The elevator doors closed completely, and the floor number changed from “3” to “4.”
The other passengers had already left, leaving only Lu Jiayan standing in place.
Chen Ke noticed something was wrong. Looking closely at Lu Jiayan’s face, he saw that it lacked color, as if he had seen something terrifying and was engulfed in fear and lingering dread. He hurriedly asked with concern:
“What’s wrong?”
“Are you feeling sick somewhere?”
Lu Jiayan’s pale face gradually regained its color. He looked toward Zhou Ke, calmed his breathing, and shook his head slightly. “I’m fine.”
Yet the voice that came out carried a trace of a tremble.
Chen Ke found it hard to believe and confirmed once more.
“Are you really okay? Don’t force yourself if you’re uncomfortable. If anything’s the matter, you can go back and rest, and I’ll talk to the team leader for you.”
Lu Jiayan managed a forced smile. “I’m really fine. I was just a bit nervous when you said the team leader was going to make me drink.”
“Is that all?” Chen Ke immediately let out a sigh of relief and patted his chest. “If they try to make you drink, I’ll help you out.”
With that, he added jokingly, “Seeing your face look so terrible just now, I thought you’d seen a ghost.”
Lu Jiayan pressed his lips together.
Wasn’t he just seeing a ghost?
Looking at it from another angle, Pei Zhiwen was even more terrifying than a ghost.
Being late to the dinner and serving as the project’s lead manager, Lu Jiayan indeed ended up drinking quite a bit.
Under normal circumstances, he definitely would have found ways to dodge the alcohol, but today, burdened with worries and walking on eggshells for fear that Pei Zhiwen might appear before him, he drank several cups straight down without hesitation.
Chen Ke kept his word, stepping in to block several rounds of high-proof liquor for him.
By the end of the night, apart from a young woman who didn’t drink, the only ones left were Lu Jiayan, who merely carried the scent of alcohol and wasn’t drunk at all.
The others were about seventy or eighty percent drunk, though not entirely unconscious.
Pei Zhiwen never showed up by the end of the gathering, and the heart suspended in Lu Jiayan’s chest slowly settled back down.
He and the young woman called cabs for the drunken colleagues, exerting a great deal of effort to send everyone safely home.
In the end, only Chen Ke remained, clutching an empty bottle and burping.
Lu Jiayan told the young woman to head back first.
Because Chen Ke appeared much more intoxicated than the other colleagues, with a large part of his drunkenness being Lu Jiayan’s fault, and because the two of them were close friends, Lu Jiayan decided to escort him home to sleep before hailing a cab for himself.
The dinner party had broken up at eleven, and by the time Lu Jiayan took a taxi and arrived home, it was almost two in the morning.
The late autumn wind felt exceptionally cold in the small hours of the morning. The dim yellow streetlights filtered through the gaps in the tree leaves, casting dappled shadows and stretching Lu Jiayan’s silhouette inch by inch.
Perhaps due to the alcohol going to his head, Pei Zhiwen’s figure involuntarily surfaced in his mind’s eye.
The man had been lazily half-leaning against a big G parked by the residential building’s curb, his trench coat unbuttoned, holding a nearly burned-out cigarette butt between two fingers. An oppressive, decadent aura radiated from his entire being, his expression completely calm, though upon closer inspection, one could tell he was actually suppressing a rising surge of restlessness.
Hearing footsteps break the silence of the surroundings, the man raised his head leisurely.
The alcohol in Lu Jiayan’s system was blown away by the wind, his consciousness gradually clearing. Focusing his gaze on the person not far away, his steps involuntarily paused.
Pei Zhiwen.
It wasn’t an illusion; it was real.
Pei Zhiwen’s voice was low and pleasant, his articulation clear yet carrying a hint of lazy rebelliousness as he called out his name.
“Lu Jiayan.”
The short two words brooked no refusal.
“Come here.”
The familiar voice and tone seemed to drag Lu Jiayan right back to the period when he was still by Pei Zhiwen’s side.
Why would Pei Zhiwen appear in Jiangling?
Did he come here to exact revenge?
