Li Jinyu remained quite calm, showing a stance of being ready for whatever might come, and said coldly: “Oh, is that so? Do you want to see me fight with Cheng Kairan? Or do you just want to see Cheng Kairan beat me up?”
“Don’t worry, if you get beaten up for me, I’ll offer myself to you in return,” Ye Meng said with a smile.
She was also implicitly warning Cheng Kairan—if you dare touch him, I’ll have the perfect reason to marry him.
Cheng Kairan finally understood—these two shameless people had already gotten together. He stood there for about five or six seconds, and if facial expressions could change with anger, he could have worked at a nightclub for free at this moment. In the end, his face turned ashen, and he stormed out without a word, slamming the door, which caused the group of men at the entrance to stand up sporadically and follow him out one after another.
“Hey, hey, hey—not eating anymore?” the owner hurriedly chased after them, “The… the bill hasn’t been settled yet!”
Ye Meng smiled gently at the owner, “I’m sorry, give me the bill.”
The owner hesitated reluctantly: “This…”
Ye Meng was polite and considerate, making it impossible to refuse: “It’s fine, I’ll pay in a moment.”
Cheng Kairan hadn’t gone far. He stood outside making a phone call, then led a group of men to smoke for a while. Beside them were several neatly arranged Audis, ready to roll. Ye Meng stared at them for a while, then said to Li Jinyu: “Guess who he’s waiting to meet?”
Li Jinyu couldn’t be bothered to guess, “Are you done eating? Let’s go if you’re done.”
Ye Meng’s attention returned to him, looking at him as she earnestly warned: “Next time I hear you say I’m someone’s girl, I’ll teach you a lesson.”
“He likes you, can’t you see that?” Li Jinyu couldn’t be bothered to beat around the bush with her, “I told you, I just want to spend the rest of my life with my grandmother in this town, without complications. The last time I helped you was purely out of respect for Sister Ya’en and the money, but I won’t get on his bad side and cause trouble for myself because of you.”
Actually, when he wasn’t around Li Lingbai, his emotional regulation was very good, almost like a normal person. Occasionally he would feel irritable or anxious, but he could control it. Li Jinyu didn’t know why, but while others couldn’t tell, Ye Meng somehow could.
She asked: “Then why are you dating Jiang Luzhi?”
“Because she’s in Beijing, I don’t have to spend money on dates, and it gives my grandmother a perfect reason not to introduce me to other girls. I told you, I’m trash,” he sneered.
Ye Meng smiled with ease, composure, and warmth, looking at him and saying: “As it happens when it comes to relationships, I’m trash too. As for Cheng Kairan, all these years he’s been like a blank canvas in front of me. His thoughts are written all over his face.”
That’s why she later cut ties with him—not because she was afraid of his revenge, but because she didn’t want to give him any more hope. Who would have thought that now, with circumstances changed, Cheng Kairan was riding on this momentum and had gotten to where he was today, and she couldn’t easily provoke him anymore? When you’re young, you can make clean breaks, but as adults, you have to leave room for maneuvering.
Neither of them spoke for a while.
In a moment, Ye Meng saw a gleaming black Mercedes slowly drive by outside. Shortly after, Cheng Kairan and his group tossed away their cigarette butts and got into the Audis parked nearby, majestically and orderly backing out of the small alley.
As the black Mercedes turned the corner, the rear window lowered about a third of the way, and a hand reached out through the gap, throwing out a cigarette butt. The thumb wore an old-fashioned yet rare jade-inlaid gold thumb ring.
Ye Meng didn’t recall it at that moment, not until she and Li Jinyu left the crab restaurant and were about to get a taxi. Then she suddenly froze like a monk in deep meditation. Li Jinyu walked quite far before noticing she hadn’t followed. Looking back, he saw Ye Meng hurriedly walking in the opposite direction.
Li Jinyu caught up and grabbed her, “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to find Cheng Kairan.”
“Why are you looking for him now? Missing him?”
