It was a quiet night. The bright moon hung high in the sky, accompanied by a gentle breeze.
A man and a woman, deeply moved, sat opposite each other inside the car, sharing a silence that seemed to speak a thousand words...
Chapter 27: Let's ditch her. Marry me, okay?
On the drive back, neither Ye Nan nor Lin Qingrou was in the mood to talk.
The silence between them felt slightly awkward.
Ye Nan took out his phone to send a message, then closed his eyes to rest.
He was mulling over those assassins from earlier.
*The men have been released, but I wonder if Yueying has the ability to trace the clues all the way back to the mastermind.*
*Although those thirteen individuals are quite capable, even their strongest leader is a notch below Yueying. There shouldn't be any danger...*
Lin Qingrou quietly received the thoughts echoing from Ye Nan's mind.
She had no idea who Yueying was.
However, she finally understood why Ye Nan had let those men go.
When it all came down to it, he did it for her—to track down the criminal mastermind who had hired hitmen to murder her.
In all fairness, Ye Nan had indeed been thorough and attentive when it came to her.
Before long, the two of them arrived back at Lin Qingrou's villa.
As soon as they stepped inside, a delighted voice rang out.
"Brother-in-law, you're back!"
Lin Qingxuan ran up to Ye Nan in high spirits and threw her arms around his arm, as if terrified that he might run off again.
Without a trace of self-consciousness, the young girl pressed Ye Nan's arm tightly against her proud, swelling breasts.
The soft, springy sensation sent a wave of ripples through Ye Nan's heart.
"Why are you here?" Ye Nan asked in confusion.
"I was worried I'd never see you again!" Lin Qingxuan pouted aggrievedly, her sultry body wriggling restlessly.
The friction of her movements, combined with her faint, delicate fragrance, put Ye Nan in a remarkably good mood.
Judging by her expression, she seemed to mean it from the bottom of her heart.
A slight warmth touched Ye Nan. He reached out and tapped her on the head affectionately, laughing softly, "I'm still a long way from kicking the bucket. How could you not see me again?"
Lin Qingxuan smiled happily, her pair of beautiful eyes gazing at Ye Nan with tender affection.
"You can go back now."
Standing to the side, Lin Qingrou wore an icy expression.
Seeing her younger sister act so dependent and intimate with Ye Nan left a deeply unpleasant taste in her mouth.
She was actually feeling a little jealous.
It felt as though some important possession of hers had been snatched away.
When she saw Ye Nan affectionately tap Lin Qingxuan on the head, a sudden wave of fury surged straight from her lower abdomen to her heart.
"I won't!" Lin Qingxuan clung desperately to Ye Nan's arm, glaring resentfully at her older sister. "What if you drive brother-in-law away again!"
"What does that have to do with you?"
Lin Qingrou's cold gaze was filled with indifference. "Find your proper place."
"You!"
A throbbing headache instantly hit Ye Nan.
"Alright, alright!" Ye Nan interrupted their bickering with a bitter smile. He looked at Lin Qingrou and tried to reason with her in a gentle tone, "It's getting late. Let her stay the night."
Seeing Ye Nan take Lin Qingxuan's side made Lin Qingrou feel even more stifled and distressed inside.
"This is my home! Since when do you get a say?"
The moment those words left her mouth, Lin Qingrou's heart skipped a beat, and instant regret washed over her.
Sure enough, Ye Nan's expression shifted slightly, though it quickly returned to normal.
He turned to Lin Qingxuan and smiled. "Come on, I'll take you back."
Lin Qingxuan had been on the verge of tears from grievance.
After Ye Nan told her about the poisoned takeout, she had rushed right over to tell Lin Qingrou, hoping to help them patch things up. She had spent the entire day here worrying and terrified, only to be met with this kind of attitude from Lin Qingrou.
Yet, looking at Ye Nan's gentle smile, Lin Qingxuan suddenly felt a warm surge in her chest, and all her grievances vanished into thin air.
"Okay!" She looked happily at Ye Nan and nodded heavily.
