Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Noon sunlight fell across my face.

Slowly, I woke up.

A dark gray room. Navy-blue sheets.

This wasn’t my room.

But it looked like Jiang Li’s.

All I had left on was a camisole and a pair of hot pants.

I pressed my lips together, confused. “Where’s my jacket?”

Jiang Li walked in right on cue, leaning against the doorframe as he looked at me.

“Awake? I thought you were planning to mooch off my place forever.”

“I came up here last night?”

“What else? You showed up in the middle of the night.” His expression turned a little unnatural, and the tip of his tongue pressed against the corner of his mouth. “You don’t remember what happened last night?”

I jolted in alarm. “No wonder my jacket’s gone! You didn’t try anything with me last night, did you?”

After all, I was that hot.

Jiang Li looked speechless. He took a deep breath. “Even if I had to jump from here, I still wouldn’t lay a finger on you. Hurry up and come eat. I have to head out later.”

I flipped out of bed with practiced ease.

At the dining table, Jiang Li’s phone kept vibrating.

Someone was messaging him nonstop.

From the profile picture, it was a pink plush bunny.

A girl.

Jiang Li ate breakfast without so much as glancing sideways.

I really couldn’t stand it anymore.

“Who is that?”

“A girl.”

No kidding.

“Obviously I know she’s a girl. What’s your relationship? Girlfriend?”

He cast me a sidelong look, leaned back, and fixed his black eyes steadily on me.

“If I had a girlfriend, I would’ve defended my virtue to the death last night and refused to let you through the door.”

Virtue?

That sounded a little off at first listen.

I shook my hungover head.

My brain wasn’t quite awake, and I felt like it was easy to start overthinking.

The WeChat notifications kept buzzing.

I grew increasingly irritated.

“Is she pursuing you?”

“Probably.”

I choked.

Some people were dying of drought while others were drowning in floodwater.

As Jiang Li’s childhood friend, I had witnessed countless crushes on him that went nowhere from the time we were little.

Some of those girls were gentle. Some were lively.

But Jiang Li had only ever cared about studying and coding.

Still, all the girls who pursued Jiang Li had one thing in common: they were especially good to him.

Except me.

When I was one, I scattered Jiang Li’s baby formula everywhere.

When I was two, I knocked Jiang Li flat and made him wail on the floor.

In middle school, I once read an overbearing CEO novel.

It was called Heartbeat 99 Times: 180 Rules for Chasing the CEO.

The very first rule in it was to oppose him at every turn, because men were all gluttons for punishment.

Since my mom wouldn’t let me read novels like that, I could only stash the book in Jiang Li’s room and savor it carefully whenever I went over to copy his homework.

After I finished reading it, I felt as if I had grasped the true meaning of life.

But I also realized something.

It seemed Jiang Li was the only person I had ever opposed in my entire life.

For example, he didn’t eat cilantro.

So I planted the balcony of his room full of cilantro.

For example, he didn’t read overbearing CEO novels, so I threatened him into reading them to me word for word.

His tone had been perfectly even. “Long Aotian approached her, his voice husky. ‘Woman, you’re playing with fire.'”

Just thinking about it even now was enough to give me goosebumps.

And yet he still didn’t like me.

So no one could ever win Jiang Li over.