Face Blindness (30) (continued)

You conglomerate heirs really knew how to play, didn't you?

At the center of everyone's attention, Xin Hexue could hardly believe how events had developed so clearly outside the script.

His long lashes trembled, and the pale shadows they cast beneath his eyes swayed with the moonlight.

Xin Hexue ventured cautiously, "You don't remember...?"

His voice was so low and soft that it seemed a gust of sea wind in the night would scatter it.

When Pei Guangji asked his name, he gave no further answer.

Pei Guangji met the young man's disappointed gaze. In that brief moment their eyes met, his heart swelled with an unbearable ache for reasons he did not understand, and an indescribable blockage lodged in his throat.

"Can you tell me your name?" Pei Guangji pressed. "We must have met before."

Xi Zhengqing had been watching Xin Hexue's expression the whole time.

The young man looked conflicted, his lips pressed gently together. As Pei Guangji continued to question him, his gaze began to dart away, filled with sadness, disappointment, and a tangle of other emotions.

Xi Zhengqing feared that if Pei Guangji asked a few more questions, Xin Hexue would soften and tell him the truth.

He acted at once, thrusting an arm between them. "Pei Guangji, that pickup line is a little too trite."

Xi Zhengqing's words were cool, carrying a note of possessiveness. "Didn't you just see that my boyfriend and I were on a date?"

Pei Guangji froze on the spot and stared at the two of them for a long time.

For some reason, a voice deep inside him subconsciously rejected Xi Zhengqing's claim.

Boyfriend?

Pei Guangji turned his gaze to Xin Hexue.

He instinctively hoped the young man would deny the relationship.

But the truth seemed to be just what he had seen.

The pair of rings in the blue velvet gift box seared Pei Guangji's eyes, and his heart seemed to plunge to rock bottom in an instant.

Xi Zhengqing put an arm around Xin Hexue, supporting his weight, and said gently, "There are too many people on the top deck. Are you all right? Do you feel unwell? Are you tired? How about I take you back to your room to rest?"

The young man seemed deeply unsettled.

Xi Zhengqing took the opportunity to lead him off the top deck.

With their backs to Pei Guangji, the two moved farther and farther away, about to leave this place of trouble behind. It seemed the young man would disappear from his sight forever.

At that moment, Pei Guangji thought of nothing and strode after them.

Xin Hexue heard footsteps behind him, and his final step grew noticeably sluggish.

"I was in an accident before and ended up in the hospital." Pei Guangji paused, his Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed dryly. "After I woke up, I think I forgot some important things. If you knew me before, could you tell me?"

The young man's steps halted for only a second.

Xi Zhengqing led him away with an arm around him.

The guests still on the top deck cast strange looks his way, but Pei Guangji did not notice. He watched the two retreating figures, and for some reason, his heart sank, hollow and empty.

[Pei Guangji Heartbreak Value +5]

"I only heard that Pei Guangji had woken up a couple of days ago myself." Qiu Yuan, the instigator of the whole incident, shrugged and spread his hands without a trace of concern. "We all grew up together. It was my birthday party. I couldn't invite only you, Xi Zhengqing, and not Pei Guangji, could I? What would he think? What if he thought we were excluding him?"

"Besides, after three days apart, you should see a person in a new light. Today's Pei Guangji isn't the Young Master Pei of old."

Qiu Yuan smiled.

"As soon as he woke up, he dragged Mr. Pei and all the brothers and uncles who'd been stirring up trouble lately down with him and settled accounts with them. All the power in the Pei Corporation is in his hands alone now. No matter how you look at it, he's no longer Young Master Pei. We should call him President Pei."

That meant Pei Guangji had set things in motion long ago. Without Mr. Pei realizing it, his eldest son had already stripped him of his authority within the Pei Corporation.

The timing of his awakening in the hospital had also been just right for him to overthrow the old man.

Qiu Yuan wasn't sure whether he should marvel at Pei Guangji's good luck.

The braking device had kept him from dying in the accident, and his vegetative state had ended after only a few months.

But then again...

Qiu Yuan gave Xin Hexue a meaningful look.

While Xi Zhengqing wasn't paying attention, Qiu Yuan waved his communicator at Xin Hexue, indicating that he would contact him later.

He took his leave of the two people in the room, giving them some space, and went to find Zuo Yongyan for a drink.

Xin Hexue seemed distracted as he idly swiped through his communicator.

[Qiu Yuan: I told you I wouldn't hurt you.]

[Qiu Yuan: Could you try trusting me a little more?]

[Qiu Yuan: I'll help you.]

[Xin Hexue: ...]

[Xin Hexue: How many times did I step on you while we were dancing?]

[Qiu Yuan: Three times?]

[Xin Hexue: Wrong.]

[Qiu Yuan: You missed once.]