"Enough!"
Lin Qingrou let out a long breath, forcing herself to calm down. "Only for one night," she said coldly.
At that moment, her heart felt unbearably sour and panicked.
That impulsive outburst of anger seemed to have pushed Ye Nan even further away.
Yet she genuinely felt wronged.
Clearly, she was the one engaged to Ye Nan.
Why was Ye Nan so gentle and easygoing with Lin Qingxuan?
Why had she herself never enjoyed such treatment?!
With that, Lin Qingrou whipped around, stepped out on a pair of flawless, long legs, and strode upstairs on her own.
"President Lin."
Ye Nan suddenly called out to her.
Just that single title made the right foot Lin Qingrou had just placed on the bottom step tremble slightly.
"I think I might not be very suited for the role of secretary. Why don't you transfer me back to the Security Department?"
"That way, both of us will be more at ease."
Lin Qingrou's delicate, perfect back remained motionless.
After a moment of silence, she spoke with cold detachment, "The Security Department has a mixed crowd. Tomorrow, report to the Administration Department."
With that, she quickened her pace upstairs.
*Bang!*
A heavy door slam echoed from upstairs.
Ye Nan smiled helplessly, unbothered.
Lin Qingxuan rolled her eyes, bit her rosy lower lip, suddenly let go of Ye Nan, and ran upstairs.
She was wearing a pair of tight jeans that hugged her full, rounded bottom, swaying from side to side in a deeply alluring way as she climbed.
Dizzy for a moment, Ye Nan froze. Just as he meant to stop her, she had already made it up.
Lin Qingxuan rushed right up to Lin Qingrou's bedroom door. Without bothering to knock, she pushed it open unceremoniously.
Lin Qingrou was in the middle of taking off her earrings. Without looking back, she said coldly, "Get out. You're not a child anymore; you should know some manners."
A wave of anger flared up in Lin Qingxuan. After a silent moment, she suddenly let out a soft laugh and casually sat down on Lin Qingrou's bed.
"You're jealous of me."
Lin Qingrou froze. Then, a flash of contempt and disdain crossed her exquisite, peerless face. "You? Based on what?"
"Based on the fact that brother-in-law treats me better than he treats you."
Lin Qingxuan delivered the emotional blow without holding back at all.
Lin Qingrou's hands trembled slightly, and the frost on her face deepened.
"Right. Ever since we were little, you were always the exceptional one."
"Your grades were better than mine, your abilities were stronger. You were pure, disciplined, cold, and noble. Wherever you went, you were a goddess adored by everyone—an existence far out of reach."
"But I know you've hated me since we were kids, because you were jealous."
Lin Qingrou remained silent, but her slightly trembling body betrayed her inner turmoil.
Every single word from Lin Qingxuan was like a powerful wave crashing against her psychological defenses.
"You were jealous that people liked me better, and you hated me for getting way more affection from Mom and Dad than you ever did."
"And now, you hate me even more for snatching away the care from brother-in-law that should have belonged to you."
"Enough." Lin Qingrou bit her lip, her body shaking even violently. It was obvious she was reaching her breaking point.
"But you never stopped to think—you brought all of this on yourself!"
Instead of stopping, Lin Qingxuan kept going with a calm expression.
"Brother-in-law saved me and treated me well, so I like him."
"That's why I smile at him and treat him nicely. I don't pull a stinking face at him all day long, leaving him baffled and walking on eggshells!"
"Lin Qingrou, you like Ye Nan too."
"I told you to shut up!" Finally pierced to the quick, Lin Qingrou whipped around, clenched her delicate fists, and glared furiously at Lin Qingxuan.
Unfazed, Lin Qingxuan stood up and met her gaze. "Even though I hate to admit it, we're real sisters. From childhood to now, no one understands you better than I do."
"You like him, but you love yourself even more!"
"You can't let go of your arrogant pride, you can't put aside that ice-cold attitude of yours, and you can't abandon your ridiculous self-esteem and condescending posture!"
