The green light is flashing, and vehicles are flowing continuously. People are gathered on the street. Perhaps because of the excellent soundproofing, the chaotic noise outside seems to have been muted.

Inside the car, it is equally quiet.

Facing Chen An’s blunt observation, Ying Ni didn’t show any embarrassment. Instead, she sat up straight and looked at him, lowering her tone as she made a sound of agreement.

The response was brief and firm, with no signs of hesitation or shyness.

She told him—yes, I was looking at you.

So what?

Then, she quietly and intently searched his calm and deep eyes.

Sure enough, Chen An just smiled, not saying anything. It seemed like a silent response of “It’s nothing,” “If you want to look, then look,” or “I was just asking,” a nonchalant answer that didn’t matter.

His smile was as bland as water, yet inexplicably reminded Ying Ni of another face.

It was also in this kind of setting—she was sitting in the passenger seat of Zhou Siyang’s newly purchased Range Rover. They were planning to go to a shopping street for Chinese food. Due to England’s right-hand driving, Zhou Siyang was very unaccustomed to it and needed Ying Ni to help keep an eye on the narrow roads.

After a safe encounter with an oncoming vehicle, Ying Ni’s gaze remained directed to the right side.

Suddenly, Zhou Siyang turned his head, his eyebrows lifted in a half-smile, “What are you looking at?”

Caught off guard, Ying Ni stubbornly turned her face away, “I’m not looking at you.”

Zhou Siyang raised an eyebrow, “Isn’t it handsome?”

Ying Ni snorted, “Ugly as hell.”

Zhou Siyang laughed, “Ugly? But you’re still staring at me with sparkling eyes? You’ve got a masochistic tendency, huh?”

Ying Ni was about to retort, but just then, there was a sudden thud as their car bumped into the car in front. The passengers were jerked forward due to inertia, but fortunately, the speed was low, and both cars were undamaged.

The car they hit was a blue Ford with a slightly broken taillight. Normally, this kind of situation wouldn’t require insurance to be involved. They could simply settle the matter and exchange contact details to handle it later.

However, the Ford owner insisted on waiting for the police and insurance company to arrive and even claimed to need to call an ambulance.

Ying Ni’s spoken English was poor, and while Zhou Siyang could communicate, the other party was speaking too quickly. The two of them argued with the Ford driver for nearly two hours.

Feeling faint from hunger, Ying Ni’s stomach growled. After the Ford driver left, she punched Zhou Siyang on the shoulder, “It’s all your fault for not watching the road!”

“How can it be my fault?” Zhou Siyang laughed in frustration. Ying Ni, enraged, raised her fist again, but this time, it was caught mid-air by Zhou Siyang’s big hand, holding it tightly.

“It’s all because you refused to admit you were looking at me.”

“Zhou Siyang!”

Ying Ni gritted her teeth in anger. Zhou Siyang laughed, pulling her back with such force that she bumped straight into his arms.

He lowered his head, wrapping his arm around her back, lifting her slightly. His nose brushed against hers, and he whispered, “Next time, look at me like this, okay?”

On the bustling foreign street, they stood under a black road sign, flanked by old British-style buildings. Cars honked impatiently behind them, and passersby paused to glance at their East Asian faces…

They had been talking for so long, yet he still went on with that routine. Ying Ni wrinkled her nose in disdain but couldn’t resist smiling when she caught the curve of Zhou Siyang’s mouth.

Later, the two of them, starving, hurried to a Chinese restaurant, but unfortunately, the owner had closed early due to family matters.

They settled for a random restaurant nearby, and while Zhou Siyang claimed the food was terrible, Ying Ni thought it was delicious.

Zhou Siyang teased her, calling her a little pig who would enjoy anything, even feed. Ying Ni got upset, and the two of them had a small quarrel.

In the end, Zhou Siyang was right.

Because when she went back alone later, she ordered the same dishes. Despite there being no change in chefs, the taste was as bland as chewing wax, and it was hard to swallow.

It was so bad… it made her want to cry.

…

The phone on her lap vibrated with a “thud,” pulling Ying Ni out of her memories.

She unlocked the screen and saw a message from Yu Jiaojiao. She could almost hear her excited tone, as though she were rubbing her hands in anticipation.

Yu Jiaojiao: [！]

Yu Jiaojiao: [Zhou Siyang is back!]

Ying Ni blinked slowly, her wrist weakly holding the phone. Her thumb and index finger were just barely gripping the bottom edge of the phone, as though it might slip from her hand and fall onto the soft foot mat with a muffled sound.

After she made a brief sound of acknowledgment, Ying Ni’s gaze grew distant, and her expression became absent, until the phone vibrated again. That’s when she snapped back to reality. However, she quickly fell back into that confused, irritable mental state.

Chen An didn’t intend to push her buttons. After she gave a brief response, his gaze shifted, moving from her arms, which she had wrapped around herself, to the AC control. He adjusted it, lowering the cooling by two levels.

Ying Ni noticed his movement and reflexively turned her phone over on her lap. She wanted to tell him not to disturb her, to let her rest for a while.

But before she could say it, Chen An grabbed the steering wheel with his left hand and then reached over, tapping the armrest box with his free hand.

“There are snacks inside. If you’re hungry, you can have some.”

Ying Ni wasn’t hungry but had the urge to nibble on something, especially when she was in a bad mood. She craved sweets, the kind that was sickly sweet.

