To Marry My Little Chestnut - Chapter 24

Yu Yan’s heart rate soared into the fast lane. Warm water flowed over his palms as the man’s slightly rough fingertips rubbed away the soap bubbles.

“Is that so?” Zheng Tingyang chuckled softly.

Supporting Yu Yan from behind while helping him wash his hands, Zheng Tingyang leaned down. Yu Yan watched blankly in the mirror as the man pressed a kiss to the gland at the back of his neck. When he spoke, it felt as though he was grazing Yu Yan’s earlobe, making Yu Yan’s legs feel as weak as overcooked noodles. “If it was comfortable, why did you cry so aggrievedly? You aren’t just trying to bluff me, are you?”

Yu Yan opened his mouth, stung by the words. His Adam’s apple bobbed, and his slightly swollen eyes held a hint of shame and indignation.

“I… I do not lie.” His voice was incredibly hoarse, sounding like a soft Southern lilt. He tried to slip away from Zheng Tingyang’s embrace, but his legs were too weak to stand.

Leaning back, his entire body was gathered into Zheng Tingyang’s arms and carried back to the bedroom.

The entire room was filled with Yu Yan’s pheromones; the air itself was thick with sweetness. An Omega saturated in the scent of heat could not simply be taken out for a checkup.

Zhou Jiangru contacted a friend in Beijing to fetch a reproductive chamber monitor from the hospital. The device, similar to a fetal heart monitor, was brought back for the examination.

Yu Yan lay on the bed, exposing his pale, round little belly. A probe was pressed and moved across the lower part of his abdomen.

“It looks fine. Currently, the reproductive chamber has opened sufficiently, and your pheromone concentration is decreasing. Did your heat periods used to last three or four days?”

Yu Yan nodded. This heat had only begun the previous night, and it was already starting to subside after just one day.

Zheng Tingyang did not fully understand. “Is that a good or bad thing? Does it affect his health?”

“For your partner here, it is a good thing,” Zhou Jiangru explained.

“The reason a normal Omega goes into heat is because the body needs soothing, both physically and psychologically. Everyone has a specific threshold. For example, if his reproductive chamber needs a full cup of water, but a normal person can only pour in a little bit at a time, the heat will persist until the body is too exhausted to continue or until the ‘cup’ is finally full.”

“The number of times he lost control yesterday left his body highly fatigued. The self-protection mechanism ended the heat early. The brain releases a signal: if the heat does not end now, the body will ‘dry up’ to death.”

By “dry,” she meant the lack of moisture found in a desert, not a verb. However, to Yu Yan’s ears, it sounded like a terrifying needle. He pulled the corner of the quilt up, covering himself tightly until he was just a ball on the bed, bashfully showing only a sliver of his forehead.

With a fever-reducing patch applied to his head, Zhou Jiangru left behind some iron supplements. Yu Yan was still confused, but he had extracted a term from their conversation he did not understand: “beaded.”

The door was ajar. Zheng Tingyang and Zhou Jiangru seemed to be discussing some sort of surgery and its side effects. He hid under the covers and secretly messaged Xiang Qian.

Xiang Qian: [Why are you suddenly asking about this? Who corrupted you?]

Great Prophet (Yu Yan): [Is it something for contraception?]

He thought it was a procedure similar to a vasectomy. He wondered if Zheng Tingyang felt guilty about the pregnancy and decided to get sterilized.

Xiang Qian: [No! Alphas in the clubs do that. When I was dating a male model, he had them. The sensation is incredible!]

After being “educated” for a while, Yu Yan dropped his phone onto his face while holding it under the covers.

Thud.

He was stunned silly. He had thought yesterday was just a dream. So, it really was different! No wonder…

He had only had intimate contact with Zheng Tingyang twice. The first time, he was much weaker; besides the reproductive instinct, he did not feel much. The second morning, he only felt weak, experiencing mostly pain and a bit of comfort. But yesterday was entirely different.

It felt like hitting the center of a bursting dam in a single second. He had been so overwhelmed he wanted to crawl off the bed while clutching his belly. Those ridges he felt… were not a dream.

Yu Yan had never understood why Xiang Qian enjoyed dating so much, endlessly cycling through various lovers. He thought Xiang Qian simply liked the feeling of being an emperor with a harem. After all, his own first time with Zheng Tingyang had been painful.

The psychological pain had been greater than the physical; he had lost his dignity in front of an old classmate he had not seen in years. Even though Zheng Tingyang was saving him that night, he still felt like an object, devoid of comfort.

Without an Alpha, he had been intermittently uncomfortable during his pregnancy, but he endured it, assuming he would eventually get used to it. It turned out he was just inexperienced and lacked the “field practice” to find the pleasure in it.

