CH 32

Yan Suizhi’s steps faltered, slight astonishment showing in his eyes.

He stared for a moment before starting to move his feet again, unhurriedly walking up to the car. 

The car window slowly wound down, revealing Gu Yan’s handsome but cold side profile. The heating in the car was more than sufficient, but it was unable to warm up his nature by any measure.

“Are you waiting for someone?” Yan Suizhi stood by the car door with his shopping bags.

There weren’t any other familiar faces in the vicinity. Actually, he knew that Gu Yan was most likely parked here because he was waiting for him, only that he still asked out of courtesy.

Gu Yan slid him a sidelong glance. He inclined his head. “Get in the car.” 

But Yan Suizhi did not immediately open the car door. Instead, he bent down and waved his finger before Gu Yan through the open window. The ring-shaped smart device glowed slightly under the streetlight. “I had just…”

As he began to speak, a black rental car slowly pulled up behind Gu Yan’s car. The hired driver looked down to check the location coordinates, and he wound down the car window, gesturing at Yan Suizhi. “Did you call for a ride?”

Yan Suizhi, “…Yeah.”

What spectacular timing.

Gu Yan glanced at the car through the rearview mirror, his already cold expression instantly dropping another ten degrees, like he was upset and possibly felt that he had done something very unnecessary.

However, given that he was never happy, it was difficult to judge if this expression was due to him perpetually looking displeased, or if he really was ticked off.

Yan Suizhi lightly tapped the car door like he was patting someone on the shoulder. “Wait for me.”

With this, he walked over to the rental car and smiled at the driver. “Sorry, I’m going to have to cancel this trip, something came up.” 

“Okay, no problem.” Fortunately, the driver didn’t chew his head off and simply recited a well-practised instruction. “Please change the status of your booking, you might have to pay a small cancellation fee.”

Yan Suizhi nodded. He apologised again, and that driver pressed a button to turn the car around, driving away.

Paying the cancellation fee on his smart device, he opened Gu Yan’s car door and got into the car.

When he sat in the front passenger’s seat, he was rather caught between laughter and tears. But putting the awkwardness of the ‘car crash’ aside, he was still quite touched. 

“I never expected that you would wait here the whole time,” the esteemed Professor Yan looked at Student Gu’s cold face askance, attempting to lighten the atmosphere.

Gu Yan moved his lips, saying insipidly, “I didn’t expect it, either.”

Yan Suizhi, “…”

Can anyone continue a conversation like this? 

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Tjc Velhtl, “Ktfgf kjr ralii j ilaaif ifoa joafg ojmabglcu lc atf gbbw offr ja atf tbafi. Rba abb wemt, rb P ybbxfv j yjrlm, wjc-bqfgjafv ajzl, cba jc ecwjccfv rwjga ajzl.”

How very frugal.

Gu Yan rested an elbow next to the car window, his gaze calmly looking at the road ahead, while his comment to that was a cold scoff. 

Yan Suizhi, “…”

“So. Are you going to give me a lift to the hotel before heading back?” Yan Suizhi asked.

Gu Yan didn’t respond, though Yan Suizhi couldn’t tell if it was because he couldn’t be bothered or something else. His eyebrows creased slightly and he looked a little lost in thought.

After a while, Gu Yan asked, “Which hotel did you book?” 

They’d already been on the road for two kilometres before this guy finally remembered to ask…

Yan Suizhi, “Mountain Pine Hotel.”

“The one at the clock tower square?” Gu Yan checked the general location.

Yan Suizhi nodded. “Yeah, right there.” 

“Have you paid the deposit?”

“Not yet.” Yan Suizhi didn’t put much thought into it when answering.

Twenty minutes later, the space podcar sped past the clock tower square and charged straight in the other, completely unrelated, direction, without the slightest sign of slowing down.

“…” From the front passenger’s seat, Yan Suizhi’s expression was stiff as he reminded, “Mountain Pine Hotel is far behind you.” 

Gu Yan glanced at him through the rearview mirror. “There was a murder at that hotel four months ago.”

Yan Suizhi nodded. “I’ve heard a little of it.”

In fact, he had only read about it when he booked the hotel, but he had too little credit history on his temporary identity, and his transactional history was even emptier, so he wasn’t able to book most hotels. The ones that he could were inconvenient because they were too far and remote; this was the only exception.

Mountain Pine Hotel itself was considered a high-class hotel, just downright unlucky to be associated with a case like that. The murder had nothing to do with the security system either; the murder was deliberate and long pre-mediated by a friend staying in the same suite. 

The murder scene was so grisly that Mountain Pine Hotel suffered a steep drop in business and clientele over the past few months.

Or else, Yan Suizhi wouldn’t even be able to book this place.

“Why didn’t you let me book it for you?” asked Gu Yan, abrupt, as the car drove into Fa Wang district.

They were the only two in the car. It didn’t take much effort to speak; his voice was very low, and very deep. At this time, Yan Suizhi was looking out of the window at the rapidly receding trails of light in a daze, thus it took him a moment to react. “What?” 

“I said…” Gu Yan paused for a moment after uttering these two words, seemingly mulling over something. And a moment passed before he continued. “You couldn’t book most hotels because your creditworthiness was affected by your low balance. So, why didn’t you ask me for help?”

