Chapter 40

  To make Si Tu Yan An settle down and not do anything embarrassing again, Si Tu Jiu An and his wife made their last ruthless move, cutting off all her financial resources, stopping her phone, taking away all her documents, and not letting her easily step out of the house. They even installed a double lock on their front door that required a key from both inside and outside, of course, everyone in the family had a key except they "forgot" to give her one. When Si Tu Jiu An and his wife were not at home, Yao Qi Yun took over the duty of a prison guard, he was so dedicated to his job, almost never leaving his post during the entire holiday.

  When Situ Xuan was stunned, he would think that he had also made too great a sacrifice. He put his newly ignited lover aside and guarded this person who had nothing to say. How difficult it was! Did he really plan to spend the rest of his life like this? What did they want to achieve by locking her up? Locking her until she died in Zou Jin's heart? Until her wildness faded away, and she married Situ family's son-in-law obediently? Every time she thought about it, she would laugh.

  Yao's expressionless face was nothing special, but if he had to choose someone from the household to be alone with, he would rather it be her. Her nagging words were mostly just complaints, but at least they could pass the time. As for that period of isolation, it didn't feel as slow and dull as he thought it would. The days blended together, one becoming another. Looking back, she couldn't remember anything except the light outside the window curtains going from dark to bright again. It was all just a fleeting moment.

  Only Wu Jiang had called her, and other people's calls could be put off by the couple and Yao Qiyun with a simple "she's not here", leaving the caller helpless. But after all, the Wu family was too familiar with the Situ family, and Wu Jiang wasn't someone who could be easily brushed off; if he wanted to call, in the morning Situ Yue would be "not there", in the afternoon he would call again, in the afternoon still "not there", and at night he would continue, and if all else failed, he would come over to "take a look". In the end, his calls became the only contact with the outside world that Situ Yue was allowed.

  When they were talking on the phone, they also noticed the humming noise of the extension cord. However, although the two were good friends, there weren't many topics to discuss at this time, and Si Tu Jue didn't pour out his current situation to Wu Jiang, who also didn't ask too much about it. The most talked-about topic was still things from the past, the fun they had when they were young, and their companions who went their separate ways.

  Ah Zhou is said to be doing some small business abroad, just getting a license made him feel half-hearted, fortunately, it was smoothly handled through connections.

  Mei Mei who studied abroad has graduated and is coming back to develop her career, she will be arriving by plane in a few days, saying that Wu Jiang must pick her up on time, otherwise she won't let him off.

  "Oh, it's fine." Situ Xin just smiled after hearing that. After hanging up the phone, life was still dull and uneventful.

  The most unbearable time on a summer day is the afternoon, when the cicadas' cries never stop for a moment and make it impossible to calm down. Yao Qiyun sat at his desk, reading the book in his hand, he had spent many hours like this during the holidays. After finishing one chapter, he stopped again to listen to the movement upstairs, at first he could still hear her footsteps, now she must have fallen asleep. Mr. Sutu and Aunt Xue were both at work, and Aunt should also be taking a nap.

  All the ice cubes in the refrigerator were used up yesterday. Although he reminded his aunt several times, only Sut Yuet liked to add ice cubes to water at home. His aunt either forgot or added raw water from the faucet to the ice tray. He thought for a moment and felt that he should go take a look himself.

  Yao Qiyun inserted the bookmark and stood up, almost knocking over the desk lamp with the book in his hand. Si Tu Jue appeared at his half-closed door without knowing when.

  Because it had been a while since she last trimmed her hair, Cui Xue's hair had grown some more, and it fell to her shoulders like she had just woken up. She was wearing the most common outfit she wore at home - a loose old T-shirt, sports shorts, and straight legs underneath. Although the air conditioner was on, her face was flushed with redness, and several strands of wet hair were stuck to her neck, as if she had just gone through a busy and chaotic scene.

  Yao Qiyun was somewhat perplexed, maintaining her standing posture without making another move.

  Situ Xuan pushed open the door and walked in, looking around before asking, "Are you going out?"

