Joining A Dating Show With Five Exes - Chapter 20

Chapter 20: Fly and Land in My Palm

The photographer’s voice echoed through the stairwell.

“Teacher Cheng? Teacher Xie? Are you there?”

But the person in front of Cheng Shiyuan, who had adopted a studious attitude, didn’t move an inch.

There was a unique kind of allure when a well-behaved student did something naughty.

It was like a drop of ink on a blank sheet of paper.

Cheng Shiyuan’s lower abdomen felt a slight heat from the dangerous stimulation.

She even felt that the other person’s fingertips must already be damp.

She curved her eyes, suddenly raised her hands, and wrapped them around Xie Zhiqing’s neck, pulling this wolfdog, who was ready to bite at any moment, even closer.

She was enjoying the thrill of testing the boundaries of those dangerous fangs.

“Actually, you really like public places, don’t you?”

Her nose brushed against the side of the woman’s neck, almost imperceptibly.

She asked with a playful smile, her breath a warm puff, as if she were seriously considering Xie Zhiqing’s suggestion: “The living room? The balcony? The outdoor swimming pool?”

This time, it was Xie Zhiqing whose breath hitched.

Her dark eyes were motionless, as if she had already entered this beautiful dream.

She even imagined her penthouse apartment with a 270-degree panoramic sea view. The dazzling golden sunlight would stream into the living room and fall on Cheng Shiyuan’s smooth, bare back…

The slender, long back of her neck, the shoulder blades that looked like they were ready to take flight, the taut, hand-span-wide waist.

And if she were also wearing a snow-white swimsuit, with a bow tied at her lower back like a gift waiting to be unwrapped…

Xie Zhiqing’s throat tightened unconsciously. Her fingertips curled, wanting to untie her gift.

But a sudden sound rang in her ear, startling her and making her heart skip a beat.

“Buzz!”

It was a notification from her phone.

The stairwell was too quiet, and the abrupt message became a guiding light for the photographer.

His voice rang out from the stairs: “Are the two teachers there? Are you there?”

Cheng Shiyuan watched as Xie Zhiqing’s dazed expression instantly cooled as she looked at her phone screen.

The rising, ambiguous atmosphere dissipated, settling into a cold, wet chill.

She let out a soft laugh, suddenly remembering the reason for their first breakup.

She had gone after her with all her passion.

But she found that in Xie Zhiqing’s life, there were many other important people and things besides love.

The immature her from back then felt sullen, thinking that this was different from the novels she read where love triumphed over everything.

But now, Cheng Shiyuan no longer harbored such naive notions.

She casually knocked on the wall to signal to the photographer that they were there. She straightened up and even managed a calm tease:

“CEO Xie, are you still so busy even on a date?”

Clutching her phone, Xie Zhiqing keenly realized from Cheng Shiyuan’s sudden coldness that she had made another mistake.

Her palm tightened unconsciously. The message she had just received replayed in her mind:

“CEO Xie. I asked around. The people who hired those professionals to steal the blood samples are from Hong Kong.”

—Why Hong Kong again? Could it be a contingency plan Chen Chuxing left behind?

No, if Chen Chuxing could hire these people, she wouldn’t have gone to all the trouble of causing a scene at the concert.

Then who could it be? Who else did Cheng Shiyuan have such a deep connection with in Hong Kong?

A series of mysteries kept popping up in her mind, but Xie Zhiqing couldn’t say a single word about it.

In the hospital, Cheng Shiyuan’s anxiety about those blood samples was off the charts. If she were to find out that the samples weren’t destroyed, then this rewarding date…

Xie Zhiqing refused to break this beautiful moment.

She, for a rare and difficult time, opened her mouth to explain: “I’m not busy… it’s just about the company’s…”

She hadn’t even finished her sentence.

Cheng Shiyuan had already smiled and interjected for her: “Work message, right? I get it.”

“Don’t show it to me, though. I don’t want to know your company’s business secrets.”

