Chapter 20: The Return Journey “She’s the best at running away.”
The engine started and the car drove out of the community smoothly.
Zhui Lian sat leaning against the window. The border town that had trapped her for months gradually disappeared from her sight, along with the majestic snow-capped mountains unique to this town.
She still couldn't believe it.
She really left.
Fu Dongli arrived faster than expected.
Just one day after Pei Zhiwei's phone call, his black SUV was parked downstairs of their apartment.
The car window rolled down, revealing a somewhat cold man's face with an ascetic air.
He tapped his fingertips twice on the steering wheel as a greeting.
"Get in the car."
Zhui Lian opened the car door and sat in the back seat.
Yu Peizhi put their luggage into the trunk slowly.
As Yu Peizhi walked around to the back door, Fu Dongli said, "You sit in the passenger seat."
"Why?" Yu Peizhi raised his eyebrows.
"It's hard to find the way here," Fu Dongli said. "I need you to point it out."
"All right."
Yu Peizhi shrugged as if he felt a little regretful.
But he still didn't open the car door immediately. Instead, he leaned over and smiled at Zhui Lian through the lowered car window.
"Are you really not going to check it out again?"
His voice was low, coaxing, as if he were sharing a secret known only to the two of them.
Zhui Lian clenched her hands on her knees, her expression calm: "No need."
She knew where he was talking about.
Before leaving today, Yu Peizhi went down to his mirror room again and smiled and invited Zhui Lian to join him.
"Are you really not going? Maybe Lianlian will get something she needs?" He whispered in Zhui Lian's ear in a coaxing tone.
Now she refused to speak again, and her husband stared at her like a ghost for a long time.
She seemed to feel the mirror against her back again, it was cold.
Countless broken images flickered before my eyes...
But Zhui Lian still suppressed the fear in her heart, looked back at him, and urged softly: "Pei Zhi, hurry up."
Finally, after a long while, Yu Peizhi showed a familiar gentle smile on his face.
He said word by word: "Okay, then the baby is alone in the back, so take care of yourself."
Fu Dongli drives very steadily and doesn't talk much.
The car was eerily quiet, with only the faint sound of classical music and the occasional brief exchange of words about road conditions.
The light outside the window was filtered by the clouds, and the night was getting darker and darker.
Zhui Lian leaned her head against the window and closed her eyes, pretending to be asleep.
Occasionally, the high beams of the car would illuminate the three faces in the car with different thoughts. After an unknown amount of time, the bumpy road became smooth and the car seemed to be on the highway.
Sufficient heating and steady progress.
It gave rise to a real sense of sleepiness.
Zhui Lian's consciousness finally began to blur, and he fell deeply.
His hand unconsciously touched the absinthe bottle cap that had been placed tightly against the inside of his pocket.
The sweet and bitter smell came up, making people feel sick.
No...I can't sleep!
"How far is the service area?" Zhui Lian shook his head violently, forcing himself out of his drowsiness.
"What's wrong, baby?" Yu Peizhi looked back at Zhui Lian and said gently, "Do you want to go to the bathroom? Do you want me to go with you?"
"We'll be there soon." After Fu Dongli said this, he turned a corner and drove into the service area.
He parked the car, glanced at Yu Peizhi, and said with a tone of disapproval: "Your wife is not disabled."
"No."
After saying this, Zhui Lian hurriedly opened the car door and jumped out.
In the toilet cubicle, Xiao Xu's message popped up from the WeChat secondary account she had just switched to.
Wen Xu: [Sister Lianlian, I've already sent the item to you, but are you sure it's to this address?]
Wen Xu: [Image: A screenshot of a courier tracking number]
Wen Xu: [Even though you told me nothing was wrong, I still feel uneasy... Sister Lianlian, if you have any questions, please tell me!]
*
Zhui Lian came out of the bathroom, and the night breeze made him feel much more awake.
As soon as the vague outline of the black SUV came into view, she saw from afar that Yu Peizhi had gotten out of the car at some point.
The sparse lights of the service station were reflected on the ground. The other person was pacing anxiously, his eyes constantly scanning in the direction she had gone.
Fu Dongli also got out of the car and leaned against the door.
Suddenly, Yu Peizhi turned around and headed towards the toilet.
Fu Dongli reached out and grabbed his arm: "What are you going to do?"
Zhui Lian was startled and subconsciously took two steps back, quickly hiding behind the nearest large truck.
"I'll go find her." Yu Peizhi's voice was calm, but it contained a creepy feeling.
