Chapter 12 Third Brother Gets Beaten
As soon as he entered the door, Lou Hongjian sensed that something terrible was about to happen.
Everyone in the family had arrived. Commander Lou sat at the head of the long table, his face stern and his expression dignified. His two elder brothers stood behind him; the eldest brother's gaze was cold, while the second brother looked at him with disapproval.
Looking around, I saw several ladies there as well.
Except for Lou Yansui, who has difficulty walking, the whole family is here.
He looked around, a bead of cold sweat sliding down his handsome face.
Xia Xiaoxiang walked over quickly and took her daughter from his arms.
Mao Mao, unaware of what had happened or the tense atmosphere, waved her little hand at her second brother, her round face full of innocent joy: "Brother, bye-bye."
Lou Hongjian forced a smile at her, thinking to himself: Don't say goodbye to me, I might really be finished.
Judging from their posture, it's obvious they're after him.
That's strange, he didn't do anything wrong.
Lou Hongjian looked at his father with trepidation: "Dad..."
Commander Lou roared, "Kneel down!"
Lou Hongjian's knees buckled, and he reflexively knelt down on the ground with a "thump".
After kneeling, he looked at his two older brothers, somewhat puzzled, for help: "What did I do..."
Commander Lou roared, "You still don't know you're wrong?!"
Lou Hongjian immediately begged for mercy, "I know, I know I was wrong!"
Commander Lou gripped the whip in his hand and stood up: "Since you know you're wrong, then it's not unjust for me to beat you."
Lou Hongjian: "..."
Xia Xiaoxiang covered Mao Mao's eyes and ears. Mao Mao's vision went black, and she couldn't hear anything either. She asked in confusion, "Mother?"
The first wife gave Xia Xiaoxiang a look, and Xia Xiaoxiang, carrying her daughter, quietly went upstairs and returned to her room. The door closed, and all sounds outside were audible.
downstairs.
Lou Dashuai's whip lashed heavily across his son's body. Lou Hongjian gritted his teeth and endured it, letting out a muffled groan.
"Swish! Swish! Swish!"
The sound of a whip whistling through the air rang out, accompanied by Commander Lou's furious voice: "Lou Hongjian, you've really grown up! You actually took your sister to gamble on horses?!"
Lou Hongjian, enduring the pain, was initially unaware of what had happened. Upon hearing these words, his mind went blank, and all he could think was, "It's over!"
How did his dad find out?!
He hurriedly tried to defend himself: "Dad, I... I did take Mao Mao to watch the horse race, but I didn't do anything else besides watching the horse race. You can check if you don't believe me... Ouch!"
Another lash struck him, and he cried out in pain, swallowing the rest of his words.
"Investigate? You think I haven't investigated?" Commander Lou glared at him and said coldly, "You, Third Young Master Lou, have become quite famous lately. Who in the entire Haicheng hasn't heard of you? You turned a fortune into a fortune at the horse farm, making a huge splash!"
Lou Hongjian was sweating profusely from the pain and dared not utter a single word in rebuttal.
Lou Heming sighed and said disappointedly, "Ah Hong, Mao Mao is only three years old. That kind of place is full of all sorts of people. How could you take such a child there?"
"I just let her sit in the private room and watch, she didn't go anywhere..." Lou Hongjian gasped in pain as he explained, "I know she's young, I don't dare take her with me when I do anything."
Lou Feng toyed with a bullet in her hand: "You won this money through Mao Mao, didn't you?"
Lou Hongjian shut up.
That's right.
His younger sister was a lucky charm; whichever horse she predicted would win, would win. Thanks to her incredible luck, his two thousand dollars turned into forty thousand dollars.
"No, not today." Lou Hongjian tried to downplay his guilt: "Today we only looked at the horses, we didn't gamble."
"Is it that you didn't gamble? Or that you didn't dare to gamble?"
Lou Hongjian fell silent.
In fact, he really didn't dare.
He took Mao Mao to watch the horse race today. Before the race started, he asked Mao Mao which horse he thought would win.
Mao Mao can't be selected.
She said innocently, "Brother, the competition hasn't started yet, Mao Mao doesn't know."
Lou Hongjian asked again, but Mao Mao still couldn't answer.
He had a bad feeling, so he didn't press the matter further and randomly picked a horse, betting a thousand dollars on it. The news that he had turned a thousand dollars into ten thousand spread quickly throughout the horse racing track, and many people followed his lead and bought tickets. Sure enough, the horse he bet on didn't win.
Lou Dashuai sneered: "The horse farm you went to is controlled by the Green Gang. You won so much money there, do you think they would let you off the hook? They only didn't pursue it because your father is me."
Lou Fengju said, "You won once, but they won't let you win a second time. No matter what choice you make, they will manipulate it to make your chosen horse lose. You're not too stupid; at least you know how to do some pretense."
Lou Heming: "You can do whatever you want outside, and the family won't care, but there are two things you can't have. Ah Hong, you've gotten too cocky."
The first wife also sighed: "Ah Hong, how could you do such a thing?"
Each person spoke a sentence, causing Lou Hongjian to lower his head further and further, a deep sense of guilt appearing on his face.
Finally, he took off his suit jacket, knelt on the ground, and bowed his head deeply.
"Dad, go ahead and do it."
Commander Lou sneered and raised the whip in his hand.
He lashed out without mercy, showing no hesitation whatsoever. With one lash, a bloody welt quickly appeared on Lou Hongjian's shirt back.
The first wife, feeling a pang of pity, turned her head away and leaned on her second son's shoulder. The concubines watched from the side, but none of them spoke up to help.
He should be punished for his mistakes. If he is not made to learn a painful lesson, he will never learn.
The sound of whipping and screams of pain reached upstairs.
Lou Yansui heard some noise.
He called the maid over: "Ah Chun, what happened downstairs?"
Ah Chun said, "The Third Young Master did something wrong, and the Master is punishing him."
Lou Yansui: "What mistake did Third Brother make?"
Ah Chun shook her head: "I don't know."
Punishing the son was a family matter, and everyone in the family was present, but all the servants had been dismissed, and no one knew the inside story.
"Didn't Third Brother take Mao Mao out to play today?" Lou Yansui asked with some concern, "Could something have happened to Mao Mao?"
"Ah Chun, could you go and check on me?"
Lou Yansui thought for a moment, then began to worry: "Where is Mao Mao? Will she be frightened?"
Meanwhile, Mao Mao, whom he was thinking about, was sitting in the bathtub, happily blowing bubbles.
The tap was running, and the sound of the rushing water masked all other noises.
Xia Xiaoxiang applied shampoo to her head, complaining, "Where have you been? Why do you smell so bad?"
As she washed her hair, she said, "This shampoo sold by foreigners is really good; it smells much better than the soap we used to use."
"My brother and I went to see the horses!"
Mao Mao sat obediently in the bathtub, letting her mother rub her hair, while happily saying, "The horses run so fast, they fly out in a flash, and Mao Mao can't find them."
"My third brother also took me to see a play, the one in that huge theater that my mother took me to during the Lunar New Year."
"Mother, I'll sing for you."
She shook her head and swayed, trying to imitate the opera she had heard that day, but she couldn't find the right tune and couldn't imitate it properly. Her little voice was just a string of off-key, dry howls.
Xia Xiaoxiang scooped up a handful of clean water: "Here, hold it in your mouth, or you'll get sick."
"oh."
Mao Mao obediently took a mouthful of water, her cheeks round and plump, and sat quietly in the bathtub. After her mother washed her hair, she raised her little hand and asked her mother to lather her whole body with soap.
After she finished washing and got out of the bathtub, she was all fragrant again.
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