Water and Fire~Chapter 18: Communicating Under the Moonlight (Second Revision)

 

Chapter 18: Communicating Under the Moonlight (Second Revision)

After shaking hands, Ren Yan paused for a moment before asking, "You suddenly asked me if I remembered you tonight. Are you asking me for a favor?"

Chu Qianmiao: "..."

She felt that in this world, the thinking of straight men was so unpredictable and unpredictable.

"Senior, you misunderstood. I'm not asking you for a favor!" Chu Qianmiao chuckled dryly. "I just wanted you to see me..." The strings in her mind were spinning rapidly, and she finally came up with an excuse, "...to see if my memory is quite good. Look, you've forgotten me, but I still remember you, hahaha!"

Ren Yan stared straight ahead, looking at an unknown point through the windshield. His voice was indifferent as he responded to her awkward chatter.

"After returning to China, I heard I'd run into a lot of people who were supposedly my underclassmates. They all told me they'd had a crush on me and couldn't forget me. But I honestly didn't remember them being students at our school."

Chu Qianmiao: "..." So cocky.

He suddenly turned and looked at Chu Qianmiao. "You're not one of them, are you?"

"………………" Just asking that directly???? Can't you be more subtle?!

Chu Qianmiao shook her head vigorously at Ren Yan: "I'm not!" For the sake of dignity, should you always say no?

Ren Yan nodded and hummed: "That's good. It's better to maintain clear emotional boundaries at work."

Chu Qianmiao agreed with this view. She'd heard Qin Qianyu and Tang Yi secretly tell her some gossip about Litong Securities' investment banking department. They said someone in another project team had gotten together while working on a project. The man was a leader, married with children; the woman was a subordinate, with a fiancé. His fiancé was also at Litong, in charge of stock underwriting in the capital markets department. A man and a woman were on a long business trip working on an IPO project, and while on the trip, they ended up sleeping in the same room. The incident was first discovered by an old colleague on the project team. He woke up early and, while going downstairs for breakfast, saw the woman emerging from the man's room in her pajamas. They exchanged a goodbye kiss at the doorway before parting.

Cheating is hard to conceal; once discovered, it spreads widely. The story quickly spread. The woman's fiancé, feeling deeply humiliated and unable to swallow the humiliation of being cuckolded, managed to obtain the couple's hotel records. It turned out that, in addition to their business trips, they had also been secretly checking into hotels in Beijing. Furious, the fiancé shared the records directly in the work group chat, causing a huge uproar and ultimately damaging the situation for all three parties.

The scandal quickly spread not only throughout Litong's branches nationwide but also throughout the industry, where it was exaggerated. Litong's reputation suffered a significant blow. After that, Litong issued an unwritten internal ban: no sexual relations between men and women at work, especially between superiors and subordinates. If discovered, at least one person would be fired.

Chu Qianmiao thought, with this scandal as a prelude, Ren Yan was right to say that everyone should maintain clear emotional boundaries at work.

The car had been parked on the side of the road for a while, and Ren Yan hadn't said what to do next. Chu Qianmiao turned to ask Ren Yan where to drive the car next.

Ren Yan pinched his forehead and asked, "Is there a pharmacy nearby?"

Chu Qianmiao quickly asked what was wrong.

"I drank too much. I need to buy some hangover medicine and headache medicine," Ren Yan said.

Chu Qianmiao immediately felt guilty. Ren Yan had been drinking a lot of alcohol tonight because he was helping her.

She quickly searched and found the nearest 24-hour pharmacy. Without a word, she started the car and headed straight for it.

"Senior, you've been helping me with most of the drinking today, so I'm telling you, you absolutely have to let me pay for the medicine later!" Chu Qianmiao sincerely wanted to spend money.

Ren Yan flatly declined, "No need."

Chu Qianmiao insisted a little: "Let me pay. It's not much... If there really was something for 1,800 yuan, I definitely wouldn't rush to buy it..."

Ren Yan turned and glanced at her: "I'm going to buy it for 1,800 yuan."

Chu Qianmiao: "..."

Oh. You're such a jerk.

Arriving at the pharmacy, Chu Qianmiao got out of the car first, as swiftly as a little monkey. She bought the most expensive hangover and headache medicine, but it was still a long way from 1,800 yuan. She then went to a nearby 24-hour convenience store to buy a bottle of water. Back in the car, she began to help Ren Yan unscrew the bottle cap.

She bought Wahaha; that was the only water the convenience store had. She had always thought the Wahaha bottle cap was the most difficult to unscrew this century. She tried… and sure enough, it didn't come loose.

Frantically, she stretched her sleeve, placed it between her hand and the bottle cap, and gritted her teeth as she tried.

This time, it finally came loose.

Without even looking up, she handed the water to Ren Yan: "Senior, here!"

With her other hand, she was already unwrapping the medicine box from the plastic bag, picking out the white pills from the silver-white tinfoil.

"The woman selling medicine just now said this headache medicine is for after drinking alcohol. Take two pills, and the pain will be gone in no time, and you'll have a good night's sleep!"

 Handing the water in one hand and the pills in the other, Chu Qianmiao raised her head and suddenly met Ren Yan's deep gaze.

