Chapter 126 Huo Jing had seen Ruan Yao's photos
Ruan Yao woke up to the smell of disinfectant.
She slowly opened her eyes, and the first thing she saw was the pure white ceiling, followed by the faces of people around the bed, all filled with concern.
"Yaoyao! You're awake!"
Su Wanqing was the first to rush forward, grab her hand, and tears immediately streamed down her face.
"My darling daughter, you scared your mother to death!"
Ruan Minghui and Ruan Sheng also came over, as did Huo Wenbai and Ye Mei, the parents of the Huo family. Everyone's face showed the exhaustion of two days of hard work and an obvious sense of relief.
She moved, feeling as if her whole body was falling apart, and a dull pain came from the back of her head.
She subconsciously glanced around.
The ward was crowded with people, but the person she most wanted to see was nowhere to be seen.
“You’ve been unconscious for two days. The doctor said you were just too frightened and there’s nothing seriously wrong, but we can’t wake you up no matter what we do. It’s really worrying.” Ye Mei also held her other hand, her eyes red.
"Where is Yanzhi?"
Ruan Yao finally found her voice, which was dry and hoarse.
The atmosphere in the ward froze for a moment.
Ye Mei spoke first, tucking the blanket around Ruan Yao, her tone carrying a hint of careful reassurance.
“Yanzhi… there was a very urgent matter at the European branch, and he went there personally to handle it.”
Ye Mei sighed.
He rushed to the airport before dawn and stayed here all night to watch over you before leaving. Don't worry too much, just take good care of yourself. He'll be back as soon as he finishes his business.
Listening from the side, Ruan Sheng couldn't help but mutter under his breath, "What could be more important than his wife?"
No sooner had he finished speaking than Su Wanqing lightly patted him on the back.
Ruan Yao lowered her eyes and remained silent.
She moved her fingers and touched a round, hard object wrapped in candy wrapper next to her pillow.
She slowly clenched the object in her hand.
It was a candy wrapped in pink candy wrapper.
Strawberry candy.
It was left by him.
Seeing that she was not speaking, everyone assumed that she was frightened and was in low spirits because Huo Yanzhi had just left. So they took turns comforting her for a few more minutes before the doctor persuaded her to leave the ward and rest more.
Huo Jing stayed.
She took an apple from the fruit basket, sat on the edge of the bed, and peeled it with a knife while apologizing on behalf of her good-for-nothing nephew.
"Don't be angry with him. He's a workaholic; he has nothing on his mind but work. Leaving you alone in the hospital was such a terrible thing to do. I'm going to give him a good scolding when he gets back."
“Auntie,” Ruan Yao interrupted her, her voice very soft, “I don’t blame him.”
Huo Jing paused in peeling the apple, looking at Ruan Yao's pale, bloodless face, and sighed inwardly.
She cut the peeled apple into small pieces, picked one up with a toothpick, and held it to Ruan Yao's lips.
"It's because you have too good a temper that he's become so lawless."
Huo Jing complained, half-jokingly and half-seriously, "But then again, Yan Zhi is actually much more worried about you than he shows."
Huo Jing smiled as if she had remembered something amusing. "Do you remember when I first met you, I said you looked really familiar?"
Ruan Yao looked at her with some confusion upon hearing this.
"It was probably three years ago," Huo Jing recalled. "I went to Yanzhi's study to get an urgent document, but he wasn't there, so I looked for it myself. And guess what? I accidentally opened his desk drawer, and guess what I saw?"
She deliberately kept everyone in suspense.
"A photo of you, a casual snapshot, you're smiling so happily, and the background looks like your school's library. I was wondering who this girl was, she's so pretty. I thought she had a crush on some pretty young star."
Huo Jing chuckled as she spoke, "It was only recently, when I saw you two together, that I suddenly remembered. No wonder he treats you like a precious treasure; it turns out he'd been thinking about you for a while."
Huo Jing's original intention was to tell a little secret to comfort her wronged niece-in-law.
