Seeing that it was a phone call from Bian Zijun, Qin Jinhuan immediately answered the phone. After listening to the other end of the line for a while, he replied, “I got it. I’m in the ward right now, and I’m not going back tonight.”

Mu Yu couldn’t see the caller ID clearly, but she could tell from Qin Jinhuan’s expression when he answered the phone that the contents of this phone conversation must be very important. Therefore, she asked, “Who called you?”

“Zijun.”

“Isn’t Zijun outside? What did you have him do out there?”

Bian Zijun was Qin Jinhuan’s personal bodyguard, so Mu Yu knew very well that Qin Jinhuan wouldn’t send him out if the matter wasn’t particularly important. Moreover, it was unusual since this phone call was made during such an hour.

“I had him look into Dong Yueyun’s whereabouts over the last few days,” Qin Jinhuan replied while putting his cell phone back into his pocket.

“So what did he find?”

“He didn’t find anything unusual about her except that there were a lot of phone calls between her and Dong Wanqing in the past few days. This morning—no, it should be yesterday morning—Dong Yueyun called Dong Wanqing at 9.30AM, and the phone conversation lasted for ten minutes.”

“Are you suspecting that Dong Yueyun incited Dong Wanqing over the phone to hurt me?

“This is very possible. Also, according to Zijun’s investigation, it was at Dong Yueyun’s suggestion that Dong Wanqing dyed her hair the same color as An… Yin Anran’s hair. Dong Yueyun probably had planned this a long time ago. No, she didn’t do this early on—she probably started planning for this from the moment she learned of your pregnancy.”

“But this is your conjecture. You don’t have any evidence to prove Dong Yueyun’s evil intentions.”

“There will be evidence.”

“Oh?”

“Dong Wanqing is the best evidence.”

Mu Yu was astounded upon hearing how confident Qin Jinhuan sounded when he spoke. “Do you want to have Dong Wanqing come forward and testify against Dong Yueyun? How could this be possible? Don’t forget their relationship! Dong Wanqing was raised single-handedly by Dong Yueyun, so she is indebted to the latter for bringing her up. Perhaps she helped Dong Yueyun with this out of her desire to repay a debt of gratitude! Of course, she could have been sweet-talked by Dong Yueyun into doing so, or Dong Yueyun might have given her some kind of promise. For instance, Dong Yueyun might have guaranteed that she would be all right or that she would definitely help her deal with any problems that arise—she’d even give her a handsome reward after this matter is over. Dong Wanqing isn’t very smart, but she isn’t stupid either, so she must be aware that she was taking a risk in doing so and that Dong Yueyun would be her only hope if anything happens. Therefore, she will never testify against Dong Yueyun no matter what, for Dong Yueyun is the only person she can count on. She’ll be finished if Dong Yueyun is put in prison as well.”

Qin Jinhuan totally disagreed with Mu Yu, though. Instead, he asked in reply with a smile, “Dong Wanqing won’t testify against Dong Yueyun because she has placed her hopes on the latter. Besides, she expects Dong Yueyun to help clear her of all suspicion and rescue her out of jail with her abilities. However, what do you think she’ll do if she learns that Dong Yueyun can’t help her at all or doesn’t intend to help her?”

“It’s… hard to say.” Mu Yu managed to figure out what Qin Jinhuan meant at last. “Are you going to drive a wedge between the aunt and niece and make them turn against each other?”

“I don’t have to drive a wedge between them. I just need to render Dong Yueyun at a loss for what to do.”

“However, you have no irrefutable evidence to prove that it was Dong Wanqing who harmed me and my baby! If you can’t even prove this, everything else you said will be hot air.”

“We don’t have to worry so much. The police will do a good job of this.”

“But—”

“Are you mistrustful of Rong Jian and the others’ abilities?”

“No—I trust them, of course. I’m just a bit worried.”

“You don’t have to worry about them right now. The most important thing that you have to do right now is to nurse your body back to health, lest your parents and Grandpa worry.”

“My body…” Mu Yu heaved a deep sigh instead of finishing her sentence. Even though her doctor, her parents, and Jiang Wenwen told her that her health wasn’t as poor as she had imagined, she couldn’t help feeling that they were teaming up to deceive her.

Seeing through what was on Mu Yu’s mind, Qin Jinhuan held her hand tightly and uttered seriously, “Yu, the doctors here at Fraternity Hospital are very outstanding. As long as you go along with their therapy and simultaneously build up your health with peace of mind, you’ll make a full recovery in no time! Please believe what I’m saying!”