Back then, he had used certain methods to leave Pei Zhiwen and begged others to ensure the man couldn’t track his whereabouts. He had heard that after that incident, Pei Zhiwen spent a long time recovering in the hospital.
Later, after his body healed, he even went abroad with his fiancée.
Whether those rumors were true or false, Lu Jiayan didn’t know, but he knew one thing: since Pei Zhiwen had tracked him down today, there was no possibility of escape.
Slowly, he walked toward Pei Zhiwen.
The man asked, “Are you happy to see I’m still alive?”
Lu Jiayan didn’t dare answer.
Pei Zhiwen bit down on his cigarette, took a drag, and blew a swirling cloud of smoke directly into the face of Lu Jiayan standing before him. He stubbed the cigarette out against the body of the big G behind him, then tossed the butt precisely into a trash can.
He lifted his eyelids, casting a light glance at Lu Jiayan, who hadn’t changed much after all these years apart.
“Even if you aren’t happy, it doesn’t matter. Seeing you, I’m very happy.”
Lu Jiayan’s lips pressed into a straight line.
“What do you want by coming to find me?”
“To catch up.”
Lu Jiayan closed his eyes and opened them again. “There’s nothing between us worth catching up over.”
Pei Zhiwen’s eyes were very dark. He gave a short, light chuckle, the corners of his mouth curving slightly upward as he spoke to himself.
“You got into a car with license plate Jiang B·R222C at twelve-thirteen.”
He paused for a moment, lowered his gaze to look at the watch on his wrist, and supplied the exact figure. “Right now it’s two-ten in the morning. You spent a total of an hour and a half at your friend’s place.”
“What were the two of you doing during that hour and a half?”
Lu Jiayan hadn’t expected Pei Zhiwen to be tailing him. He raised his head and glared at the man. “It has nothing to do with you.”
It was getting late; he didn’t want to keep entangling himself with Pei Zhiwen.
“We are already over.”
With that, he took a stride forward to leave.
Pei Zhiwen selectively chose to ignore Lu Jiayan’s words, speaking in an infuriatingly languid and leisurely tone.
“Chen Ke, twenty-four years old, native of Jiangling City, single-parent family. Ever since graduating from Jiangling University, he has been working at Qifeng Group. During college, he had two girlfriends, both relationships ending on peaceful terms. Currently single.”
Lu Jiayan came to an abrupt halt. “Pei Zhiwen, you investigated the people around me? What on earth are you trying to do?”
He had anticipated that Pei Zhiwen’s vicious temperament wouldn’t let things rest easily.
Yet he never imagined that in the span of a single night, the man would have complete mastery over Chen Ke’s personal information.
Pei Zhiwen curved his lips. “Do you have time to catch up now?”
Lu Jiayan regretted his momentary impulse to bring someone back to his rental apartment in the middle of the night.
Even after three years, their relationship couldn’t be considered cleanly severed.
He had been drinking, and now the two of them, two grown men, were shut up together in a single room, making him worry that some absurd one-night stand might happen.
Pei Zhiwen stood one meter ninety centimeters tall, looking exceptionally constrained in the thirty-square-meter small apartment. Yet he showed no expression of disdain or impatience; instead, he carefully inspected the clean, cozy room tidied up by its owner.
A layer of black-and-white diamond-patterned carpet was laid beside the bed. Against the wall stood a soft lazy sofa and a cloud-shaped small coffee table. Moving past the foot of the bed and pulling back the curtains, one could see the flowers Lu Jiayan lovingly tended on the balcony.
Every corner was filled with a ubiquitous sense of everyday life.
Pei Zhiwen took off his coat, hung it on the vertical coat rack, and sat down on the sofa. He looked toward Lu Jiayan, who was currently drinking water, and asked.
“You like small apartments?”
Lu Jiayan’s Adam’s apple bobbed, but he chose not to answer.
Pei Zhiwen didn’t mind either. Crossing his legs, he raised his chin.
“Finish your water, come over here, stand right there, and take off your clothes.”
Lu Jiayan’s hand haltingly lowered the glass of water. Lowering his gaze, he said word by word, “I don’t want to do this.”