Chapter 132: Keeping?
At that time, Lu Yan still didn't understand what Tang Rufeng meant by that. He was stunned when he heard it, but when he reacted, he couldn't help but laugh out loud, his chest shaking: "You haven't inherited the Duan family yet, and you are so arrogant?"
Tang Rufeng asked back: "Can't I inherit it?"
Lu Yan shook his head, thinking it was difficult: "The old man still has a few more decades to live."
He should try to earn more money and support Tang Rufeng again.
Tang Rufeng's voice was deep, as if it had been soaked by rain, and it carried an indescribable gloom: "He will get his comeuppance."
Lu Yan said: "Good people don't live long, but evil deeds last for thousands of years."
Tang Rufeng didn't believe it. He straightened his clothes and stood up slowly. Except for the redness at the corners of his eyes, he didn't look aroused at all. "You go back first. I'll go in later so that no one can see us."
Lu Yan paused and asked: "Do you still want to stay in the Duan family?"
Tang Rufeng acquiesced: "I still have something to bring back."
Now the Duan family is extremely sensitive to the word "Lu". If Duan Jianfeng knew that he and Lu Yan were involved at this juncture, he would be so angry that he would die. Although Tang Rufeng didn't care about his life or death, he had to get the family property first and not let Duan Jiyang get it for nothing.
Lu Yan had no intention of going in: "No, I'll go home directly. I didn't come here to celebrate his birthday anyway."
Tang Rufeng lazily leaned against the wall, his breathing still a little unsteady, even his neatly combed hair slipped quietly. Hearing this, he tilted his head to look at Lu Yan, his eyelashes trembling slightly, and his pupils brighter than the stars in the dark night: "Then why did you come here?"
"Looking for you."
Lu Yan did not hide anything. He shook his phone and said in a low voice: "I haven't changed my number. Go back and add the contact information back. Do you hear me?"
After Tang Rufeng left without saying goodbye, he blocked all contact methods of Lu Yan, but they all kept their original numbers and never changed them.
Tang Rufeng seemed to nod, but not clearly: "Got it."
Lu Yan touched his cold fingertips again, then slowly pulled away, and his figure soon disappeared into the darkness. Tang Rufeng looked at his departing back, his fingertips moving in the air, trying to grab something, but caught nothing.
My heart was full just now, but now it is completely empty, and I feel indescribably lost.
Tang Rufeng closed his eyes and slowly exhaled. He inexplicably felt like the wet mud in the garden. His short life had already become a mess, but he still had a glimmer of hope, breaking out of the misery and shadow.
He straightened his clothes and waited for the redness in the corners of his eyes to fade away before returning to the brightly lit banquet hall. Unexpectedly, he saw Duan Jiyang standing at the door looking around, as if he was looking for someone.
"Why, looking for Lu Yan?"
Tang Rufeng's voice was indifferent, and no emotion could be heard from it. Even if there was any emotion, it would only be ridicule. He watched Duan Jiyang's scheming and trickery with cold eyes, and couldn't help but wonder what the other party was going to do now that it had come to this.
Duan Jiyang was indeed looking for Lu Yan, and asked with a frown, "Where are they?"
Tang Rufeng looked at him deeply. Although he was smiling, he gave him an inexplicable chill. He lowered his voice and warned him, "This has nothing to do with you. Stay away from him in the future. Otherwise, I can't guarantee that you will not be kicked out by the Duan family. Do you understand?"
His words seemed to have a deeper meaning, which inexplicably made Duan Jiyang's heart jump: "What do you mean?!"
Tang Rufeng walked into the banquet hall and passed him by. The tail of his voice disappeared into the air: "It doesn't matter what I mean. You'd better not understand it. Otherwise, it will be too late to turn back."
However, he had just left for half an hour, and when he returned, he saw Duan Jianfeng in the lounge furious. It turned out that the assistant who organized the wedding banquet accidentally used lilies when decorating the venue, and Duan Jianfeng happened to be allergic to lilies. He had difficulty breathing after smelling them, and even went into shock in severe cases. At this moment, he was leaning on a cane and scolding the person in the lounge.
As expected, this assistant can no longer hold the job.
Tang Rufeng stood at the door, and soon he saw the female assistant running out with red eyes. When she left, she bumped into Duan Jiyang who was waiting outside. He looked at the two of them from a distance and seemed to have said a few words to them.
Tang Rufeng smiled imperceptibly, his eyes looking meaningful.
