"What are you hiding from?"
The man lowered his head, brushing against Meng Shu Tang's lips with a force that carried a restrained ruthlessness. "You were quite bold when you kissed my Adam's apple just now, weren't you?"
Meng Shu Tang's shapely, fair legs, visible beneath her long dress, were pressed firmly against the man.
She trembled slightly, her wet, clear eyes fixed intently on the man before her, whose bone structure was striking and whose beauty was bewitching.
"No... not here..."
Her hands rested weakly against his chest, as if resisting, yet also as if inviting.
He looked at her without saying another word.
His slender fingers ran through her soft, long hair, gripping the back of her head tightly as he greedily claimed her breath, as if he wanted to crush her into pieces within this small space.
Inside the cramped, swaying car, reason had long been cast to the winds.
A brief flash of red light illuminated her tightly closed eyes and the expression on his face—one that was near-manic and reckless.
It was just like three years ago, at her engagement banquet with Gu Jin Xing, when he had burst in wearing black, radiating hostility, and ignoring everyone's gaze, kissed her lips before saying to Gu Jin Xing, word by word, "I never fight you for anything, but her—she is the exception."
...
Inside the car.
After the intense intimacy, Meng Shu Tang was drenched in sweat.
She nestled in Gu Yun Ci's arms, held tightly by him.
She felt as if she were melting, and she turned to embrace him back.
"Yun Ci, I have something to tell you."
They had been married for three years, and apart from his enthusiasm for intimacy, Gu Yun Ci was always cold and distant toward her.
She wanted to tell him that she wanted to have his child, and that they could live properly, like a normal married couple.
"I also have something to tell you."
"You go first."
The man pushed her away and took a document from the car's console.
"Once the Ancient Bead Cultural Tourism Town project cooperation ends, let's get a divorce!"
Meng Shu Tang was caught off guard, struggling to control herself so she could sit steadily. "Did I do something wrong?"
Gu Yun Ci gave a bitter smile and reached out to touch the Ancient Bead necklace around her neck, with its dull color and blurred patterns.
He had seen this necklace in Gu Jin Xing's room before.
He had bought her so many priceless jewels and one-of-a-kind pieces from around the world, yet she had shown no interest in them, only to be deeply attached to this unremarkable necklace.
And every time they were intimate, she would keep her eyes tightly closed; it turned out she had always kept his younger brother in her heart, still pining for the past.
The man put on his suit jacket.
The Rolls-Royce door was opened from the outside, and his polished leather shoes stepped onto the road surface.
In the night, the light drizzle was illuminated by the streetlights, casting a slanted arc.
The tall man stepped out of the car, and the mist of rain settled on his crisp, high-end suit, creating a hazy glow.
Assistant Qin held up a black umbrella, the canopy precisely covering the man in front of him, not letting a single drop of rain fall on him.
"Move to the guest room upstairs; don't make Ci Xian uncomfortable."
Meng Shu Tang desperately held back her tears, leaning out of the car window, about to speak up to ask him to stay.
A red Porsche slowly approached, and the hazy face inside, obscured by the rain and mist, looked familiar, etching itself into Meng Shu Tang's pupils.
"Bai Ci Xian."
Bai Ci Xian was Gu Yun Ci's ex-girlfriend, his White Moonlight.
The servant Li Sao had gossiped about how she had been parachuted into the Gu Corporation, able to bypass managers and report directly to Gu Yun Ci.
Watching as Gu Yun Ci walked toward Bai Ci Xian and bent down to sit in her car, Meng Shu Tang could no longer control herself and burst into tears.
Her heart ached, and her stomach churned; she held onto the car window to steady herself.
The cold rain lashed down diagonally, her fingertips digging into the cold, metallic paint of the car body, her thin frame trembling in the rain curtain like a fallen leaf.
Tears mixed with the rain, rolling down and splashing into tiny droplets on the ground.
"Young Madam, let's go back!"
