Yao Chen took Han Yanyan to a shopping mall full of expensive, branded stores.
Selecting a store, he bought her a little reception gown and matching shoes. When she emerged from the dressing room, he looked surprised.
“Sure enough, clothes make the woman,” he tutted.
“You’ll have to buy a coat, too. Mine is a two-hundred yuan down jacket, you’ll only be embarrassed if I show up wearing it,” she said lightly and casually.
Yao Chen’s eyes were full of smiles. “I enjoy your honesty.”
What Mr. Yao had was money, and he wasn’t afraid to spend it on women. If he didn’t, what would be the point of earning it by licking blood off a knife? He swept out the shop, not only purchasing a nice outfit for the next evening’s reception, but also a large pile for everyday attire for Han Yanyan.
“Throw away what you no longer need. You’ll have plenty of new clothes to wear in the future,” he told her.
While she was trying on the new things, he had the clerk quietly throw out the ones she was currently wearing, forcing her to wear the new clothes, shoes, and coat out of the store.
Next to them, her torn old purse stood out. Once again, Yao Chen high-handedly threw it out, buying her two new ones.
First the gently domineering act, then an offensive of cash.
Han Yanyan accepted it all with a cold face, but inside she was blissfully happy. She felt like the stereotypical rich, mean girl.
They ended by having dinner together, much as if they were on a date.
When the evening ended and he sent Han Yanyan home to her apartment lobby, Yao Chen asked, “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”
“My boyfriend rented this place,” she replied. “He certainly wouldn’t like me inviting other men in.”
“Oho,” Yao Chen asked. “And where he he?”
“Studying abroad.” Her face was expressionless.
Yao Chen’s smile looked especially happy.
Han Yanyan stretched out her hand to punch in the door code. He dragged her back into the car by the arm, pressed her down on the seat and coaxed, “Now, now, don’t be upset. He left you behind, and it’s his loss. You should cherish the present.”
The car was small and the two of them were too close. Deliberately, Han Yanyan allowed her breath to quicken.
Yao Chen noticed and laughed mockingly, feeling very satisfied with his pheromones. He went in to kiss her, but Han Yanyan tilted her head to the side so that he only managed to kiss her ear. Unsatisfied, he bit it.
Her whole body quivered. She shoved him away, opened the door, and ran upstairs.
Watching her disappear, Yao Chen stroked the steering wheel, satisfied with the progress bar.
When Han Yanyan got home, she let her bags fall where they sat, threw herself onto the sofa, and leaned her head back, satisfied with the progress bar.
It was time to let Yao Chen slowly ‘conquer’, she thought. It’s just that the way he bit her ear… was very familiar.
But if Yao Chen was truly Ding Yao, then… Chengyu1, where are you?
She rubbed her face hard.
The next evening, Yao Chen picked her up in his limousine. Even though he had seen her before in that little cocktail gown, with her hair and makeup done Han Yanyan seemed like another person altogether.
Though she was clearly the beautiful daughter of a poor family, to look at her one would think that she was born wealthy and distinguished.
Yao Chen was quite astounded.
The cocktail party was a serious, proper business reception, and all its participants were serious, proper business people. Han Yanyan, locked in the shell of ‘college student’ for the last month, breathed in the familiar air and felt like she had come back to life.
Holding a wine glass and sipping slowly, she thought to herself that the mere face that Yao Chen would come to such an occasion was enough to show that he wished to wash his hands clean.
This was good. She smiled.
As Yao Chen spoke with the other attendees, he kept an occasional eye on her. Whenever anyone struck up a conversation with her, she conversed and laughed very appropriately with them, seemingly completely at ease.
Just yesterday he had been worried about whether she would make a fool of oneself. Someone who had never attended such an occasion was particularly liable to seem like a frog in a well. But now she seemed like a fish in water, like a powerful young woman born with a silver spoon in her mouth. Who would have thought that every article of clothing she had worn yesterday lumped together would not have exceeded 500 yuan?
Yao Chen felt confused. Was this thanks to higher education? But no, nearly everyone here had attended university. It was people like him who hadn’t even finished high school who were the exception. Yet none of those people were as eye-catching as her.
He smoked a cigarette, quietly observing her for a while. When she turned down someone trying to start a conversation, he walked over.
“This isn’t bad.” He said, handing her a glass of wine.
She took it. “Are you not busy?”
“Feeling done with chit-chatting,” he replied, loosening his tie a little.
Han Yanyan put her glass down and tidied it up for him. “Just a little longer. The night isn’t quite over yet. If you don’t comply with etiquette, the others will feel slighted.”
Yao Chen let her take care of him. “You seem to know a lot.”
“Just basic business etiquette. I’ve attended lectures about it at school.” Han Yanyan said.
She drank a couple more glasses on purpose that night. After having fought Yao Chen for so long, it was time for them to have a ‘heart to heart’. Alcohol was the best intermediary.
This body really couldn’t handle alcohol. She was so light-headed on the way back that she fell asleep without meaning to.
She woke to being kissed by Yao Chen in the back seat.
When he was in a suit and tie, he was still a man. But now with his tie thrown on the seat and several buttons undone, his humanity was slipping away and there was only the wolf.
Biting him, she tried to push him away. But this body she was in now was far weaker than the apocalyptic world’s strengthened ‘Han Yanyan’, and weaker too than ‘Eldest Miss Han’ who had taken fighting lessons from a coach at the gym every day. Still tipsy, the hands she was trying to push him with were instead soft and supple.
The bite left Yao Chen with blood on his lips. He wiped his mouth and held her wrists down, kissing her ruthlessly and relentlessly, his tongue and hands wandering.
Han Yanyan tonight had shone as brilliantly and radiantly as any star. On top of that, she was a woman from a good family, and the feeling was just right.
The blood was rushing from Yao Chen’s brain. He burned with lust.