Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Huo Shaoheng took Gu Nianzhi’s hand and stopped in front of the elevator. He looked at the open doors but didn’t speak. Pursing his lips, he stepped inside with an unquestionable posture.
Exerting a slight force with his arms, he brought an unwilling Gu Nianzhi inside.
“Huo Shao, I said I want to go back. Didn’t you hear what I said?!” Gu Nianzhi reached out to stop the elevator doors, and because there was a sensor in them, they didn’t close.
“You really want to go back?” Huo Shaoheng continued to hold Gu Nianzhi’s hand as he watched her turn around and walk out of the elevator.
The two of them stood with one person inside the elevator and the other person outside, with only their intertwined hands between the elevator and outside.
Huo Shaoheng resumed his typical calm expression. He didn’t let go but didn’t use much pressure. It was like no matter what Gu Nianzhi said or did, nothing could deter him.
A man with determination, who did what he said and knew what he was doing, possessed an irresistible attraction to women. This attraction also increased exponentially when this man was a soldier.
He stood just like that in the elevator, looking at her quietly. Gu Nianzhi’s heart couldn’t help skipping two beats.
But if she went back to that apartment, she was afraid she would remember all those sweet memories…
She had already been working hard to resist Huo Shaoheng, and her rationale told her that Huo Shaoheng could no longer give her a sense of security. If she was with him, it would only be a matter of time before she was hurt again.
At this time, Huo Shaoheng could tell that there was a barely detectable hint of hesitation in Gu Nianzhi. He took the opportunity and pulled hard to drag Gu Nianzhi back inside. With one hand holding her in his embrace, he used the other hand to quickly take out his key card to swipe in the elevator’s card reader.
The elevator doors slammed shut, and the elevator quickly rose up towards the 18th floor where they had previously lived.
Gu Nianzhi was nearly suffocated as her head was held tightly against his chest. By the time she struggled out of his arms, she discovered the elevator had already chimed because they had arrived at their destination.
The elevator doors slowly opened, and the familiar apartment door appeared before them.
As much as Gu Nianzhi was reluctant to, she had no choice but to be taken out of the elevator by Huo Shaoheng.
She watched him take out the door’s key card as her heart hammered along.
Since returning from Germany, she hadn’t come back to this place even once. As sweet as their past was, she had suffered just as much heartbreak.
However, there was nothing amiss in Huo Shaoheng’s expression as he calmly opened the door and went inside. He took out house slippers from the shoe cabinet in the foyer, a pair for himself and a pair for Gu Nianzhi. He set them down before her.
“Why aren’t you changing your shoes?”
“Why would I change my shoes? If you have something to say, then say it. I’m leaving once you’re done.” Gu Nianzhi turned around so that her back was to the living room, and she only looked at the door in front of her.
Seeing her childish behavior, Huo Shaoheng felt a bit of a headache coming on. He walked over and stood behind her back with both hands in his trouser pockets. Looking down at the black hair on the top of her head, he also didn’t speak but stood in silence for a while.
Gu Nianzhi waited for a while to see that Huo Shaoheng wasn’t speaking. She turned around and said, “I’m leaving if you have nothing to say…”
Before she could even finish her sentence, Huo Shaoheng suddenly bowed his head down and used one hand to grab her shoulder and the other hand to hold the black hair at the back of her head. He controlled her tightly and leaned down to kiss her.
This time he didn’t treat her gently at all, but forcefully sucked on her lips and used his teeth to nibble on them.
Her curvy lips were full and lush, so they were comfortable to kiss.
When he bit them, his teeth seemed to nearly sink into a pile of soften cotton, and it made him want to do nothing more than swallow her whole.
Gu Nianzhi’s lips were growing numb from the biting. It didn’t hurt, but Huo Shaoheng’s teeth seemed to carry their own current. Every time he bit her, a rush of pleasure would shoot up to the top of her head and course through her entire body from head to toe.
She was becoming so soft that her legs nearly couldn’t stand up anymore, so she had no choice but to lean against Huo Shaoheng’s body to seek a moment of support.
As a result, Huo Shaoheng held her even tighter and kissed even harder. His tongue delved into her mouth and pulled out the tip of her tongue. He sucked it between his own lips to carefully savor before slowly nibbling the tip of her tongue in a circle.
This time it hurt a bit, but it wasn’t unbearable pain. Instead, it made her drift in and out of consciousness.
Gu Nianzhi was starting to cry from his kissing and weakly beat at his chest. “Huo Shaoheng, let me go… I’m begging you… Let me go…” She had grown up with him, so how could he possibly not know what she liked?
He changed his tactics to tease her again and again, making her unable to resist him.
Her heart wasn’t made of stone, so how could she be completely unmoved by his continuous efforts to woo her? But she also understood very clearly that she wasn’t currently ready to get into a relationship with him…
Huo Shaoheng’s lips and teeth suddenly paused, and the storm-like kisses gradually eased. He did not continue to bite her lips or the tip of her tongue but instead moved his warm lips away from her. The hand that was cradling the back of her neck also released her as he quietly looked down at her.
Gu Nianzhi closed her eyes, not daring to open them. She hated her own weakness very much.
“Ok, stop crying.” Huo Shaoheng took out tissue from the cabinet in the foyer to help Gu Nianzhi wipe her tears. He bent down to hug her, then said with a bit of helplessness, “It was only a kiss. Why are you crying?”
