Shaoting, even if they divorced later and she didn’t get anything from him, it wouldn’t be a loss for Gu Xia.
As for the child in her womb, Gu Xia hadn’t given that much thought yet.
First, she was still young—whether now or in her previous life when she faced death, she had only been around twenty.
Second, she had just become pregnant, and her baby wasn’t showing yet.
Apart from missing her period each month and feeling a bit hungrier than usual, she had no discomfort whatsoever.
How could she possibly feel any so-called maternal love before the child was even born?
In the eyes of the Gu family, Gu Xia was still just a child herself. Naturally, she had no emotional attachment to the baby in her womb, so it was only natural that she hadn’t given it any thought.
Right now, her only concern was winning Lu Shaoting’s trust.
Lu Shaoting, of course, had no idea what was going on in Gu Xia’s mind; he simply felt a sense of inner conflict.
He knew Gu Xia’s kindness toward him was calculated.
But the way she treated him was so natural—it almost seemed to come from the heart.
Lu Shaoting couldn’t tell whether Gu Xia was genuinely kind to everyone or if she was simply a schemer who hid her true intentions too well.
When Gu Xia finished speaking and saw that Lu Shaoting hadn’t replied, she lowered her eyes, seemingly a little disappointed, but didn’t press the matter further.
Lu Shaoting hadn’t answered her question—whether or not they would get married…
They were discharged from the hospital at 2:00 p.m. and packed their things; by the time they returned to the Lu residence, it was already past 3:00 p.m. He chatted with everyone in the living room on the first floor.
By the time Lu Shaoting made it back upstairs and lay down on his bed, it was already past 5:00 p.m.
After Gu Xia tidied up the second-floor bedroom, she asked Lu Shaoting where she would be sleeping that night.
Lu Shaoting replied bluntly, “Sleep on the floor.”
But that evening, he still called his driver—who had been following him the whole time—and had him deliver a folding bed.
The nanny brought dinner upstairs, but only served Lu Shaoting a meal.
The housekeeper did call out to Gu Xia, telling her to wait and come downstairs to eat.
Gu Xia didn’t think much of it. She took the meal the housekeeper handed her, set it down on the table in front of Lu Shaoting, and then stepped forward to help him up.
Lu Shaoting seemed like a difficult person to please, but his needs appeared minimal and were easily met.
As Gu Xia bustled about taking care of him, Lu Shaoting actually began to look uncomfortable.
“Just go downstairs and eat. Come back to clean up after I’m done.”
Gu Xia paused for a moment; she wasn’t confident the Lu family would have saved any food for her.
Just look at the way the Lu family matriarch was eyeing her—a mix of dislike and calculation.
Still, Gu Xia went ahead and set out Lu Shaoting’s meal.
She went downstairs one after another with the housekeeper.
Lu Jianming and Qin Xiulian were still there, but Lu Ye was nowhere to be seen.
Lu Xiaojing and Lu Xiaoyan had both gone home; as married daughters, they often visited their parents during the day.
Usually, by dinnertime, they’d head home to cook for their husbands and children.
When they saw Gu Xia come downstairs, not a single member of the Lu family gave her a friendly look.
Gu Xia couldn’t be bothered with any of that.
She only listened to Lu Shaoting now. He’d said he was going to marry her. Since she was already Lu Shaoting’s wife, why shouldn’t she be able to eat a meal at the Lu household?
Unless she said something—or Lu Shaoting said something—who would know they were only pretending to be husband and wife?
Besides, she was really quite hungry right now; the unbearable pangs of hunger were too agonizing.
She watched as Gu Xia went to the kitchen to serve herself some rice, then pulled out a chair and sat down. She did it all in one fluid motion, her movements natural, without the slightest trace of embarrassment.
Qin Xiulian looked up at her mother-in-law.
She knew full well that her mother-in-law favored her eldest son—her husband—and naturally doted on her eldest grandson, Lu Ye.
