Chapter 334 - Truth

Wuming refused to talk last night and made intimacy an excuse. Addison started asking him questions as to why he didn't want to go look for his mother when he started kissing her.

She knew that he was only trying to distract her and avoid the conversation all together—and she also knew that she shouldn't let him get away with it, but his mouth was hot and soft against her lips that she could not help but give in to it.

She told herself, I would ask him right after.

But when Wuming was done with her, she was so tired that she could not even speak and only had enough energy to close her eyes and she drifted right to sleep. She was awakened in the middle of the night and found that Wuming was not on his spot on the bed. She was still so sleepy that she just let him be.

He was just probably tiring himself in the bas.e.m.e.nt again, trying to escape his own thoughts. Addison also did that sometimes, use workout to clear her mind and then fall asleep because you would be so tired to even think of something.

When she woke up again, she finally found him getting out of the shower. "Long night?" she croaked, her throat begging for water.

He was rubbing his hair dry with a towel. "Not really."

"You didn't sleep again."

"Not something that I haven't done before." He sat down the bed and pulled his phone from the nightstand.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm just checking my messages," he answered with a giddy tone. "Are you jealous or something?"

"No, I didn't mean that," she said and got up, the blanket falling down to her waist, exposing her torso. "I was talking about your mom and the clue from last night."

"Oh that." He answered it like it was the last thing on his mind. "I don't know. I'll let Chen decide on the matters of that."

"But you were on his side last night."

"He's the reasonable one," Wuming said like it was the most obvious thing. And it was. "He knows what he's doing."

"Or you just don't really want to see your mother?"

Wuming sighed. "We've been over this. I've been over this with my brothers too. They both know that I don't really want to find her. I'm just fascinated with all these clues. Don't get me wrong, I love my mom, I just didn't think she would be this smart."

Addison felt somehow offended for his mother. "Why? Why do you resent her?"

Wuming laughed but it was without joy. "I don't hate my mom! We were just never close."

"You're lying. Why do you hate her?"

Wuming tilted his head to the ceiling, like he was hating every second of this conversation. "I don't want to talk about it and I don't hate her."

Addison wanted to know. She knew she was not in the right place. Hell, she didn't even know what she was having with Wuming. All she knew was that they were going on a trip around the world when everything was over. "What is it that she did that make you hate her?"

Wuming shook his head and replaced his phone on the nightstand. He stood up and rummage through a drawer of clothes. "There's no specific reason for it, Addison. I am believer that you are going to get what's coming for you. She was probably involved in some shitty business for her to need to escape. Or I don't know, maybe she's dead already."

Addison got up and sauntered to him. He stopped looking for clothes. "You're not telling me the truth. In case you've forgotten, I am an assassin. I can tell when you're lying. I could read the truth in your eyes, Qing Wei. What are you hiding?"

Wuming found this laughable but Addison had been around many men in her entire life. All these self-defense tactics and walls around their soft hearts—she has heard of all that bullcrap. "You're not some detective, Addison. I'm not lying."

"But you're hiding something." She pressed her n.a.k.e.d body against his. "What is it?"

"Are you trying to seduce me into telling the truth?" he scoffed. "That would've worked on your weak targets, my dear. But in case you don't notice, your charms don't actually work on me that way."

She pushed him on the bed and got on top of him. "I admit, sometimes it doesn't work. But guess what? I have backup plans." She brandished a knife from under the pillow and pressed the sharp edge against his neck.

"You're not going to kill me," he said, his eyes sparkling at the danger at his throat.

"I won't. But I can make you feel pain. Lots and lots of it." Wuming only tilted his neck, exposing more of his veins and Addison hated him that moment. "Are you trying to kill yourself?"

Wuming gave her a half-smirk. "I'm not afraid to get hurt, Addison. I already had lots of that in my life. I don't think I even feel pain that much. I'm not scared of it."

Addison felt defeated and pulled the knife away from him. She threw it in the air and there was a soft thump as it stuck to the wall. She sighed and laid down next to him. "I don't get you, Qing Wei."

"I'm fairly easy to understand," he said, sounding like hisself. 

"Why are you so detached, with your mother?"

Wuming swallowed. He wanted to lie so much, to make up a story. But he thought it was about time for him to tell the truth. "You're right. I hate my mother. I don't want to blame her, it was her death that pulled this family apart. She made us who are. We used to believe we shouldn't blame a dead person, and now we think she's still alive… I can't."

Addison wanted to find something to say to him. To defend the mother but she found none. She herself didn't want to be associated with her parents. When her accident happen, she could've gone home, but she chose this path and killed people as she walked.

"She did this intentionally. What kind of mother are you that you let your sons suffer?" he asked the ceiling. He should be feeling something in his chest, something burning. He was waiting for it to come but it didn't.

"One thing that I know is that…" he began and shook his head. "On the day that she supposedly died…"

No, that was not the right sentence either.

"What is it?" Addison asked, looming over him.

Upon seeing her eyes, it somehow made the truth easier to say. "I think it's my mom that started the fire."