After Trying To Pursue The Cold, Elegant Beauty. I Ended Up Being Flirted With Instead - Chapter 2

“If you dare to leave, don’t ever come back.”

Wen Zhu didn’t go to see Director Chen off instead, she hailed a cab straight back to the Pei residence.

In the living room, Qiao Yu, Pei Xiubai’s mother, was having a manicure done by a nail technician.

Seeing Wen Zhu enter, her previously cheerful expression immediately soured. She said with a touch of impatience, “Xiao Zhu is back, huh? Xiubai didn’t take you out for socializing? In that case, go to the kitchen and make some Rock Sugar Pear Soup. Xiubai can drink it when she gets back.”

Pei’s mother spoke as if it were a matter of course. Although there was an auntie/maid at home, Pei Xiubai only liked the one Wen Zhu made.

If it were before, Wen Zhu would have surely gone to make Pei Xiubai a bowl of warm, heartfelt soup.

But she stood at the doorway, her mind completely filled with the image of Pei Xiubai embracing and kissing Jiang Xinxin.

Clutching her chest, she suppressed the urge to vomit and simply said, “I can’t do it today.”

Then she went upstairs.

Pei’s mother was used to treating Wen Zhu like a servant, and this open defiance of her command was the first she’d ever seen.

She frowned, subconsciously wanting to scold her, but ultimately she dismissively pursed her lips.

Suppressing her displeasure, she stared at the slender figure on the stairs and added in a chilling tone, “Xiubai is meeting with the eldest daughter of the Lin family soon. You’d better not harbor any unwarranted expectations just because you once saved Xiubai.”

Wen Zhu’s steps paused slightly, but she still didn’t stop, continuing up the stairs.

The door on the second floor closed, and Pei’s mother’s eyes were filled with disgust as she muttered under her breath, “Heartless thing.”

The nail technician was curious and tentatively asked, “Madam Pei, is that a relative of yours?”

“Relative?” Pei’s mother sneered, her laugh seemingly able to freeze the air. “You give her too much credit.”

Her gaze swept over the room at the end of the second floor, her eyes filled with intense contempt. “She’s just the daughter of a nanny, that’s all.”

Wen Zhu returned to her room.

Her room was large but empty, with hardly any furnishings.

The room was clean everywhere, with barely a speck of dust to be seen.

For years, she had lived like a cautious puppet in the Pei house, yet dared not leave any trace of herself, not wanting to bring the Pei family the slightest trouble.

Pei’s mother had even wished she would walk on tiptoes so as not to defile the Pei family’s floor.

But Wen Zhu was tired today. She casually took out a few pills from the drawer, swallowed them with the half-glass of cool water on the bedside table, and then collapsed onto the bed, too exhausted to even take off her clothes.

Outside the window, the moonlight was like water, its pale glow filtering through the thin sheer curtains, spilling onto her ashen face.

Wen Zhu closed her eyes, her thoughts drifting back to how long she had stayed at the Pei residence.

Fourteen years.

Since her mother died, she had lived in the Pei house for over a decade.

Pei Xianyi, Pei Xiubai’s mother, took pity on her and let her stay at the Pei house as a playmate for Pei Xiubai.

When they were little, Pei Xiubai wasn’t the powerful, aloof figure she was now. She would smile and take Wen Zhu to play hide and seek in the garden outside.

She would even fight other children on Wen Zhu’s behalf when they made fun of her.

She grew up with Pei Xiubai, following her wherever she went.

After graduating from college, Pei Xiubai was going to work at the family company. Not wanting to interact much with other women, she whined and insisted that Wen Zhu give up her job and become her secretary.

Wen Zhu couldn’t refuse any of her demands, so she followed Pei Xiubai into the company.

She worked tirelessly with Pei Xiubai, on call day and night, thinking this would make Pei Xiubai see how good she was.

But what she ultimately received was nothing but emptiness.

Pei Xiubai had changed her mind.

She had noticed that something was off with Pei Xiubai over a year ago.

Slowly, Pei Xiubai stopped affectionately calling her by her nickname, “Qingqing,” and replaced it with the cold “Secretary Wen.”

Weekends, which used to be spent sticking together, turned into one social engagement after another for Pei Xiubai.

Her side also began to fill with many women Wen Zhu had never seen before.

After sleeping fitfully for a while, Wen Zhu woke up again. She checked the time; it was only three in the morning.

With some strength recovered, she got up to pack her things.

Since she had decided to resign, it was better to make a clean break. She didn’t want to stay in the Pei house any longer.

The packing went quickly. After living in the Pei house for so many years, all her belongings fit into a single suitcase.

Finally, only two crudely made, crookedly stitched cloth dolls remained.

Wen Zhu looked at them and couldn’t help but fall back into memories.

These were the first dolls Pei Xiubai had made in a craft class when they were little, given to her as a birthday present.

She had even sewn the hands of the two dolls together, stitch by stitch, right in front of Wen Zhu.

Little Pei Xiubai smiled at her, her eyes crescent shaped, and said with utmost seriousness, “Qingqing, I will always hold your hand like this and never let go.”