  She asked with a sincere tone, but Yao Qiyun didn't know how to respond. It had been almost a century since he last spoke directly with Situ Xuan, and even the sound of her voice felt strange to him. If at first it was just puzzlement, now his heart was ringing alarm bells. During this time, she had become too quiet, too still, and this Situ Xuan made him afraid, but this fear didn't make him want to retreat, rather he waited in a daze for something to arrive.

  His silence didn't seem to have any effect on Situ Xin, who actually smiled at him, "Are you going to meet Tan Shaochen? It's been so long since you've seen her, you must be thinking of her, right?"

  "This is not a pleasant topic." Yao Qiyun said coldly, "What does this have to do with you?"

  "It's really beyond what you intended, and now your good deed has been ruined."

  "I accept your apology." He still replied with a cold tone.

  Si Tu Xuan glanced at the book in his hand, "Cultivating one's body and nature? This doesn't seem like the Yao Qiyun I know, is it...?" She drew out her voice, a sly smile on her face, "Is it that Tan Shaocheng's rough taste no longer suits your habit?"

  Yao Qiyun furrowed her brow, tolerating her impertinence, but Situ Xuan had already stepped inside the room, closing the door behind him with one hand while raising a finger to his lips with the other, signaling silence. "Shh, let's not wake up that old monster."

  These words were often said by Situ Xin before, and even the sly expression was exactly the same as in the past. Yao Qiyun's rationality reminded him that they had long since changed from their former appearance, but memories of the scene still lingered in front of his eyes, and he didn't dare to believe that they had once had such good times.

  "You're just standing there like this in front of her? Are you tired? Have you ever told her that you like it...like this?"

  Yao Qiyun's body leaned back, trying to avoid Si Tu Xuan who was wrapping around him like a snake, but his resisting hands always fell in the wrong place.

  "What do you mean by this?" He said sternly.

  Once again, so close to the end of the summer, a few faint freckles scattered on the side of his nose, Yao Qiyun could paint them with her eyes closed, and at that time she would always smile in his arms, gasping for air, saying: "Aren't you afraid of dissolving them?"

  He also selfishly thought that whether she was disfigured or not didn't matter, even if her face was covered in scars and blemishes, without this enchanting face, perhaps happiness would be easier to come by.

  Situ Xuan's breathing became urgent, dissolving Yao Qiyun's resistance that had never been firm to begin with.

  "You're still no different from before."

  The next rhythm comes naturally, two bodies in harmony, having practiced countless times before.

  When Yao Qiyun no longer concealed his infatuation and joy, Situ Xuan leaned in to kiss his face, her lips lingering by his ear. "Has 'good girl' ever seen you like this? It's okay, it's okay, after all, it's just the afternoon, and even if we're idle, you can close your eyes and imagine my body as her face."

  Yao Qiyun stiffened for a moment, but didn't back down. Before his eyes, he could almost make out the image of a youthful and beautiful body entwined with that of a middle-aged man, just like those obscene photographs. These fantasies drove him to madness every time, and he pressed Su Tu's body down even harder, each movement seeming to cause her pain.

  "What's the point of being idle?" He gritted his teeth. "Situ Xuan, your mom wasn't wrong, you're really that cheap?"

  Situ Xuan whispered in pain, and also like the most lingering . She said: "Right, I'm so cheap, you look down on me, and haven't rolled far from me, aren't you equally despicable? Don't you like such despicability?"

  Yao Qiyun had given up thinking, the most violent collision, he didn't have a bit of pity, it was best if she was crushed to pieces at this moment, swallowed into his belly, and turned to ashes with him, that way she would thoroughly belong to him, without any other man's mark left.

  He himself didn't realize that at his most frantic moments, he was actually the weakest. Every inch of him clung to her, desperate to keep her in his arms, fearing that this "depraved" pleasure would end. He suspected it was a dream and feared she would wake up before him again, so he let himself speak without restraint.

  "How about it, am I better than that old man?"

  At that time, Situ Xinyan could hardly say a coherent sentence, panting and turning her head to let him see her smiling face.

  "You... you can't even compare to one of his fingers."