But these words were like a thunderbolt, exploding in Ruan Yao's mind.
Three years ago?
She was still in college and didn't know Huo Yanzhi at all.
How did he get her photos?
A fragment of a past life memory that she had deliberately ignored suddenly surfaced.
In her previous life, she was also in Huo Yanzhi's study, in his drawer, when she saw not a photograph, but a detailed and chilling investigation document about her from childhood to adulthood.
At the time, she only felt fear, thinking that this man was a perverted control freak.
But now...
Ruan Yao's heart began to race uncontrollably.
“Auntie,” she tried to keep her voice steady, “do you remember… which drawer it was?”
"Which drawer?" Huo Jing tilted her head and thought for a moment. "It seems to be... the one on the right, the top one. Why?"
It's that drawer!
Past lives and present lives, all the clues miraculously connected at this moment.
A bold and absurd guess began to grow wildly in her mind.
She tightened her grip on the blanket, looked at Huo Jing, and tentatively asked the most crucial question.
"Auntie, when Yanzhi was little... was he kidnapped? When he was found, was he in Nancheng?"
Huo Jing was completely stunned, looking at her in surprise: "How did you know? This is something we rarely talk about at home... Oh, Yanzhi told you, right?"
She nodded in sudden realization, "That's right, he was found in Nancheng and suffered a lot. This child, he even told you this."
boom--
Ruan Yao's world has completely collapsed.
South City.
Huo Yanzhi was actually abducted and sold in the southern part of the city.
The seeds of their destiny were sown twenty years ago in that small southern town she had long forgotten.
But why didn't he tell her?
Why did he never mention this in either of his two lifetimes?
Why did he keep lying to himself in his past life that he had never been to Nancheng?
Countless "whys" formed a tight, impenetrable net, completely enveloping Ruan Yao.
All the clues are like scattered fragments; just one more crucial piece of information will be enough to piece together the complete truth that he has hidden.
She couldn't sit still any longer.
Ruan Yao suddenly threw off the blanket and pulled out the IV needle from the back of her hand.
"Hey! Yaoyao, what are you doing! Your injury hasn't healed yet!" Huo Jing was startled and quickly stopped her.
"I'm fine, Auntie. I have to go back right away. I have something very, very important to confirm." Ruan Yao quickly changed out of her hospital gown, put on her own clothes, and rushed out.
She drove her own car at breakneck speed towards Huo Yanzhi's villa.
The scenery outside the car window rushed past, but her mind was clearer than ever before.
She made a phone call using her Bluetooth headset while driving.
"Assistant Qin."
Qin Feng on the other end of the phone was clearly surprised: "Miss Ruan? You're awake? How are you feeling?"
"I'm fine." Ruan Yao's voice was frighteningly calm. "Come to my and Huo Yanzhi's villa right now. I'll be waiting for you in the study."
Before Qin Feng could ask any more questions, she hung up the phone.
The villa was empty.
Ruan Yao rushed upstairs immediately. The bedroom had been cleaned up and was exactly the same as before he left.
He always did this, habitually erasing any trace that might upset her.
Ruan Yao felt another sharp pain in her heart.
Without pausing, she turned and rushed into the study next door.
In the study, rows of bookshelves reached the ceiling, and the air was filled with the faint scent of ink and his usual cool ebony fragrance.
She rushed to the familiar desk and forcefully pulled open the second drawer on the right.
Empty.
There were only a few pens and a stack of blank sticky notes inside.
Undeterred, she searched every corner of the study like a madwoman—bookshelves, hidden compartments, the safe…
Documents, contracts, proposals... everything is related to work.
There were no photos, and even less detailed personal information.
No, there's nothing there.
There isn't a single trace of her.
The reborn Huo Yanzhi cleaned everything up.
Just as she was at her wit's end, there was a gentle knock on the study door.
Qin Feng, dressed in a sharp suit, stood at the door.
"lady."
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