Shi Nuan immediately let go of Fu Chengyan’s hand that she was holding right after they got out of Fu Residence. The abrupt change left him in a dazed state. With a deadpan face, she continued walking without waiting for him.
After a while, Fu Chengyan frowned a little with an intimidating look in his eyes while catching up to her speedily. “May!”
Ignoring Fu Chengyan, Shi Nuan continued striding toward the door of his Maybach and came to a stop.
Fu Chengyan came over to Shi Nuan’s side with quick and steady steps. He tried to grab her hand, but she withdrew it before he could manage to touch it. Fu Chengyan’s own hand was left outstretched in the air as Shi Nuan glared icily at him.
The two stood still while staring at each other without uttering a single word. Fu Chengyan had never seen such an unfamiliar look in her eyes before this. It was exceedingly aloof, which stirred up uneasiness in his heart.
Shi Nuan stretched her hand out after a long moment of silence. “Key!”
Stunned for a moment, Fu Chengyan stared at her. Shi Nuan’s eyelashes fluttered briefly before she said, “Give me the key if you’re not gonna leave. I want to go home.”
Upon hearing that, Fu Chengyan responded, “Okay.”
Without delay, he took out his car key and opened the door to help her get into the car, but she shoved his hand aside.
He looked at her as she got into the car by herself. A sense of helplessness rose in him as he watched her put her guard up against him and kept him at arm’s length.
Anxiety struck him as Shi Nuan remained muted while sitting quietly after he got into the car. It was as if he was non-existent. “May—”
“Please drive. I don’t want to stay here even for a second,” Shi Nuan interrupted. He had no choice but to abide.
Fu Chengyan drove slowly. It took them over an hour to arrive at Wutong Residence. Neither of them spoke throughout the entire journey.
As Fu Chengyan witnessed Shi Nuan’s figure gradually disappearing after she got off the car and entered the house, he couldn’t help but heave a deep sigh. A few moments later, Zhou Zheng’s call came in. “Mr. Fu, the matter is done.”
“Good. I want to see the report regarding Shen Shixiu on my desk tomorrow morning.” After that, Fu Chengyan ended the call. There was an impassive look in his eyes as he looked out of the window.
Shi Nuan was standing in front of the door of their bedroom when Fu Chengyan reached the second floor. Wasting no time, she handed over a pillow and a blanket to him and said, “Go sleep in the guest room.”
Fu Chengyan’s usual neat look was disorganized by the pillow thrown at him. He met her unwavering gaze and said, “I thought you might have some questions for me.”
Shi Nuan smirked mockingly while looking at him. “Well, I thought you’ll take the initiative to tell me, or at least make an effort to keep them hidden until the very end. But you didn’t.” Then she stood upright and shouted, “I don’t want to talk to you for now! And I don’t want to share a room with you either!”
Meanwhile, Fu Chengyan simply stared at her without moving an inch.
To avoid making rash decisions that she would regret later, along with the reluctance to stay in an awkward atmosphere, she had decided not to see him temporarily.
Fu Chengyan could tell that she was suppressing her emotions. So, he nodded. “Okay.”
With that, he spun around and entered the guest room, which was opposite their bedroom.
Shi Nuan exhaled after he entered the room and leaned against the wall. She smiled bitterly as she stared at the door of the guest room.
In reality, she had mustered every ounce of her strength back at Fu Residence to refrain from losing control of herself. She had only uttered those words back there out of pure exhaustion.
In fact, she had been feeling tensed the moment Yu called out to Fu Chengyan. I was betting on the small possibility that he would stand up for me. Good thing he did. Otherwise, I’ll make a fool of myself at the scene. And I’ll make the headlines the next day while being a laughingstock in Jiang City.
Shi Nuan got back to her room after her legs felt stiff from standing at the door for too long.
As she sat on the bed, the recollection of what happened earlier repeated like a video in her mind, including Fu Chengyan and Yu’s silhouettes, not to mention Shen Qianan and Shi Wei’s words.
Feeling irritated, she widened her eyes and gripped the corners of the blanket with her hands. After taking a deep breath, she took her phone to dial a series of numbers with her slightly shaky fingers.
Two beeps later, a raunchy voice could be heard saying in a suggestive tone, “Hey, Mrs. Fu. Why are you calling me at this hour? Hmm?”
