Shen Lingxi fell asleep while receiving her IV.
Her slender body curled onto its side, shrinking into a small ball as though she had no sense of security at all.
Fu Jinglan raised the room temperature by two degrees.
Then he pulled a chair over and sat down beside Shen Lingxi’s bed.
Time lay still, like a match struck alight, burning slowly.
Fu Jinglan lowered his eyes and silently watched Shen Lingxi.
When she slept, she was just like a child.
Fu Jinglan tried speaking to her, his voice low and hoarse.
“Shen Lingxi, how long are you planning to sleep? Are you still going to eat dinner?”
How ridiculous. Even lunch had been ruined by a cat.
She had ended up kneeling in the snow, yet when she complained, she still hadn’t forgotten to emphasize that it had been her yellow croaker.
For all he knew, she might not have eaten a single bite of fish.
Fu Jinglan scolded her irritably. “You have neither temper nor backbone.”
Shen Lingxi was sleeping deeply and gave no response.
Her eyelashes did not even tremble.
Fu Jinglan leaned forward and reached out. As if playing with a toy, he first touched Shen Lingxi’s chin, then pinched her cheek.
Soft, smooth, and completely innocent.
She had almost no ability to resist.
In the end, Fu Jinglan’s hand came to rest on Shen Lingxi’s forehead.
It was burning hot, scorching the small amount of humanity he possessed.
Only belatedly did Fu Jinglan feel his heart soften. He murmured to himself:
“I won’t bully you anymore.”
Apart from Jiang Qingyan, he had bullied her too today.
As soon as Shen Lingxi had entered the room, he had made her do unfamiliar things she was unaccustomed to. She had been frightened.
Fu Jinglan himself could not explain what had happened. Normally, aside from feeling uncomfortable during the morning*, he did not have much desire.
But from the photograph to the real person, the moment he saw Shen Lingxi, he had lost his senses.
He wanted her.
He wanted to do it.
Actually, when Shen Lingxi had first arrived at Lu Manor and stood waiting in the living room, Fu Jinglan had seen her.
He had merely glanced at her.
She was beautiful.
Now, Fu Jinglan lowered his head and pressed the side of his face against Shen Lingxi’s forehead.
It was still very hot.
After keeping it there for a while, Fu Jinglan muttered under his breath,
“You soft-boned thing, where exactly does that milky smell on you come from?”
It was rather pleasant.
Shen Lingxi was feverish and muddled.
Suddenly, she raised both burning arms and wrapped them around Fu Jinglan’s neck, forcing him to bend deeply at the waist as his body came down over her.
Their cheeks brushed against each other, their ears nearly touching.
Shen Lingxi’s lips lightly grazed Fu Jinglan’s ear, and the breath she exhaled was scorching hot.
“Da^^ddy, can you help me wash something?”
Fu Jinglan felt hot and itchy.
Not knowing whether Shen Lingxi was talking nonsense, he asked in a low voice,
“What do you want washed?”
He could not help her take a bath.
Shen Lingxi kept her eyes closed and smiled foolishly.
Her voice was soft and milky. “Like me~”
Then her arms went limp, and she sank back into sleep, making no further sound.
She really was talking nonsense.
But was Shen Lingxi truly so afraid of being unloved and unwanted?
Even while sick, she could not rest easy. She was still trying to please him.
Fu Jinglan felt an indescribable discomfort in his chest, something difficult to put into words.
He still answered the delirious Shen Lingxi:
“I can’t help you. I don’t like little children who are always getting sick.”
“If you don’t get sick, I might be able to like you a little.”
Five minutes later, Fu Jinglan rose from the chair. Before leaving, he lifted a hand and patted the crown of Shen Lingxi’s head.
“You soft-boned thing, you should know when to take a hint.”
“Get well quickly. Waste less money on medical expenses, or I’ll deduct it from your food, clothing, and daily necessities.”
At that moment, Shen Lingxi let out a soft whimper.
“Starve Pangpang until he gets skinny, then drive him away. That’ll do. You don’t have to starve him to death.”
Beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows stretched an endless gray-white expanse left behind by the snow.
Fu Jinglan’s room was unlit.
The safe flickered between light and darkness as it was opened and closed.
Something was taken out.
Afterward, Fu Jinglan sat down on the deep-brown sofa. The match in his long fingers flared, went out, flared again, and went out again.
One after another.
The fragrance of burning wood curled through the air, winding around the man.
Time seemed to grow slow and quiet.
At last, Fu Jinglan flicked his hand and extinguished the match with a sharp motion.
He made a phone call. “Come over.”
In front of the office building inside Lu Manor, a black Bentley had just come to a stop. Mu Suizhou had originally intended to come in to work, but urgently turned the steering wheel all the way around.
“All right. I’ll be there immediately.”
When Mu Suizhou arrived, Fu Jinglan was standing before the window.
His tall figure was immersed in the dim light, unbearably lonely. A longevity lock hung from his fingers, swaying gently.