Since the banquet that day, Lu Yan and Tang Rufeng added each other's contact information privately. He originally thought that the other party was joking about supporting him, but he didn't expect that the other party actually took it seriously.
Yang Qin usually lives the life of a rich wife. She used to love shopping, but now she has given it up to save money. What she does most at home every day is grow flowers and cook. But today, she went out for the first time and made an appointment with some card partners to play cards. She was in high spirits when she returned home.
Lu Yan had moved a computer to the living room to check the accounts. Seeing this, he couldn't help but ask, "Are you so happy about winning the lottery?"
Yang Qin said happily, "I just won the lottery. You know, I went out to play mahjong with Mrs. Chen today. Her family runs a beauty salon. They just happened to be opening a new store near the business district. Seeing that I live here, they wanted me to help manage it. They pay the money and I work hard. I will get 60% of the dividends at the end of the year."
Lu Yan felt something was wrong when he heard this, and looked at Yang Qin as if she was a fool: "Mom, there is no such good thing in the world, you can get 60% profit without spending any money, don't let yourself be cheated."
Yang Qin said angrily, "Your Aunt Chen and I have been friends for more than ten years. She is a very honest person. Besides, she is from a wealthy family and has more than three million dollars in her hand. Why would she cheat a divorced woman like me? It was she who helped me find a lawyer for my divorce lawsuit. I guess Mrs. Chen wanted to help me, but it was inconvenient for her to give me money directly, so she used the store opening as an excuse to save my face."
Yang Qinyu patted her limited edition bag from last year and said, "I've brought the contract with me. There must be no problem. If you don't believe me, check it out for yourself."
Lu Yan took the contract and checked it carefully. He found nothing wrong. He hissed and felt even more strange: "Something is wrong, Mom. There is no such thing as a free lunch in the world."
“Pah.”
Yang Qin stood up and slapped him on the head. "Of course there is no such thing as a free lunch. This is what I earned through more than ten years of friendship. Do you remember that five years ago, Mrs. Chen lost 30 million playing cards and she couldn't fill the hole herself, so I used my private money to help her. Otherwise, her husband would have divorced her if he knew about it."
Lu Yan thought it was reasonable and asked suspiciously, "Really?"
Yang Qin lazily told him: "Well, believe it or not, I won't ask you for it even if I lose it. I even made an appointment with her to play cards tonight. You can order takeout for dinner at home."
Lu Yan tilted his head to look out the window and said with a sigh: "It's raining, and it's still raining. You don't mind your hands being frozen. Can't you change your hobby?"
Although Yang Qin is already over 40 years old, she has taken good care of herself and looks gentle and beautiful: "My hobby is playing the piano, but I have almost forgotten it over the years. There is nothing else to do to kill time except playing cards. If you have time, go out more often and don't stay at home all the time. I won't talk to you anymore. I have to go out."
Yang Qinyu packed up her things, picked up her bag and went out, leaving Lu Yan alone sitting on a chair in a daze. During the time when Tang Rufeng was away, he had been trying to keep himself busy, as if that would stop him from having wild thoughts. In the blink of an eye, more than half a year had passed.
There is a sound of rain outside the window, and it is late autumn again.
Lu Yan suddenly lost interest in looking at the dense data on the screen. He turned off his computer and wanted to lie on the sofa to relax. Suddenly, Pan Yuan called and asked for a meal: "Lu Yan, please take some time to come out for dinner."
Lu Yan turned over on the sofa, frowning, and said lazily: "No, I hate going out on rainy days."
It's useless to go out in this kind of weather, whether holding an umbrella or taking a car, because your pants will be soaked every time.
Pan Yuan said: "If you don't come, you will miss out. Don't blame me for not reminding you then."
Lu Yan opened his eyes and asked, "What do you mean?"
Pan Yuan said nonchalantly, "It's the bar we opened together. Shunzi and the others don't want to play anymore, and I just happen to have to go to my family's company to help out. Anyway, there's not much money, so I can transfer all the remaining shares to you."
Lu Yan sat up from the sofa after hearing this. He remembered that Yang Qin opened a beauty salon today, and the strange feeling in his heart became stronger: "Why?"
Pan Yuan said in a long tone: "Didn't I tell you that I have to go to my own company to help out and don't have time to take care of it."
Lu Yan: "You speak as if you were in charge."
Pan Yuan choked: "Just take it and that's it. I'm giving you a bar for free and you don't want it."