  As her voice fell, she strongly felt the hair wrapped around his fingertips being pulled tight, her scalp burning, and a part of her body seemed to no longer belong to her, as if even her soul was being stirred out of her body. But this part of her soul was intact and secure, watching with relief as the person under him endured, not letting tears fall until the end.

  When everything returned to calm, Yao Qiyun let out a sigh and opened up Situ Xinyue's hair, pushing her away with disgust. He separated himself from her sweat-drenched body and left her there, walking into the bathroom by himself. As someone who was extremely particular about cleanliness, it wasn't unexpected that he felt unclean due to his momentary lapse in judgment earlier. He hoped a thorough cleaning could help him.

  The moment the water started flowing, Situ Xuan quickly put on her clothes. She frantically searched for his scattered clothes and his drawer. When she held that key in her hand, all the pain, shame, and unshed tears were worth it. The iron bars on the window were indeed welded very firmly. Situ Xuan ran barefoot up the stairs, not caring if her parents would think they had been robbed when they came home. She finally found the documents. After a sleepless night, she had packed the simplest luggage, and although no one would enter her room, Situ Xuan was still afraid of being discovered, carefully hiding in the closet. Now, she held that small suitcase in her hand, running down the stairs as if she had rehearsed it thousands of times, finally touching the lock on the front door.

  She tried the second key, her palm was already wet with sweat, and the third key slipped at the edge of the lock. At this moment, Mrs. Yao's room door opened, and the middle-aged woman who had not fully woken up from her nap stared blankly at the flustered Sutu Yu.

  The next second, Aunt Yao would loudly shout.

  Despair was like a tsunami crashing down on Situ Xuan, she whispered pleadingly to the other party, that was the last lifeline before sinking to the bottom of the sea.

  "Let me go, Aunt. After I leave, this house will be all his and he won't have to mix with me again, you can rest assured... Let me go, please!"

  Yao's aunt opened her mouth, after a while, she rubbed her eyes, woodenly retreated one step, quietly, and re-closed that door.

  The third key successfully turned the lock, and Situ Xuan stepped on the cement floor outside the door. The scorching sun made her feel like she was in a different world. She ran out for over ten meters before seeing Wu's car parked quietly by the side of the road. Wu Jiang, who had lost so much weight that his cheekbones were sunken, rushed out of the car to meet her and immediately stuffed a bulging bundle into her arms.

  Situ Xuan ignored her own disheveled and sweaty appearance, and hugged Wu Jiang tightly. When she let go of him, he saw that she was a mess, but he didn't say anything, only revealing a hint of sadness on his face.

  "Let's go, if we're going, let's hurry up."

  Yao Qiyun had been driving for years without ever getting a ticket, but if he could, he would have smashed every red light. He should have known better than to stoop so low with Si Tu Jue's temperament, not even making a sound, and even trying his best to please him, which only enraged him more. It wasn't just an idle afternoon's "humiliation", but he had been drenched in the cold water of the shower for so long that his dizzy head finally cleared up, and then he realized where the deepest fear in his heart came from. He didn't even bother to dry himself off, grabbing a random piece of clothing to put on before rushing out, only to be met with the wide open door and the dazzling sunlight outside.

  She couldn't have done it alone, there must be someone backing her up. If it wasn't Zou Jin, then it could only be Wu Jiang. Yao Qiyun drove his car in pursuit for a good distance and indeed saw the silver-gray sedan of the Wu family at the most congested intersection far away. He followed that car, chasing after it as they left the city limits, just about to get on the airport expressway, but unexpectedly, not far from the toll station exit, that car began to slow down, finally pulling over and stopping under his head-on pursuit.

  Yao Qiyun rushed over to pull open the car door of Wu's family, and the window was slowly rolled down. Sitting in the driver's seat, Wu Jiang greeted him with a good mood, "What a coincidence, you also have time to come out for a spin?"

  The passenger seat was empty, and except for Wu Jiang, there was no one else in the car. Yao Qiyun restrained himself from opening the trunk of someone else's car, he understood that from the beginning, Si Tu Jue had never planned to leave with Wu Jiang. She had thought everything through, guarding against him, calculating him, only to escape him. But he had prepared for a lifetime of mutual dislike, no matter what she had done, as long as she was still there, even if they were sworn enemies from then on. At the moment when he nodded in agreement under Shi Alang's clever calculation, he indeed succumbed to his greed, that greed having nothing to do with affection or past love, but rather an unyielding determination to keep her by his side forever.

