Chu Junyu tossed the agreement onto the coffee table, his clear, dark eyes fixed on Chu Lingzhi. "Mommy, am I that kind of person?"
He walked over, patted Chu Lingzhi's leg, and offered her comfort. "Mommy, I know what you're afraid of. Don't worry—your son knows how to handle things."
Chu Junyu's words eased Chu Lingzhi's mind considerably.
She looked into his eyes, her own red-rimmed.
Seeing her like this, Chu Junyu felt a pang of sympathy.
His gaze turned somewhat deep and detached.
He had found out that Nangong Yehen was his father.
But he hadn't uncovered how they met, how they fell in love, how they had them, or how they ended up abandoning him and his mother.
...
Chu Junyu's small figure sat on a stone bench in the community park.
The afternoon sunlight fell on him, making him seem more composed and mature than other kids his age.
His chubby, adorable little hand pulled out a phone and dialed Nangong Yehen's number.
At that moment, Nangong Yehen had just finished swimming and was lounging on a beach chair to rest.
He was only wrapped in a bathrobe, revealing his solid chest muscles, his posture lazy and utterly wild.
Huo Luan handed him his phone. "Master, your call."
The caller ID made the perfect, sensual corners of his lips curl up into a faint smile.
His slender, jade-like finger lightly swiped across the screen and answered the call.
"Master Nangong, can you tell me how I came to be?"
On the other end of the line, Chu Junyu's young, pleasant voice rang out.
Nangong Yehen smirked. "How about we find a time to talk properly?"
"When?"
"You decide the time and place."
---
For the past two days, Chu Lingzhi hadn't gone to the office.
She felt uneasy and stayed home with Chu Junyu.
She picked him up and dropped him off at school on time every day.
She was afraid Nangong Yehen would come to take her son, so she spent those two days on edge.
But things didn't turn out as she feared. Three days passed, and Chu Junyu was fine, with no sign of Nangong Yehen.
Instead, Mu Yu suddenly knocked on the door. Because she hadn't been selected for the audition, she cried at Chu Lingzhi's house for a full two hours.
Seeing her so heartbroken and upset, Chu Lingzhi felt bad too, but she couldn't help and didn't know how to comfort her.
So she decided to go pick up her son and let Mu Yu cry it out alone at home.
Halfway there, she got stuck in traffic.
The cars ahead were bumper-to-bumper, and Chu Lingzhi checked the time—it was almost time for Chu Junyu's class to end.
She tapped the steering wheel impatiently, craning her neck to look ahead.
Why was it so jammed today?
This road never usually had traffic.
The longer she sat in the jam, the more unsettled Chu Lingzhi became.
She had a feeling something was about to happen.
She pulled out her phone and called Chu Junyu.
She wanted to tell him not to leave the school gate—she'd go into the kindergarten to pick him up herself.
The call went through, but no one answered for a long time.
Stuck in traffic and with no one picking up, Chu Lingzhi grew even more anxious and panicked.
She tried to call Chu Junyu's teacher, but before she could find the number, the cars ahead started moving, and the ones behind honked incessantly.
*What are you honking at? I'm more anxious than you!*
Chu Lingzhi muttered a curse in her mind, put the phone down, and drove forward.
At first, it was slow, but once the road cleared up, she floored the accelerator and sped toward the kindergarten.
Her heart raced, unsettled, with a bad feeling like an invisible hand tightly gripping her heart.