“She’s calling you ‘brother,’ Jian Gong? She’s talking to you, right?”
The small eyes behind the thick glasses of the engineer sitting next to Jian Shen widened to twice their size. He looked left and right, only to find that three out of the four people in the car wore the same expression as him. Only Jian Shen seemed different.
Too serious—definitely putting on an act.
The girl standing outside the car window was the most beautiful he had ever seen in his life, though she looked a bit young. Considering he was already in his thirties, if it weren’t for the fact that she was Jian Gong’s sister, he would have wanted to pursue her.
Jian Shen shot him a glance. Having worked together for so long, he knew this colleague had no filter. If he didn’t remind him, the man would likely become even more unrestrained. His tone was stiff: “What else? Do you have a sister?”
The man touched his face and fell silent. He really didn’t have a sister, but… but he had never heard of Jian Gong having a sister either. Wasn’t he supposed to only have a brother?
The bespectacled man looked at the driver in the front seat, who then glanced at the passenger beside him. The three exchanged looks, winking and gesturing at each other before simultaneously shaking their heads.
Jian Shen opened the car door and got out, walking around from the parking spot to stand in front of Lin Wanwan. His broad back completely blocked the prying eyes of the people in the car.
“Hey—no fun, Jian Gong! Are you still coming back for lunch?”
All three men in the car were bachelors too busy with work to consider their personal lives. Now, suddenly, one of their “hard-to-settle” group had a girl appear beside him. Given how well they knew Jian Shen, any girl who could make him stop the car voluntarily was definitely not ordinary. The three exchanged glances and started teasing him.
The four engineers in the car had just returned from a meeting in the city, rushing back to their unit for lunch. They never expected to run into Lin Wanwan here, but Jian Shen immediately called for the car to stop.
Carrying such a large bundle, a young girl walking alone on the road was hard to miss.
“I… came to return the clothes. The ones you lent me last time. Thank you.” Lin Wanwan had also heard what Jian Shen said to his colleagues, and she felt utterly embarrassed inside.
Who would have thought they’d run into each other on the road ahead of time? She had originally planned to just leave the clothes at the reception room, avoiding any face-to-face interaction for the sake of comfort.
Jian Shen didn’t reach out to take the bundle. It wasn’t until the girl holding the clothes looked up at him, her eyes filled with confusion and doubt, that he spoke.
At noon in winter, the sun hung high in the clear blue sky, generously pouring down its light.
The rays carried a sharp quality, making the world shimmer and ripple before Lin Wanwan’s eyes the moment she looked up. The interplay of light and shadow turned Jian Shen’s figure, standing before her, into the only dark spot in her entire field of vision.
She blinked rapidly, trying to adjust to the glaring light. With both hands holding Jian Shen’s military coat, she couldn’t spare even one to shield her eyes from the sun.
“You…”
What Jian Shen saw were her eyes, just like the glimpse he had caught in the car that night, etched into his memory. Under the refraction of light, they took on a special effect: the irises deepened in color due to congestion, while the whites of her eyes were slightly tinged with red.
Overall, they resembled a critical component of a precision instrument under special conditions—filled with tears yet possessing a breathtaking quality that followed an internal logic.
“Get in the car.” Jian Shen took the large bundle she was holding in her arms.
The man turned and opened the car door, speaking to the bespectacled person sitting in the back seat: “Chen Gong, could you please move further inside?”
Then Jian Shen got in first, leaving the car door wide open and a spacious seat available as he looked at Lin Wanwan.
Lin Wanwan pointed at herself with her finger. “Me?”
What did Jian Ming’s brother want by calling her into the car? The clothes had already been returned, so there shouldn’t be anything else. Could it be that he wanted to help Jian Ming explain things to her, his girlfriend? After all, they were brothers. From Lin Wanwan’s perspective, she still knew nothing—her boyfriend Jian Ming had been missing for two or three days, so it was normal for someone from the Jian Family to step in and give an explanation.
Lin Wanwan was just about to wave her hand and say she needed to return to school when she heard the man say, “There’s only one bus back to the city in the afternoon, and it won’t depart for another two hours. Get in, unless you want to wait here alone.”
“That’s right, get in, girl. We’ll treat you to a meal. The food at our institute is really good. We’ll send you back after eating.”
Jian Shen frowned. Hearing him refer to himself as ‘brother’ in his words, he felt a subtle, rare sense of displeasure. It was surprising—even hearing about Jian Ming being detained hadn’t stirred his emotions this much.
When Lin Wanwan came, she really hadn’t paid attention to the bus schedule. Looking at Jian Shen again, his face was as usual—devoid of warmth, let alone any expression.
Alright then. She had been out for quite a while and was indeed a little hungry. Lin Wanwan thought to herself: if Jian Shen later spoke up for his brother, what kind of reaction should she give to avoid being discovered that she already knew what had happened to Jian Ming?
“Then I’ll trouble you.”
Bowing her head, she bent down and got into the car, pulling the door shut.
She hadn’t expected Jian Shen, who was assigned a unit car, to actually know the departure schedule of the bus at the unit’s entrance. He paid attention to quite a lot of things.
Dealing with Jian Shen, Lin Wanwan somehow always felt a little afraid. Even though Jian Ming and Jian Shen were brothers, interacting with Jian Ming felt completely ordinary.
She always felt that Jian Shen was too clever—he could see right through her little thoughts at a glance. But someone like him couldn’t be bothered to expose her, leaving Lin Wanwan alone to feel awkward.
Fortunately, the atmosphere in the car wasn’t awkward.
The bespectacled man was Chen Zixiang. In the back seat sat him, Jian Shen, and Lin Wanwan. Even with Jian Shen sitting between them, Chen Zixiang persistently struck up conversations with Lin Wanwan.
He asked Lin Wanwan how old she was, then which school she attended and what her major was—basically, he didn’t stop talking the whole way.
Lin Wanwan answered everything she could openly and generously. Only when Chen Zixiang asked about her relationship with their Jian Gong did she not answer, instead turning to look at Jian Shen, who hadn’t spoken a word since she got in the car, to see what his attitude was.
This man was really troublesome—he showed no expression at all. Lin Wanwan couldn’t figure out his mood swings. Unlike Jian Ming, whose feelings were written all over his face, clear as day.
“Hey, Wanwan-meimei is looking at you. Go on, tell us—what’s the relationship? Don’t say she’s your sister; we won’t believe that.” Chen Zixiang nudged Jian Shen with his elbow.
Jian Shen’s mouth twitched almost imperceptibly. In just a few minutes, he was already calling her ‘Wanwan-meimei.’
Just as Lin Wanwan thought he would reveal her relationship with Jian Ming, she heard Jian Shen push back Chen Zixiang’s arm that had nudged over and say, “She’s my sister, not yours. Don’t call her that.”
This time, it was Lin Wanwan’s turn to be surprised. Jian Shen would rather tell his colleague she was his sister than introduce her as his younger brother Jian Ming’s girlfriend.
Did he look down on her?