Chapter 7
Edward Quan ·
By the end, his expression had gone cold and numb.
“If she keeps making a scene, I’ll have to break up with her.”
I was startled. Then I realized it was exactly the sort of thing he would do.
In their circle, his devotion to Khương Lai had already made him something of a rarity.
Apparently, she really had been his only woman all these years.
28
“I should go, Chu Cảnh Hoài. You don’t need to tell me about the two of you. I don’t want to hear it.”
“Hứa Trăn.”
He looked at me.
“If you hadn’t let me leave that night when she called—if you’d asked me to stay—could we…”
“There are no ifs.”
I interrupted him calmly.
“Khương Lai was there. She was part of our marriage. Nothing can change that.”
“Our ending was decided long ago.”
“You really do like that man, don’t you?”
His gaze lingered on the coral beads at my wrist, then moved to my belly.
“Do you know something?”
“That day at Grandmother’s bedside, when I found out you were pregnant…”
He gave another bitter laugh.
“I genuinely wanted to kill you.”
“If that man had been standing in front of me, I might have stabbed him to death.”
“But after I calmed down, I understood.”
“What right did I have to be angry?”
“I brought it all on myself.”
“Being married to me made you suffer so much. Yet you’re still willing to help.”
His voice was sincere.
“I feel terrible about it.”
“No need. Aren’t you giving me ten million?”
I smiled, making light of it.
“That’s a lot of money to me. Really.”
Just then my phone rang. Trần Tông Nguyệt.
I didn’t answer, only stood and headed for the door.
“The driver’s hurrying me. I’m going now, Chu Cảnh Hoài.”
29
Once I was outside, I took the call.
His low voice had a pull of its own.
“Trăn Trăn, what’s taking so long? Why aren’t you downstairs?”
“I’m about to get in the elevator.”
“I’m waiting in the car.”
“Trần Tông Nguyệt… Why are you here?”
“Am I so unfit to be seen with you?”
“What are you talking about?”
I couldn’t help laughing.
As I stepped into the elevator and turned to press the button, I saw Chu Cảnh Hoài standing a little way off, watching me on the phone.
I paused.
The doors slowly closed, and he disappeared from view.
Downstairs, I crossed the lobby and immediately spotted Trần Tông Nguyệt’s outrageously expensive car.
I was hurrying down the steps when the door opened.
In a dark gray business suit, his gaze cool and distant, he strode toward me.
“Hứa Trăn, you’re pregnant. Stop bounding down the stairs…”
“Don’t worry. At the last checkup, your precious baby was behaving beautifully and developing well.”
I looked up at him.
“Perhaps one day I’ll rise in the world on the strength of my child. I’ll be careful.”
“Why couldn’t the child rise in the world because of its mother?”
I faltered and instinctively tried to change the subject.
But he drew me into his arms.
“My elders have already given me a talking-to. A child of the Trần family can’t be born without a proper place in it.”
“So when we get to Hong Kong, we’ll register our marriage.”
I wouldn’t lift my head. I stared at the intricate pattern on his suit button until my eyes stung.
“I haven’t agreed.”
“I’ll propose first. Then we’ll get engaged. There’ll be an engagement celebration, a marriage ceremony, a wedding reception. You won’t miss a single step.”
“For the baby?”
My eyes reddened as I tried to push him away.
He only held me tighter and bent to kiss my forehead.
“For Hứa Trăn.”
30
The day before he was to take me to Hong Kong, Chu Cảnh Hoài transferred ten million yuan into my account.
Over the phone, he said, “When you came to sign the papers, I saw the coral beads on your wrist.”
“Fourth Brother has worn them since he was little. They’ve never left him. How could I fail to recognize them?”
“Chu Cảnh Hoài…”
“Thinking back, everything he said before returning to Hong Kong had another meaning.”
“You’re a good woman, Hứa Trăn. You deserve him.”
After he hung up, I noticed the bank notification.
My balance was a hundred and eleven million yuan.
I was stunned.
It was the same bank card I had given Trần Tông Nguyệt.
The one he had later returned.
I had always thought it still held only my own million.
On the flight to Hong Kong, I rested in his arms.
Half asleep, I asked, “Why did you give me so much money?”
“I was afraid you’d suffer. At least with enough money, you wouldn’t have to struggle.”
“Why did you leave your phone number? Were you sure I’d call?”
“I hoped you would. And I hoped you wouldn’t.”
He stroked my hair.
“I wanted to come and get you. But I was afraid it would mean you’d really been mistreated that badly.”
“Trần Tông Nguyệt…”
I burrowed into his arms.
He smelled faintly of sandalwood, a scent that made me feel utterly safe.
Before I knew it, I was asleep.
He covered me with a blanket and kept his arm around me.
He didn’t believe in love at first sight.
Yet when he first met Hứa Trăn as a boy, he had fallen for her.
The second time they met again, he had sworn he would marry her.
But she had long since forgotten him.
Back then, the young girl had happily told her friend how much she liked him.
She had never known how delighted he was to hear it.
Then his parents had suddenly taken him back to Hong Kong.
By the time he finally had a chance to return and look for her, she had developed a crush on an older student who played basketball. Every day, she went to the court to watch him.
He stayed for three days and sulked for all three.
In the end, he never went to see her.
After returning to Hong Kong, he cut off contact with all his former classmates.
Many years later, he saw her again at her wedding to Chu Cảnh Hoài.
She was nothing like the girl he remembered.
Her eyes no longer smiled. A dense gloom clouded them, and her brows were always drawn.
Later, he heard from the Chu servants that the groom had stayed out all night on their wedding night.
Chu Cảnh Hoài had been keeping his first love at the Peninsula Hotel for two years.
Angry and worried for her, Trần Tông Nguyệt found an excuse to remain in Beijing for a while.
Then, when she cried alone in the back garden, he finally lost the strength to stay away.
He had never imagined she would make such a request.
And he simply couldn’t refuse the girl he had loved since his youth.
He had regretted it, despised himself for it.
In the end, he was profoundly grateful that he had given in.
What could make him happier than having the woman he loved sleeping peacefully in his arms, carrying their child?
Unable to resist, he bent and kissed her forehead once more.
At lunchtime, a flight attendant approached to ask politely about their meal.
He smiled gently and lowered his voice.
“My wife is asleep. Please don’t disturb us until she wakes.”
The pretty young attendant looked at the woman in his arms with a little envy.
In sleep, her brows had smoothed, and a faint smile rested on her lips.
The man holding her was refined and handsome, his manner graceful.
A simple wedding band circled one long finger.
At her wrist, the woman wore only a beautiful string of vivid coral beads.
Her skin was very fair. The beads looked exquisite against it.
Perhaps the attendant would remember this happy newlywed couple for many years.
And years later, Trần Tông Nguyệt and Hứa Trăn had a son and a daughter.
They still loved each other as they had at the beginning.
You see, the moon can be brought down from the sky.
When it meets someone for whom it is willing to descend, it will cross any distance to reach her.
And fall into her arms.
The End