His rabbit was gone

"Hiss..." Ji Chi narrowed his eyes slightly.

The pain pulled him back from his agitation a little.

Ji Chi gripped Bai Yao's collar tightly.

His fierce plum brandy pheromone rampaged as though it had taken physical form.

In the blink of an eye, it surged like rolling waves.

It spread fast and hard.

Bai Yao, sprawled on the ground, went limp almost instantly. He gave Ji Chi a frightened look.

Besides the oppressive force of Ji Chi's Pheromones, something else frightened him.

The Boshen Group's young heir was an S-class Alpha whose Pheromones were S390 plum brandy.

He was Ji Chi.

So when he had said earlier that Bai Yao was fired...

He had meant it!

The man was instantly struck speechless, his eyelids twitching nonstop.

Ji Chi violently released Bai Yao's collar, and the man trembled all over.

Ji Chi rose and walked toward the Omega with neatly combed hair, who was trembling nearby.

He took out a business card and handed it to the Omega, whose tears had yet to dry. "The Boshen Group can offer you any help you need."

"Whatever you choose to do."

The Omega accepted the card with trembling hands, sobbing softly.

After handing over the card, Ji Chi turned away. He touched his cheekbone and muttered, "Fuck."

Fortunately, it was only a slight scrape, with just a trace of blood.

He seemed to have been a little impulsive just now.

An indescribable irritation had driven him to beat the man up.

Well, he'd hit him. The bastard deserved it.

Ji Chi let out a long sigh and retraced the route home from memory.

It was already eleven when he got home.

Back in his bedroom, Ji Chi began searching everywhere for something.

He turned the tidy room into a complete mess. Clothes littered the floor, and bedding had been tossed everywhere.

Ji Chi grew increasingly agitated and dejected.

His Little Bunny was gone...

He couldn't find it.

And he couldn't sleep.

Why was it gone?

How could it be? It had still been on the floor when he'd gone out that afternoon.

The noise Ji Chi made woke Lin Jun, who pushed open his door.

"What's wrong, Chi?" Lin Jun asked tiredly, wearing a coat over his pajamas.

Lin Jun glanced around Ji Chi's room. The mess looked like the aftermath of a robbery.

"What are you looking for? Why aren't you asleep this late?"

Ji Chi saw Lin Jun.

All that inexplicable helplessness and hurt suddenly came rushing up.

His eyes reddened before he knew it. He concealed it well, but not well enough to escape Lin Jun's keen observation.

"Talk to me."

Ji Chi's hoarse voice was so faint a breeze could have scattered it. "My rabbit's gone..."

"Rabbit?" Lin Jun walked into Ji Chi's bedroom.

Ever since childhood, Ji Chi had been all motorcycles, basketball, and a fiery temper. As far as Lin Jun remembered, he wasn't someone who would fall apart like this over anything.

He was just like Ji Shengming, always insufferably arrogant.

Self-centered, proud, and always impeccably put together.

He shouldn't have been like this.

Lin Jun walked over to Ji Chi. "What rabbit?"

Ji Chi's lips parted. He was so anxious that his words came out before he could think.

Seeing him so despondent made Lin Jun's heart ache.

"Huo Jin..."

"The rabbit Huo Jin gave me..."

Too much information flooded Lin Jun's mind at once.

Huo Jin?

A rabbit?

Huo Jin?

Lin Jun's calm gaze shifted slightly, his thoughts hidden behind his gentle eyes.

At a time like this, he couldn't ask too many questions.

He carefully searched his memory, then suddenly asked in earnest, "Is it a stuffed rabbit with a purple ribbon on its ear?"

Ji Chi reacted intensely. "Yes! That's the one!"

Lin Jun breathed a sigh of relief. There was a children's room in the house that Ji Chi had once stayed in, filled with stuffed toys other people had given him-rabbits, cats, dogs, elephants, and everything else. He had guessed it wouldn't be something from that room. "Your little cousin's staying here tonight. I saw him carrying one off, though I didn't know where he'd gotten it."

Ji Chi clenched his hands into fists.

His little cousin was five this year. There was nothing wrong with him liking soft, furry things.

Ji Chi himself had told him the code to his bedroom lock.

If he went charging over now and demanded it back like a madman...

He would look like a lunatic.

Ji Chi didn't want Lin Jun to see him that way.