This odd habit was something even Zhou Siyang didn’t know about.

When she was a child, her mother, Lin Rongyuan, had strictly controlled her sugar intake to ensure her teeth would stay beautiful.

As a result, Ying Ni developed an intense craving for desserts, to the point where she would salivate just watching someone eat chocolate.

It wasn’t until the fifth grade, when a new live-in aunt came to work at their house, that she learned to satisfy this craving.

Ying Ni had gone through a series of nannies and tutors, either because the nanny couldn’t control her daughter or because Ying Ni had angered them enough to quit. But this one stayed for an entire year, and Ying Ni became more obedient, no longer throwing tantrums.

Lin Rongyuan was pleased and gave the nanny a generous red envelope for Chinese New Year, praising her for managing Ying Ni so well. She even promised a pay raise for the next year.

However, before the aunt could come back, on the third day of the New Year, Ying Ni ended up curled on the floor in agony with a toothache.

That night, they rushed to the emergency department, and the doctor diagnosed it as a cavity caused by excessive sugar consumption. It turned out the nanny had been using cheap candy as a reward to get Ying Ni to behave.

Lin Rongyuan was furious and fired the nanny. She also confiscated all the candy Ying Ni had hidden in her room and began checking her teeth three times a day.

At that time, Ying Ni wasn’t really craving sugar anymore, having already eaten so much candy for an entire year that she had grown sick of it.

Although she no longer had the desire for sweets, the habit of sucking on lollipops when upset lingered into adulthood.

The armrest box had plenty of snacks, including several kinds of chocolate. Ying Ni picked out an apple-flavored lollipop, unwrapped it, and stuck it in her mouth. The sweetness seemed to clear away her tiredness. She then kept her eyes fixed on Chen An.

Men driving always seemed serious, but not quite.

She remembered how, when Zhou Siyang drove, his narrow double eyelids would slightly widen, revealing amber-colored pupils that seemed to shine.

He appeared fully focused, but as soon as she made any movement, he would suddenly glance at her.

Chen An was similar. He didn’t turn his head, but his peripheral vision would subtly, slightly sweep over to the passenger seat.

Like now.

Ying Ni sucked on the lollipop, and although Chen An kept his eyes on the road, they both knew the other’s actions and expressions at this moment.

“I have a niece who just started kindergarten. A few days ago, the driver took this car to pick her up,” Chen An said, turning his head only when the car stopped at a red light. “She left it in the car before finishing it.”

This explanation reminded Ying Ni of the time he handed her chocolate last time, and she was curious about where it came from. Chen An had said it was from a child. She hadn’t asked further.

Now it seemed that his niece was that child.

Ying Ni didn’t care about his family or what snacks his niece liked. She gave a half-hearted “oh” and closed her eyes, pulling her chin down to her neck.

The phone on her lap kept vibrating relentlessly, but Ying Ni pressed her lips together, unwilling to check the messages, unwilling to respond. She didn’t want to deal with anything.

Even breathing felt like an unnecessary burden.

The rest of the ride was silent, and soon they arrived at the restaurant.

Because it was a holiday, the streets around the restaurant were crowded with cars. Chen An drove around and parked in the underground garage of a nearby building. They took the elevator up and walked towards the restaurant.

The “Xiangwei Restaurant” was a simple Chinese restaurant with an old-fashioned feel. It was packed with people, all seemingly repeat customers due to its good reputation.

“You order,” Ying Ni glanced at the price and pushed the menu in front of him without hesitation.

Chen An’s finger hovered over the corner of the menu, but his eyes stayed on her.

Ying Ni was annoyed by the message from Yu Jiaojiao suggesting, “Why don’t we schedule a time to eat together? I’ll call Zhou Siyang.” She didn’t want to waste time arguing over what to order.

She said irritably, “Don’t be so fussy.”

Chen An was in a good mood, saying nothing, and picked up the pen to write, pressing it down on the table. Perhaps it was the dull sound of clinking glassware that caught Ying Ni’s attention.

This was a restaurant that still had customers write down their orders by hand—a nostalgic, century-old establishment.

Ying Ni clicked her tongue as she watched him write.

It wasn’t far from her, and the pen tip moved smoothly across the paper. Ying Ni wasn’t really interested in how his handwriting looked but watched his hand. His hand was broad but slim, with pronounced knuckles and visible veins.

It looked strong.

No wonder, when he had grabbed her arm in the break room, not allowing her to leave, or when he had held her wrist outside the company and forced her into the car, she couldn’t break free no matter how hard she tried.

Ying Ni was one of the stronger girls and had learned martial arts, so most men without sports training wouldn’t be her match.

But looking at Chen An’s muscular arms, his rolled-up sleeves, and those long, powerful legs… her instinct told her that she probably wouldn’t be able to win.

But if they were back in high school, she could easily knock five of him out.

Chen An, of course, had no idea that Ying Ni was thinking about fighting him. He just knew that after she glanced at her phone, she seemed to zone out, her lips curving downward, looking like something was bothering her.

Chen An almost opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted when a little girl, carrying a basket of flowers, ran up to their table. After selling flowers to one table, she stopped right in front of them, smiling broadly.

“Uncle, buy a flower for the beautiful sister, this one will never wilt!” she said, holding up two handcrafted roses, the size of the table, her small arms reaching out with determination. Although her gaze was aimed at Chen An, she was looking eagerly at Ying Ni.

It seemed like if she were rejected, she would immediately start crying.