Chapter 122 Kidnapping
After parting ways with Jiang Tangtang, Ruan Yao drove home alone.
As dusk settles, the city's neon lights stretch into blurry streaks of light outside the car windows.
Her mood, however, was not as radiant as the night view; instead, it was somewhat heavy.
Jiang Tangtang's half-joking, half-serious words lingered in her mind.
Ruan Yao unconsciously tapped her fingertips on the steering wheel.
She raised her left hand and looked at the exquisite watch on her wrist.
Of course she knew that Huo Yanzhi loved her, a love so intense it almost melted her, yet also mixed with an unsettling feeling that she couldn't quite grasp.
He was always afraid, afraid that she would leave.
She once thought it was a psychological illness caused by his childhood experiences.
So she used all her passion and energy to prove to him that she would stay by his side forever.
Does he... really not trust her?
The moment that thought popped into her head, Ruan Yao forcefully shook it off.
No, it won't.
He just doesn't know how to express himself.
Ruan Yao took a deep breath and decided to wait for him to come back so she could have a proper talk with him.
Let's start with this watch.
The car turned onto a road that was the only way back to the villa. The road was lined with tall sycamore trees and the streetlights were far apart, making it seem somewhat secluded.
Just as she was lost in thought, a dilapidated silver minivan suddenly sped out from a side intersection, swerved wildly, and came to a stop right in the middle of the road.
Ruan Yao's heart skipped a beat, and she instinctively slammed on the brakes.
The car stopped just half a meter away from the van.
She was still in shock, her palms instantly breaking out in a cold sweat. Before she could even see what was happening, the van door was flung open with a "whoosh".
Three men wearing black hoods, with only their eyes showing, jumped out of the car and rushed straight toward her vehicle.
Ruan Yao's mind went blank; fear gripped her heart instantly.
She instinctively reached for her phone on the passenger seat.
"Bang!"
A loud bang.
The driver's side window was smashed violently by one of the men with an iron bar. Glass shards flew everywhere with a "crash," and a few even grazed her cheek, causing a slight sting.
The car door was roughly pulled open from the outside.
A rough, large hand reached in, grabbed her arm, and tried to drag her out.
"Ah! Who are you! Let me go!"
Ruan Yao screamed and struggled desperately, gripping the steering wheel tightly with her other hand.
Another masked man went around to the passenger side, smashed the window, leaned in, and tried to pry her fingers off the steering wheel.
In the midst of the chaos, a third person appeared behind her, holding a white handkerchief, and without saying a word, pressed it tightly against her mouth and nose.
A pungent, sweet-smelling chemical odor instantly filled her nostrils.
Ruan Yao's struggles and screams became powerless within a few seconds.
Her consciousness began to drift away rapidly, the scene before her eyes spun around, and in the end, all that remained were the menacing eyes of those men and the boundless darkness.
Her phone slipped from her limp hand and fell into the crevice of the seat.
The abandoned warehouse was filled with the smell of dust and rust.
Shen Yu stared at his phone screen, where a message had just popped up.
The person has been acquired.
He stared at those four words, and a crazy, twisted smile slowly appeared on his face.
He lost.
They suffered a crushing defeat and lost everything.
But he couldn't let Huo Yanzhi, that high and mighty victor, win so easily.
This was his last gamble, and his only chance to turn things around.
With trembling hands, he retrieved the name he hated to the core from his contacts and dialed it.
*
The Huo Group's top-floor conference room.
The atmosphere was serious; a meeting about overseas markets was underway.
Huo Yanzhi sat in the main seat, listening quietly to his subordinates' reports with a focused expression, occasionally making annotations on the documents.
His personal cell phone, which was on the table, suddenly lit up.
He glanced at it habitually.
It was a background push notification from the location software that alerted him that "Yaoyao's wristwatch" had stayed in one location for more than ten minutes.
This is normal; perhaps you've encountered a traffic jam.
He didn't pay attention and continued to focus on the meeting.
But after two minutes, his gaze returned to his phone.
The red dot representing Ruan Yao on the map began to move at an abnormally high speed in a direction that deviated from the villa.
That route leads to an abandoned industrial park in the northern suburbs of Beijing.
Huo Yanzhi stopped moving.
He picked up his phone and dialed Ruan Yao's number directly.
The receiver only played a busy tone, "beep-beep-", over and over again, with no one answering.
Everyone in the conference room noticed the change in the president's aura, and the sound of the report gradually faded away.
Just then, a call from an unknown number cut off his continued dialing.
Huo Yanzhi stared at the number on the screen, pressed the answer button expressionlessly, and turned on speakerphone.
"Huo Yanzhi".
On the other end of the phone was Shen Yu's hoarse yet excited voice.
Huo Yanzhi did not speak, but simply raised his hand to signal the meeting to pause.
"Want to know where your fiancée is?" Shen Yu's voice was filled with a morbid glee. "Take a look at the MMS I sent you."
Huo Yanzhi opened the newly received MMS message.
In the photo, Ruan Yao is lying unconscious in the back seat of a van, her face pale and her hair disheveled. The exquisite watch on her wrist is still conspicuous in the dim light.
Huo Yanzhi's breath hitched for a second.
"I want a billion, in cash. And get me a ship to leave the country." Shen Yu's voice turned ruthless. "Remember, you come alone, and don't call the police! Otherwise, I don't know what I might do to her."
He gave an address located at the East Wharf.
"Once the money is delivered there and I confirm it, I will release the person."
Huo Yanzhi's gaze fell on the phone screen.
The red dot representing Ruan Yao is currently resting in an abandoned industrial park in the west of the city.
thing.
Two completely opposite directions.
"good."
Huo Yanzhi agreed readily.
"The money and the route will be ready for you within an hour. Don't touch her, or you know the consequences."
After hanging up the phone, Huo Yanzhi stood up and uttered two words to the group of executives in the conference room who were already trembling with fear.
Meeting adjourned.
As he walked out, he dialed Qin Feng's internal line.
Qin Feng immediately appeared at the conference room door.
Huo Yanzhi stood up and walked outside, giving instructions quickly and clearly in a voice that only the two of them could hear.
"East of the city, at the location you've been identified, send a team there, along with a doctor."
"Call the police to the abandoned factory in Longshan, west of the city. Tell them to stall for time and wait for me to arrive."
"Also, prepare a car."
Qin Feng's expression instantly turned serious. He had no questions and simply said one word: "Yes."
Huo Yanzhi entered the private elevator alone.
The elevator doors slowly closed.
His face, dark and terrifying, was reflected in the gleaming metal mirror.
In those unfathomable eyes, a black storm churned, powerful enough to incinerate everything.
Shen Yu.
It's best to pray that she didn't lose a single hair.
Otherwise, even if his bones were crushed to ashes, it would be difficult to quell the hatred in his heart.
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