"It's only been less than ten minutes." Fu Dongli frowned.
"Ten minutes is a long time."
Yu Peizhi's gaze was still fixed on the distance. "She's the best at running away, you don't know."
Fu Dongli tutted, "Don't push the girl so hard. Have you forgotten what you said before? Do you want to repeat the same mistake again?"
"Want a cigarette? Press it." He took out a cigarette from his pocket, took out a cigarette and handed it over.
Yu Peizhi's gaze lingered on the cigarette for a moment, and he reached out his hand.
But when he was about to touch her, he suddenly withdrew his hand and said calmly, "No, she doesn't like the smell of cigarettes."
Fu Dongli said "oh" in understanding, put the cigarette away, and asked without lighting it himself, "How is the effect of that thing?"
“It’s pretty realistic.”
Yu Peizhi answered absentmindedly, his eyes still looking anxiously in the direction where Zhui Lian left.
"It's specially made for night effect." Fu Dongli added unwillingly.
Yu Peizhi just hummed, obviously his mind was not here at all.
Fu Dongli looked at him like this, sighed, and reached out to push him into the car: "If it really doesn't work, just make a phone call."
immediately--
Zhui Lian was hiding in the shadow of a large truck, and the screen of the mobile phone in his pocket suddenly lit up.
Accompanied by a prelude to a cell phone ringtone.
Two words suddenly jumped on the screen——
"husband".
Zhui Lian hurriedly pressed the mute button.
After a long while, the screen went dark and the call was automatically hung up.
Everything around her was quiet, so quiet that the only sound she could hear was the pounding of her heart.
And from the SUV—
"She's dead."
There was a deep coldness in Yu Peizhi's tone.
Fu Dongli seemed to sigh, and his voice came vaguely: "... Wait a little longer."
Zhui Lian waited for a few more minutes, and it felt like every second was as long as a century.
Only after confirming that there were no footsteps approaching outside did she slowly walk out from behind the truck, pretending to have just returned, and walked towards the SUV.
When I opened the car door, the warm air that hit me was a little stuffy.
Zhui Lian just bent down to get in, but his movements suddenly froze.
The passenger seat was empty.
Yu Peizhi, who was supposed to be sitting in the passenger seat, was now sitting safely in the middle of the back seat.
In the dim light, his deep black eyes were fixed on her.
Locked her in without blinking.
The sticky gaze seemed to have never left.
Fu Dongli glanced in the rearview mirror, said nothing, and just put the car back in gear.
Zhui Lian hesitated for only a second, then lowered her eyes and silently tried to squeeze past Yu Peizhi and get to the other side of the car window.
However, as soon as she turned sideways, an arm suddenly wrapped around her and tightly held her waist.
"Well!"
Zhui Lian was caught off guard, let out a low cry, and fell heavily into his arms.
The next second, Yu Peizhi buried his head.
Sniffing sound, quick and hard.
No words.
Like a wild animal confirming its possession, his nose quickly brushed against the top of her hair, sniffing deeply, his breath hot and scorching.
The heat continued to descend.
Slide behind her ears and into the crook of her neck.
Next are the cheeks and collarbones.
Then he even grabbed her hands and sniffed them carefully from her fingertips to her wrists, even between her nails.
The movement was paranoid, urgent, and carried a kind of morbid certainty.
The rising and falling sound of breathing blends into the low melody of classical music.
Fu Dongli glanced in the rearview mirror again, his brows furrowed imperceptibly. "Yu Peizhi, that's enough. Your wife is right here, she can't run away."
Yu Peizhi seemed not to hear it.
But his inspection finally came to an end.
The cold big hand touched Zhui Lian's cheek, and the touch was even more thrilling than the night wind outside the car blowing across her cheek.
His fingertips were placed on her lips, caressing them bit by bit.
"Baby, you've been gone for a long time..."
The voice was terribly low and hoarse, even with a barely perceptible gasp: "You didn't meet anyone else, did you?"
Zhui Lian's heart was beating wildly.
But perhaps because she had experienced so much, she was not as frightened as before and speechless.
She just instinctively turned her head, trying to avoid his overly aggressive gaze and touch.
"No...it's just that the restroom was crowded and there was a queue."
"Really?" Yu Peizhi smiled slowly, his voice becoming lighter and softer. "Then why did the baby just now--"
"Hang up on me?"
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The author has something to say: orz, wait for me to make up the word count tonight. I have been very busy these past two days due to internship handover and overtime work. I feel like what I wrote is a bunch of TAT. I'm sorry everyone.
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