Doctor Xie went from astonishment to horror, then from horror to an indescribable expression. "Wait, you little punk! You-you're into married women??"
Bo Yan: "..."
He seriously suspected the certificate Xie had hanging in his consulting room was fake. With that IQ, could he really have passed the national licensing exam?
He said flatly, "Am I sick in the head?"
Doctor Xie choked. "Weren't you the one who said you liked her?"
Bo Yan said, "When did I say I liked her?"
Doctor Xie was thoroughly confused. "Just now! I asked if you were serious about Jiang Tingwan, and you said yes."
Bo Yan gave an "Oh," then said, "I lied."
Doctor Xie: "..."
He was about to start swearing!
Struggling to suppress his explosive temper, Doctor Xie maintained a smile. "Then what exactly is going on?"
Bo Yan didn't answer immediately. He stood, clutching his abdomen, and made his way to the table with difficulty.
Wisps of steam still rose from the two cups of hot water on the table.
Bo Yan stared at them silently for two seconds, then emptied both cups Wen Ning had poured into the sink.
Turning, he emptied the remaining hot water from the kettle as well. After rinsing the kettle repeatedly, he filled it with fresh water and set it to boil.
Doctor Xie had long since stopped finding Bo Yan's behavior strange.
Bo Yan had probably experienced something as a child. He was extremely guarded and rarely ate food other people gave him. Even a bottle of water would end up in the trash the moment he turned away.
Let alone water that had passed through that young lady's hands.
Seeing how much difficulty he had moving, Doctor Xie got up to help.
"What exactly happened? Is it something you can't tell me?" Doctor Xie asked tentatively once more.
He kept feeling there was something strange about tonight's events.
He saw Bo Yan lean against the wall to steady his breathing.
His injuries were so severe that even a couple of steps left him panting for ages.
After a moment, Bo Yan curled his lips and looked at him. "Would you believe me if I said that Jiang Tingwan approached me first?"
Doctor Xie froze for a moment. "What do you mean?"
Bo Yan smiled. "Exactly. I'd like to know what she means, too."
His smile made Doctor Xie's skin crawl, so he skipped over the subject. "What happened between you two before? Do you actually know each other?"
Bo Yan thought for a moment. "Probably."
He only remembered the people who wanted him dead. As for anything else, he couldn't remember much.
What was interesting, though, was that this Jiang Tingwan seemed to know him, and had known him for quite some time...
Remembering how Jiang Tingwan had told him last night that no matter what happened in the future, she would spare no effort to help him and would never let him be alone again, Bo Yan narrowed his peach-blossom eyes slightly, lost in thought.
Jiang Tingwan deeply regretted it.
She had been impulsive last night. She shouldn't have gone straight to Bo Yan, much less said those things to him.
He must have found her words specious and utterly baffling.
Besides, if she hadn't suddenly gone to see Bo Yan last night, he wouldn't have fought with Bo Xubai tonight.
On this night in her previous life, Bo Yan and Bo Xubai had only exchanged a few heated words. It had never escalated to blows...
Hearing that Bo Yan had been badly injured tonight, Jiang Tingwan was worried, and her worry only deepened her regret.
She had to find a chance to visit Bo Yan.
But only half an hour ago, she had finished arguing with Bo Xubai over him...
Jiang Tingwan had taken her child out on an errand today. When she returned, she happened to see the butler seeing several police officers out.
Only after asking did she learn that Bo Xubai and Bo Yan had come to blows.
Just how serious had it been for even the police to come to the house!
Jiang Tingwan had only just "returned" in the past two days. She had yet to "escape" the nightmare of that fire and felt an instinctive fear of Bo Yan.
Because of that, when she heard that Bo Xubai had struck Bo Yan, Jiang Tingwan's first reaction was fear, followed immediately by fury!
If Bo Xubai hadn't targeted Bo Yan time and again in her previous life, Bo Yan might have spared her and her child out of consideration for the last shred of their old bond.
Bo Xubai was the one who had brought that disaster upon them!
Bo Xubai was the one who had doomed her and her daughter!
Her fear of Bo Yan had been building for so long that Jiang Tingwan couldn't think rationally. Without a second thought, she went to confront Bo Xubai and ask why he had fought with Bo Yan. Bo Xubai mistakenly believed she had feelings for Bo Yan, and the two had a huge argument before finally parting on bad terms.
