The dream was a damp London.
The grayish-blue sky cast a hazy filter over the city.
Raindrops the size of beans pelted against the glass window, pitter-pattering. People had long grown accustomed to the city’s sudden downpours—even without an umbrella, they walked the streets unhurried.
Inside, however, chaos had been raging for quite some time.
Slender, soft arms, like peeled lotus roots, draped over a man’s broad shoulders. Her breathing matched the rhythm of the rain—rapid and heavy.
The man supported her lower back. Something on his fingers seemed to dig into her delicate skin.
His voice was hoarse, laced with dark desire and a deadly allure.
He called her by her real name, desire and rain interweaving in a rising heat: “…You’er.”
Ying Chan couldn’t help but hold him tighter. Just as she was about to climb the peak with him, a chilling voice drifted into her ear:
“So you really are coveting me.”
Ying Chan jolted as if yanked from drowning—her eyes flew open!
Her breathing was ragged. It took her a while to gradually come back to her senses.
In the dream, she had uncontrollably kissed the small mole on the man’s Adam’s apple. In reality, she discovered her hand was resting on Jin Si’s Adam’s apple.
“!?”
It felt like a blunt blow to the back of her head—a loud buzz!
She immediately shoved Jin Si away, hugged the blanket, and scrambled backward!
Her mind split into several pieces.
One part wondered how he got into her room. Another part wondered how she ended up clinging to his neck.
Yet another part realized she finally knew why Jin Si’s voice sounded familiar—it was just like the man in her dream!!
But all these chaotic thoughts were completely scattered by Jin Si’s low, magnetic, lazy yet raspy—
“Boss, I sell my skills, not my body.”
Ying Chan couldn’t help it. She grabbed a pillow and hurled it at this bastard who dared to slander her character: “How did you get into my room?!”
Jin Si caught the pillow with perfect accuracy, tossed it aside, and swept his gaze around the room.
His eyes were cold and sharp, cutting like a blade: “I was in my room just now and heard a noise coming from yours. But your lights were already off—so where was the sound coming from?”
“It felt off, so I came to knock. You didn’t answer, so I pushed the door open… I meant to wake you up and ask if you were okay, but instead you latched onto my neck.”
A meaningful curve tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Boss, I’m requesting a raise. Working by your side is quite a threat to my personal virtue.”
Ying Chan: “…”
Nonsense!
“I was just—having a dream! A dream!”
Jin Si braced one hand on the edge of the bed, leaning in close to Ying Chan, his shadow enveloping her.
Amusement glinted in his eyes: “Don’t believe it. Unless you tell me what you dreamed about? What kind of dream makes the boss grab my neck and touch my Adam’s apple? Quite the restless sleeper.”
“Jin Si!”
Ying Chan’s ears burned. She grabbed another pillow and hurled it at him. “Get out! Do you know this is harassment?!”
She was going to fire him tomorrow!
Jin Si caught the pillow with ease, his tone lazy: “You touched me in your sleep—you’re the one committing workplace harassment. And real harassment looks like this. Let me demonstrate—”
He reached out to grab Ying Chan.
Ying Chan, already sensitive and fragile after being startled awake, felt a surge of fear and panic as a man she barely knew showed aggression toward her. She was about to dodge and snap at him when she suddenly heard a “bang” from somewhere in the bedroom.
Jin Si’s unserious expression sharpened in an instant. He rolled up and pressed Ying Chan back onto the bed.
Ying Chan only saw the curtain stir without any wind, lifting at one corner. Under the streetlight outside the window, a dark figure lunged forward with a knife!
“—!” Ying Chan’s eyes flew wide!
Jin Si moved with incredible agility. He spun and kicked the figure’s wrist—the dagger clattered against the wall!
Before the other party could react, he grabbed their shoulder, kicked out their knee, pressed his own knee into their spine, and pinned them hard to the floor.
His speed was a stark contrast to his usual laid-back demeanor!
“I knew my ears weren’t wrong. You’ve got a ‘guest’ in your room.”
Jin Si flipped the person over, drove his knee into their ribs, and tore off the mask covering their face, revealing it. “Is this the same one who broke in last time?”
The latter half was directed at Ying Chan.
Ying Chan hastily switched on the bedside lamp and got a clear look at the person—a thin, small man with a crew cut. Not the same obsessive fan from last time.