She was stunned.

"Senior?"

"Are you so stubborn? Just let me do it myself if the bottle cap is hard to unscrew," Ren Yan said.

"Oh." She'd been raised like Lei Feng since she was a child. Besides doing things she could do herself, she also did things she could do for others.

Ren Yan reached out to take the water and medicine.

"Thank you." He took the medicine with the water. As he swallowed the medicine, he tilted his head back, and Chu Qianmiao could see the lines of his neck from the side. It had a graceful and elegant beauty, his prominent Adam's apple bobbing up and down, carrying the water and medicine to his stomach. That movement only enhanced his graceful and masculine beauty.

What a wonderful person!

Chu Qianmiao thought to herself.

Ren Yan turned his head back and looked at her again.

"How much?" he asked.

"Not much!" Chu Qianmiao waved her hands repeatedly.

"Even if it's not much, it's better to calculate it clearly." He spoke calmly, but with a firm attitude.

Chu Qianmiao had no choice but to tell him the amount, and Ren Yan transferred a red envelope to her.

Chu Qianmiao rolled her eyes, thinking, "What a wonderful person! Forget it! He's such a bore, even for a tiny sum of money."

Ren Yan happened to catch her rolling her eyes.

"You seem to have a problem with my approach?" Ren Yan asked.

Chu Qianmiao quickly blinked back her eyes, blinking and saying, "No, no." Then she thought, "It's ok for her to be a little hypocritical during the day, but why should she be so hypocritical in the middle of the night?"

So she said, "Senior, it's after get off work now. Can I have a word without getting angry?"

Ren Yan raised an eyebrow: "Tell me."

"Sometimes, your words or attitude really... stimulate sales of sacks and sticks," Chu Qianmiao said.

Ren Yan: "Translate that."

Chu Qianmiao: "...I just really want to put a sack on you..."

Chu Qianmiao looked both cowardly and overwhelmed.

After she finished speaking, Ren Yan glared at her, nearly making her admit her mistake and say, "I'm sorry, I was wrong. I'll never tell the truth again." But Ren Yan suddenly turned away. The night was hazy, and the car even hazier. She could faintly see the corners of his mouth curl up slightly.

In the silent car, the sudden silence was like a heavy block of black steel, oppressing everyone's breath.

Chu Qianmiao quickly said, "Senior, what's next? Let me take you back first!"

Ren Yan said, "Back to where you parked in Yangqiao."

Chu Qianmiao started the car and left the pharmacy. As she drove, she wondered why they were taking her back to Yangqiao again. Isn't that where I live? Could one of your properties, Boss Ren, be in my neighborhood?

She drove back to where she had been.

"Mr. Ren, what's next?" She was still thinking about getting him home after drinking.

Ren Yan unbuckled his seatbelt and prepared to get out.

Chu Qianmiao: ???

"I'll leave the car with you. The rest of the way is short, and I'll go back on my own. This way, I'll have fulfilled your attorney Zhang's instructions. You drive directly to the company tomorrow, and I'll go there too." Ren Yan pushed open the car door and prepared to get out.

Oh, so he was fulfilling attorney Zhang's instructions.

As he was about to get out, Ren Yan suddenly turned around and told Chu Qianmiao, "We'll discuss the company's business and technical situation tomorrow."

Chu Qianmiao: "...?"

The underlying meaning behind this statement was that she should work overtime to sort out this part of the problem after returning home tonight... It was already so late, was he retaliating against her for just saying she wanted to have him sacked and beaten with sticks?!

"Ren Ba Pi!" Chu Qianmiao couldn't help but mutter softly.

Ren Yan had already extended one leg out of the car and landed on the ground, and the other leg immediately followed. But he suddenly stopped.

"Chu Qianmiao," he sat back down, turned around and called out.

Chu Qianmiao immediately responded, "Here!"

Ren Yan raised his lip, a half-smile on his face. "I have very good hearing. You've called me a scoundrel twice tonight. Next time, you'd better keep your voice down, or I might retaliate against you if I hear you."

"………………..." He even heard what she and Qin Qianyu said while they were drinking? He was clearly chatting with someone else at the time. His ability to hear everything is a bit excessive...

So, working overtime really is retaliation, right? Right!

Chu Qianmiao felt the urge to buy sacks and sticks again.

But then she heard Ren Yan sigh, "Forget it. You have to drive tomorrow. I won't ask you any questions at the meeting tomorrow. Go to bed early when you get back."

This time, he actually got out of the car. Chu Qianmiao was startled. She felt as if she had just been considerate.

She sat in the car, leaning over the steering wheel, turning to look in the direction Ren Yan had left. He walked, his hands in his trouser pockets, into the moonlight, into the night. Trees lined the road, and streetlights cast a faint, clear glow. His tall figure blended seamlessly into an ink painting, contributing to the surrounding scenery while also becoming a part of it.

Chu Qianmiao leaned over the steering wheel and thought, thankfully, she's no longer the 19-year-old girl obsessed with s*x.

Then her phone dinged. She picked it up and saw it was a message from the person in the painting.

"Go to bed early, don't be late," he said.