Once Jiang Tingwan had completely calmed down, she began regretting her impulsiveness again.
She remembered that fire, remembered Bo Xubai desperately shielding her amid the flames, and her feelings toward him were deeply complicated.
In their previous life, both she and Bo Xubai had taken one wrong step after another, until they both died horribly at Bo Yan's hands.
Not just her and Bo Xubai-even Father Bo and that woman Wen Ning had ultimately been killed by Bo Yan himself.
Now heaven had given her another chance at rebirth.
For the past two days, she had been thinking about what she could do to change the ending of her previous life.
After turning it over and over, she still felt she had to start with Bo Yan.
The reason Bo Yan had later become neither human nor ghost was that no one had ever chosen him.
So in this life, no matter what, she had to find a way to heal and redeem Bo Yan, to make him let go of his hatred and become an upright, kind person.
"Mommy, isn't Daddy going to tell Zhizhi a story tonight?"
Her daughter's soft little voice brought Jiang Tingwan back to her senses.
Looking at her innocent daughter, who knew nothing of the world, Jiang Tingwan's eyes instantly reddened.
She hugged her daughter tightly, thinking bitterly, If I could, I'd rather kill Bo Yan with my own hands than redeem him!
But she had no choice. Bo Yan was a madman, a madman through and through!
She couldn't kill him. Unless he wanted to die, no one could kill him!
That night, Jiang Tingwan dreamed of the fire again.
Raging flames seared her body. In unbearable agony, she begged the person outside for mercy, only to receive a cold laugh in return.
Then she heard quiet humming.
The night, the warehouse, the raging fire, and that nameless tune Bo Yan hummed.
It sounded like a lullaby, yet also like some nursery rhyme.
The song gradually faded into the night and the flames, yet grew ever clearer in her dreams.
Jiang Tingwan jolted awake from the nightmare.
That night, she suffered insomnia again.
Wen Ning, on the other hand, slept unexpectedly well.
Perhaps too much had happened that night, combined with the several days of overtime she had worked before transmigrating into the novel. She fell asleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.
Oh, there had also been a little incident before bed.
Mindful of Bo Yan's injuries, Wen Ning told him to take the bed.
Wen Ning had long since noticed the blanket on the sofa and more or less guessed that Bo Yan probably usually slept there. But now she was supposed to be playing the simp, wasn't she? Since she "loved" Bo Yan so desperately, she certainly couldn't let him keep sleeping on the sofa.
Yet Bo Yan acted as though she was going to eat him alive and rejected her invitation with silence.
Wen Ning made another request, and Bo Yan said coldly, "Have you forgotten who made me sleep here in the first place?"
Wen Ning thought fast and immediately argued, "Wasn't I just trying to get you to take the initiative and get close to me?"
She even shifted the blame while she was at it. "Bo Yan, I hate that you're such a blockhead!"
Bo Yan looked at her, his gaze somewhat chilling.
Wen Ning met his gaze without the slightest panic.
That had been the original owner's doing, anyway. Everything she was saying now was the honest truth.
Bo Yan stared at her sinisterly for a while. Presumably finding no cracks in her act, he lost interest, stopped paying attention to her, and turned over to sleep.
After that, no matter how much Wen Ning prattled on, Bo Yan never answered her again. He didn't even sneer.
Wen Ning was tired, too. If he wouldn't sleep there, so be it. A single bed all to herself-peak luxury.
So she switched off the light, closed her eyes, and went to sleep.
After sleeping for who knew how long, Wen Ning vaguely felt a chill around her neck.
Her best friend had a cat and a dog.
Both little masters were incredibly clingy.
Every time Wen Ning visited her best friend's place, the two little cuties would pounce on her.
In her sleep, Wen Ning thought her best friend's cat had come to knead her again, and her best friend's dog had come to lick her again.
So she reached out with both hands, pinning down the "cat master" with her left hand and the "dog master" with her right. Working both sides, she planted a smooch on each!
In the darkness, Bo Yan had been weighing whether to simply strangle Wen Ning or whether a blade through the heart would be more direct, when the woman on the bed suddenly pinned his hand, hooked an arm around his neck, and yanked him down.
Caught completely off guard, he received a kiss on each cheek!
Bo Yan's peach-blossom eyes suddenly widened.
The next second, he heard the woman on the bed giggle foolishly. "Yanyan... baby... cute... hehe..."