Lu Yan thought for a moment and suddenly said, "Did Tang Rufeng ask you to do this?"
Pan Yuan started to play dumb: "What did you say?! Hey, the signal here is not very good, I can't hear what you said... Forget it, let's talk later, I'm hanging up first."
“Beep, beep, beep—”
Hearing the busy tone coming from the other end of the phone, Lu Yan lowered his eyes and looked at the screen of his mobile phone, not knowing what he was thinking. After thinking for a moment, he finally sent a message, then put on his coat and went out.
Tang Rufeng was originally sitting in the office working overtime when he suddenly received a message from Lu Yan asking him out for dinner. He was stunned for a moment. After all, today was not a holiday. Even if the other party asked him out for dinner normally, he would try to arrange the time one day in advance and rarely made a surprise request.
Tang Rufeng came to his senses, quickly finished his work and prepared to go find Lu Yan. However, just as he walked out of the company gate, the phone in his pocket suddenly vibrated and a message popped up:
【Waiting for you across the street. 】
Lu Yan originally wanted to go pick up Tang Rufeng, but showing up in front of Duan's office building would attract too much attention, so he drove across the street and waited.
Tang Rufeng recognized Lu Yan's car, walked across the street quickly, opened the door and got in the passenger seat. Although he was holding an umbrella, it was splashed with rain when he put it away. His hair was wet and he looked a little bit unruly. "Why are you suddenly inviting me to dinner today?"
Lu Yan handed over a pack of tissues, and hadn't figured out how to start asking about the bar: "Nothing, I just happened to come across a restaurant that tastes pretty good, and I wanted to take you there to check in. Wipe the water off your body, don't catch a cold."
Tang Rufeng took out a tissue and wiped the water off his body. He glanced around and suddenly found a paper bag on the back seat of the car. The trademark on it looked familiar. "Did you buy milk tea?"
Lu Yan seemed to smile: "You have sharp eyes."
He stretched out his arm to take the bag of milk tea and handed it to Tang Rufeng: "Drink it, it's still hot."
Lu Yan doesn't like these junk foods, but Tang Rufeng likes them. I don't know if it's because his family was poor when he was a child and he never had good food, so he has a certain obsession with these snacks that were indispensable in his childhood.
Tang Rufeng took the milk tea and took a sip. The mellow taste spread on his tongue, which was a little strange. He shook the cup, and the warm wind in the car blew away the chill brought by the rain: "Do you still remember that I like to drink milk tea?"
In fact, he hasn't drunk for a long time.
To be exact, he hadn't drunk much since he separated from Lu Yan. Most of the time, Tang Rufeng was thinking about how to climb up. He tossed and turned in the middle of the night, trying to calm the hatred surging in his heart. He no longer had the heart to taste anything sweet.
Lu Yan drove towards the restaurant: "I'm only in my twenties, my memory shouldn't be that bad."
Tang Rufeng raised his eyelids and asked, "Do you remember it just because you have a good memory?"
He poked the pearls at the bottom of the cup with a straw. He didn't know what answer he was expecting, but his face remained calm, as if nothing could cause him to fluctuate.
Lu Yan said slowly: "Because..."
Why else?
He fell silent.
The car made a sharp turn and drove into a snack street. It was rush hour and the traffic was extremely congested. Lu Yan used his superb driving skills to squeeze into an empty space. He opened the door and got out of the car, holding an umbrella and walking to the other side to prevent Tang Rufeng from getting wet. "I'm tired of eating those foreign dishes. Here, today I'll take you to eat barbecue at a roadside stall. I heard that it's a decades-old shop."
Tang Rufeng actually didn't mind what he ate. Lu Yan was the only one who was picky about this. He looked around. It was a famous snack street nearby. It was crowded and narrow, with constant noise and a strong smell of fireworks. This feeling was a long time ago for Tang Rufeng: "It just so happens that the weather has turned cold. It's not bad to eat some barbecue."
They were two grown men, and it was inevitable that they were a little crowded under the same umbrella, and from time to time they would be separated by the crowd. Lu Yan held the umbrella with one hand, and with the other hand he held Tang Rufeng's shoulders tightly as he walked inside. Soon they arrived at the barbecue restaurant.
Although the barbecue restaurant's busiest business is in the evening, it is already busy in the afternoon. The owner is a neat middle-aged woman with a crisp and clear voice: "Two handsome guys, let's eat barbecue. Come inside and sit. There's room!"