As for this younger brother-in-law, he hadn’t been raised under her roof since childhood, so there was hardly any emotional bond to speak of.
Even though he’d been promoted several times in recent years and the old lady had started to look upon him more favorably, she still didn’t particularly like him and wouldn’t show him any special favor.
Since she didn’t like Lu Shaoting anymore, how could she possibly like the woman he married?
Seeing that her mother-in-law clearly disliked Gu Xia, Qin Xiulian deliberately said:
“Gu Xia, your father is a college professor too—how did he raise you to be so ill-mannered? No one even called you to dinner, yet you just helped yourself to rice. You have absolutely no manners.”
Gu Xia shot Qin Xiulian a glance.
“Is eating on my own so lacking in manners? I am, after all, Lu Shaoting’s fiancée. Whether you acknowledge it or not, the child in my womb—if he claims it, then he is the father of my child.”
“I’m Lu Shaoting’s fiancée, and I’ve just arrived at the Lu household. By deliberately not inviting me to join you for dinner, are you trying to show how ‘well-mannered’ you are?”
Gu Xia’s words seemed directed at Qin Xiulian, but in reality, they also applied to the matriarch of the Lu family.
She’d seen favoritism before, but never to such an extreme.
Gu Xia even began to wonder: Was Lu Shaoting really a biological member of the Lu family?
Even if one doesn’t love the house and extend that love to the birds nesting in it,
She knew Lu Shaoting was in poor health, and she happened to be carrying his child.
Not only did the Lu family fail to encourage her to keep Lu Shaoting’s child, but they actually treated her with utter disdain.
What was their motive?
The Matriarch of the Lu family slammed her chopsticks down on the table with a thud.
Her words were sharp as she said, “Gu Xia, who exactly are you insinuating here?”
Gu Xia replied calmly, “Grandmother, please take care of your health—don’t let anger harm you. I wasn’t referring to you at all; you’re not the kind of person who would hold it against me for eating the Lu family’s food.”
Grandfather Lu, meanwhile, glanced at the housekeeper.
“Didn’t I tell you to invite Gu Xia to dinner? Be prepared next time.”
“Eldest daughter-in-law, keep your comments to yourself. Since Shaoting has made up his mind, and Gu Xia is right—she’s Shaoting’s fiancée. Since she’s living here now, treating her like family isn’t wrong at all.”
In the Lu family, only Old Master Lu and Lu Xiaoyan showed her even a modicum of concern.
But Gu Xia knew that the concern they showed was solely because she was carrying Lu Shaoting’s child.
If it weren’t for this child, they would be no different from the rest of the Lu family.
All they were thinking about was how to get rid of her.
This only made it even clearer to Gu Xia that not a single person in the Lu family was any good.
Gu Xia didn’t worry about anything else; she just wanted to fill her stomach first.
After eating her fill, she took her bowl and chopsticks to the kitchen.
Then, after telling the elderly Mr. Lu that she needed to go take care of Lu Shaoting, she headed upstairs.
Just then, she heard Qin Xiulian complaining to her mother-in-law:
“Mom, just look at this Gu Xia—she has absolutely no manners or upbringing. She seemed so well-behaved before, but I never expected it was all an act. I told you, what kind of decent young woman could a black-listed family like the Gus possibly raise?”
“Gu Xia isn’t even married into the Lu family yet, and she’s already so arrogant. Once she’s married into the Lu family, will we even dare to come here for meals?”
Grandma Lu said sternly:
“As long as I’m still alive, I’ll see just how arrogant she dares to be. That Fourth Son of mine is such a fool—why did he have to marry Gu Xia?”
“She may not look like much, but she’s full of tricks.”
Qin Xiulian muttered under her breath:
“What other reason could there be? She’s just relying on her youth and beauty. She’s so sly and seductive—I never realized before just how good Gu Xia is at luring men in.”
“And Fourth Son, too—he looked down on this one, didn’t approve of that one, and in the end, he actually ended up marrying Gu Xia.”
Men are all no good; they’ll love young women until the day they die.