Pei Huaijin’s kiss was gentle, nothing like Shen Qingyu had imagined.
She thought it would be urgent and possessive, like the kisses in movies. But he kissed her slowly, gently, as if confirming something—or waiting for her to change her mind.
Shen Qingyu’s heart was beating so fast it felt ready to leap from her throat, but she didn’t change her mind. She closed her eyes and could clearly feel every detail of his lips.
So this was what kissing felt like. She’d never known.
In her twenty-six years, she’d never been in a relationship. She’d never known what kissing felt like.
But now she did. It was a tingling that spread from her nerve endings through every part of her body, as if tiny electric currents were darting beneath her skin, leaving her limp all over.
It was actually pretty nice, she thought to herself. No wonder young couples liked kissing. So this was what it felt like: something hard to describe, something that made you want to close your eyes, draw closer, and keep the moment from ending.
Pei Huaijin realized his heart was beating much faster than he’d expected, and found it a little absurd.
His pulse stayed steady when he faced contracts worth billions at the negotiating table. He never flinched when a dozen or more shareholders challenged him at board meetings, and he didn’t even bat an eyelid when women threw themselves at him at business dinners. He’d thought his heart could no longer race for anything.
But now it was beating like crazy.
He had never kissed anyone. He’d never met a woman he wanted to kiss. The women who presented themselves to him, who pressed close—he couldn’t even be bothered to look at them, much less put his lips to theirs.
But tonight, he didn’t know what had come over him.
Her lips were even softer and sweeter than he’d imagined. Kissing her felt wonderful.
He wanted to kiss her hard. His body was urging him to deepen the kiss, to show her what a real kiss was. His desire had caught fire, starting at his lips and burning downward, tightening his lower abdomen and making the veins at his temples throb.
But he held back. He was afraid of frightening her.
She’d said it was her first time—not just her first time doing that. He could tell from her reactions that she’d never even been kissed before. She didn’t know how to respond with her lips, how to steady her breathing, or where to put her hands. She was like a blank sheet of paper, clean and untouched.
He didn’t want to scribble all over it.
But he was holding himself back.
His fingers sank into her hair, his knuckles tightening slightly. His breathing was much heavier than usual, but he kept it under control, careful not to let his breath fall too heavily on her face. His body was taut as a drawn bow, every muscle straining, but he held himself back and didn’t press down on her.
He wanted to kiss her for a long time.
When the thought crossed his mind, even he was taken aback. He had never been someone who got attached to anything. But right now, he wanted to kiss her for a long, long time, to stretch this moment out until the kiss would never end.
Then his phone rang.
The abrupt ringtone exploded through the quiet room. Shen Qingyu jumped and instinctively pulled back.
Pei Huaijin paused. He stopped.
Shen Qingyu stared into the eyes so close to hers, her mind blank. He was looking at her too. At last, something besides indifference showed in those cool eyes—desire.
Pei Huaijin straightened and reached for the phone on the bedside table, the one interrupting them.
He picked it up and checked the caller ID. It was his driver, Old Zhou. He answered in a cool voice. “You don’t need to wait. Go home. I’ll call tomorrow morning, and then you can come pick me up.”
There was a brief silence on the other end.
“Understood, Mr. Pei.”
The call ended.
Outside the hotel, Old Zhou put away his phone and stared at the entrance for a long while. Then he suddenly smiled.
“Mr. Pei,” he muttered to himself as he started the car. “You’ve finally figured it out.”
He’d been Pei Huaijin’s driver for three years.
In all that time, he’d seen Pei Huaijin finish business dinners at two in the morning and still insist on being driven home alone. He’d watched him turn down one woman after another who’d been offered to him—women sent by business partners, daughters of business associates, celebrities and models who threw themselves at him. All sorts.
But Pei Huaijin never gave them a second glance.
Once, at a dinner, a businessman had insisted on pushing a girl toward Pei Huaijin, saying, “Come on, a man’s needs are perfectly normal.” Pei Huaijin hadn’t said a word. He’d simply put down his chopsticks and looked at the man.
After that, the man’s contract fell through.
Old Zhou had always thought that a man like Pei Huaijin probably had no need for women.
But that phone call just now…
The car pulled slowly away from the hotel entrance and merged into the late-night traffic of San Francisco.
