The fragrance in An Juexiao’s hair lingered at Gu Zhanran’s nose, thread by thread, tugging at the heart.
And his warm breath fell into An Juexiao’s soft hair, so warm that someone’s cheeks turned red.
After a few seconds or so, the two finally seemed to come back to their senses and shyly separated.
Embarrassed, An Juexiao patted her chest. Her lively eyes darted all around, looking at the sky, the horse, the grass, anything except Gu Zhanran. “Ah, ah, that scared me to death.”
Gu Zhanran patted Little Curly’s neck and scolded, “You naughty thing. What if she had fallen?”
Little Curly let out a few cheerful neighs.
Gu Zhanran said sternly, “Behave yourself.”
Having been scolded, Little Curly obediently stood still.
An Juexiao watched the scene and found it utterly amusing. “It really is so smart.”
“In the past, it secretly opened the stable lock at night and slipped out to play. Once it got tired, it came running back on its own.”
“And getting out by itself was not enough. Later, it got bold enough to open the locks for the other horses too, then led them all out to play together. When the trainer saw the empty stable the next morning, he was so scared he was nearly in tears.”
“Hahaha, what happened after that?” An Juexiao asked curiously.
“The trainer was frantic, running in circles. Then he saw it proudly leading the other horses back, clip-clopping all the way. After that, they changed all the locks on the stable, specifically to stop it from breaking out.”
“Little Curly really is a horse demon!”
“Do not praise it. The more you praise it, the prouder it gets.” Gu Zhanran took hold of the reins. “Get on.”
Standing at the horse’s side, An Juexiao patted its neck. “Little Curly, do not play tricks this time, okay?”
After saying that, she seemed to remember something and looked at Gu Zhanran. “Come to think of it, I still do not know its name.”
Gu Zhanran glanced at An Juexiao, then at the curly-haired black horse, and calmly lied, “Little Curly.”
Curly-haired black horse: “???”
“I actually guessed its name right by accident. Looks like we really are fated.” An Juexiao lifted her chin happily, her face bright with delight.
Gu Zhanran only smiled faintly and said nothing.
An Juexiao grabbed the saddle and stepped on the stirrup. Just as she was about to push herself up, a hand suddenly supported her from behind, giving her a helpful boost.
An Juexiao naturally knew whose hand it was. She also knew Gu Zhanran had no improper intent, but her ears still turned red at once, and she shot upward like a firework taking off.
Her movement was so quick and nimble that even Gu Zhanran was briefly startled. Then, when he saw her reddened ears, he understood.
Gu Zhanran smiled quietly, then stepped on the stirrup and swung himself up with ease.
An Juexiao: “!!!”
No one had said they would be riding together!
Her heart started pounding wildly. “President Gu? We are riding together?”
Gu Zhanran said in a low voice, “It is safer this way. Little Curly has a much stranger temper than Little White, and it is sly too.”
Although what Gu Zhanran said made perfect sense, An Juexiao could not help grumbling inwardly, If you are going to talk, can you not use such a sexy voice right by my ear?
When his warm breath brushed past her ear, she felt the little deer in her heart start tap-dancing like crazy.
“O, okay…” An Juexiao nodded distractedly.
Gu Zhanran chuckled softly. “When you speak badly about it, keep your voice down.”
An Juexiao: “…”
So that is why you are talking right into my ear.
While An Juexiao’s thoughts were wandering all over the place, Gu Zhanran’s right hand reached around in front of her chest to take the reins, while his left hand gripped the saddle.
There was a round handle at the front of the saddle for the rider to hold onto.
An Juexiao had both hands wrapped around that handle, taking up all the space, so Gu Zhanran could only place his hand over the back of hers. At the same time, his broad chest seemed to brush lightly against her back.
In that shared riding position, An Juexiao was practically tucked into Gu Zhanran’s embrace.
The heat of his body, along with that magnetic, sensual voice that seemed to rise straight from his chest, made her feel only one thing.
The weather today was really hot.
Way too hot.
An Juexiao’s whole body went stiff. She did not dare move at all.
But once Little Curly started running, staying still was no longer an option. With the jolting of the horse’s back, she bumped against the person behind her again and again.
The cool breeze and the heat in her heart left her caught between ice and fire.
“Do you want to go faster?”
“Mhm…” In truth, An Juexiao had not really noticed what Gu Zhanran was saying. It was only when he gave the command and Little Curly took off like the wind on its strong hooves that she snapped back to herself.
“Ah!” An Juexiao cried out, reflexively shutting her eyes and instinctively leaning back into the embrace behind her.
She felt the dry, warm hand covering the back of hers tighten slightly, as if soothing her.
“Do not be nervous.”
Gu Zhanran’s voice drifted through the wind. At the same time, the horse slowed, giving An Juexiao a chance to adjust.
“Relax your body, grip with your thighs, let your waist and hips rise and fall with the rhythm of its run.”
“It can feel you, and you can feel it too.”
An Juexiao: “…”
Even though Gu Zhanran was teaching her how to ride, with that voice and those words, it all sounded way too much like something out of an adult film, cough cough cough.