  He was like being petrified, his consciousness woke up, but his body didn't, every cell was screaming and struggling, in fact, he couldn't move at all, even breathing became increasingly laborious.

  "Where is she?" The sentence was originally a question, but as soon as it came out of his mouth, only a pleading tone remained. "Tell me where she's going!"

  Wu Jiang didn't say a word, but instead looked at Yao Qiyun with a mixture of disdain and pity. He watched as Yao frantically turned around in circles before starting to cry, then slowly squatted down along the edge of his car door onto the scorching hot asphalt highway.

  Since Wu Jiang was willing to stop the car, it meant that Si Tu Jue's escape had become a foregone conclusion. He knew it, and Yao Qi Yun naturally also knew. Wu Jiang wasn't in a hurry to leave either, staying in the car like this, staring blankly with the man outside at the sun slowly setting from its peak, from being dazzlingly bright to a helpless dusk.

  Situ Xuan hailed a taxi bound for the neighboring city, and Wu Jiang had already paid the full fare. An hour and a half later, she would depart from this unfamiliar airport to a coastal city in the south, where she would meet her contact and head to a small country in Southeast Asia, embarking on an unknown journey. The paper bag that Wu Jiang handed her contained things prepared by Zou Jin for her, including necessary identification, contact information, plane tickets, boat tickets, some cash, and a $75,000 check. These things would become hers over the next few years.

  Situ Xuan changed into a set of decent clothes in the bathroom, washing away the sweat and dust on her face. In the mirror, she saw a frightened face. On the way here, she had been running wildly, with only one thought in her mind - to escape. Now that she had escaped, she finally came back to herself. Who was she escaping from? They were all her loved ones! She felt like turning back would only lead to nightmares. Situ Xuan burst into tears and wept bitterly beside the marble sink.

  When passing through the security gate, Situ Xinyue turned around to accept the inspection under the guidance of airport staff. Suddenly, he saw Zou Jin standing quietly tens of meters away, as if wanting to make a gesture of farewell, his hand raised halfway and then put down again.

  In the end, it was only him who saw her off on this journey.

  "Alright, you can go now." The staff reminded.

  Situ Xuan left without looking back.

  She had never taken a night flight alone, through the huge glass of the waiting room, she could see the dark and empty apron with stars twinkling, these lights seemed more desolate than the city lights she was familiar with, she didn't know what the next place would be like, what awaited her ahead wasn't her starting point or destination.

  Before boarding, according to the agreement made earlier, Situ Xuan used a temporary mobile phone SIM card purchased at the airport to make a safe call to Wu Jiang. After confirming that she was safe, Wu Jiang hesitated for a moment, and another person's voice came over the phone, which was Yao Qiyun.

  She thought he would be furious, but in fact, he was like a child who had lost his temper, desperately making excuses that weren't excuses, and making useless efforts. Having no other choice, he resorted to his last resort of being shameless.

  "He said in a low voice: 'Situ Xuan, you want to leave first and leave that bracelet behind. You said it belongs to Mrs. Yao. Unless you take it off and return it to me in person, you can't just walk away like this...'"

  That bracelet had been on Situ Xuan's hand for a long time, and she was so used to it that she almost forgot its existence. He knew very well that it couldn't be taken off anymore. Several times during their quarrels, she would take it off in front of Yao Qiyun, but before she could even struggle with it, they would make up again. At that time, she thought she was destined to be Mrs. Yao.

  "Where are you? Wait for me, I'll rush over right away. Can you hear that? If the handcuffs haven't been taken off for a whole day, then you can't leave!"

  Situ Xin stood in the crowded waiting hall with a faint smile, she raised her hand and knocked her wrist against the stainless steel armrest with all her might.

  Yao Qiyun heard the sound of jade shattering on the other end of the phone.

  "Yao Qiyun, why don't we make a bet instead? I bet you won't be happy!"

  This was her last words left for him.

  Then, it was seven years.

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