The promise back then was real, and the forgetting now was also real.

All these years later, the thread sewing the two dolls together had long since become brittle.

Wen Zhu just lightly picked them up, and the thread snapped.

She hesitated but ultimately chose not to take the two dolls with her.

The downstairs lights were still on, suggesting Pei Xiubai probably hadn’t returned yet.

Wen Zhu wasn’t in the mood to think about that. It was better that Pei Xiubai wasn’t here.

She grabbed her suitcase and, enduring the cold wind, left the Pei house without looking back.

In the early morning, when the sky was still dark, Pei Xiubai finally returned.

Still not fully sober, she stumbled onto the sofa.

“Wen Zhu, Wen Zhu…” Pressing her throbbing temples, her throat terribly dry, she called out, “Bring me the pear soup you boiled…”

The call echoed in the dark and cold living room, receiving no answer.

Pei Xiubai was extremely annoyed, kicking the sofa heavily with her long legs. “Are you pretending not to hear me? How long are you going to keep up this fuss? I really don’t know what you’re so wronged about all day.”

The second floor remained deadly silent.

Pei Xiubai’s patience finally ran out. She grabbed a delicate ornament from the coffee table and went upstairs, smashing it against Wen Zhu’s door.

“Bang!”

With a loud noise, the ornament shattered into pieces on the door.

Her expression was as dark as ink. “I’ll give you one last chance. Get out here!”

The room was silent, but such a commotion still woke up the auntie/maid sleeping on the first floor.

The auntie threw on some clothes and, still groggy, looked up at the second floor, asking, “Miss, what’s wrong?”

Pei Xiubai’s head was splitting. She ordered, “You call Wen Zhu out for me.”

She mentioned resigning last night, and today she wouldn’t bring her pear soup and was pretending not to hear her calls. Had she not played this trick enough?

The auntie knew Pei Xiubai’s habit: every time she came back after drinking, she had to have the pear soup stewed by Miss Wen Zhu.

She checked the time; it was only six o’clock. She wondered if the girl absolutely had to be woken up to stew soup at this hour.

However, thinking that if Wen Zhu didn’t get up to stew it, she would have to, the auntie didn’t dare disobey Pei Xiubai’s command. She went downstairs to get the spare key, then came back up and directly unlocked Wen Zhu’s door.

“Click,” and the wooden door was slowly pushed open.

The auntie took two steps inside. As soon as she entered Wen Zhu’s room, she paused, seemingly surprised…

This was Miss Wen Zhu’s room?

For all these years, Madam hadn’t let her clean Miss Wen Zhu’s room, so she didn’t know what it looked like.

Now, it seemed so empty.

There was no warmth of life, it was even simpler than her own servant’s room.

Thinking of Pei Xiubai still waiting outside, the auntie walked in a bit further and softly asked, “Miss Wen Zhu, are you awake?”

The sky had brightened a little. The room’s curtains weren’t drawn, and the faint morning light leaked in, hitting the bed.

The bed was clearly empty.

Wen Zhu wasn’t there.

After hearing the auntie tell her this, Pei Xiubai immediately said, “Impossible. If not back at the Pei house, where else would she go?”

The auntie cautiously glanced at Pei Xiubai’s face and added, “Also, Miss Wen Zhu’s room is very empty. There’s nothing in it, like… like she moved out.”

“What did you say?” Pei Xiubai’s expression darkened completely, and a storm brewed in her eyes.

She pushed the door open and walked in.

The room was indeed as the auntie had described: empty. The bed, the shelves—there wasn’t a single extra item.

Pei Xiubai opened the wardrobe. It was equally hollow.

No, it wasn’t completely empty. She instantly spotted the only two things left behind: the two cloth dolls.

The two dolls were separated, sitting back to back in the corners of the wardrobe, as if a chasm lay between them.

Seeing the scene before her, Pei Xiubai was first stunned.

Then, realizing something, her face turned ashen. She was so furious that her temples pulsed, and she uttered three “Good”s.

“You’ve truly gained some nerve!” she sneered, a flicker of coldness in her eyes as she stared at the dolls. “If you dare to leave, don’t ever come back.”

Did she really think Pei Xiubai would indulge Wen Zhu’s bad temper forever?

With that, she forcefully slammed the wardrobe door shut, the wood panel buzzing.

As soon as dawn broke, Pei Xiubai changed her clothes and went to the company.

Yu Pei was one of Tongcheng’s foremost large enterprises, a century-old prestigious family. As the future heir of Yu Pei, Pei Xiubai’s noble status went without saying.

The first thing she did upon arriving at the company was to immediately instruct her other secretary, her gaze intensely cold: “When Wen Zhu arrives, have her come to see me immediately.”

Upon hearing this, Secretary Sun was startled.

She sensed that Pei Xiubai was in a very bad mood today, and the intense pressure made her spine prickle. “President Pei, Secretary Wen may not be able to come.”

She hesitated, then said as if steeling herself for death, “Just half an hour ago, Secretary Wen sent her resignation to the Human Resources department…”