She sat nervously at the side of his bed. Biting her lips, she observed the pale little face with agony and mixed emotions.
She reached out her hand to stroke his face, and her heart winced at the coolness she felt at the end of her fingertips.
Her brows kneaded. His skin felt so cold it was devoid of warmth.
Tears gushed from her eyes uncontrollably as great pain gripped her heart.
"Youyou…" she whispered his nickname, worried that she might wake him up.
The heart of Mu Yazhe, who was standing behind her, skipped a beat as he watched the little lad feebly sleep in the bed.
What emotions should a man have when he saw his missing biological son for the first time in six years?
He could only feel something relentlessly stirring in his heart. This was a strange glowing feeling that was indescribable!
This was not his first time acknowledging his status as a father.
When this woman bore Little Yichen for him, he lost his usual composure at that time and repeatedly made mistakes during the board meeting.
He had rushed to the Mu's private hospital immediately after the meeting and took hold of the infant from the nurse's hands. Little Yichen was so tiny then with his little head, crumpled face, and squinted shut eyes. The two little hands could hardly hold on to his one index finger.
When he carried the child in his hands, the wailing baby instantly stopped his cries; the two small hands flailed wildly in the air before one of which caught his finger. Instinctively, the infant pulled the finger toward his mouth and started to suckle on it with great succulence.
He was so amused by the baby's antics he broke into a slight smile and his eyes danced with merriment.
At that moment, he thought that he was dreaming.
Had he really become a father?
There was no happy marriage or a wife he doted on. In fact, he did not experience what other men had – an anxious long wait outside the delivery room. It felt as if a precious son had dropped from the sky that made him an instant father!
He had sworn there and then that he would provide a warm and loving family to his child.
Although no mother was in his household, he would be a good father to him.
He could only model his fathering after his father's. Becoming a full-fledged father himself, he actually felt lost inside with all the mixed emotions…
When he first got hold of the infant, he stared at Little Yichen for half a day, diligently searching for an inkling of his identity on the tiny face.
The child was still a baby with a crumpled face back then, and it was only after he had reached a month of age that his face started to show a vague resemblance – the child's mouth, with distinctive thin flaps, was like his.
Logically speaking, the son should look like the mother, and the daughter would take after the father, but in Little Yichen's case, he looked so much like him it would not be an exaggeration to say that both had been cast in the same mold.
As he stood gazing at Youyou in the bed within this room, his heart was in great turmoil, even more so than when he had carefully held the crying Little Yichen in his arms.
At that time, when the pregnancy report indicated that Yun Shishi was with a pair of twins, Old Master Mu was over the moon. Unfortunately, they were delivered prematurely at eight months. He learned that the younger twin was not breathing upon birth and was subsequently pronounced as stillborn. The hospital settled the baby's affair before he had a chance to take a look at him.
He did not pursue the matter further for fear of stirring his grandfather's grief.