Chapter 2: A Suffocating Night

To be completely honest, playing the canary in his golden cage was far from easy. The man was a walking psychiatric evaluation waiting to happen. But hey, the money was unbelievable. Over the last five years, I had basically poured my blood, sweat, and tears into a high-stakes rehab project to turn Xie Yun into a functioning member of society.

And it worked! Now, he kissed me every morning, dropped text updates about his daily schedule like clockwork, and pulled me into his arms the second he walked through the door at night, whispering softly, “Sweetheart, I missed you so much today.”

I’d honestly convinced myself I was about to upgrade from side-piece to main wife. Turns out it was all just the delusional daydream of a gold-digger.

I looked down at my flat stomach. Right now, it held nothing more than a tiny clump of cells. But according to those crazy ghost comments, those cells were going to grow into an eight-month fetus, only for both of us to be flattened by a truck.

That thought snapped me back to reality real quick.

Better to flush a clump of cells now than try to outrun a semi-truck with an eight-month bump later. As long as I took the initiative to cut ties early, I’d be safe… right?

I whipped out my phone and booked a discreet appointment at a high-end private clinic.

Man, milking rich guys really is hazard pay.

Holy crap, is she actually going through with the abortion?

Wait, didn’t she just want to brag to the male lead a second ago? Why the sudden U-turn?

The barrage of floating comments kept flashing across my line of sight, but I completely ignored them. The most critical item on my agenda right now: liquidated assets.

Luckily, Xie Yun was absurdly generous. A single sneeze earned me a wire transfer. Me missing him earned me a wire transfer. If he was happy, he bought me designer bags; if he was stressed, he bought me real estate. After five years of putting my life on the line for this job, my net worth had accumulated to a jaw-dropping number.

I sprinted into my walk-in closet and pulled out every unused handbag, outfit, and piece of fine jewelry to list online for quick cash. The stash was so massive that I spent from morning till dusk wrapping up sales, and I still wasn’t done.

Just as I was confirming the final offer with a buyer, a pair of familiar, strong arms wrapped tightly around my waist from behind.

Xie Yun buried his face into the nape of my neck, his voice husky and thick with needy grievances. “Sweetheart… we’ve been apart for eight hours and thirty-two minutes today. I missed you to death.”

I quietly locked my phone screen and offered a smooth, practiced response. “I missed you too.”

He lightly nipped my earlobe. “Liar. You didn’t text me a single time today.”

A wave of guilt washed over me, but I kept my tone breezy. “I was just so busy I forgot.”

“You forgot about me again.” His voice was barely a whisper. Soft, low, and completely chilling.

The orange glow of the setting sun bled through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting a muted warmth across the living room. Xie Yun leaned down, pressing his lips against my neck, his voice dropping to a low murmur. “Sweetheart, are you keeping something from me?”

My body went completely rigid, my brain instantly scrambling into overdrive. Was I keeping something from him?

Well, yeah. I could hit him with: “Hey babe, I’m pregnant.”

Or maybe: “Hey babe, you’re about to run us down with a truck in eight months.”

Naturally, I kept my mouth shut. Looking back, twenty-one-year-old me must have been blinded by pure greed. Out of all the billionaires on the market, why did I have to lock eyes on this literal lunatic?

Yeah, high pay definitely comes with high risk.

—

The next morning, I stood in front of the bathroom mirror brushing my teeth, staring blankly at the cluster of dark hickeys covering my neck. Just then, those wretched text overlays flickered back to life:

Honestly props to her for surviving this psycho. He’s so brutally aggressive.

Relax, the second he meets the female lead, he turns into a total softie. He’ll be cradling her like fragile glass.

Side note: the girl is built like a tank. After a night like that, the baby is still totally fine.

I nearly choked on my toothpaste. Built like a tank my ass!

Xie Yun hadn’t even done anything last night! He had just wrapped himself around me like a boa constrictor, visibly holding back some dark impulse while endlessly probing: “Sweetheart, what are you hiding? Be good and tell me. Tell me, and I’ll let you off the hook.”

I had trembled in his arms like a leaf in a hurricane. “I… I’m not hiding anything!”

Whereupon he clamped down hard on my wrist, leaned down, and bit my lip hard enough to draw blood. *”Liar.”

It was exhausting. Not just the comments, but Xie Yun himself. The way he was acting these past couple of days was triggering severe flashbacks to five years ago. God damn it, it took me five painstaking years to rehabilitate him into a civilized human being—how the hell did he revert to factory settings overnight?

—

Around noon, Xie Yun left an important document folder at home and asked me to drop it off at his office.

The moment I stepped into the CEO suite, I spotted a young woman sitting across from his desk. White button-up shirt, plaid skirt, silky black hair hanging straight down her back—the absolute blueprint of a sweet, innocent, high-school-sweetheart female lead.

She was chirping away animatedly, while Xie Yun kept his head buried in his work, his expression as cold as a corpse.

The comment feed instantly lost its mind:

AHHHH! Mai Tu is here!

The female lead is so freaking cute!

Why is the side-chick popping up now? Girl, do not disrupt their romance line!

Oh no, Mai Tu saw him holding the side-chick… her little heart is breaking, I’m crying!

Me: “…” Wait. So this is the actual heroine?

I walked over and handed the folder to Xie Yun. The girl looked at me, hesitating before asking, “And… who is she?”

Xie Yun took the documents without looking up, his voice dripping with ice. “None of your business.”

The girl gasped, looking shocked. “Xie Yun! I am your fiancée!”

Xie Yun finally raised his eyes to meet hers, dropping a single, freezing word: “Get out.”

My scalp went numb just listening to him. Tears welled up in the girl’s red-rimmed eyes as she bit her lip and sprinted out of the office.

The comment feed threw an absolute pity party:

Keep playing tough, big guy. You’re gonna regret this so hard later!

Right beneath that comment, I noticed Xie Yun subtly stiffen. His gaze drifted toward the closed door, a fleeting trace of melancholy and regret washing over his face.

Lightbulb moment. Ah, the classic ‘tsundere male lead’ routine—cold on the outside, soft on the inside.

Being the deeply pragmatic individual I am, I chimed in with utmost tact: “Aren’t you going to chase after her? If you want, I can go explain things to her for you.”

After all, I’d already booked my appointment at the clinic, and my exit was inevitable. She was the destined female lead; the least I could do was play nice and repay Xie Yun for keeping me like a queen for five years.

Besides, the last thing I needed was him regretting this later and going psycho all over again.