The feeling was like a timid cat being caught by its powerful master by the tail; he bristled instantly, his tail forced upward. He was both terrified and enjoying it. He could not stand it for a single second, and they had soaked through the hotel mattress. He thought a century had passed, but in reality, it had only been a short while.

They say a day in heaven is a year on earth. Was it because it was too comfortable that time moved so fast?

Last night, Zheng Tingyang was afraid of scaring him, so he covered Yu Yan’s eyes. Having experienced it, Yu Yan naturally knew the general shape. Uncertain, he lifted the quilt and looked down. He saw only his bulging belly; he really could not see his toes anymore.

Yu Yan was born an Omega, his glands had developed early, and his frame was quite small. He used his forearm to estimate the size. His arm was slender, and under the dim indoor light, he hallucinated a string of pearls wrapped around his arm, loop after loop after loop.

No wonder his backside hurt.

After seeing the doctor out, Zheng Tingyang entered the room to find Yu Yan with a red nose. He glanced at the phone, saw the chat logs, and then looked at Yu Yan’s dodging yet curious eyes. He raised an eyebrow. “Why did you not ask me?”

“I have discussed it. If you do not like it or cannot handle it, I can have them removed.”

“Ah?” Yu Yan felt a phantom pain. Even though he was not the one undergoing surgery, the mere thought was painful. He hooked his finger around Zheng Tingyang’s hand and shook his head.

Zheng Tingyang brushed his knuckles against Yu Yan’s cheek. “Then I will be gentler in the future. It will not be like that again.”

“I am not an Alpha; I cannot give you many things. In this regard, I cannot let you be uncomfortable. If you are not used to it, I will ask you in the future.”

“Ask?”

Zheng Tingyang nodded. “I will enter when you tell me to enter, and retreat when you tell me to retreat. Your feelings are the most important.”

The image of Zheng Tingyang touching his abdomen and asking if “this far” was okay flashed through Yu Yan’s mind. He opened his mouth, but his throat was too hoarse to speak.

Seeing his silence, Zheng Tingyang understood. He leaned over and pulled away the quilt Yu Yan was using as a shield. His lips curled into a slight smile, a rare hint of dominance showing through his gentleness.

Their noses almost touched. Zheng Tingyang asked, “Okay? Yu Yan.”

Hearing his name called, Yu Yan’s heart skipped a beat. He nodded like an ostrich. “…Mhm.”

“Do you want to sleep more? If not, do you want to eat? When Zhou Jiangru came earlier, I had her get crème brûlée from the hotpot restaurant across from the hospital. Do you want some?”

Yu Yan bit his lip before finally nodding.

The crème brûlée smelled sweet and fragrant. The hotel room was a presidential suite; in addition to the fireplace under the TV, the floor-to-ceiling windows in the living room led to an infinity pool. The light snow falling over Beijing melted into the flowing pool water. Zheng Tingyang covered him with a blanket. “If you like it, I will have someone deliver more tomorrow.”

It was a five-hour drive from Haicheng to Beijing. Yu Yan stared at the palm-sized dessert in his hand, an indescribable feeling in his heart. It felt as though the inside of his chest was much sweeter than his mouth.

“What is it?” Zheng Tingyang saw him set the bowl down and reached out toward him. “Is it not good?”

He leaned over, and Yu Yan, being small, hugged his neck as he leaned down. Due to nervousness, he accidentally kissed the wrong spot, landing a peck on the man’s earlobe.

Yu Yan smelled wonderful; even without pheromones, he had the pleasant scent of the brûlée.

Zheng Tingyang pursed his lips. “It is quite sweet.”

Yu Yan’s voice was soft, possessing a sickly sweetness from the hoarseness. “Really?”

The sound made Zheng Tingyang’s heart itch. When this voice reached his ear, it nearly melted his bones. “Really.”

The television was tuned to the financial channel Zheng Tingyang had been watching in the early hours. Haoyang Group and Changhang Group were the hot topics of the last two days. Amidst the soaring real estate industry and the rapid expansion of the information age, they were being pushed to the forefront.

In the past, Yu Yan would never have watched this, and he still did not understand it now. He sat on the sofa eating while Zheng Tingyang occasionally watched the TV or typed on his laptop. Yu Yan remembered that he had graduated from university, while Zheng Tingyang had dropped out of high school. To reach his current position step by step, how much hardship and suffering must he have endured?

He leaned gently against the side of the sofa to keep him company, eventually becoming drowsy.

Just as he was about to fall asleep, Zheng Tingyang caught his cheek. Yu Yan’s soft cheek felt like a hamster’s. He struggled to stay awake and asked, “Are you busy… because of me?”

Zheng Tingyang carried him back to the bedroom. “Why do you say that?”

Yu Yan noticed that since the night of the party, Zheng Tingyang’s phone was constantly ringing. He had become busy again, and Yu Yan felt like a burden for making him take time out of his busiest schedule to accompany him through his heat. Being an Omega was such a hassle. A little troublemaker.

