The man wrote on Jiang Qingke’s palm again.
One vertical stroke and three horizontal strokes, repeated twice, tickling Jiang Qingke’s palm until she finally wrote back the character “no.”
“How old were you when you were poisoned mute?”
The man wrote two numbers: seven, eight.
“…”
Jiang Qingke was momentarily at a loss for words, and found herself feeling a bit of sympathy for him.
But she didn’t fully believe his words either.
Anyone who worked for Li Xuanyao couldn’t possibly be a good person.
Who knew if he was just playing pitiful and pretending to be miserable to win her sympathy?
“Are you ugly and old?” Jiang Qingke asked again.
The man seemed to shake his head, and in his helplessness, let out an extremely soft laugh from his throat.
He took Jiang Qingke’s hands and guided them to feel his face.
A sharply defined facial contour, smooth and firm skin, without a single wrinkle.
Her fingertips swept across his brow and eyes, and his blinking lashes brushed against her fingertips—soft and downy, stirring a faint ticklish sensation.
Jiang Qingke commented flatly, “Your eyelashes are quite long.”
Her delicate hands moved downward, and Jiang Qingke continued, “A nose like a hanging gallbladder—tall and prominent.”
She had already begun to imagine what the man looked like in her mind.
When her fingertips touched those two soft lips, Jiang Qingke felt as if she’d been scalded.
She instinctively withdrew her hand, but the man pressed it back down.
As if waiting for her assessment, the man parted his lips, and while kissing them, gently sucked on her finger.
Even though they had already shared a bed many times before, Jiang Qingke’s heart still shamelessly skipped a beat.
Heat surged up her back, warming her face until it flushed slightly.
Her fingers curled, and Jiang Qingke pretended to be calm, swallowing against her suddenly dry throat.
“Lips of moderate fullness, slightly parted at the peak, like flower petals.”
The flesh beneath her fingertips shifted, and she could feel the corners of his mouth curving upward.
He was smiling.
“How old are you?” Jiang Qingke asked.
The man took one of her hands and guided it to touch the hair crown on top of his head.
Cool and smooth—it was the texture of jade.
“Past the age of twenty?” Jiang Qingke guessed.
The man nodded.
About the same age as Li Xuanyao—no wonder they could flock together like birds of a feather.
“You have calluses on both hands, sir, so you must be someone trained in martial arts.”
The man nodded again.
Someone who could take Li Xuanyao’s place in the bedchamber must surely be Li Xuanyao’s trusted confidant.
And if he was Li Xuanyao’s confidant, he would certainly appear frequently at the Donggong.
Jiang Qingke finally understood why she was made to wear a blindfold every night—it was for fear that she might recognize the man in the palace later.
But this was far too unfair.
The man knew her, yet she didn’t know who he was.
Jiang Qingke finally began to grow curious about the man’s identity.
But she had only recently arrived at the Donggong and wasn’t yet clear on who Li Xuanyao’s trusted aides were.
Jiang Qingke probed, “Are you… Li Xuanyao’s personal bodyguard?”
The moment his identity was brought up, the man went still, and no matter how she asked, he no longer responded.
Jiang Qingke suddenly felt displeased.
She tore off her blindfold and flung the man’s hand away.
Groping for the whip she had placed beside her beforehand, Jiang Qingke rose and, still in the dark, climbed onto her large round bed.
The man followed closely, about to get on the bed as well.
Jiang Qingke immediately lashed out with her whip.
“Don’t think that just because you’ve exchanged a few words with me, you can get into my bed.”
“If you dare defy my orders and come up here, I’ll whip you until you cry for your mother.”
The man chuckled softly and stopped in his tracks.
He returned to the low couch and sat for a while before rising and leaving the hall.
……
The next day, the man came to Fengluanxuan again at night.
But this time, he brought something with him.
The moment he entered the hall, Jiang Qingke caught the scent.
Beneath the snow-white silk pearl blindfold, her pert nose twitched slightly.
Jiang Qingke identified it as the smell of red date cake.
Before she could say anything, the man sat down and brought a piece of red date cake to the corner of her lips.
Swallowing her saliva, Jiang Qingke let out a disdainful “tsk” and turned her head away in refusal.
“Don’t think you can fool me so easily.”
“Did Li Xuanyao have someone put an aphrodisiac in this red date cake of yours?”
A light, airy chuckle drifted into Jiang Qingke’s ear like a dandelion seed.
Then came the faint sound of chewing.
It sounded like he was enjoying it quite a bit.
Jiang Qingke took her whip in hand and gave it a firm tug, threatening the man in a hostile tone.
“If your lust gets the better of you, I guarantee I’ll whip you so good you won’t be able to get out of bed for days.”
The man ignored her and kept eating.
The sweet fragrance of red dates mixed with the mellow aroma of glutinous rice lingered around Jiang Qingke, making her stomach growl with hunger.
At that moment, the man took Jiang Qingke’s hand and guided it to touch the oil-paper-wrapped red date cake.
The texture was warm and slightly sticky.
He placed a piece into Jiang Qingke’s hand, then lowered his head and opened his mouth to bite into the cake.
His warm red lips and wet, slick tongue, as they swept away the piece of red date cake, brushed against Jiang Qingke’s fingertip—just a light touch, yet unbearably ticklish.
That sensation seemed to transform into a tiny worm, burrowing into her skin, crawling into her bloodstream, and racing toward her heart, leaving a trail of restless tingling in its wake.
A man and a woman alone, sharing a room.
And since Jiang Qingke had only just tasted the pleasures of the flesh with the man before her, the lingering craving left her momentarily dazed by this tease.
But the man did not eat that piece of red date cake.
Biting the other end of the cake, he suddenly leaned close to Jiang Qingke’s face.
His large hand caressed her cheek, his nose brushing past hers as he intended to feed her mouth-to-mouth.
Her heart inexplicably began to race, a wave of heat rising from her back, making Jiang Qingke’s face flush as she found herself inexplicably wanting to open her mouth.
Quite some time had passed since the man had eaten the first piece of red date cake.
He showed no signs of being aroused or acting lewd, indicating that the red date cake had not been tampered with.
She slowly parted her lips and took the other half of the cake into her mouth.
Just as she was about to bite it off and pull it into her mouth, a large hand pressed against the back of her head, and two soft, warm lips forcefully pressed down on hers.
The moment their lips touched, her heart gave a violent jolt.
The two pieces of cake passed between their lips, teeth, and tongues, their mouths filled with the sweet richness of red dates and the mellow fragrance of glutinous rice.
When Jiang Qingke’s arms unconsciously climbed onto the man’s shoulders, she suddenly snapped back to her senses.
With a “smack,” she slapped the man across the face, then shoved him away with force.
There was no aphrodisiac in the red date cake—he himself was the aphrodisiac!
She had almost fallen for this man’s trick.
Spitting out the cake in her mouth, Jiang Qingke snatched the remaining package of red date cake from the man’s hand and snapped angrily.
“With a honey trap of this caliber, you think you can seduce me?”
“Get lost!”
……