The education Xie Zhiqing received had almost drilled into her the importance of separating private and public matters.

For commercial groups the size of the Xie and Cheng families, a successor who couldn’t tell the difference would be a devastating blow to the company’s development.

But only today did Xie Zhiqing realize that Cheng Shiyuan’s self-awareness and avoidance of suspicion were actually a form of alienation.

Cheng Shiyuan knew that she valued this date very much, but she wasn’t curious about the important message that interrupted it. She wasn’t angry, nor did she show any signs of jealousy—

She suddenly found her past values of rationality and calmness unbearable.

Because if she truly loved her deeply, how could she hold on to such trivial rationality and restraint?

“Shiyuan…” She closed her eyes and caught up to the person who was explaining to the photographer that they were “cooling off in the stairwell.”

“I’m sorry.” Xie Zhiqing, who rarely showed her emotions in front of the camera, said it again: “I’m sorry.”

Profound guilt and self-blame surged in her eyes.

The wolfdog, who was always dignified and held her head high, for the first time, lowered her arrogant head without her master’s command.

She wanted to beg Cheng Shiyuan to return to her old self, to not be so “understanding” and to not so easily accept her excuses. Whether it was throwing a tantrum or deliberately making a fuss…

She wanted to see Cheng Shiyuan’s “care” and “love” for her.

Cheng Shiyuan understood her rare and humble plea.

But she didn’t want to satisfy her just yet.

When being understanding became a special form of torment, she suddenly found it quite enjoyable to play the part.

Captured Xie Zhiqing’s emotional fluctuation. Converted to life duration: 5 hours.

Wow.

This guilt was apparently more dramatic than if they had actually engaged in discreet intimacy in the stairwell.

Cheng Shiyuan was astonished, but on the surface, she expressed her understanding with a light and breezy demeanor.

However, the more casually she treated it, the more obvious Xie Zhiqing’s unwillingness and self-reproach became.

After toying with Xie Zhiqing for a few minutes, Cheng Shiyuan suddenly realized:

Something’s not right!

Even if the message on Xie Zhiqing’s phone was about the Xie Group preparing to acquire the Cheng Group and make the Cheng family go bankrupt.

Based on Xie Zhiqing’s understanding of her, she knew their relationship with her family had dropped to freezing point over the years, so doing something like this wouldn’t cause such guilt, would it?

“But, Zhiqing.” She spoke with a bright smile, like a sudden curiosity.

“Was that really a work message you just received?”

“I remember your assistant is quite reliable. For them to message you at this time, it must be something important, right? It’s okay, if it’s urgent, you can just go back to the company now.” Her tone was full of consideration.

Xie Zhiqing instinctively denied it: “No. It’s nothing urgent.”

That made it even more suspicious.

Cheng Shiyuan’s smile on her face deepened, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

“Really?” She tilted her head, stared at the woman for a moment, and then shrugged: “Okay, if you say it’s nothing, then it’s nothing.”

Then, she changed the subject: “Just don’t be like you were when your grandfather passed away, hiding it and not telling me. As if I didn’t deserve to share your joys and sorrows.”

Xie Zhiqing’s breath hitched.

She knew Cheng Shiyuan was calling her out for being overly strong-willed and self-righteous.

She thought she should bear all the bad, sad emotions by herself, silently processing them, while the other person should always be happy and bright.

But Cheng Shiyuan, it seemed, didn’t need her to “shield her from the wind and rain.”

“I…”

Xie Zhiqing knew this full well, yet she still couldn’t bring herself to let go of her phone—

There weren’t many people who could take things from her so brazenly.

Her willingness to bow her head to Cheng Shiyuan was a sign of her trust and affection for her partner.

But if the aggressive party was another watchful competitor coveting all her possessions, how could she willingly admit defeat?

She wished she could bite all her competitors to death on her own territory, and then hang their defeated bodies on the high wall to warn all the unthinking coveters.

“Shiyuan, do you trust me?” But in the end, Xie Zhiqing just closed her eyes.