"Lin Qingrou, what gives you the right?"
"What makes you think everyone has to pamper you, coax you, accommodate you, and unconditionally endure your foul face day after day?!"
"Do you even know how to smile? Do you know how to apologize? Do you possess even the most basic manners of a normal person?"
"You like Ye Nan, yet you're too stingy to give him a single smile."
"He saved your life today, but you acted like it was only natural, without a single tender tone in your voice."
"Do you honestly think he's just supposed to run errands for you, lick your boots, and be your live-in matrilocal husband?!"
"Get real!" The more she spoke, the more agitated Lin Qingxuan became, her voice rising with every word.
"I'm actually really curious now."
"If one day Ye Nan leaves, will you regret it?"
"Will my iceberg goddess of a sister end up like a little girl, hiding under the covers and crying her eyes out?"
"I'm looking forward to that day."
"Once he leaves you, he's mine!"
With a cold laugh, Lin Qingxuan turned, walked out of the room, and slammed the door shut behind her with a heavy bang.
"And another thing—you're not the only one who knows how to slam doors. What Ye Nan is too classy to do, I'll do for him!"
Dropping those final words through the door, Lin Qingxuan hurried downstairs.
Ye Nan sat quietly on the sofa, watching Lin Qingxuan walk over in silence. Without a trace of hesitation, she sat straight down onto his lap and pressed her face against his chest.
He let out a sigh.
Earlier, worried that the sisters might get into a fight, he had quietly circulated his internal energy to enhance his hearing, catching every single word of their conversation.
This girl...
Ye Nan gently stroked Lin Qingxuan's head.
Lin Qingxuan let out a comfortable hum and said coquettishly, "Brother-in-law, let's ditch her. Marry me, okay?"
Chapter 28: She won't survive past midnight!
Hearing this, Ye Nan froze, then let out a dry laugh.
"I remember the first time we met, you called me a stinking security guard."
Lin Qingxuan's pretty face flushed red as she gave Ye Nan's chest a light punch with her little fist.
"Hate you! Why are you bringing up ancient history!"
Ye Nan smiled, a warmth filling his heart.
After a moment of silence, he sighed. "Your sister has it tough too. Don't say things like that in the future."
"You're still taking her side!" Lin Qingxuan raised her head and glared at Ye Nan pouting. "You're driving me crazy!"
Right at that moment, the doorbell rang.
A moment later, Lin Qingrou came downstairs with a blank expression to open the door.
She still maintained her cold, composed demeanor, as if completely unaffected by what Lin Qingxuan had just said.
"It's you?"
Curious, Ye Nan and Lin Qingxuan walked over as well.
Standing at the doorway was none other than the Qi family of three.
Qi Jingyao sat in a wheelchair, her face pale and looking exceptionally weak.
"President Lin, our attitude towards you earlier today was poor. We came specially to apologize in person!"
Li Ruomei wore a forced smile, though the overwhelming worry for her daughter was clearly written across her face.
"Please come in."
After a brief thought, Lin Qingrou stepped aside to let the three of them enter.
Once they were seated according to host and guest, Qi Kang still sat with a cold face, refusing to say a word, clearly unable to swallow his pride.
"Ye Nan, you're here at President Lin's place too? That's wonderful!" Li Ruomei exclaimed in pleasant surprise upon seeing Ye Nan.
After Lin Qingrou, Ye Nan, and the others had left today, Qi Jingyao's symptoms had persisted without improvement.
Qi Kang had thrown a fit of rage, but there was nothing he could do.
After calming down for a while, the couple had rehashed the events of earlier and finally figured it out.
Ye Nan was clearly the only one who could actually save their daughter!
Zhao Chuanping and that crooked-minded Taoist priest had been exchanging glances and acting suspiciously the whole time—it was obvious they harbored malicious intentions. That nonsense about a "special destiny" and needing to find a predestined person was complete hogwash.
It was just that the two of them had been too worried about their daughter at the time, losing their heads in panic and foolishly believing it.