Yu Yan did not want Zheng Tingyang to ruin a partnership for his sake. Zheng Tingyang protected him, and he did not want to be a hindrance. Finally, he said, “If only I were not an Omega…”

Then his father would not have tried to marry him into the Gao family, and Gao Wenjing would likely have no reason to cross paths with him.

Zheng Tingyang closed his laptop, hearing the subtext. “Being an Omega is fine. It has nothing to do with you.”

He knew. He knew everything. He knew that Father Yu was a greedy, petty man and understood the pain Yu Yan felt being put on display as the youngest son since childhood. How could he blame him?

Yu Yan wished he were not an Omega, and Zheng Tingyang similarly wished he were an Alpha. To love someone is to hate one’s own limitations and to resent one’s own perceived uselessness, feeling unworthy of the bright moon in one’s heart.

The Gao family had their eyes on Yu Yan since he was sixteen. Even in his fifties, the elder Mr. Gao viewed Yu Yan as a “rejuvenation pill” to be kept as a lover. Gao Wenjing followed in those footsteps; in high school, he thought Yu Yan was a future toy for the Gao family and tried to defile him.

Zheng Tingyang remembered every single incident. Yu Yan was pure-hearted; even talking about the events in high school did not feel shameful to him. He simply felt that things were like a vast sea—once they dissipated, they were gone.

His father did not want him, and when the Yu family went bankrupt, countless people wanted to trample on them. Yu Yan knew his own perceived uselessness all too well.

He could not help but shed tears, his shoulders shaking as he sobbed in Zheng Tingyang’s arms. “Tingyang, it is not worth it for you to stand up for me.”

“No one has ever treated me like this. I am happy in my heart, but I am afraid of dragging you down.” He did not want to see Zheng Tingyang suffer.

“Why are you crying all of a sudden?” Distressed, Zheng Tingyang hugged him and gently patted his back. “Do not be afraid, Xiao Yu. As long as you stay by my side obediently, you have nothing to fear.”

Yu Yan did not know if breaking the partnership with the Gao family was a major disaster. After his heat passed and his senses returned, he was still worried. He then changed the subject and asked Zheng Tingyang if the surgery was painful.

Zheng Tingyang said, “It does not hurt.” It was just a bit frustrating when the stitches kept snapping when they first got married.

Yu Yan hugged the quilt and then hugged the man’s arm, falling fast asleep with his cheek pressed against him. Zheng Tingyang’s fingertips cautiously touched a tear that had not yet fallen from Yu Yan’s eyelashes. The tear was absorbed into his fingertip; the salty bitterness of it felt like his heart was breaking.

Xiao Yu, oh Xiao Yu.

After he tore up your love letter back then, did you cry even more heartwrenchingly than you are now?

His Xiao Yu was such a crybaby and so considerate of others. If he knew that Zheng Tingyang was the true culprit who forced the Yu family into bankruptcy, would he cry then too? Would he cry for his father who died in a foreign land, or would he cry, as he did today, for the years of hardship and calculated intentions?

Zheng Tingyang did not dare to gamble. At the very least, he did not plan to let Yu Yan know the truth before the child was born. As long as Yu Yan stayed by his side obediently and remained within his sight, everything could be managed.

While Yu Yan slept soundly, Secretary Lin called.

“Gao Wenjing reported to the police, claiming you intentionally injured him. The police require you to come in for an investigation tomorrow.”

Zheng Tingyang did not expect Gao Wenjing to choose the path that led to the quickest death. He took a chestnut candy from his pocket and crushed it with his teeth. “The night market has opened. Liquidate all of the Olympic stocks in Country P. Have Xiao Kai handle the trading and kick the retail investors out.”

Buy low, sell high, and kick out the retail investors. Without external forces to manage it, this stock would only see “green lights” (losses) from now on. The Gao family was proud of their domestic and international businesses and looked down on him as a “stray dog” working for Pei Changji. Little did they know that the Gao family’s overseas business had long been inside a trap Zheng Tingyang had prepared. He only had to trigger the mechanism for it to be fatal.

He paused as the sweetness of the chestnut candy spread in his mouth. He leaned his head back against the sofa. “The Gao family is out, too.”

Secretary Lin asked, “Then tomorrow…”

“Can Gao Wenjing still walk?”

Secretary Lin replied, “Three fractured ribs. If he uses a wheelchair or crutches, he should be able to.”

Zheng Tingyang said, “I will go to the police station for the investigation tomorrow morning. It is only natural that I cannot be reached. Only family members can see me. Yu Yan is my only partner. If Gao Wenjing wants me to give the Gao family a way out, have him contact Yu Yan. Let him beg Yu Yan.”

“If his knees can move, do not let him stand while he begs.”

“Xiao Yu wakes up late. Call him later.”

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