Old Zhou glanced in the rearview mirror at the hotel growing smaller in the distance. For some reason, he was in an especially good mood.
He’d gotten a look at the girl. She was a little drunk, but quite pretty, with a sweet, well-behaved look about her. She was dressed respectably, too—not like the kind of woman who got into trouble.
He hoped she was a good girl.
In the hotel room, Pei Huaijin set down his phone. He couldn’t hold back any longer.
He lowered his head and kissed her again.
This time, he wasn’t nearly so gentle.
She didn’t know how to catch her breath and soon began to feel short of air, so she pushed at him. He eased up, and Shen Qingyu took a deep breath. Then he kissed her again.
He didn’t let her go until he’d kissed her for a long time.
She lay on the bed, breathing hard, her eyes glistening and her lips red as she looked at him.
He braced himself above her and gazed down at her.
“What was it you said downstairs just now?” he asked in a low voice.
Shen Qingyu was still dazed. “What?”
“You said I…” He paused, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly. “Couldn’t perform?”
Shen Qingyu’s face flushed bright red.
She wanted to say something, but he lowered his head again and kissed her neck.
His lips were hot against her skin, sending a shiver through her. Then he reached for the belt of her bathrobe.
She instinctively tried to cover herself, but he pinned her wrist.
“Don’t move,” he said, his voice so hoarse it hardly sounded like him.
She stopped moving.
He kissed her hard, as if he wanted to devour her whole. Her hands clenched the bedsheet beneath her, her knuckles turning white, and her breathing grew more and more uneven.
After some time, he lifted his head and looked at her.
She lay there, her eyes glistening, her face flushed, her lips pale from biting them.
He reached out and pressed his thumb to her lips, gently freeing the lower one from between her teeth.
“You don’t have to hold back,” he said in a low voice. “It’s just you and me here.”
Then he straightened and took off the towel.
Shen Qingyu’s gaze dipped briefly before she quickly looked away, her heart pounding as if it would explode.
He leaned over her, bracing one hand beside her head, then gently gripped her neck with the other. He was so close that their breaths mingled.
“Look at me.”
She raised her eyes to his. They were filled with desire.
“Tell me if it hurts in a moment,” he said.
She gave a slight nod.
And then—
She let out a cry.
It hurt so much.
Her nails dug into his skin.
He stopped.
“Does it hurt?” he asked, his voice hoarse, fine beads of sweat appearing on his forehead.
She looked at him, her eyes red-rimmed, and nodded.
He looked at her and fell silent for a second.
Then he kissed her, the kiss easing the pain a little.
After that, he moved slowly and gently, afraid of hurting her.
She didn’t know how much time passed. She only knew that the pain gradually faded and another sensation began to rise.
It was utterly unfamiliar, but it seemed rather nice.
She began responding to him without meaning to. Her fingers slid from his arm to his back, her fingertips tracing his spine and leaving faint red marks.
Her breathing grew ragged.
Then a burst of white light exploded before her eyes.
She couldn’t stop herself from making sounds that embarrassed her. Her fingers clutched his back so tightly her nails dug into his skin, and tears ran down her face.
He kissed away her tears.
Then he pulled her into his arms and continued.
In a daze, Shen Qingyu wondered how he could go on again—and why it felt so…
She had no idea how many times it had been by now. Shen Qingyu was utterly exhausted.
“Stop… I don’t want to do this anymore…”
“It’s too late to say you don’t want to now,” Pei Huaijin murmured in her ear.
“Be good. Just one more time…”
In her half-conscious state, Shen Qingyu knew he had turned her over and held her from behind. Then he bit her earlobe and told her to be good.
And at the very end, he held her so tightly it felt as if he wanted to press her into his bones.
Much later, Shen Qingyu woke briefly in a daze.
The room was dark. She was lying in his arms, her face buried against his chest, listening to his heartbeat—deep and steady, one beat after another.
His hand still rested on her waist.
She lifted her head, wanting to see his face.
But it was too dark. She couldn’t make anything out, only a blurred outline: deep-set eyes, a high nose, and a sharply defined jaw.
She stared at the indistinct face for a while. Then her eyelids grew heavy, and she fell asleep again.