When she opened them again, she looked deep into her eyes with an almost unreserved sincerity:

“When this matter has a resolution, I will tell you the whole process, okay?”

She wanted to get the item back and make everything lead to the ending she had promised Cheng Shiyuan.

Even if in the process.

It would be proof of her incompetence.

Cheng Shiyuan looked at her, appearing to have made a huge decision to be honest with her, and suddenly felt like the bad guy who had pushed her into a desperate situation.

But what could she do?

She wanted to be even naughtier.

She smiled and spread out her palm to Xie Zhiqing:

“But, compared to passively waiting for the result, I actually prefer to be in control of things.”

“It sounds like this matter has something to do with me. Are you really not going to let me see it?”

Xie Zhiqing pursed her lips.

The hostility toward the unknown competitor and her love for Cheng Shiyuan were constantly clashing in her mind.

She slowly raised her phone, her inner struggle growing more intense. Just as her rationality was about to waver—

A pair of hands suddenly reached out from the side and firmly held her palm, shaking it.

“CEO Xie, since you had time to return to your alma mater, why didn’t you let someone notify me in advance?”

The principal, a wide smile on his face, rushed over with several school leaders.

The Xie family was not only the local leading enterprise and a major taxpayer, but they had also built a gymnasium for the school when Xie Zhiqing was a student. After she took over the family business, she also consistently donated to the school’s anniversary celebration every year.

The principal looked at her as if she were a walking golden goose.

Although his gaze was inevitably drawn to Cheng Shiyuan, his body was very honest, walking beside Xie Zhiqing.

Seeing herself surrounded by school leaders, who had, in the blink of an eye, separated her from Cheng Shiyuan, Xie Zhiqing’s brows furrowed slightly. She stopped and replied indifferently:

“This is a private trip for the show, so I didn’t intend to bother everyone.”

The principal: “What show? Hey, do you want to take a picture of the alumni honor board? I remember the photo of CEO Xie being elected as the student union president in middle school is still there!”

Xie Zhiqing took out a wet wipe, cleaned her hands, and walked through the crowd, pulling Cheng Shiyuan back to her side and firmly holding her hand.

She didn’t care for these flatteries and even found it ridiculous that they couldn’t see who they should be flattering.

“Do you want to go see it?” So, she only showed a gentle smile to the person beside her:

“I remember the person who was elected president the first year was you.”

Xie Zhiqing was certainly an excellent student. Everyone at school who had seen her thought that the student representative should look exactly like her.

But when Cheng Shiyuan went on stage, Xie Zhiqing had to admit that there was a type of person in this world who was born for the stage.

Her eyes couldn’t move away from this person. After Cheng Shiyuan finished her election speech, she couldn’t help but clap loudly, willingly losing to this shining person.

And when she saw that photo again, the balanced scale in Xie Zhiqing’s heart finally began to tilt—

Would Cheng Shiyuan, who was just as capable as her as an heir, really be happy with her ultimate honesty?

Or perhaps.

Now was her only chance to be honest.

Xie Zhiqing’s eyelashes trembled.

Her fingertips lightly touched the screen, and she lit up her phone again. Xie Zhiqing, who had always planned her moves and preferred to solve all problems with a cool head, now held the courage of a gambler betting everything.

She wanted to use this chance to gamble for Cheng Shiyuan’s love to change her mind and return to her.

However, Cheng Shiyuan, standing beside her, was unaware of the determined courage being born next to her. Her gaze was involuntarily drawn elsewhere.

Captured Xia Ziran’s emotional fluctuation. Converted to life duration: 5 minutes.

As the saying goes, even a mosquito’s leg is still meat.

But who could stand a mosquito constantly buzzing in their ear?

Ever since this date with Xie Zhiqing began, if the emotional fluctuations from others were only occasional, the frequency of broadcasts about Xia Ziran could almost be called harassment.

Cheng Shiyuan, almost helplessly, finally looked at the fence behind the honor board.

