"They're running!" The reporters exclaimed, stunned. It took them a moment to react, and by then Jingwei and Xue Ning managed to get a good head start. But the reporters weren't pushovers; they hastily grabbed their equipment to chase them.
Xue Ning almost felt bad for causing them trouble, then she remembered they camped outside their apartment and inconvenienced their neighbours and one of these fuckers might have been responsible for throwing eggs at Jingwei.
They could deal with a bit of inconvenience.
"Mr Sun! Wait!"
"Mrs Sun! Please answer our questions!"
While chasing after them, they continued to yell. Xue Ning had to marvel at their lung capacity. It wasn't as easy to lose this horde of reporters as it was to lose that black car that put them in this mess in the first place!
"Do you know where we're going?" Xue Ning panted to Jingwei as they ran away.
"No? I was following you." Jingwei said so cheerfully that she nearly punched him.
"Great! I have no idea either!" She exclaimed, taking a quick look behind her. They were still hot on their heels.
They continued a chase so frantic that Xue Ning had to wonder, through the loud pounding of her heart, if she had ended up in a zombie movie.
Why did she go and attract so much attention by calling out his name? This wasn't in her original plan at all!
Before she arrived, she planned to discreetly sneak into the conference room and take a seat at the far corner so she could watch over Jingwei, or sit somewhere at the back where she could keep a better eye out for threats, but then she had arrived so late that the whole thing was nearly over!
She had to run to the hotel's conference hall. Xue Ning didn't want Jingwei to think that she had abandoned him, willingly or not. He deserved to have someone in the audience supporting him, seeing that she had not seen neither the head nor tail of his family members.
His name just slipped out from her lips by accident. When she saw him being mobbed by the horde of reporters, her first thought was to let him know he wasn't alone.
She had forgotten that Jingwei and her couldn't exactly communicate via telepathy, and reporters had ears of their own.
And Jingwei, that dumbass of hers was still standing stock still with a stupid smile on his face as he gazed at her after she called out to him.
If he was smarter, he should have ran off first - she would have met him elsewhere!
Moron. Yet she couldn't help but return the blinding smile Jingwei gave her as they ran off, hand in hand, with her own.
'Guess this means I'm a moron too', Xue Ning thought to herself wryly as they ran through the hotel lobby, giving Jingwei a quick glance.
He looked nearly beside himself with glee even when he was being chased. She had to roll her eyes at that. Ridiculous man.
Jingwei was having the time of his life as he held Xue Ning's hand and got a cardio workout at the same time. A couple that exercised together stayed together!
(Sure, now their exercises weren't bedroom exercises, but it was only a matter of time.)
It was romantic to run off hand-in-hand with your lover to escape the press, no matter what anyone said. If they were on a beach and the sun was setting, it would be the perfect moment!
Just as they had to make a split second decision on which turn to take, a group of men in suits suddenly came into view and formed a barricade between them and the horde of reporters, offering them a safe passage to escape.
"Who are you people?" Xue Ning asked warily, giving all of them a cautious look. There were at least 15 of them, and they were all tall and well-built. If they wanted to kidnap Jingwei, she wouldn't be able to fight them off.
Jingwei took a closer look at the men and frowned.
"Captain Mu? What are you guys doing here? Does my father know you guys are loitering here instead of protecting him?" Jingwei demanded.
"Father?" Xue Ning asked.
"These men are my father's bodyguards." Jingwei said, frowning. "So none of them should be here. Now answer my question - why are you here?"
"Your father sent us here," Captain Mu answered evenly. "He sensed that you and Miss Li might have trouble extricating yourselves from the reporters."
"Huh? But I thought he said he didn't care?" Jingwei asked, confused. Xue Ning wasn't much better, but she was also eyeing the bodyguards, trying to emulate the way they walked and how their eyes scanned the walkways even as they escorted the both of them to another room.
She had a chance to observe real bodyguards in action for free! Of course she wasn't going to miss it.
Captain Mu knocked on the door and entered, before he turned to the both of them to invite them in.
"As you ordered, Old Master Sun, I have delivered your son and his fiancee safely to you."
"Father? What are you doing here? And Ge? You're here too?" Jingwei exclaimed. "Why?"
"Such scepticism from you warms my heart," Tianwei said dryly. His brother was clearly expecting to be abandoned by his family, and Tianwei couldn't fault him for it.
Tianwei himself had spent his childhood thinking he was going to be left under a bridge if he couldn't live up to his father's standards for his first son.
"Oh sorry, let me try again." Jingwei said, clearing his throat before launching into a more excited tone.
"Father?! Ge?!" Jingwei exclaimed excitedly. "I'm so happy to see you! Is our company holding a function at this hotel?"
Beside him, Xue Ning nearly facepalmed with her other free hand at his antics. She would, if not for the fact that Jingwei's father was once again, glaring at her intensely for no reason. She hadn't even said anything yet.
"Is this better?" Jingwei asked, standing in front of Xue Ning to once again, shield her from his father's disapproval.
"Is this the thanks I get?" His father demanded. "Aren't you happy that I'm here to support you?"