Pregnant with My Late Husband’s Child - Chapter 12

The rain on the Qingye Peninsula finally stopped in the evening. Fallen leaves and grass littered the walking paths, and the cleaning robots were dutifully sweeping them away. Roth walked past the robots with bloodshot eyes, stumbling back to his family villa.

Luo Taylor watched her son enter the house, soaked and in a disheveled state. She hurriedly commanded the AI to bring him a dry towel and then brushed the rain from his face with a pained heart: “Roth, what happened? Why did you get yourself into such a state?”

Under his mother’s soft inquiries and gentle patting, Roth Davis could no longer bear the gloom and grievances in his heart. He hugged his mother and wept.

“Mom, why is it that Li just does not want to be with me?” Roth collapsed emotionally. “What exactly is wrong with me? Why is he unwilling to like me and be with me?”

Luo Taylor did not expect that her son was heartbroken over this matter, and she was startled by his loud, agonizing cries. She did not know what to say for a moment and could only try to soothe him: “My treasure, how could there be anything wrong with you?”

“And you all! You knew I liked him, yet you still sent him to that marriage alliance! I like him so much! I have liked him since I was sixteen!” Roth poured out all his dissatisfaction. “You said before that as long as I became a Major General, I could marry him. I worked so hard, and it was so difficult to finally become a Major General, but in the end.”

As he spoke, Roth began to cry again.

Luo Taylor felt a bit helpless. In her view, Roth and Li Yixing were simply not a match. Someone like Li Yixing, with a cold heart and indifferent nature, was an ungrateful wretch who could never love her child, Roth, with his whole heart. Moreover, he was the child of her husband Stan Davis’s first love. If not for that connection, why would Stan Davis have brought him home?

In short, Luo Taylor did not like Li Yixing at all, nor would she ever allow Li Yixing to be with Feng Zhao. Therefore, when this marriage alliance emerged, Luo Taylor was the first to agree. She was practically cheering for it with both hands and feet.

Fortunately, Li Yixing was also sensible and did not oppose it. Opposing it would have been useless anyway. They had raised Li Yixing for so many years; they had to collect some interest eventually.

As for the earlier remark about waiting until he became a Major General to let them marry, that had merely been a joke. With Roth’s military command capabilities, he would not have known how long he would have had to wait to accumulate the seniority for a Major General rank. But who knew? Driven by this marriage alliance, so many people came to flatter and curry favor that they actually pushed Roth into the Major General position.

She did not want her child to be any Major General, and she had even demanded with vehement language that Stan find a way to remove Roth from his post. However, she was met with opposition from Stan, who said this position was the perfect way to grind down Roth’s willful, arrogant young master personality. But being a Major General meant going to space to fight; one careless mistake, and he would end up like Feng Zhao, dying without even a bone left. She would eventually find a way to transfer Roth to a more suitable post so that, in the future, he could inherit Stan Davis’s mantle and enter the Alliance Council.

“Why must you like him? There are plenty of warm and thoughtful men and women in the Alliance, and Li Yixing is nothing but an ungrateful little wolf,” Luo Taylor patted Roth’s shoulder, feeling that he was not meeting her expectations. “What kind of partner could you not have? Why must you hang yourself on a crooked tree?”

“Although Li is indeed a bit of a wolf and just hit me, he is not a crooked tree. You do not understand.” Roth felt as wronged as an abandoned golden retriever.

“He hit you? Then why are you still licking his boots!”

“I like him.”

Luo Taylor: “…”

She felt a sense of frustration, truly unable to understand what there was to like about Li Yixing.

But Roth was clearly deep in the throes of love and was deeply heartbroken. He had indeed liked Li Yixing for a very long time.

He remembered Li Yixing’s appearance when he first arrived at the Davis home: a twelve-year-old boy wearing a washed-out blue striped shirt and denim overalls, his hair obediently pasted against that soft, cute face. He had watched his surroundings vigilantly like a rabbit that had just come out of its burrow. What a heart-softening child!

However, Roth’s attitude toward Li Yixing back then had been terrible. After all, he had been the only child in the house, and now there was another. He felt that Li Yixing would steal away his parents’ affection. Therefore, relying on being five months older, he was always bossy toward Li Yixing and would bully him from time to time. But Li Yixing never seemed to care; he did not cry and never told on him.

The turning point was during their military combat course when they were sixteen. Roth remembered he was unlucky enough to be matched against Feng Zhao. His skills were not refined enough to beat Feng Zhao, and if he went up, he would definitely be beaten until he did not even recognize his own mother. He remembered anxiously asking his classmates for help, hoping to swap numbers, but no one listened. It was Li Yixing who took the initiative to swap with him.

Roth could still recall Li Yixing’s appearance back then. He wore the navy blue combat uniform of Dacles Military Academy, and a black combat mask covered his lower face and neck, revealing only a pair of beautiful, long-lashed black eyes. Those eyes seemed to speak, shining brilliantly in the outdoor sunlight, flashing so brightly that Roth’s heart beat wildly.

He swapped their numbers and raised his hand, saying: “Roth, I will go fight him.”

Roth had remembered this scene for many years. From then on, he stopped bullying Li Yixing, relying on his status as the Davis family’s biological child. Later, he lowered his pride and apologized to Li Yixing, hoping to improve their relationship.

