He slowly opened his eyes, with the usual obscurity remerging in his pitch-dark pupils.

“How's it going with the reporters?”

“It's all taken care of, but there is one who has directly released the photos taken on the spot. We've ordered them to delete them, but we don't know ….”

It was unclear whether anyone had seen the photos.

Mu frowned, meditated for a moment and spoke calmly.

“Let's go to the company.”

In Ye's room, she had just refused Li Ma's kind offer to come in and help her take a bath. She had some hot water on her own and lay in the bathtub of the bathroom, which was now filled with steam.

In case there was any accident, Li Ma stayed by the door of the bathroom.

“Li Ma, I'm fine.”

Seeing her remaining shadow through the door, Ye explained, “It's late. You can go and have a rest.”

“The master has asked me to take good care of you.” Li Ma refused to leave. “Just let me know if you need anything.”

Ye sighed helplessly. As she looked at her fair and delicate skin in the steam and remembered those countless nights with him, how he smelled, the unpleasant smell of smoke, and his warm body which she was unwilling to forgo, she suddenly asked, “Li Ma, have I done a heinous crime to fall in love with my own uncle?”

Li Ma was standing at the door. She was almost fifty now, about the same age as Ye's mother.

Ye originally thought she would criticize herself severely, which she thought was exactly what she needed right now.

But she didn't.

Instead, she said, “Miss Ye, anything, if caused by love, cannot be simply judged as right or wrong.”

Ye was at first stunned by her answer, then she smiled bitterly, “If my mother knew that I fell in love with my uncle, she would be extremely disappointed in me.”

“I don't think so.” Standing at the door, she replied unhurriedly, “If Mrs. Ye were still alive, she would definitely look forward to seeing you happy.”

Ye poured a little hot water on her body with her hand.

“Li Ma, you've worked for my uncle for a long time, right?”

“Hmm. When Elder Mu was still alive, he a.s.signed me to take care of the young master. It's been more than ten years.”

Elder Mu …

Ye suddenly remembered the picture she saw in the living room that day.

“Grandpa, he …”

The old man looked hale and hearty, though a tinge of seriousness between his eyebrows made him appear very forbidding.

“Why did he kick my dad out of Family Mu?”

Ye Kang'an …

As long as she was old enough to remember things, her father was named Ye Kang'an … she didn't find out that his name was actually Mu Kang'an until lately.

No wonder he always wore a grim face. Now Ye understood that her father must have taken that from the grandpa in the picture.

“Miss Ye, I know very few about your father. I only remember that he never came back home after a big quarrel with his Elder.”

“What about …”

The water in the bath now got a little cold, but Ye still had no intention of getting up. She was feeling much better while chatting with Li Ma.

“What about my uncle? What was he like when he was a child?”

“He was already twelve years old when his Elder brought him back. He wore a straight face all the time. He was untalkative and he didn't take the initiative to be close to anyone.”

Ye couldn't help laughing on hearing this, “It turned out that he already had such a weird temper since he was a child.”

“It can't be seen as weird.” Li Ma smiled and said, “The young master has been just too defensive and resists intimacy. All these years, even his Elder had only hugged him for once on the day when he came of age. All the intimacy that a son and his father should have is missing on him.”

Resisting intimacy …

Ye thought for a moment, and found him really different from the one she knew.

“Miss Ye.” Li Ma continued to say, “Before you show up, I even seldom see him smile.”

“Really?” Ye was a little surprised. That guy obviously liked to keep looking at her, and smiled at her in the end.

He … turned out a person who didn't like to laugh.

“Yes, Miss Ye, although I know it may sound inappropriate, I still want to tell you the young master is really a different person in front of you.”

As she listened, her steadfastness in something began to fall apart.

It might be her senses, or ethics … she had no idea.

“But …”

Their relations.h.i.+p was doomed to never last long.

But …

What could give her the courage to beg it to last long? She had obviously become a person with no future.

Wasn't the reason why she was still struggling to live in this world to find out the truth about her father's disappearance? As for the future, she never thought about it.

So it was also meaningless to think about it at this moment.

Maybe it was exactly because they were both the same kind of person who had no hope for the future that they couldn't get enough of each other when they were together.

Now that the world had showed her no kindness, then why should she refuse the warmth Mu offered?

At that moment, Ye suddenly figured it out.

She had always endeavored to live on this world, but see what it all ended up? Her best friend had betrayed her and her parents had left one by one.

Now, what was the meaning of keeping on forcing herself to take everything so seriously?

Ye finally returned to serenity after sorting out her messy thoughts. And she realized the water was already very uncomfortably cold in the bathtub.

“Li Ma, I've finished.”

“The towel is on the third cabinet by your hand. You can see it when you look up.” Li Ma heaved a sigh of relief in the end when she sensed from her tone that she was feeling better. “I'll go downstairs and prepare something for you to eat. Just come downstairs when you're ready.”

“Ok.”

This night would eventually pa.s.s, and people like her who already lost everything had nothing to fear.

After getting dressed, Ye went down the stairs and through the empty living room, she could only saw Li Ma bustling in the kitchen in the s.p.a.cious villa.

It just pa.s.sed like this last night and now it was almost dawn.

“Where's my uncle?”

Ye pulled a chair to sit down around the dining table, about to eat the savory hand-pulled noodles with beef made by Li Ma.

“The young master said he was going to the company, but he didn't say when he would be back.”

The company …

As she ate the noodles with relish, she wondered how he was gonna deal with all those involved. Judging from his personality, it would end well for none of them.

He could even poke a hole in the sky once he got tough.

After hesitating for a moment, Ye took out her phone and sent a message to Mu on Wechat.

“Uncle.”

Ye had just helped him register as a new user of Wechat not long ago. Actually he only budged under her insistence. Although he never used these social software, Ye had been used to checking the message on Wechat as soon as she woke up and saying “Good night” on it.

His avatar was still one of those landscape photos which came with Wechat. And there was no update in his Moments.

Ye looked at the blank screen and sighed.

She thought he certainly wouldn't use Wechat and thus wouldn't see her message even if she sent one to him.

But her phone rang unexpectedly as she was thinking in a daze.

The name on her phone gave her a start.

It was Mu Tingchen.

It took her a while to recover herself before she picked up her phone.

“h.e.l.lo.”

Then she heard his hoa.r.s.e and worried voice.

“It took so long but you still didn't finish your words. Are you hesitating over what you want to tell me?”