As before, he seemed uncaring, lazy to expend the effort. His voice was very low, but because it was very quiet within the car, his words were unusually clear.

Yan Suizhi froze for a moment. He was used to being independent and taking care of everything himself. He didn’t really like people meddling in his affairs, nor was he used to asking for help—so, the thought had never even crossed his mind. But if he really answered it in this manner, Gu Yan’s expression would probably drop another ten degrees.

He wanted to make a joke and say, ‘Don’t forget that you were trying your utmost to send me packing at first, how could I dare approach you for help.’ But the words caught in his mouth, and changed by the time they left his tongue. “I forgot. I’ll remember to trouble you for help the next time that I encounter something like this again.” 

Saying this, his eyes curved and he smiled at Gu Yan, showing his sincerity.

But in fact… even if it wasn’t in the hundreds, Professor Yan had said similar words at least a dozen times in his life before. But his so-called ‘next time’ never came. These were basically words said out of etiquette and once leaving his mouth, forgotten; though they sounded sincere, he had never taken them to heart.

When the next time he encountered any issue really came, he would still not ask anyone to step in and help.

Gu Yan well understood this bad habit of his, and his eyes didn’t even lift when he heard these words. 

“So where are we headed to now?” Yan Suizhi looked out the car, asking doubtfully, “A different hotel? But there are more parks and not too many hotels on this side, right?”

Besides, at this hour, finding a hotel in De Carma at the last minute would be a pie in the sky; it would be faster to dream.

Gu Yan replied flatly, “What hotel, I’m finding you a park bench to make do for the night.”

Yan Suizhi, “…” 

Ten minutes later, Gu Yan’s space podcar really did drive into a garden in the middle of Fa Wang.

Naturally, this wasn’t just a garden. Past the garden, there was a quiet community, small villas one after the next that especially were beautiful to look at in their minimalistic design. And, of course… the prices were particularly beautiful to look at as well.

This residential area was a close, five-minute drive to the central business district where Southcross Law Firm was also located, so it was a popular residence for the elite working class.

“You stay here?” Yan Suizhi asked. 

Gu Yan hummed, and this time, the words that left his mouth approached normal human speech. “I’ll lend you my loft for a few days.”

“The lodging fee—”

“Same as what the hotel charged you.”

Yan Suizhi was relieved. 

If there was no charge, he would probably have found a way to move out by morning. Since Gu Yan was willing to charge for accommodation, then he could stay for a few more days with a peace of mind. After all, trying to find a flat that suited his tastes wasn’t something that could be actualised in half a day.

Just for this reason, he suddenly felt that he and Student Gu would get along smashingly.

Yan Suizhi got out of the car carrying his few shopping bags, and watched Gu Yan park his car in the garage of the small storied building before him.

As he waited for Gu Yan to come out, another car entered the garden area behind him. It was a very brilliant red, dazzling under the streetlights. 

Yan Suizhi squinted over at that side, but because of the headlights, he couldn’t make out the person in the driver’s seat. He took a few steps back, standing on the edge of the flower-lined road in front of Gu Yan’s door, watching as that bright red car turned the corner through the community gates, driving past him.

And then…

It double backed.

Yan Suizhi, “???” 

As he remained puzzled, that car screeched to a halt before him, and the window slowly lowered. A face more confused than Yan Suizhi’s poked out. “I thought my eyes were mistaken, but Ruan, why are you here?”

“Ms Fizz? You live here too?”

“Yeah, I’m too broke, I can only afford to stay in a semi-detached,” Fizz flippantly replied. “You’re not here to find Gu, are you? I hope you’ve made an appointment, or it’d be a disaster… Gu never receives anyone in his private residence. There have been a few times when clients were audacious enough to come down here and he got them to set a meeting elsewhere before he was willing to receive them. Also, at this hour…”

Yan Suizhi thought for a moment and decided to avoid the subject for now, asking about something else instead. Because from the moment that the car window was lowered, Fizz had used a very peculiar gaze to study his face. 

“Is there something dirty on my face, why are you giving me that look?” he asked with a smile, in passing using Fizz’s rearview mirror to glance at himself.

“No, nothing like that,” said Fizz. “I was just thinking. You’ve been to Wine City for, what, a few days? And yet you seem to have grown more handsome than before. Does Wine City have such an effect? Why do I only get pimples all over my face when I go there?”

Yan Suizhi gave a start, and he frowned slightly. But he very quickly raised his hand to hide it, pretending to rub his brows, laughing. “It’s probably the lighting that gave me a makeover. You do look even prettier than usual now.”

Even prettier meant that she was already very pretty on most days; Fizz was particularly pleased to hear that, laughing with a hand on the car window. 

But she hadn’t laughed for more than a few seconds before she choked.

Because she saw Gu Yan’s garage door open and close, and the so-called lawyer who ‘never received anyone in his private residence’ came over, nodded at her calmly, then spoke to Yan Suizhi. “I’ve something to attend to tomorrow, so I won’t be at the firm. You can ask Fizz if she’s willing to give you a lift.”

Fizz, “???”

Her upper body almost crawled out from the car window like a beautiful snake villainess that had just emerged from its hole. “I think my ears went faulty. What did you say???”