He didn't want anyone to see him that way.

He took a deep breath. "I understand, Dad. Go back to bed."

Lin Jun studied Ji Chi's expression, then nodded. "You should get to sleep soon, too."

"Mm..." Ji Chi's voice was low.

After leaving Ji Chi's room, Lin Jun went upstairs to the room his cousin was staying in.

The rabbit had been tossed onto the floor, and the little boy was asleep with his limbs splayed out.

Lin Jun went over and tucked the boy in.

The child woke as he adjusted the covers.

"Uncle... are you going to sleep with me...?" His childish voice was heavy with sleep.

Lin Jun pulled the covers up to the child's shoulders and said gently, "You took your cousin's things today. That's very rude, you know?"

The boy frowned slightly. "Ji Chi said before that I could play with all his things..."

Lin Jun rubbed the little boy's head. "Other things are fine, but not this rabbit."

Then Lin Jun looked at the Little Bunny. "Shall we give it back to Ji Chi, big brother?"

"Hmph..." The little boy huffed.

"Ji Chi's so old, and he still plays with stuffed toys. How embarrassing." The little boy couldn't resist complaining.

"Not at all. You can like something no matter how old you are," Lin Jun replied gently.

"Okay..."

The boy seemed to understand, yet also seemed not to. "Then take it to Ji Chi for me."

Lin Jun chuckled at that. "Good boy."

"But remember, you can't take it again. Do you hear me?"

The boy pressed his lips together and nodded. "I understand, Uncle..."

After leaving the room, Lin Jun took the rabbit back to Ji Chi's bedroom.

He knocked for quite a while before Ji Chi opened the door.

When Ji Chi opened it and saw the rabbit in Lin Jun's hand, a glimmer lit his eyes. "Dad..."

Lin Jun held out the Little Bunny to Ji Chi. "Here."

Ji Chi rubbed his fingers together, not daring to let his feelings show too clearly. "I'm not..."

"You don't need to explain anything to me," Lin Jun interrupted Ji Chi. "I'm not interested in your business."

Ji Chi pressed his lips together and said nothing more.

Lin Jun looked up at him. The light was brighter by the doorway, and only then did he notice the slight scrape on Ji Chi's face.

He reached up and touched the skin around the wound. Lin Jun had long since grown used to seeing Ji Chi like this.

He had never behaved himself, even as a child.

"Were you fighting?" Lin Jun asked in a low voice.

Ji Chi turned his head aside. "No."

Lin Jun didn't ask any more questions. He pulled the door closed. "Go to sleep. Make any more noise and I'll beat you to death."

Ji Chi: "..."

Holding the Little Bunny, Ji Chi nodded. "I understand."

After Lin Jun left, Ji Chi lowered his gaze to the Little Bunny in his hands.

Disgust rose in his eyes.

He couldn't control the hatred in his heart.

He hurled the rabbit forward.

In the darkness, his standing silhouette was tall and slender. The vast room was empty and lonely. The Little Bunny tumbled several times into a corner by the floor-to-ceiling window, the ribbon on its ear fluttering in the air. The man who looked away was left with nothing but resentful retaliation and a refusal to submit.

Ji Chi ignored it after that and went straight to bed.

He tossed and turned for an hour.

His whole body was wracked with agitation.

He couldn't sleep.

During the second hour, he grew even more frustrated.

He still couldn't sleep.

This distance wasn't close enough.

Finally, Ji Chi got up in anger, walked to the floor-to-ceiling window, and picked the rabbit up from the floor.

He brought it into bed.

And held it in his arms.

He had lost.

Early the next morning, the scrape on Ji Chi's face had reddened further, leaving a dark mark.

Ji Chi picked out a black outfit, a luxury runway design with clean, elegant lines. The dark ensemble made him look utterly unapproachable.

He studied himself in the mirror. The dark mark on his cheekbone seemed to give his whole face its edge back-that air of being ready to fight anyone who had a problem with him.

Normally, he would have left it alone.

But today, he had to go see Huo Jin.

Ji Chi found a bandage in the drawer and stuck it over his cheekbone. Rather than diminishing his arrogance, it heightened it, adding a sullen, defiant edge.

Once he was ready, Ji Chi took the detailed documents and left.

When he arrived at the CE Experimental Institute, Ji Chi sent Huo Jin a message.