Lu Yan was a very outgoing and friendly person. He responded and took Tang Rufeng to a seat inside. Because of the smoke and fire in this roadside barbecue shop, the tabletop was always covered with a layer of sticky oil smoke, which could not be wiped clean. He took out a wet tissue and wiped it, then started to scan the code to order.
Lu Yan usually wears casual clothes, so it's not strange for him to appear in a barbecue restaurant. However, Tang Rufeng, wearing an expensive suit and leather shoes, looks a bit out of place in this gray barbecue restaurant. He pulled out two pairs of disposable chopsticks from the chopstick holder, carefully picked off the barbs, and whispered, "I remember that you hated coming to places like this before."
Lu Yan is a clean freak and hates crowded places the most. The smoky snack street is a place he will never set foot in. But Tang Rufeng used to have to eat in such places because he was poor. Even though his status has risen today, he still subconsciously feels that he and the other person are from two different worlds.
Lu Yan hummed: "It's OK, it's quite lively. If you invite me, I will come."
But Tang Rufeng never made a date.
Tang Rufeng paused when he heard this, then pulled up the corner of his mouth slightly, with a self-deprecating smile: "I thought you wouldn't come."
Tang Rufeng is sensitive and suspicious, Lu Yan is casual and casual. They have never opened their hearts to each other and seem to have missed and ignored a lot of things without realizing it.
Lu Yan lowered his head and peeled the peanuts given by the boss. His movements were neither hurried nor slow. Soon, he had a pile of plump white peanuts in his hands. He said casually, "It depends on who invites me. I definitely won't come if someone else invites me."
He almost pointed at Tang Rufeng's forehead and told him: You are the most special one.
Tang Rufeng didn't know if he understood Lu Yan's thoughts. He opened his mouth to ask something, but swallowed the words back several times. In the end, he drank the store's special liquor in silence, one cup after another, and didn't even touch the barbecue.
Lu Yan originally wanted to drink with them, but when he remembered that he had to drive later, he gave up.
Tang Rufeng could actually hold a lot of alcohol, but he couldn't resist being distracted and he drank hard. Lu Yan held him down several times and wanted to ask him to stop drinking, but he was caught off guard and met Tang Rufeng's red eyes, so he subconsciously withdrew his hand.
As the sky turned from dusk to late night, Tang Rufeng was already too drunk to sit still. He lowered his head and mumbled something that was not clearly audible.
Lu Yan seemed to know that he was upset. After settling the bill, he helped Tang Rufeng walk out without saying a word. At this time, there were fewer pedestrians on the street and the rain had stopped. There were only fallen sycamore leaves on the ground, which rustled when stepped on.
Lu Yan looked around, then half-knelt down and said to Tang Rufeng, "Come here, I'll carry you."
Tang Rufeng still had a trace of consciousness. When he saw Lu Yan's actions, he lay on his back without thinking, wrapped his hands tightly around Lu Yan's neck, closed his eyes and rubbed his back twice, saying with a bit of sleepiness: "Let's go home, I'm sleepy..."
Lu Yan carried him on his back and walked slowly back along the path. The long street was brightly lit and the air was slightly humid. "You are not sleepy, you are drunk. If I had known, I would not have let you drink so much. You still have to carry me on your back."
Tang Rufeng said to himself: "But...but I feel sad..."
Lu Yan paused when he heard this and asked softly, "Why do you feel uncomfortable?"
“…”
The answer he got was a long period of loneliness, with only the sound of wind blowing the leaves and the dripping of rain from the eaves. Just when Lu Yan thought Tang Rufeng had fallen asleep and was about to continue walking forward, he suddenly felt a burning sensation on the back of his neck, and something boiling liquid flowed down his collar into his neck.
Tang Rufeng buried his face in Lu Yan's back, silently tightened his fingertips, and said in a very hoarse voice: "Lu Yan..."
His eyes were red, his lips were trembling, and he finally asked the question that he had not asked on that rainy night: "Am I... Duan Jiyang's substitute?"
It would have been fine if he had not been exposed to that circle before, but when he got to know it more deeply, Tang Rufeng would more or less hear their stories from other people, and hear how obsessed and persistent Lu Yan was with Duan Jiyang.
Tang Rufeng was jealous and panicked, powerless and frustrated. He could have defeated Duan Jiyang completely in other places, but every time this happened, he seemed to have turned back into the poor student he was before, without the slightest power to resist.
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