The driver, Lao Zhang, watched with heartache.
In the past, Meng Shu Tang had been kind to him.
Meng Shu Tang wiped away her tears and gave a bitter smile.
She bent down and sat back in the car. "Uncle Zhang, let's go."
The rain pattered against the car window, resonating with the dull, aching pain in her chest.
She was plunged into deep sorrow when her mobile phone in her bag suddenly rang.
She reached out to take out her mobile phone, and upon seeing the caller ID on the screen, her expression softened, suppressing the hoarseness from her recent crying. "Grandmother."
The old woman's loving voice came from the other end of the line. "Tangtang, did you pick up Yun Ci?"
Meng Shu Tang paused. "I did."
Li Xiu Yun said, "That's good. You told me yesterday that Yun Ci was coming back tonight, so I went to the market early this morning and bought a lot of seafood, and even ordered king crab. It cost me a whole month's pension!
When you have time, come over to the house for a meal."
Listening to this, Meng Shu Tang's eyes suddenly turned red. "You don't need to buy it; he doesn't care for it."
Li Xiu Yun laughed. "Are you two having a spat? Whether he cares for it or not is his business; me preparing it is my gesture."
Meng Shu Tang sniffled and changed the subject. "Grandmother, how have you been lately?"
Grandmother paused slightly, but replied with a smile, "I'm fine, I don't have any problems."
Meng Shu Tang asked, "And my mother?"
Li Xiu Yun didn't speak for a long while. "Tangtang, I took it upon myself to move your mother from the special care ward to a general ward. That place costs nearly ten thousand a day, and I've also stopped the imported special medicine to help her wake up.
Over these years, although Yun Ci has always helped cover the bulk of the costs, we can't rely on him forever!
You've put in the restoration fees you earned from your studio, and I've taken out my own retirement savings; we can't hold on much longer.
Moving your mother to a general ward... she won't have to suffer so much for much longer."
Grandmother's words hit Meng Shu Tang's heart like a giant boulder, and a terrifying thought sprang up: Could it be... that Gu Yun Ci was going to stop paying the fees?
When they got married, she and Gu Yun Ci had signed an agreement.
It was a nakedly "unequal treaty."
The agreement stipulated that during the marriage, the treatment fees for Meng Shu Tang's mother would be fully covered by the Gu Corporation.
But Meng Shu Tang and Li Xiu Yun felt bad about it, so they only let Assistant Qin pay the treatment fees on time each month.
They had never mentioned the smaller, miscellaneous expenses.
In addition, the agreement also stipulated that Gu Yun Ci had the right to terminate the agreement at any time, but if Meng Shu Tang asked for a divorce, she would have to pay a penalty of 1 billion.
1 billion—to Gu Yun Ci, it was pocket change, but to Meng Shu Tang, it was an astronomical figure.
Faced with such an unequal marriage agreement, she had written her name without hesitation.
She loved him, and being able to marry the Ice Mountain Flower she had looked up to in her youth was, to her, the luck of crashing into a sky full of stars, her eyes filled with the joy of running toward him.
She hadn't expected it to become a shackle now.
A loud bang on the phone pulled Meng Shu Tang back to her senses.
"Tangtang, the wind blew the window open and the rain blew in. I'm going to go collect the laundry. You and Yun Ci should be well; don't worry about me so much."
After giving her instructions, Li Xiu Yun hurriedly hung up the phone.
Looking at the darkened mobile phone screen, Meng Shu Tang's fingers gripping the phone tightened abruptly.
Gu Yun Ci had cut off her mother's medical expenses without a word.
Well, they were going to get a divorce anyway; naturally, he wouldn't care about an outsider who had nothing to do with him.
She opened her mobile phone again, turned to Gu Yun Ci's WeChat, and replied with a single word: "Okay."
In 50 days, the Gu Corporation's Cultural Tourism Town project cooperation would end.
At that time, they would have no relationship at all.
✦✦✦