Having lived in an ivory tower for the past eighteen years, she rashly followed him in, failing to grow wary of the filthy, depraved environment in time. She didn’t realize she’d been targeted early on.
Someone dragged her into a back alley and covered her mouth and nose.
By chance, Dai Linxuan passed the alley entrance carrying a scrawny child.
She didn’t have time to wonder why Dai Linxuan was there too and saw him as her lifeline, struggling to make noise. But they dragged her behind a small garbage dump.
Huo Shuang didn’t know if Dai Linxuan heard or even glanced over. She only heard him soothing the child in his arms. “Don’t be scared. I’ll take you to the police…”
And the sound of Dai Linxuan’s footsteps fading away, along with her own despairing heartbeat.
Huo Shuang’s consciousness faded with the drug, thinking “I’m done for.” Maybe she’d run into a rapist or human trafficker—but she never imagined something even worse…
She woke again, hands and feet bound, dressed provocatively, lying on a strange, luxurious bed.
From the outer living room came a fawning voice. “This one’s absolutely tender and fresh. Rest assured, sir.”
Afterward, the man closed the door behind him and left. Another set of heavy footsteps entered the room, and their eyes met.
Both of them froze.
It was her father, Huo Jingyun.
Huo Shuang’s body had luckily been saved, but her soul had plummeted into an abyss.
Later, she went abroad. She only knew that the man who had assaulted her had been imprisoned for intentional homicide and sentenced to fifteen years.
As for why Huo Jingyun had gone to a place like that, how many times he had sought “fresh goods,” and why the Slum District had such a clean and luxurious environment…
She didn’t want to think about it. She didn’t dare to think about it.
Even later, during a phone call with Huo Wenhai, she heard him mention in passing that the Dai Family had taken over the Slum District project. The area was about to be demolished to build something called Future City.
The Slum District had undulating terrain, and its underground had been hollowed out extensively, giving it a strong “sense of spatial hierarchy”…
…
Huo Shuang’s expression was complicated. The words reached her lips, circled around several times, and were ultimately swallowed back down.
“I happened to pass by and saw you holding a scrawny kid who didn’t even look human.” Huo Shuang tossed the tissue into the trash bin. “It only hit me after coming back this time that Lai Li was that child… You’ve raised him so differently from how he was back then.”
Dai Linxuan paused for a long time before lifting his eyes to the mirror. “Why didn’t you say hello to me?”
Huo Shuang also looked into the mirror, meeting his gaze.
After a moment, Huo Shuang casually tugged at the corner of her mouth. “You went to a place like that carrying a kid on your back. I thought you had some unspeakable secret, so I didn’t call out to you.”
Dai Linxuan slowly raised his hand and propped it against the marble countertop.
He remembered that day—he had only carried Lai Li for a short distance.
“You…”
“What happened to that woman A-Ling? Last time, you said you’d settled her here.”
Dai Linxuan looked at her for a while before saying to the mirror, “She tried to slit her wrists yesterday. Fortunately, she was discovered in time.”
Few people knew that Huo Shuang had returned to the country once a year ago.
She had encountered A-Ling in a special place. A-Ling had panicked and begged her for help. Not knowing what to do, Huo Shuang had desperately called the only person whose character she could somewhat trust—Dai Linxuan.
She had done it purely on a gamble, betting that even if Dai Linxuan refused, he wouldn’t betray her.
Dai Linxuan had been abroad at the time. After hearing the whole story, he still chose to help. He found people to bring A-Ling out of Danshi and arranged a place for her to stay.
“I should apologize to you for just dumping the responsibility on you like that.” Huo Shuang pursed her lips and lowered her voice. “My dad has never stopped looking for her.”
Dai Linxuan was just about to say something when he heard familiar footsteps amid the sound of running water.
He turned off the faucet and dried his hands with a tissue. “Forget about her. Pretend you know nothing.”
As his words fell, Lai Li entered the mirror’s view and called out, “Bro.”
Dai Linxuan turned around and ruffled his hair. “Why are you still wet even with an umbrella?”
“Didn’t notice.” Lai Li said, “Shall we go? Don’t you have to meet a friend this afternoon?”
Dai Linxuan checked the time. “Let’s go. They might be getting impatient.”
The three of them arrived at the door together. Huo Wenhai opened the car door for Huo Shuang and called out, “We’re heading out first. See you at the banquet next week.”
Dai Linxuan smiled and nodded.
Lai Li tilted his head and asked, “What banquet?”
Dai Linxuan said, “Uncle He’s sixtieth birthday.”
Lai Li frowned. “You’re going?”
“What kind of question is that? Which year have I skipped it?” Dai Linxuan said amusedly. “You can skip it since you had a falling out with He Shuxin, but I can’t miss it.”
Lai Li descended the steps with a gloomy face, contemplating the possibility of sending He Shuxin to the hospital on his dad’s birthday.
Dai Linxuan pulled him along and shoved him into the passenger seat. “I’ll drive. Do you know the address?”
They were now heading to A-Ling’s place.
As they neared, Dai Linxuan said, “She’s not in a good state. Don’t say anything harsh.”
Lai Li was somewhat displeased with his protective attitude toward a friend. He kept a cold face for a while before saying, “I’m not going up.”
Dai Linxuan agreed. “You can wait downstairs if you want. I’ll be quick…”
Lai Li interrupted, “I’ll leave as soon as you get there. I have a friend to meet too.”
“…Who?”
Lai Li rarely referred to someone as a friend. Usually, when Dai Linxuan asked who he was going out with, he would just say the name directly.
This time, however, Lai Li said, “You don’t know them.”
After a moment, Dai Linxuan smiled. “You have friends I don’t know?”