“Ready?”
That gentle voice asked by her ear.
An Juexiao nodded.
Gu Zhanran nudged the horse’s belly with his foot, and Little Curly started running again.
The wind roared past her ears.
It was the feeling of racing like the wind, the feeling of freedom.
Although the ride was bumpy enough to make it feel like her insides were about to be shaken loose, An Juexiao kept trying to adjust her posture. Guided by Gu Zhanran, she let her body rise and fall with the horse’s rhythm, and gradually the discomfort eased.
Once she got used to the horse’s running pace, she felt joy, the joy of racing across the wide open land, enough to make anyone forget all their troubles.
Little Curly ran ahead, while Little White, unwilling to be outdone, kept pace alongside.
The two riders and two horses ran for quite a while before finally slowing to a stop.
An Juexiao’s heart was still beating excitedly, her cheeks flushed red with exhilaration.
Her eyes shone as she said, “That was so fun.”
“If you like it, you can come find Little Curly to play anytime you are free,” Gu Zhanran said as he swung down from the horse.
The sudden loss of that warmth made An Juexiao pause slightly. A feeling of attachment and reluctance rose from the bottom of her heart, like ripples spreading across the surface of a lake.
“But with your current riding skills, it would still be better to have the horse trainer with you.”
An Juexiao asked instinctively, “What about you?”
The moment the words left her mouth, she realized how inappropriate they were, how greedy.
Wanting the horse was not enough, now she was coveting the horse’s owner too.
Gu Zhanran stopped and turned his head, his dark, bright eyes fixed on An Juexiao.
An Juexiao stammered, “Uh, I was just asking casually. I know you are busy, you definitely would not have that much free time.”
She felt her explanation sounded exactly like a clumsy attempt to cover something up, so as she spoke, her voice gradually grew softer.
To her surprise, Gu Zhanran naturally performed a gentlemanly bow and smiled. “At your service, Princess.”
Sitting on horseback, An Juexiao looked at Gu Zhanran, graceful and elegant like a knight, and suddenly felt her eyes sting.
When she was little, because her parents had divorced, other children often mocked her for being a fatherless bastard. It was never easy for a single mother to raise a child alone, so to spare her mother worry, An Juexiao had matured earlier than her peers. She had learned to turn pain into a hard shell, using it to weather life’s storms by herself.
Yet no matter how hard the shell, inside was still a soft heart. She too had wanted to be a little princess, cherished and pampered by someone.
So Gu Zhanran’s simple sentence struck her right in the heart.
Gu Zhanran noticed something was off about her mood. “What is wrong?”
“Nothing, some dust blew into my eyes.” An Juexiao used the clumsy excuse to hide her feelings. After steadying herself, she joked, “I did not expect that before filming has even started, I would get to enjoy being a princess first, and even have the honor of President Gu escorting and protecting me.”
The role she was playing in this film was a princess, so the joke fit perfectly.
Gu Zhanran looked at An Juexiao quietly for a moment. His dark eyes seemed capable of seeing straight through her, of understanding everything.
An Juexiao pressed her lips together, feeling a little uneasy.
In the end, though, Gu Zhanran only smiled lightly and tactfully chose not to expose her disguise.
Just then, Zhang Xiaowan came looking for her. From a distance, she waved at An Juexiao. “Juexiao, Juexiao.”
“Xiaowan-jie has come to find me. It is probably something from the production team. Are you coming too?”
Gu Zhanran shook his head. “I am taking Little Curly back to the stable.”
“Then I will head over first.” An Juexiao reluctantly got off the horse and switched back to Little White.
“Mm.” Gu Zhanran stroked Little White’s neck and said, “Do not run off again.”
An Juexiao replied, “Okay.”
Then after thinking for a moment, she added in self-defense, “Actually, it was not me running off.”
Gu Zhanran paused, then could not help laughing. “I was talking to Little White.”
“…” Mortified by the misunderstanding, An Juexiao quickly tugged the reins. “Let us go, let us go.”
What had just happened was too embarrassing. An Juexiao did not dare look back at Gu Zhanran. If there had been a hole in the ground, she would have crawled into it on the spot.
When An Juexiao reached Zhang Xiaowan, she saw her waggling her brows and teasingly saying, “So you turned down Prince Charming Peng Chenglang because you secretly ran off to find the dark horse prince.”
An Juexiao gave a light cough, a trace of shyness flashing across her face. “Compared to a prince, he is more like a knight.”
As she said this, An Juexiao looked into the distance. Gu Zhanran was seated on horseback, handsome and dashing. He waved to her, then rode away.
Gu Zhanran rode Little Curly back to the stable. After dismounting, he gently stroked the horse’s neck and said to the trainer, “Give Little Curly an extra meal today.”
The trainer asked in confusion, “Little Curly? It got renamed?”
“Mm.”
Although the trainer had no idea why Gu Zhanran wanted to change its name, he was the horse’s owner, so what he said went.
Little Curly snorted and shook its head, whimpering inwardly, You change my name whenever you feel like it, do I not have any dignity?