[Xin Hexue: It was twenty-four times.]

Qiu Yuan was drinking when he suddenly laughed aloud, as though he had come across something exceedingly amusing. He laughed so hard he choked on his drink a couple of times, giving Zuo Yongyan a fright.

Qiu Yuan brushed a finger behind his sunglasses and casually wiped away the tears of laughter at the corner of his eye.

Was Xin Hexue mocking him for being an octopus?

Or warning him to mind his own business?

After all, Xin Hexue did have leverage over Qiu Yuan's identity.

Either way, it was far too amusing.

[Qiu Yuan Affection Points +5]

Xin Hexue put away his communicator.

Xi Zhengqing came out of the bathroom with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, the lines of his arms showing their strength. He sat down beside Xin Hexue. "I've drawn your bath. The temperature is just right. You look tired, so why don't you take a bath and get some sleep first?"

Xin Hexue lowered his gaze and stared at the floor for a long time.

Xi Zhengqing heard him murmur softly.

"How could he have forgotten me?"

"He still remembers you, and Qiu Yuan..."

Xi Zhengqing's Adam's apple dipped for a moment.

Once you told one lie, you had to tell a hundred more to cover it up.

He suddenly understood those words.

He couldn't let Xin Hexue know that he had once assumed Pei Guangji's identity to get close to him.

Xin Hexue hated deception. If he found out that everything between them had begun with a lie...

He didn't dare think any further.

Xi Zhengqing was immensely grateful that he had abandoned Pei Guangji's false identity not long ago.

"I didn't tell you before because I was afraid it would upset you." Xi Zhengqing pretended to be troubled. "Actually, at the banquet for Pei Ying's Coming-of-Age Ceremony, an exotic infiltrated the event and assassinated one of the guests. Pei Guangji was also injured and fell unconscious. He spent some time in the hospital. After he woke up, he must have lost his memories of you."

"Is that so..."

The young man looked utterly lost.

Xin Hexue concealed the amusement in his eyes.

He didn't need to panic at all.

After all, Xi Zhengqing would take the initiative to explain it away.

"Do you still like him?" Xi Zhengqing had no choice but to ask more directly, probing Xin Hexue's feelings. "He isn't worthy of your true feelings. Pei Guangji has now lost his memories of you. Isn't this the best chance to get away from him?"

The young man seemed to be caught in painful memories of being imprisoned in the villa and instinctively shrank back.

Xi Zhengqing didn't know the truth. He thought Xin Hexue simply resisted the subject.

He stopped pressing him and instead retreated to advance, leaving the gift box containing the rings by Xin Hexue's bed.

"Take a bath and get a good night's sleep first." Before leaving the room, Xi Zhengqing spoke to Xin Hexue from the doorway. "Whatever happens after this, give me a chance to face it with you."

Pei Guangji believed he must have forgotten something.

That something was more important than anything else, taking priority far above his heavy workload and his title as the person in charge of the Pei Corporation.

But he had forgotten it.

The doctor who had given him a full examination was also at a loss. "Mr. Pei, for now, we can only determine that the device above you fell during the aircraft accident and compressed the nerves in your brain. It may have damaged the temporal lobe on the side of your brain, which could explain the small amount of memory loss."

"Please allow us to discuss a treatment plan based on the scans first. We will do our utmost to provide you with medical care going forward."

Pei Guangji had no interest in making things difficult for medical staff.

After everyone had left, he gazed at the distant sky, slowly clenched his hand into a fist, and tapped his temple regretfully.

Pei Guangji believed his missing memories had something to do with the young man he had seen on the cruise ship that night.

A week had already passed.

The young man's disappointed gaze in the moonlight was on Pei Guangji's mind at every moment.

What connection did they have?

There was no way they didn't know each other. Otherwise, the young man wouldn't have treated him that way.

He felt an instinctive panic, as though he were about to lose something and would never be able to get it back.

Pei Guangji was now no different from a drowning man, wanting to grasp something but finding nothing to hold on to.

His new special assistant knocked on the office door.

Pei Guangji hadn't had water in a long while, and his voice was low and hoarse. "Come in."

The new special assistant entered and reported truthfully, "President Pei, we still haven't been able to contact your former special assistant, Jiang Jing. We sent someone to his hometown in the Third District, but his neighbors said he went traveling with his wife and child. He may not have noticed the calls and messages."

Pei Guangji closed his eyes briefly. The dark circles beneath them showed some of his fatigue.

His personal communicator had been destroyed in the aircraft accident.

That ordinarily would not have been a major issue, since Pei Guangji had another communicator for work. All his important work-related messages and contacts were on it, so the destruction of his personal communicator would not affect his life.

Pei Guangji was someone whose social connections were spotless. He had almost no friends in private, and his network of relationships was as uncluttered as could be.