Later, it was Ye Nan who used Lin Qingrou to expose the Taoist priest Xuanyi's lies.
Qi Kang and Li Ruomei were, after all, the heads of the prominent Qi family; they weren't complete fools.
Once she figured it out, Li Ruomei persuaded Qi Kang to bring their daughter to beg Lin Qingrou.
Only Lin Qingrou could get in touch with Ye Nan.
Never did they expect Ye Nan to be right here at Lin Qingrou's house.
"Ye Nan, Uncle and Auntie's attitude toward you today wasn't great. Please don't take it to heart. We're apologizing to you now!"
Li Ruomei coaxed with a smile, "Look, you and Yaoyao used to be engaged after all. For the sake of that past relationship, can you please help Yaoyao?"
"Of course, our Qi family will never mistreat you! Just cure Yaoyao, and you can name your price for the consultation fee!"
She heavily emphasized the word "used to," terrified that Ye Nan might misunderstand anything.
Qi Kang let out a cold snort and directly added, "Money is no object. Name whatever amount you want, but don't harbor any delusions about other excessive conditions."
"Old Qi!" Li Ruomei gave Qi Kang a reproving look. "Why are you speaking so abrasively? Can't you be a bit softer?"
Sitting in her wheelchair, Qi Jingyao also wore an unwilling expression.
It was clear she was extremely reluctant to come and beg Ye Nan.
Yet the pain was simply becoming too much for her to bear.
Watching this family, Ye Nan found them genuinely amusing.
It was as if they were terrified he might seize the opportunity to latch onto their family. Even while swallowing their pride to beg for his help, they still managed to act so overbearing and arrogant.
Truly a rare breed!
Lin Qingxuan felt a surge of anger. She couldn't bear to see her brother-in-law treated this way and was about to open her mouth with a sarcastic remark.
To her surprise, this time Lin Qingrou beat her to it.
"The three of you can leave. Ye Nan is an employee of my company, and on his behalf, I refuse to treat Miss Qi." Lin Qingrou's cold tone had already directly sealed Qi Jingyao's fate.
"Ah?! This..." Li Ruomei's face instantly drained of color.
"Lin Qingrou, don't push your luck!"
Furious, Qi Kang pointed at Lin Qingrou and yelled, "I, Qi Kang, came here in person—that's giving you more than enough face!"
"What do you think your Haiqing Group is?! You dare put on airs with my Qi family?!"
"Do you believe that if you don't cure my daughter today, I will bankrupt Haiqing within a month, and your whole Lin family will be reduced to begging on the streets?!"
Qi Jingyao also glared at Ye Nan with venom in her eyes. "Ye Nan, I know you hate me because I broke off the engagement, but you need to know your place!"
"Our social statuses are worlds apart; you shouldn't harbor pipe dreams!"
"If you cure me today, our two families can part on good terms, and everything in the past will be wiped clean."
"If you insist on letting a petty personal grudge stand in the way and refuse to help, you know very well what the Qi family is capable of!"
"I advise you to calm down, lest you live to regret it!"
Watching the arrogant and tyrannical attitude of this father and daughter, the sisters Lin Qingrou and Lin Qingxuan were both so angry they almost forgot their manners and wanted to walk over and slap them a few times!
What an eye-opener!
Begging someone for medical treatment while acting this brazen.
Shameless—truly without lower limits!
Ye Nan narrowed his eyes, the corners of his mouth ticking up slightly.
He was actually, genuinely a little angry now.
It had been quite a while since he had run into someone so arrogantly courting death.
If it weren't for the fact that the old patriarch of the Qi family seemed to know his good-for-nothing master, Ye Nan would have long since taken action to punish them and tossed them out like dead dogs.
Seeing that the Lin sisters were about to erupt, Ye Nan stopped them.
He glanced at Qi Kang and Qi Jingyao, smiled faintly, raised his hand casually, and gave a gentle wave toward Qi Jingyao.
"Ah!!!"