Lai Li looked at him. “Can’t I?”
Dai Linxuan’s lips curved into a faint arc. “You can.”
Wrong answer.
The car pulled into the underground parking lot of an ordinary residential complex.
Lai Li opened the car door, glanced at the surveillance camera, and confirmed it couldn’t capture this side. He circled around the front of the car and pushed Dai Linxuan, who had only gotten halfway out, back into the driver’s seat.
He reclined the seat and aggressively pressed down on top of him.
Caught off guard, Dai Linxuan reclined with the seat. “Don’t mess around…”
He had just propped up his upper body when Lai Li pressed his shoulders down again, and his lips stung with pain.
Lai Li invaded his mouth fiercely, not so much like kissing as using it to attack and vent something.
But he was quite obedient, remembering to close his eyes at a time like this.
Dai Linxuan, however, did not close his.
He maintained a half-resisting posture but didn’t move for a long time. He traced Lai Li’s eyebrows and eyes, which were so close—sharp and harsh at first glance, with a touch of the pride that he had nurtured over twelve years.
Dai Linxuan clearly heard his own heartbeat and let it beat on.
For a moment, he felt like Lai Li was ruthless enough to bite through his lip, but soon he saw Lai Li’s brows furrow together, twisting tightly as if enduring something with great effort.
The pressure on his lips clearly eased. Dai Linxuan closed his eyelids.
“You should say no.” Lai Li said out of nowhere. “I just taught you this morning.”
Dai Linxuan opened his eyes, momentarily speechless.
“Don’t you like me?” Lai Li stared at him. “Why can you accept me having a friend you don’t know, meeting them behind your back, doing things you don’t know about, saying words you don’t know?”
Dai Linxuan felt a headache coming on. “You said it’s a friend, not a lover.”
Lai Li pressed relentlessly. “Who would confess to cheating by saying they’re off to meet their lover?”
“…” The word “cheating” only applied to partners. Even after being unilaterally together for two years, Dai Linxuan hadn’t adapted to it.
He said, “Then don’t meet them. Come upstairs with me.”
Lai Li: “No.”
Dai Linxuan was exasperated yet amused. “This won’t do, that won’t do. Pray tell, Young Master, what would satisfy you right now?”
“You should interrogate me about who it is. I refuse to tell you no matter what, so you leave an obvious mark on me before letting me go—”
Lai Li pulled open his collar and offered his neck to Dai Linxuan’s lips.
Dai Linxuan: “…”
This little emperor had leveled up.
Lai Li commanded, “Bite me.”
He couldn’t ruin his bro, so he changed tactics—let his bro ruin him instead.
Lai Li heard a sigh, and then a hand firmly cradled the back of his neck. Dai Linxuan bit the skin on his neck and gently ground against it twice.
Lai Li didn’t feel pain, only a dense itch spreading out. His bro’s lips felt even softer than during the kiss, and the warm breath clearly fell on his neck but felt more like it was tickling the tip of his heart.
Completely different from the tearing bite he had imagined.
After a stalemate, Lai Li prepared to pull away, but the hand on his neck pressed down harder, burying his neck deeper into that softness, as if his bro had taken it into his mouth.
The light nibbling and rubbing became even more impossible to ignore—intimate yet carrying a hint of cherishing.
What kind of mark would this leave?
He was already getting hard. Precum was already leaking from the tip.
Dai Linxuan timed it perfectly, releasing him just as Lai Li was half-hard. “President Lai, does this meet the standard?”
Lai Li pulled down the passenger-side mirror and saw a hickey on his neck.
“…” Lai Li took a deep breath. “I told you to bite me, not kiss me.”
Dai Linxuan leisurely fixed his collar for him. “Isn’t this a better mark than a bite?”
Lai Li’s expression flickered between dark and light. A bite mark could have other explanations, but a hickey was impossible to wash away even in the Yellow River! But…
“Don’t do it like this next time. It’s too easy to suspect.”
After all, they were often inseparable, making it easy to arouse suspicion.
Dai Linxuan took the advice. “Next time, a more hidden spot.”
Lai Li thought it feasible—he wouldn’t undress in front of others, so the chance of being seen was negligible.
Lai Li began to look forward to that “next time.”
At the same time, he didn’t forget to continue directing the plot. “After letting me go, you should have someone tail me, find out who that friend is, and deal with them.”
“Won’t your friend be too pitiful?” Dai Linxuan couldn’t help laughing. “Stop messing around. Really not coming up with me?”
Lai Li was unhappy that he changed the subject but let him off after staring for a bit. “Wait for me to come pick you up.”
He needed to see who this “buzzcut guy” the bodyguards mentioned was.
Dai Linxuan didn’t press further. “Drive slowly. Don’t treat the city streets like a racetrack.”
Lai Li watched Dai Linxuan enter the elevator. He checked the rearview mirror, hesitating for a long time between exposing the hickey or pulling up his sweater collar, and ultimately chose the latter.
Twenty minutes later, he walked into a coffee shop.
A man wearing a mask sat in the corner. Seeing him approach, the man immediately said, “Hello. Third Uncle sent me to find you.”
Lai Li said impatiently, “Where’s the stuff?”
The man handed him a USB drive. “As long as you plug this into the laptop Dai Linxuan always carries with him before tomorrow afternoon, you’re done. Nothing else.”
Lai Li took it and toyed with it for a bit. “Why should I help him?”
The man persuaded him patiently. “Think about it—once Dai Linxuan joins the board, his influence will skyrocket. Even if you acknowledge your ancestry later, your chances of winning the family inheritance will drop dramatically.”
Lai Li sneered coldly.
If he were really Dai Linxuan’s blood brother, would he even need to fight for it?
