Chapter 37 37 Unable to Conceal

He Peiru couldn't say whether Gu Zhaoqian had heard what she had just said.

But now she was certain the man had heard those words.

She was afraid that Gu Zhaoqian would notice something from the words in those sentences, so her only thought was to escape from this place as soon as possible.

He Peiru took the first step, but then repeated, "Let's go."

Her voice trembled, mixed with a panic she herself was unaware of.

Gu Zhaoqian assumed she had suddenly remembered something else and turned to ask, "What's wrong?"

In that instant, He Peiru seemed startled, her whole body tense and she dared not move. All her strength seemed to be used to look at Gu Zhaoqian, and she blurted out, "What?"

Gu Zhaoqian was puzzled by her unusual reaction, since she hadn't shown any abnormality just now.

However, he immediately recalled the sentence he had just heard, and quickly connected and expanded upon the words in his mind, piecing together the dialogue without much difficulty.

So, the two of them were the main characters in that sentence?

Gu Zhaoqian suddenly understood why He Peiru had quickened her pace. He couldn't help but chuckle at He Peiru's reaction, but he didn't want to show it.

He knew that given He Peiru's usual personality, if he directly confronted her now, she would probably choose to hide, so he didn't intend to tease her.

Gu Zhaoqian shook his head slightly and replied, "It's nothing, let's go."

-

Although He Peiru was focused on leaving, she didn't forget to put away the little horse figurine.

However, she couldn't bring herself to bring it up naturally; she was constantly thinking about how to hide her emotions.

She even had the idea of ​​going back to find Jiang Yici.

It would be a matter of course for everyone to wait until Jiang Yici's situation was over before going back to Repulse Bay together.

However, if her change in attitude is too obvious, Gu Zhaoqian will obviously notice something amiss.

He Peiru had no choice but to grit her teeth and move forward.

However, when she pushed open the glass door and stepped inside, not knowing Gu Zhaoqian's next plan, she had to turn back to him and ask, "Where are we going now?"

Gu Zhaoqian glanced down and saw the obvious flaws on her face; her panicked expression was unmistakable. He subtly curled his lips and replied, "Go back to the VIP room first and get your things."

"good."

It turned out that Gu Zhaoqian had not forgotten, and indescribable feelings once again filled her heart.

Instead of walking side by side as usual, they walked a few steps apart, one in front of the other. To a passerby, it would be impossible to tell whether they knew each other.

Along the way, many people greeted Gu Zhaoqian as they walked towards him.

He Peiru couldn't help but feel relieved that she wasn't standing next to a man, otherwise she would probably be so embarrassed that she wouldn't know what to do.

He Peiru wished she could walk even faster.

Fortunately, the walk back to the VIP box wasn't far. Her only worry was that if they were the only two people in the elevator, continuing to remain silent might amplify the awkwardness.

Fortunately, there were already a few people standing in front of the elevator, so she wasn't too uncomfortable.

She simply didn't dare turn her head to look at Gu Zhaoqian.

They quickly got out of the elevator.

He Peiru looked up and saw the staff member who had initially greeted them. Before she could even speak, the staff member walked straight towards them. Upon closer inspection, she noticed the small pony plush toy wrapped in a transparent gift bag placed in a prominent position.

A staff member approached with a smile and asked, "How can I help you? Would you like to come in and rest?"

"No."

He Peiru hurriedly refused, but for some reason, she habitually turned her head to look at Gu Zhaoqian.

It was as if, despite not speaking a word to each other the whole way, she still subconsciously relied on him in the end.

Gu Zhaoqian seemed to have understood her meaning and said to the staff, "Let's go first and put everything in the car."

"OK."

The staff member immediately turned around.

He Peiru noticed that besides the pony figurine, there seemed to be some other things.

However, she didn't ask any further questions, simply assuming that some of it belonged to Gu Zhaoqian.

She was still lost in thought when she suddenly heard Gu Zhaoqian's voice in her ear—

"Let's go back to the car and wait."

He Peiru nodded and replied, "Okay."

Now she and Gu Zhaoqian could no longer keep their distance as before. If the staff noticed anything amiss, she wasn't sure if it would lead to rumors, and she was even more at a loss as to how to handle the situation.

Fortunately, there was no need to force a conversation.

Gu Zhaoqian remained silent, so He Peiru could only suggest that she wasn't usually very talkative, hoping he wouldn't easily notice anything amiss.

He Peiru's thinking became increasingly divergent.

She arrived at Sha Tin Racecourse with Jiang Yici, but a few hours later, she got into another car and left with Gu Zhaoqian.

This kind of thing used to happen often, but today it felt completely different.

These thoughts kept popping into her mind, and the more she thought about them, the more subtle they became. Unconsciously, she followed Gu Zhaoqian's steps into the parking lot.

But to He Peiru's surprise, there were two or three people standing next to Gu Zhaoqian's car, who kept looking up and glancing around.

At that moment, her thoughts became clear. Without having to think too much, she could guess that they wanted to try their luck and see if they could corner Gu Zhaoqian.

This guess made her pause, and then it became a fact the moment the other person looked at them.

These people hurriedly stepped forward and said respectfully, "Mr. Gu."

Their gazes then shifted to her, but they seemed hesitant to speak, perhaps unsure how to address her.

Today, Gu Zhaoqian was without an assistant, so he skipped the step of having an assistant introduce the two parties. How to deal with the current situation was entirely up to Gu Zhaoqian.

To He Peiru, these were all unfamiliar faces; she was certain she didn't know them and had never seen them before.