Like duckweed drifting on the water, unable to grasp its own fate.
The lock was gold, and so was the chain.
Fu Jinglan turned around. A layer of shadow covered his handsome face, and his features were silent and solemn.
Mu Suizhou was just about to ask what had happened when he heard Fu Jinglan speak in a hoarse voice.
“Suizhou, do you think Xiaosi might still be alive?”
Surgery at the age of ten. Amnesia. The features of someone from the past…
What if Xiaosi’s life had not been meant to end, and she had survived against all odds?
What if Shen Lingxi was Xiaosi, who had lost her memory?
Mu Suizhou sat down on the sofa and thought in silence as he smoked.
Even now, he still remembered the sight of Xiaosi lying in a pool of blood.
Her young body had fallen heavily from the top floor, bent and broken as it withered away.
Her small, fair, innocent face, and the bright-red blood that had flowed beneath her head, blooming like a tragic red flower.
Fu Jinglan had been heartbroken to the point of madness, to the point of wanting to die.
He had lain in bed for days and nights without eating or sleeping.
As a result, the knife wound at his waist had healed very slowly. After he returned to the fighting ring, the wound had split open repeatedly.
Beneath the red-and-black snake tattoo, beads of blood had seeped out one after another…
Mu Suizhou stubbed his cigarette into the ashtray.
“Miss Shen and Xiaosi do look somewhat alike, but we need to verify it from several angles.”
Across from him, Fu Jinglan had undone several buttons of his shirt.
His cold, pale collarbones and a portion of his chest muscles were exposed. The old wound at his side gave off a faint ache and itch in the rain and snow.
He frowned slightly.
“Contact Shen Lanting and ask him why Shen Lingxi underwent brain surgery at the age of ten.”
“At the same time, have him and Shen Lingxi undergo a DNA kinship test.”
“Then investigate photographs and videos of Shen Lingxi from childhood to the present and compare them.”
Mu Suizhou nodded. “I’ll take care of it right away.”
Northern State Airport in winter possessed an indescribable desolation.
Shen Lanting wore a black coat and walked silently away from a girl in a pink-and-white cake dress.
Before entering the terminal, he threw the bouquet in his hand into a trash can.
Then he removed the matching ring from his middle finger and discarded it as well.
He never looked back.
Only when a tearful voice came from behind him did he hear her say, “I’m sorry, da-^^ddy. I’m a bad person!”
She wanted someone who could keep showering her with gold coins even more.
Shen Lanting did not turn around either. He merely waved his tall back at her in a carefree manner.
He had originally wanted so badly to have a child with her, but he would not have to think about that anymore.
It was all right. This saved him the trouble.
His little dog did not want him anymore.
And he was about to fly away from Northern State.
Perhaps the end of every relationship between people had been decided long ago, whether it lasted long or briefly.
It was only when he saw Mu Suizhou’s incoming call that Shen Lanting gradually slowed his steps.
Finally, he impatiently pulled off his gold-rimmed glasses and hooked them over one finger, coming to a complete stop.
“First of all, I will not cooperate with you in studying my niece as you please.”
“Furthermore, there is no need for A-Xi and me to undergo a kinship test.”
Shen Lanting leaned against the cold wall and closed his eyes briefly, steadying his breathing.
“I’m not biologically related to the Shen family, so A-Xi and I have no biological kinship at all.”
No matter who Shen Lingxi was, no kinship would be detected between the two of them.
Shen Lanting’s mother had been the Shen family’s second concubine and his father’s first love.
The two had been forced apart because of his father’s arranged marriage.
His mother had conceived Shen Lanting through in-vitro fertilization abroad, while his father had never stopped caring for mother and son.
At last, many years later, he had brought them back to Northern State.
On the phone, Mu Suizhou continued speaking.
“Mr. Shen, the Governor regards you as a friend. That’s why we can discuss this and come to an agreement. Don’t you think?”
How could Shen Lanting fail to hear the sharp edge in those words?
If they were not friends, there would be no need for further discussion.
There was nothing the person at the summit of Northern State could not do.
Shen Lanting collected his boarding pass and walked to a somewhat quieter corner.
He leaned against the wall with difficulty. “A-Xi has been in poor health since childhood. Before she recovered from her surgery, she never left the house to attend school.”
“When I returned to the country, the little girl was ten years old and had just undergone surgery for a brain tumor. I have a photograph. That is all I can provide.”
Mu Suizhou soon received the photograph.
Uncle and niece stood in the garden of a villa beneath the bright sunlight.
Shen Lanting had an arm around Shen Lingxi’s shoulders.
Shen Lanting had been eighteen then, tall and thin, with a handsome, wicked smile.
Shen Lingxi had just recovered from a serious illness. Her face was pale, and she was so frail it seemed the wind could blow her away.
After looking at the photograph, Mu Suizhou sent it directly to Fu Jinglan.