Chapter 26

Bai Zifan brought me to his place, an ordinary apartment in a residential block.

I sat on the sofa with my arms crossed, refusing to look at him.

“I’m sorry.” he said quietly. When I didn’t respond, he turned and went into the kitchen.

His place wasn’t big. It had a simple industrial style. The coffee table was made from an old tire with a sheet of tempered glass set on top. It actually looked pretty cool.

The bookshelf against the wall was crammed with books-management, accounting, finance… The shelves were full, and stacks of books had climbed all the way into the corners.

“Hungry?” He brought out a steaming bowl of noodles, a golden fried egg resting on top. “Eat it while it’s hot, don’t let your blood sugar crash again.”

I really was hungry. The smell of the noodles made it impossible to hold back. I dug in. It was delicious.

I asked why he had so many books. He said he liked reading and had been studying nonstop all these years. Becoming Li Yunzhou and never slipping up was all thanks to those books. His professional skills had earned everyone’s trust. No one had ever doubted who he was.

He gave a bitter smile and said that being Li Yunzhou felt so natural now that sometimes he couldn’t even tell who he really was anymore.

It suddenly hit me: all the suffering he’d gone through over the years was because of me. He was so capable, he could have lived openly as himself, yet he was reduced to living under someone else’s name, someone else’s life.

My anger from earlier was gone, replaced by guilt.

“These years… it’s been hard on you, hasn’t it?”

“Isn’t it pretty good now? You saw it yourself, my life’s not bad.” He waved it off lightly. “Talk about you. I’ve been really worried.”

I hadn’t even started talking and my whole body was already shaking. He took a dress shirt from his wardrobe and gently draped it over my shoulders.

“You can trust me.” He took my trembling hand in his.

Haltingly, I told him everything that had happened to me.

Before I even finished, Bai Zifan slammed his fist down on the table and shot to his feet. “That bastard! I’m going to kill him right now!” In that moment, with that murderous look on his face, he was exactly like the hot-tempered kid from the old auto repair shop.

I grabbed his arm in a panic. “Don’t go! I don’t want my family to know about this yet. My dad just had heart surgery; he can’t take any shocks. The company needs him right now too…”

“So we just let this go?” His eyes were bloodshot, his emotions about to explode.

“I have my own plans.”

Bai Zifan suddenly seized my shoulders. “Lili, promise me you won’t wrong yourself. Whenever you need me, I’ll be there. Always.”

He yanked me into his arms as he finished. My heart skipped a beat. I quickly struggled out of his embrace.

“I’m still a married woman. This isn’t appropriate.”

But he domineeringly took my chin and turned my face toward him, forcing me to meet his eyes. In them churned a stubbornness I had never seen before. “Listen. If you’re happy, I’ll sincerely wish you well. But if Suhang treats you badly, I’m going to steal you back. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

Flustered, I pushed him away. “I should go home.”