On the pedestrian street outside the fence, vendors should have been setting up their stalls at this time on the weekend, but now the entire street was empty. They didn’t even need the production crew to put up banners to block people.

She narrowed her eyes, watched Xie Zhiqing being enthusiastically surrounded by the leaders and unable to break free, and walked toward that area alone.

She examined the cold-blooded animal that had been lurking in the shadows for a long time and finally couldn’t help but come out into the open to show her presence.

“What mischief are you up to now?”

She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow through the fence’s gaps.

Xia Ziran lifted her chin toward her, gesturing to the small cart she had just rented: “What’s wrong? Is it okay for classmate Cheng to miss her alma mater and revisit old places, but not okay for me to suddenly miss the snacks outside the school and revisit the past?”

Cheng Shiyuan glanced at the simple cart.

Then she looked at the flashy, multi-colored dress Xia Ziran was wearing.

Her expression was subtle: “How do you plan on revisiting the past?”

“Selling wontons, handmade ones.” Xia Ziran emphasized the important part: “I made them. Want some?”

Cheng Shiyuan burst out laughing.

She seemed to remember a night when she had a hard time with her request for freshly boiled wontons.

Then, she shook her head with feigned sincerity: “No. There’s no one in line around your stall. It must not taste good.”

Xia Ziran: “?”

Faced with the foolish option of having to spend money to hire people to come and line up after already spending money to book the place.

“Cheng, Shi, yuan.” She narrowed her eyes dangerously, and her tone deepened. She chose to threaten the only customer present.

Cheng Shiyuan, who was immune to her tricks, pretended to think and looked back deliberately:

“Or should I ask my date if she wants some?”

Xia Ziran almost choked.

She immediately sneered and announced: “You, free. Her, one hundred thousand per bowl.”

Hearing Cheng Shiyuan’s fake complaint about how expensive it was, as if she was actually going to pay for Xie Zhiqing’s bowl too.

Xia Ziran knew she was doing it on purpose, but she still couldn’t control the distorted look on her face because she cared about someone else.

—Especially that someone else, who was named Xie Zhiqing.

But then she thought about the “big gift” she had prepared for their exclusive date, and she could only constantly tell herself to calm down.

A moment later, she picked up the ladle hanging nearby, lifted the lid, and scooped up a bowl of hot, plump little wontons.

She even hesitated, looking at Cheng Shiyuan’s expression, and put a little bit of chopped green onion in it.

Cheng Shiyuan didn’t expect her to be so composed today. She was originally thinking that there were too many dogs around her, and making one of them angry would save her trouble. Now, she could only accept the bowl of wontons with a look of regret.

Xia Ziran, with her sharp eyes, saw that the wontons’ skin and filling had separated after being boiled for too long and stirred a couple of times.

She watched Cheng Shiyuan with a menacing look, ready to deal with her mockery.

But after waiting for a while, she only saw her slowly and seriously tasting the wontons.

This made her suddenly remember that the first time she cooked wontons for Cheng Shiyuan, they were probably undercooked.

But the “princess” who should have been very picky back then finished them graciously.

This little bird never learns…

She pretends to be heartless and promiscuous, flitting among flowers, as if she doesn’t care about anyone, but even when she bickers with a bad guy like her, she’s not that fierce.

Because of this, whenever Xia Ziran saw her acting bad, she couldn’t help but want to personally teach her how a truly bad person should act—

After all, Xie Zhiqing, that stupid person who only knew how to feign weakness, could never hold on to this little bird who loved freedom.

It would be much more interesting to put a leg band with her own mark on her and dye her with her own color.

Ignoring the highly-present warning gaze from a distance, Xia Ziran smiled nonchalantly and said to Cheng Shiyuan:

“As the first customer to visit my stall today.”

“I’ll give you an extra gift, a piece of art meticulously crafted by me, as a souvenir.”

She deliberately used a tone that sounded like she was up to no good.

She succeeded in making little bird Cheng’s beautiful eyes fill with vigilance and wariness.