Perhaps it was because of her that the other party was taken aback. Even though their expressions revealed their thoughts, due to the more urgent situation at hand, the person standing in the middle gritted his teeth and stepped forward, saying again, "Hello, Mr. Gu. I am the building materials supplier who contacted you before."

The other party paused, as if observing Gu Zhaoqian's expression, before continuing, "Our company doesn't want to lose this cooperation opportunity, so we resorted to this tactic..."

Gu Zhaoqian was already used to this situation. Often, those projects that seemed insignificant to him could be the key to keeping a company afloat.

Therefore, he would not essentially make things difficult for such behavior.

He nodded slightly and replied simply, "Contact my assistant directly. You have his contact information, right?"

The man's expression showed no emotion, and his tone was so indifferent that it seemed the matter had nothing to do with him, as if he were just talking about a trivial matter.

The other party did not relax at his reaction, but replied repeatedly, "Yes, no problem, thank you Mr. Gu."

Gu Zhaoqian always had the habit of double-checking information to avoid any oversights, otherwise it would be easy for someone with ulterior motives to take advantage of the situation.

So he asked again, "What is your surname?"

The other person quickly replied, "My surname is Li, the Li of the Wood radical."

"Okay, I understand." He looked at the other person again and said, "Is there anything else?"

"No, thank you, Mr. Gu." After receiving Gu Zhaoqian's approval, the man surnamed Li was in a good mood, as if they had already established a cooperative relationship. At this moment, the two people behind him could not hide their excitement and turned their gazes to He Peiru, who had remained silent all along.

One of them, as if having finally mustered the courage, boldly guessed, "Excuse me, is this your fiancée?"

No wonder these people looked at her with a probing gaze from the very beginning, and seemed hesitant to speak.

He Peiru suddenly realized what was happening and was about to explain when Gu Zhaoqian, who was standing next to her, spoke up faster than she could: "We're leaving."

He seemed not to have heard the question. He Peiru turned her head in confusion and met his gaze.

The man raised an eyebrow and gestured to her, "Get in the car."

He Peiru bit her lip somewhat helplessly, but still got into the car as Gu Zhaoqian opened the door.

The other person's volume wasn't much different from before. She felt it was unlikely that Gu Zhaoqian hadn't heard her.

He Peiru didn't want to remain silent any longer; otherwise, these inexplicable emotions would only accumulate in her heart, like a persistent smog. She simply asked, "That question from earlier...don't you need to explain it to them?"

The moment she said it, she felt her heart rate double.

Gu Zhaoqian leaned back in his chair, looked at her, and smiled faintly, "It doesn't matter."

These three simple words made He Peiru think deeply.

Whether he thinks it's a misunderstanding and therefore doesn't care, or thinks it's not worth mentioning, or perhaps... he acquiesces.

The more possibilities she considered, the more He Peiru couldn't help but get stuck in a rut; speaking just now had almost exhausted all her courage. But she didn't want to delve any further, since it seemed that no matter what, she could hardly guess Gu Zhaoqian's thoughts, which meant she was destined to remain guessless.

It felt like two little voices were arguing inside her about what she should do.

Just as He Peiru was about to reach a dead end, Gu Zhaoqian suddenly spoke up: "Do you find Sha Tin Racecourse rather boring?"

Feeling bored?

He Peiru didn't really feel anything, but apart from Gu Zhaoqian accompanying her around, she didn't see any other activities.

On second thought, people who come to the horse farm with a specific purpose are unlikely to have their attention diverted elsewhere.

She shook her head and replied, "It's alright."

Gu Zhaoqian neither agreed nor disagreed with her answer, and continued according to his own ideas: "I'll take you to Happy Valley next time."

Ho Pui-yu knew that Happy Valley also had a racecourse, but unlike Sha Tin Racecourse, the Happy Valley Racecourse usually held horse racing activities at night, and the target audience seemed to be completely different from that of Sha Tin Racecourse.

Her curiosity was piqued by Gu Zhaoqian's words, and she could also use this opportunity to ease her current emotions, so she followed up by asking, "Is there anything fun to do?"

Gu Zhaoqian explained to her, "In Shatin, the activities are mainly concentrated at the beginning of the season or when the season is about to end, or during key seasons."

“Happy Valley is different. Because it’s on Hong Kong Island, foreigners and young people make up the majority of the population, and there are more events held there.”

He Peiru knew that getting familiar with different occasions would be of indescribable benefit to her. Moreover, with Gu Zhaoqian by her side, she wouldn't easily feel timid even in unfamiliar environments.

Without hesitation, she readily agreed, "Okay, then I'll trouble you."

One reason why He Peiru answered so easily was that even Gu Zhaoqian himself probably couldn't say for sure when exactly they would go to the Happy Valley Racecourse.

This little incident on the way back to Repulse Bay made the journey, which is usually quite long, less arduous than it initially seemed.

Before long, the black van drove into the Jiang family's parking lot. Before the butler could come forward, He Peiru saw that the automatic door was almost open and got out of the car first.

Even under these circumstances, she didn't forget her proper etiquette. She turned slightly to the side and said to the man, "Thank you, Brother Qian."

Inside the car, Gu Zhaoqian maintained his usual inscrutable expression and replied softly, "You're too kind."

However, He Peiru thought that as long as she was not by Gu Zhaoqian's side, everything would be fine. But when she returned to her room, the pounding of her heart was amplified once again in the silence.

This time, she was more certain than ever before.

She couldn't hide her attraction to Gu Zhaoqian.

The only thing missing between them is to break through that thin veil of secrecy.