Gu Nianzhi would never tell him that her head spun as soon as he kissed her. She was very scared of what kind of humiliating and shameful decision she would make under her unconscious state. Biting her lip, she looked away without saying anything.
Huo Shaoheng patted her head and took her to sit down on the living room couch. He quietly held her in his arms, and neither of them spoke.
They merely sat there, hugging in the living room. Huo Shaoheng’s hand patted her back intermittently.
The afternoon sun spilled through the French windows, bathing the room in warm light. The coziness flowed through the empty living room giving a hint of liveliness to the apartment that had sat empty for many days now.
The light was a bit too bright, so Gu Nianzhi instinctively turned her head into Huo Shaoheng’s embrace to avoid the sunlight directly shining in.
Huo Shaoheng stood up when he saw this and walked up to the window to close the blinds.
He then went to his study to bring out a small, creamy white Bluetooth speaker. He set it on the coffee table in front of the living room couch, then took out his phone, tapping a few times to turn the Bluetooth speakers on.
Gu Nianzhi curled up on the couch with a slightly awkward expression on her face. She looked at Huo Shaoheng like she wanted to say something, but Gu Yanran and Jin Wanyi’s voices suddenly played from the Bluetooth speakers to dispel the earlier awkwardness.
Gu Nianzhi was instantly fixated, and she stared intently at the Bluetooth speaker, listening to Gu Yanran and Jin Wanyi’s conversation playing from it.
Huo Shaoheng didn’t listen to it, so he said to Gu Nianzhi, “I’m going out for a smoke.” Then he opened the French window to go outside and walked to the balcony to light the cigarette in his hand.
…
“Yanran, what on earth is going on? Why is Gu Nianzhi suddenly asking to equally split the family estate with you? Isn’t she an adopted daughter of the Gu family? Why is she shameless enough to ask for money? Your parents must’ve left a will, right?” Jin Wanyi both loved and loathed Gu Yanran as a client.
She was properly the richest heiress, yet made herself seem like a shameful mistress and spoke vaguely to keep many things from her.
Typically, this type of client was hard to deal with, so all of Jin Wanyi’s colleagues didn’t want to take the case. But Gu Yanran paid generously, so just the lawyer fee made Jin Wanyi unable to say no to her.
Jin Wanyi had been in the profession for ten years and had only been able to use a distant relative’s help to be able to work as a lawyer at the largest law firm in the Imperial Capital, JD. She had just recently been promoted to the role of senior.
All these years, she believed she had good ability but bad luck, so she didn’t encounter good cases and clients like others had.
Afterwards, she went up against Gu Nianzhi on several cases and although she lost, she won fame from it. She was no longer an unknown, small-time lawyer but was now able to open the doors to the upper echelon of society.
Good clients and cases poured in for her, and her economic situation also improved because of this.
The red Accord she had purchased shortly after entering the profession had now been replaced by a BMW X5. She also paid her down payment for a house in the Imperial Capital. Under these circumstances, she needed to latch onto clients like Gu Yanran even more tightly.
Actually, it didn’t even matter if she won or lost, since she would receive handsome compensation either way. But if she won, then she would reach new heights.
Jin Wanyi’s words caused a new wave of heartache for Gu Yanran.
She used a handkerchief to wipe the corners of her eye and said listlessly, “My father used to love Gu Nianzhi a lot and treated her like his own. Maybe that caused the delusions in her head. But the will…”
Gu Yanran hesitated for a second, her voice a bit hoarse. “My father hasn’t passed away yet, so would it will take effect?”
“Your father’s situation is a bit complicated. But in theory, if your parents left a will, Gu Nianzhi cannot be compared to you since she holds the identity of an adopted daughter. In an estate dispute, this can help you quite a lot,” Jin Wanyi said in an attempt to subtly point out that the case could be settled outside of court and wouldn’t even have to be taken to court if there was a will.
Gu Yanran frowned in thought for a while before saying quietly, “But what if there really wasn’t a will?”
“Under those circumstances, it would probably be split evenly.” Jin Wanyi spread her palms with some pity. “Without a will, Gu Nianzhi is also a primary heir. Even if she was adopted, she is an officially adopted daughter, legally speaking.”
As soon as she said this, Jin Wanyi had another idea. “Gu Nianzhi is an officially adopted daughter, right? Are there official adoption papers?”
Sometimes, some people might say that they were adopting children but may not have necessarily completed all the legal procedures.
A few years ago, an international movie star adopted a pair of twin girls because she didn’t have daughters of her own. Later on, she had her own daughter, so she “transferred” the adopted twin daughters.
Public opinion accused her harshly, but legally speaking, she didn’t do anything wrong. Although she had told the public that she “adopted” the daughters all those years ago, there were some issues with the legal procedures during the adoption, which led to her later behavior being free of accountability by law.
If this was the case, then Gu Nianzhi’s desire to pursue the family estate could be extinguished.
However, Gu Yanran only stiffened. “Official adoption papers?”
“Right, since we are fighting an estate dispute lawsuit, then everything must be done according to the law. Gu Nianzhi wants a part of the estate, so she first needs to prove she is a legally adopted daughter and present legal documents to prove her adopted identity before she can even say anything.” Jin Wanyi knocked the desk, her words like a heavy hammer that struck hard against Gu Yanran’s heart.