The next instant, Qi Jingyao shrieked in agony, tumbling straight out of her wheelchair and rolling on the floor in unbearable pain.
She had been hurting all day, and the intense agony had nearly numbed her, but just then, the pain in her body had suddenly multiplied a hundredfold!
"Dad, Mom, I... I can't take it anymore!"
"Ah!!!"
"It hurts! It hurts so much!"
"Just kill me! I'm begging you! Please kill me right now!!!"
Qi Jingyao screamed hysterically, her delicate body writhing on the ground in a pathetic, horrifying display that made everyone's blood run cold.
"Yaoyao!"
Tears instantly welled in Li Ruomei's eyes as she threw herself beside her daughter, crying out, "Yaoyao, don't be scared. Mom's here, Mom's right here..."
Panicked and enraged, Qi Kang watched his precious daughter suffer like this, his heart aching with a wrenching pain!
"It was you!" Qi Kang whipped his head around, glaring at Ye Nan with venomous hatred.
Lin Qingrou and Lin Qingxuan also stared at Ye Nan in absolute shock.
Could it really have been him...
Lin Qingrou thought to herself: *He just gave a gentle wave of his hand a second ago...*
Yet, remembering that this fellow's master was a Taoist priest, Lin Qingrou calmed down considerably.
Taoist priests, after all, practicing medicine and strange abilities related to geomancy and such—that was normal enough.
She had no idea that Ye Nan's good-for-nothing master was no ordinary Taoist priest.
And what Ye Nan knew went far beyond medicine and feng shui.
"She won't survive past midnight tonight."
Without even looking at Qi Kang, Ye Nan nonchalantly pronounced Qi Jingyao's death sentence.
The talisman Xuanyi had planted inside Qi Jingyao's body had not been removed, making her body a massive magnet for foul Qi.
With just a wave of his hand, Ye Nan had simply added fuel to the fire, using profound techniques to gather a patch of foul energy and send it straight toward Qi Jingyao.
The talisman within her immediately drew that foul energy directly into her body, causing the sudden, excruciating spike in pain.
"Ye Nan!"
Trembling with rage and panic, Qi Kang pointed at Ye Nan and roared, "Do you believe I can wipe you off the face of the earth within three days?!"
"I don't." Ye Nan gave a bland shake of his head, looking at him with amusement. "However, I do believe that tomorrow you'll be collecting your precious daughter's corpse."
Furious and frantic, Qi Kang was overwhelmed by rage, breaking into a fit of violent coughs as he clutched his chest and collapsed limply onto the sofa.
"President Lin! President Lin! I'm begging you! Save my daughter!"
In the end, maternal love won out as Li Ruomei rushed to Lin Qingrou's side, weeping and pleading.
Lin Qingrou's face was as cold as ice, completely unmoved. "I don't know how to practice medicine."
The implication was clear: begging her was useless.
When it came down to it, Ye Nan called all the shots!
Startled, Li Ruomei immediately turned to plead with Ye Nan. "Ye Nan, Auntie is begging you. Auntie only has this one daughter..."
Watching the tear-stained face of a mother grieving for her child, Ye Nan felt a slight stir in his heart.
After a moment of silence, he flicked his hand gently.
*Whoosh...*
The pain racking Qi Jingyao's entire body vanished instantly.
Drenched in sweat, she lay flat on the floor, her eyes hollow and her delicate frame trembling slightly.
"Yaoyao!"
Overjoyed, Li Ruomei hurried over to help her daughter back up and seat her in the wheelchair.
"Yaoyao, how do you feel? My poor daughter!"
With trembling lips, Qi Jingyao remained silent, her pair of dull eyes staring blankly at Ye Nan.
In her gaze, only two emotions remained.
Resentment and... terror!
Terror welling up from the depths of her soul!
Chapter 29: Your old life isn't enough to die ten times over!
"Ye Nan, you..."
Seeing his daughter pushed to the brink of life and death by Ye Nan, Qi Kang felt a mix of piercing grief and furious rage, grinding his teeth.
"I advise you to watch your words."