After the crowd dispersed, stillness settled in the tea room, pierced only by the sound of flowing water from the pool. Pei Zhen was still holding Xu Si’s hand, but he had moved it from under the table to rest openly on top. His cool fingertips rested on her wrist bone; a little pressure made the skin flush slightly. Her skin was fine-textured and delicate, smooth as satin to the touch.
"It’s so beautiful," he murmured, gazing down to admire it for a moment longer before releasing her arm. He was careful not to injure it and deliberately kept his distance, lips curving into a smile. "President Xu, everyone has left. What did you want to tell me? Is it something I’d like to hear?"
Transparent glass walls surrounded them, offering a view of the rockery and stream outside, where delicate grass and robust trees grew side by side.
Xu Si casually picked up the oil lighter from the table. It still bore the fingerprints of the woman from Hong Kong Island who had used it. Pursing her lips into a smile, she asked, "What do you like to hear?"
His thin lips curled. "For instance, that mixed-race man—how did you two end up together again? I heard he confessed his feelings to you?"
"You really do know everything." Xu Si wiped the fingerprints off the lighter, her voice laced with amusement. "He did confess to me, but I rejected him. Did you know that?"
Pei Zhen tilted his chin up slightly, his grey eyes cold and sinister. "Mm, I knew. If you hadn’t rejected him, we wouldn’t be sitting here so peacefully. You would have had to die for love with me."
"You’re really crazy." Xu Si suddenly looked up at him, a laugh tingeing her words. "But to tell you the truth, I’m a bit infatuated with this kind of craziness, and with you."
At that moment, the air in the tea room seemed to have been vacuumed out, growing so thin it was suffocating.
Xu Si never lacked the courage to be honest. As she spoke, she found the words weren’t as hard to say as she’d imagined. The world didn’t end, and the great wall of morality and ethics didn’t crumble because of it.
She just propped her chin on her hand, quietly observing his reaction.
He looked up, his grey eyes like an abyss, and a pleased chuckle rumbled in his throat.
Xu Si seized the moment, rising to stand before him. She reached out, her fingers tracing his dangerously alluring eyebrows, the high bridge of his nose, his perfect lip line, and finally lingering on the crimson mole. Her voice was husky and low as she said, "I admit, I’m a bit of a beast. I’ve taken a liking to you. I slept with you, and I’m willing to take responsibility."
Pei Zhen caught her restless hand. He remained perfectly still, his voice bewitching. "Mm, so? What are you planning to do?"
Xu Si used her other hand to cover his eyes, leaned down to plant a light kiss near his lips, and then... she bit hard into his lower lip, blood welling quickly.
Surprisingly, it wasn’t metallic, but rather a little sweet.
Hearing his hiss of pain, Xu Si laughed. The movement pulled at the cut on her lip from the previous night, making it throb as well.
"So," she began, "let’s put taking responsibility aside for now. First, let’s get one thing straight: what right did you have to punish me yesterday, and then arbitrarily forgive me? I didn’t mistake you for someone else. Even if I was drunk, I swear, at that moment, you were all I was thinking about."
At her words, Pei Zhen paused. He completely ignored the wound on his lip, looking up at Xu Si with an astonished expression.
He had seen that kind of look far too many times in his life. It was the kind of look that clearly saw through him to someone else.
Yet Xu Si was saying... she was thinking of *him*?
Pei Zhen lowered his gaze and suddenly drew her close, his arms wrapping around her waist, eliminating the distance between them. His shoulders trembled for a moment as he murmured, his voice barely a whisper, like words from a dream, "How could it be me? Xu Si, don’t lie to me."
He lifted Xu Si’s hand, pressing it to his heart. He kept his gaze fixed upwards on her, the corners of his lips forming a smile that seemed to hover between tears and joy. "Don’t let my happiness be for nothing. It would hurt too much, right here. Even if the truth makes me sad, please don’t lie to me."
Xu Si’s hand was pressed so firmly against his chest that her palm could feel his heart hammering wildly, its rhythm alarmingly fast and heavy.
In turn, her own heart began to pound just as fast, just as heavily.