But Li Yixing had always kept him at a distance. At first, Roth thought Li Yixing was just playing hard to get, but he later discovered that Li Yixing truly did not care about him.

Roth felt a bit devastated; he could not believe Li Yixing did not like him.

Was it because he had bullied Li Yixing when they were children that Li Yixing refused to accept him?

But I apologized! Roth thought to himself. I told him I was sorry and explained that I was too immature back then. Why could he not forgive me? Besides, he did not seem to care about those childhood matters at all.

Or did he care a lot deep down, even if he appeared indifferent? If that were the case, he was truly petty, Roth thought with grievance. But it did not matter; he was a magnanimous person and could naturally tolerate such a small flaw. Sooner or later, he would win Li Yixing over. He would make Li Yixing understand that he was the best and final destination for him.

“Regardless of whether I understand or not,” Luo Taylor told Roth, “I will absolutely not agree to you being with him. Moreover, Li Yixing has already married Feng Zhao, and it is impossible for him to be with you.”

“But Feng Zhao is already dead,” Roth sniffled and said in a low voice. “How can the dead compete with the living? Li just does not understand my goodness yet. Once he understands, I will definitely be able to marry him.”

Luo Taylor watched as Roth stood up with absolute certainty, his eyes filled with a look of inevitable victory, and felt another headache coming on.

She had to find a way to completely break Roth’s obsession.

On the other side, inside the brightly lit villa, Li Yixing was recalling the final interrogation results he had seen that afternoon. The Imperial spy they had captured finally confessed that his handler was in the Alliance Institute of Life Sciences. However, because it was always a single-line contact, he did not know the handler’s name or appearance, only that his handler’s codename was “X” and that he was ordered to collect the movements of professors at Boya Medical School regularly every month. As for what they planned to do, the Imperial spy did not know, because he was just the most inconspicuous little nail, and even if he were pried out, it would not affect the overall situation. He had no opportunity to know what the plan was.

To avoid alerting the enemy, the interrogation content was kept strictly confidential. Currently, only a few key personnel within the Security Department knew this news.

Feng Zhiyu sat down beside Li Yixing with a glass of hot milk. His movements were very light, but it still startled Li Yixing, who was deep in thought.

He looked at Feng Zhiyu expressionlessly and said in a flat tone: “What is it? Is something the matter?”

Feng Zhiyu felt a shiver down his spine at the sight of Li Yixing’s cold face. He placed the hot milk on the table and said to Li Yixing: “Senior, it is very late. Let us talk about work matters tomorrow. I heated up a glass of milk for you; it can help you sleep.”

“Thank you,” Li Yixing politely refused, “but I do not drink milk. You drink it.”

Feng Zhiyu’s expression froze for a long moment before returning to normal: “So that is how it is. Then what do you like to eat and drink for breakfast, Senior? I will have the robot prepare it tomorrow.”

“Thank you, I do not have the habit of eating breakfast,” Li Yixing once again refused Feng Zhiyu’s kindness, “You can prepare it for yourself.”

“Not eating breakfast is bad for your health,” Feng Zhiyu revealed just the right amount of distress in his eyes, “No matter how busy you are at work, you cannot disregard your body.”

As he spoke, he moved his body quietly, inching a bit closer to Li Yixing.

This distance was technically imperceptible, but Li Yixing moved slightly further away without a word: “It does not matter, work is important.”

Feng Zhiyu’s smile froze on the corners of his lips. He pretended not to know anything and turned to another topic: “Major General Roth’s actions this afternoon truly scared me to death.”

“…” Mentioning Roth gave Li Yixing a bit of a headache.

His attitude toward Roth had always been lukewarm. To him, Roth was a product of excessively powerful fetal protection technology in the New Era. Furthermore, Roth was a member of the Davis family, and he did not want to have too much contact or entanglement with him.

But Roth clearly did not think so. He bullied him as a child and wanted him to marry him when he grew up. To survive, Li Yixing tolerated Roth’s childhood bullying, teasing, and even insults. After growing up, facing Roth’s 180-degree turn in attitude, Li Yixing had always clearly refused.

He had told Roth many times that he did not like him, but Roth seemed as if he could not understand, insisting that he was just throwing a tantrum because of past events.

“Speaking of which, Senior and Major General Roth are childhood sweethearts. Does Major General Roth like you, Senior?” Feng Zhiyu remembered the faint sounds of arguing he had heard when knocking on the door during the day. “I am sorry, I was very anxious at the time and stayed outside the door. It seems I heard some things I should not have. Senior will not blame me, right?”

Li Yixing was noncommittal regarding this: “It is nothing important.”

This sentence was like a reassurance pill stuffed into Feng Zhiyu’s mouth. He let out a long sigh of relief and said to Li Yixing: “Although Brother is dead, this marriage alliance has not ended. Senior…”

“I understand what you mean,” Li Yixing said in a flat tone, “Please rest assured. I will continue to maintain this marriage alliance, play the role of a widowed mascot, and ensure that I will not betray Feng Zhao by remarrying in the next twenty years. If you feel this time is not enough, I can extend it further.”

Feng Zhiyu’s smile froze again, and he almost bit his teeth to pieces.

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