Ye Meng couldn’t be bothered to explain to him and solemnly pushed him aside: “Little brother, big sister isn’t joking with you. I have something very important to confirm right now, so you go play somewhere else.”
His expression cooled, “Tell me what it’s about first, and I’ll tell you where to find them.”
“You know where they went?”
Li Jinyu crossed his arms over his chest, leaning against the wall at the entrance of the alley, chuckling as he said: “Do you want to find Cheng Kairan, or that Mercedes with license plate 5567?”
Ye Meng was startled, “You recognize it?”
“No,” he shook his head, “But I always glance at out-of-town license plates. Can’t help having a good memory—one look and I’ve remembered it.”
Ye Meng asked: “Then how do you know where they went?”
Occasionally satisfied customers would come out of the small alley. Li Jinyu pulled her aside before saying, “Just a guess. At this hour, with a bunch of subordinates and an out-of-town visitor, they changed locations at the last minute. There are only a few restaurants in town.”
She looked at him hesitantly, not knowing why, but feeling he might be trustworthy, so she said: “A few days before my mother died, she met a man wearing a jade-inlaid gold thumb ring. I want to confirm if it’s him.”
“And then what?” Li Jinyu leaned against the wall, waiting leisurely for her to provide a more precise plan, “How will you confirm? Call Cheng Kairan and ask if the man with the jade-inlaid gold thumb ring next to him is your mother’s friend. Or rush in and confront him face to face, asking if he killed your mother?”
Ye Meng rolled her eyes: “Do you think I’m an idiot? If he is the murderer who killed my mother, how could he possibly admit it to my face? And if my mother had some secret, wouldn’t I be putting myself in the line of fire? I just want to confirm his identity.”
Li Jinyu smiled, staring at her discreetly for a moment, then sent a voice message. With his finger pressed on the screen, aimed at the microphone, his eyes stared straight at her, saying: “Yang Tianwei, check if there’s an out-of-town Mercedes outside, license plate 5567.”
Ye Meng immediately heard a swoosh sound.
Yang Tianwei quickly replied with a voice message, “5567? Beijing license plate? I think there is one, right on the back hillside.”
“Keep an eye on it for me,” Li Jinyu replied.
He then opened a map and marked several locations for her to see, “At this time, with so many people, there aren’t many places they could go. Also, Cheng Kairan is dressed formally today, and the visitor has a Beijing license plate, so the venue definitely won’t be too shabby. The crab restaurant is popular on social media, which means this Beijing person is quite young, under forty at least. There are two other popular restaurants in town, one near the hospital and one near the Three Water Tower. But to go to the Three Water Tower, you have to cross the bridge, and it’s rush hour now—look how congested the bridge is. The only thing is, they can’t enter the hospital parking lot, so they can only park on the abandoned back hillside of the inpatient department, which is something Cheng Kairan often does.”
“…” Ye Meng was rendered speechless by his analysis.
After they got into the car, he asked, “Has that person seen you before?”
“No, I only saw this man with the ring from a distance, giving something to my mother,” Ye Meng didn’t want to involve a third party in matters concerning her mother. If there was any trouble, she was, after all, her mother’s daughter, while others had no connection—especially Li Jinyu. So she said, “Li Jinyu, just send me the address, and I can go by myself.”
Li Jinyu withdrew his gaze from the window, glancing at her and saying lazily: “I never said I’d accompany you. I’ve given the address to the driver, and I’ll go straight back to the hospital later.”
“Good,” Ye Meng breathed a sigh of relief.
There was silence for a long time. The scenery outside the car gradually became familiar, as the car turned onto the main road of the old city center, with the buildings on both sides becoming increasingly dense and low.
“There’s something strange,” Li Jinyu stared out the window and suddenly said.
Ye Meng: “What is it?”
He turned back, “Why did Cheng Kairan suddenly decide to change locations? If this Beijing person is so important to him, why would he temporarily leave with everyone just because we upset him? He shouldn’t be that impulsive.”
“So what do you think?”