But Xia Ziran, who knew her true nature, already knew how to lure her prey into the trap step by step.

“You don’t want to see it? It seems to have something to do with your date. She seems to have made some big enemies.”

Xia Ziran never used obvious provocation.

Although she didn’t want to see Cheng Shiyuan show any concern for Xie Zhiqing, this was the only way to get Cheng Shiyuan to approach her. Even if the bait was her most disliked rival in love.

“Did you misunderstand something?” Cheng Shiyuan looked at her with surprise.

Even though she was highly suspicious that Xia Ziran was deliberately throwing out a smokescreen, she couldn’t help but laugh at the reason she gave:

“If she really made an enemy, I would, of course, choose to stay as far away from that danger as possible.”

With Xie Zhiqing’s current status, if she made an enemy of someone she couldn’t afford to, Cheng Shiyuan couldn’t even think of a way to help her.

“I thought so too.”

Xia Ziran nodded gladly, wholeheartedly agreeing with her smart choice not to stand near a collapsing wall.

If Cheng Shiyuan didn’t fall for it and let Xie Zhiqing suffer, she would be happy.

And if the silly little bird had to choose to worry about Xie Zhiqing and suffer with her, that would be a good lesson for her.

No matter what, she would get the result she wanted. Xia Ziran turned around and pushed her cart away on her own:

“In that case, I’ll just destroy this piece of art that no one can appreciate.”

Three.

Two.

“Wait.”

Before Xia Ziran could count to one, Cheng Shiyuan’s voice slowly rang out again.

“I thought about it. Even though I can’t share a hard time with Old Xie, I do quite like to watch people’s drama.”

“—Why don’t I help you appreciate that piece of art?”

Lying again.

With her back to her, Xia Ziran’s silhouette was cast in a deep shadow by the strong sunlight.

But when she turned around, she had already put on a calm smile, like a loyal knight serving his princess. She took out her phone, opened a video, and played it for her.

It was a clip from a hospital’s surveillance footage, taken by Xia Ziran’s people.

It was only a little over ten seconds.

Two groups of people clashed, fighting for a few vials of blood. It made her frown deeply.

But she was sure that Xie Zhiqing wouldn’t want something like this to get out.

And it just so happened that the things Xie Zhiqing didn’t want to happen were exactly what Xia Ziran wanted to make happen. After all, the two main characters, Cheng Shiyuan and Chen Chuxing, were also in that hospital that day.

Observing Cheng Shiyuan’s seemingly expressionless face, but with every hair tense, Xia Ziran thought to herself thoughtfully, the core of this struggle is indeed about Cheng Shiyuan again.

If the blood was Cheng Shiyuan’s, then what kind of secret would the little bird be hiding from her?

Did it have anything to do with that kiss in front of the art museum, where she begged for more?

After several thoughts passed through her mind, she smiled and leaned her cheek close to the fence, seemingly lowering her stance, but her eyes were firmly fixed on Cheng Shiyuan’s face above.

“If you like this piece of art, remember to give me a five-star review, okay?”

Xia Ziran’s tone was exceptionally sweet, like a lure.

Her eyes also narrowed in pleasure.

In her mind, however, she held an art knife, cleanly and crisscrossing, scratching out a portrait belonging to Xie Zhiqing.

Xie Zhiqing, out.

As for that Chen Chuxing, even if she had a few tricks up her sleeve, she ultimately had no capital to compete.

She was not a threat, out.

“Swoosh,” “swoosh”

She scratched out another portrait, a seemingly beautiful and gentle face.

Wang Shu? She’s just going through a rebellious phase, likes to go against her parents, out.

The art knife tapped on the canvas, still mercilessly scratching off the entire piece of fabric.

She scratched out these portraits one by one.

The huge canvas of portraits, as she had imagined, came crashing down, taking a perfect final bow on the stage.

Only Xia Ziran was left standing in the center of the stage, licking her lips with satisfaction.

It looks like this little bird only has me to rely on now, right?

Come on.

Fly and land in my palm.