Shi Nuan’s fingers quivered for a while after hearing that. She had a strong urge to drop the phone onto the floor as indecent images flashed across her mind. Then, she drew a deep breath. “Shaoqing, I-I have something to ask you.”
Su Shaoqing had arrived at his home not long ago. Old Master Fu has made a significant move tonight by publicly denying her status in their family. At first, I thought that she might not be able to take it. But who would’ve thought that she’ll say those things at the end? I even had the urge to give her a round of applause. In comparison, when Shen Qianan met with trouble back then, all she did was to ask for help from others, unlike Shi Nuan, who keeps her emotions in check and refute everyone’s verbal attacks on her. With this alone, she could easily become the matriarch of their family. Still, why won’t Chengyan’s grandfather accept her as one of their own? I don’t get what’s going on in his head.
Needless to say, Su Shaoqing didn’t mind Shi Nuan calling him. After all, Pei Jingxiu and Li Heng weren’t exactly the best people to answer questions regarding this topic, let alone being a listener.
Besides, it was apparent to Su Shaoqing that Shi Nuan had it worst among all, though she did well at that time. In addition, her breaking point wasn’t caused by the others but by her own misunderstanding of Fu Chengyan. After all, she had no concern for anyone but that man.
“Go ahead. What do you want to know?”
As Su Shaoqing spoke, he removed his jacket, unbuttoned the first three buttons of his shirt, plonked himself on the sofa, and heaved a sigh. “I’ll tell you in full whatever you want to know.”
At his words, Shi Nuan pursed her lips. “Shen Qianan. I want to know about her.”
Su Shaoqing narrowed his eyes at once. “Oh? What do you want to know about her? I may not know much about that woman, but…” He paused for a few seconds before continuing, “But I know the important parts, I guess.”
“What’s up with Yan and her?”
“What exactly do you want to know? Her relationship with Chengyan?” Su Shaoqing asked curiously. Then, he turned on speakerphone mode, headed to the bar counter and continued, “In short, it’s as you perceived. Before she left three years ago, she had been considering herself as his fiancée. However, Chengyan had never once acknowledged it, nor did he deny it.”
Following this, Shi Nuan’s tightened her grip on the phone while her eyes became somewhat unfocused. She raised a corner of her mouth. “Is that so?”
“But you should know that Chengyan acknowledged no woman as his girlfriend back then. Well, I’d say the women that were flocking around him were a little too many.” At this, Su Shaoqing let out a laugh. “It’s not without a good reason, though. For a fine and outstanding man like him, it’d be outrageous if no one likes him. As you might expect, Shen Qianan was one of them.”
“I see.”
“After that, things unfolded naturally. Since Shen Qianan could help him get rid of all the other women, he did at least try to fulfil her requests. But, as far as I know, they had never dated each other.” Right then, Su Shaoqing removed the cork from the wine bottle and poured the content into the glass. Swirling the glass, he leaned on the bar counter and continued, “Well, Shen Qianan was the woman picked by Chengyan’s grandfather. She was a good choice at that time. Hence, most of the Fu clan members favored her. But then, an incident occurred three years ago. It wasn’t a secret, but Chengyan made sure everyone who knew about it seal their lips in order to protect Shen Qianan.”
“What happened?” Shi Nuan felt a little tense. “Why did he need to protect her?”
“As for what happened, you should ask Chengyan about it. I’m not really sure about the exact details. One of two reasons he didn’t deny the false assumption about her being his fiancée was so that she could deal with the other women trying to approach him and prevent his family members from pestering him to get married. The second reason was that she had saved his life once.”
Shi Nuan bit her lip while remaining silent the entire time, and the sound of her breathing was the only indication that she was still on the line.
“Shi Nuan, sometimes whatever you see and hear might not be the whole truth.”
“What should I do to know the truth, then?” Shi Nuan inquired with a bitter smile. “You too saw just now what Yan’s grandfather was like. And there’s that child too.” Even the thought of what happened earlier caused her much grief. “Shaoqing, the thing that I cannot bear is that I had given him a chance to come clean with me, yet he didn’t.”
“You should know better than anyone how Chengyan has been treating you. To be frank, I’ve never seen him being serious and attentive toward a woman before. Ever since he got together with you, it was like he had turned into another person.” Su Shaoqing sighed and added, “I’ve witnessed your relationship with him. Yes, the duration of your relationship isn’t long. Still, isn’t it long enough for you to get to know someone deeply already? I can’t deny that he’s treating you like no other. You are truly special to him.”