“…Not the same one.”
“Then it’s a copycat. Who are you? Start talking!” Jin Si pressed down harder with his knee.
The man felt like his ribs were about to snap under Jin Si’s weight. His face was twisted in pain, but his eyes burned with a manic light: “I-I’m not… I just… I just wanted to hold her…”
Jin Si let out a derisive snort and directly clamped his hand around the man’s throat. The man choked, veins bulging on his neck, eyes bulging out.
“Jin Si!”
Ying Chan threw off the blanket and scrambled off the bed, grabbing his arm. “Don’t kill him! Hand him over to the police!”
He glanced at her, his features sharp with lingering menace, but he obediently loosened his grip.
Unexpectedly, the man seized the opportunity to grab the fallen knife, snatched it up, and thrust its cold gleam straight at Ying Chan’s heart!
In a flash, Jin Si lunged and knocked Ying Chan down. The blade grazed his arm as he precisely kicked the man in the groin!
The man crashed to the floor, clutching himself and screaming in agony.
Jin Si yanked Ying Chan up, shielded her behind him, and kicked the man into the corner of the room. The man writhed in pain on the ground, completely incapacitated. Jin Si pulled out his phone and called the police.
After hanging up, annoyed by the man’s noisy screams, Jin Si casually grabbed a belt from the coat rack and bound his hands and feet, then dragged Ying Chan out of the bedroom and shut the door behind them.
Finally, silence.
“…” Ying Chan hadn’t yet recovered from the sheer terror of moments ago.
Jin Si gripped her wrist, felt how cold she was, and released it to leave. Ying Chan instinctively grabbed his arm: “Where are you going!”
Jin Si glanced down. Her fingers clutching his sleeve were trembling, and her voice carried lingering fear. He suddenly smiled: “Weren’t you just telling me to leave? Now you can’t bear to let me go?”
Ying Chan: “…”
Her throat tightened with an indescribable sense of grievance. She let go of his arm, and Jin Si strode into the guest bedroom.
But within two seconds, he came back out with his own windbreaker and draped it over her shoulders, his tone returning to its usual lightness.
“That wasn’t to harass you earlier—it was to force him out. I wasn’t sure where he was hiding. If I’d just thrown open the curtains and he stabbed at me, there’d be no time to dodge. I figured it was another obsessive fan of yours, so I deliberately said those things to flush him out.”
Ying Chan looked at him, lips parting: “Oh…”
“Sit on the couch. Wait for the police.”
“Oh…”
Jin Si smirked: “So? Your newly hired bodyguard—pretty solid on the job, right?”
Ying Chan pulled the jacket tighter around herself and mumbled a vague “Mm,” then caught sight of a patch of red on his arm. She froze, then gasped: “You’re hurt?”
Jin Si looked down. There was indeed a wound, neither shallow nor deep.
He’d gotten it when pushing Ying Chan aside—that bastard’s blade had caught him.
Jin Si waved it off: “Just a scratch.”
Ying Chan refused to take it lightly: “Who knows if his knife was clean? What if you get tetanus? Let’s go to the hospital.”
“Overreacting. Do you have a first-aid kit at home? Iodine to disinfect, Yunnan Baiyao to stop the bleeding, wrap it in gauze, and it’s done. I’ve had worse injuries before. This is nothing—I know what I’m doing.”
Jin Si said lazily, “If the boss feels bad for me, how about a raise? Day shift rate, night shift rate.”
Ying Chan really couldn’t help but be both annoyed and amused by his endless teasing: “You’re Luck, not Duck!”
Luck was the English name on his file.
Jin Si paused for a moment before catching her dry humor, then burst out laughing: “If I were a duck, the price wouldn’t be that low, boss. Don’t get a bargain and then act like you’re hard done by.”
A bargain? Ying Chan glared at him.
But after his joking around, her earlier panic and fear had miraculously loosened its grip.
She turned on the living room light, found the first-aid kit, and tended to his wound on the couch.
Jin Si wore only a black tank top, his arm muscles solid and defined.
Ying Chan’s gaze drifted, almost involuntarily, to his Adam’s apple.
There was a tattoo on it—she couldn’t tell if it was real or a temporary transfer—shaped like a flying dove.
She asked with feigned casualness: “Doesn’t it hurt, getting a tattoo on your neck?”