Mu Yu replied in a choked voice, “I also want to believe what you’re saying. I’m just—”

“You’ll only make me feel even worse by continuing to be so conflicted.” Qin Jinhuan heaved a deep sigh the way Mu Yu did. “Ultimately, it’s my fault for failing to protect you. It’s my fault for being incompetent. It’s my—”

“This has nothing to do with you. It was my fault for being too stupid, for I fell into someone else’s trap at once.” At this moment, Mu Yu had gotten rid of her resentment toward Qin Jinhuan. After struggling to sit up, she sulkily told him the whole story of why she went to Rising Sun Plaza. When Liu Xiaofan came to her that evening to have her testimony recorded, she only said vaguely that someone called and asked to meet her at Rising Sun Plaza, but she didn’t talk about the details.

After hearing the story from her, Qin Jinhuan didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. “If someone really had pornographic videos of me, would they extort only 20,000 from you? They’ll make a sizable income by selling the videos to any media.”

Mu Yu was a bit ashamed. “To be frank, I was also doubtful at the time, but I was in too much of a hurry to meet the person at the time she specified, so I didn’t have time to give it a second thought. I thought that Huang Bo was there anyway…” she explained. At the mention of Huang Bo, she looked startled and hurriedly asked, “By the way, you didn’t do anything to Huang Bo, did you? He has nothing to do with this. He was completely unaware of this, and it was me who ordered him not to get so close to me!”

“I haven’t done anything to him yet for the time being. I’m planning to let him reflect on his mistakes later on.”

“Will you only let him reflect on his mistakes?” Judging from what she knew about Qin Jinhuan, Mu Yu believed that what he would do would never be so simple.

Qin Jinhuan asked in reply, “In that case, how would you like me to punish him?”

“I hope that you won’t punish him! I said that he has nothing to do with this. I have only myself to blame!”

“I’ll do as you wish this time,” Qin Jinhuan replied. Then, he immediately turned serious and warned with a stern expression, “However, you mustn’t make your own decisions no matter what happens in the future. You must tell me first whenever you come across something. Got it?”

Mu Yu curled her lips. “What if such videos really exist? Can I still see the videos if I tell you about them?”

Qin Jinhuan looked hurt. “Do you distrust me so much?”

Mu Yu shook her head. “It’s not that I don’t trust you; I just don’t have enough confidence in myself. The women around you are much—”

Qin Jinhuan interrupted her at once, “To me, the other women are no different from men. You’re the only woman in my eyes and my heart!”

“Will I always be the only one?”

“You must always be the only one.”

Even though the answer sounded incredibly sweet to Mu Yu, she couldn’t help voicing her doubts. “What if I can no longer have a baby in the future? Will you—”

“No, I won’t! To be honest, having a baby isn’t as important as you think it is. Don’t you see that Xi can’t have a baby as well? Yet, Shang Qi still spoils her, doesn’t he? Besides, you must believe that my feelings for you will only be deeper than Shang Qi’s feelings for Xi! It doesn’t matter if you don’t believe me right now; I’ll prove it to you over time.”

“I trust you. I trust you, of course.” Mu Yu hugged Qin Jinhuan while burying her face in his chest.

Feeling gratified, Qin Jinhuan hugged her in return and caressed her face while saying with pity, “I’ve read many books about expectant mothers lately. One of the books says that every mother and her baby are sworn to live or die together because childbirth is very dangerous. Not only must the mother endure the worst pain, she might even lose her life. It’s a particularly long and difficult process for a woman to carry a baby to term, so I don’t intend to let you bear such pain and take such a risk.”

Mu Yu pushed him away in shock. “Am I really unable to get pregnant anymore?”

“No, no, no. You’ve misunderstood what I meant,” Qin Jinhuan hurriedly explained. “I mean that I don’t want you to get pregnant. If you want to have a baby that belongs to us, I can hire a surrogate mother for you.” He embraced her affectionately once again. “Actually, I have asked the obstetricians earlier to understand the situation; they said that it’s risky for women to give birth to babies, and they can’t guarantee that there is absolutely no danger, so I’m particularly nervous. But I also wanted a baby that belonged to us earlier on, yet I was afraid that you wouldn’t accept what I thought, so I planned to find some time to talk to you about this after coming back from the business trip. However, I didn’t expect that something would happen to you right after I went away on business, and it surprised me even more that you were already pregnant. Now, I think everything was predestined.”

Mu Yu was touched upon hearing this and gave a long sigh. “It seems that this baby isn’t destined to be my child,” she said. Then, she continued sternly, “If I can still get pregnant, I won’t hire a surrogate mother. Not only do I want to bear children for you myself, but I want to give birth to two babies. It’ll be best if I can give birth to a son and a daughter and let them bear witness to our love.”

“But—”

Mu Yu covered Qin Jinhuan’s mouth. “I don’t want to be at a loss for a reply when my children ask me in the future how they were conceived. I can’t tell them that I didn’t give birth to them because their father didn’t want to let their mother bear the risk of giving birth and thus hired a surrogate mother to give birth to them, can I? If I say so, they will definitely question my love for them and our selfishness; they might even want us to find their surrogate mother. Xi’s case is special since she has no choice but to do so. She can explain her reason to her children, but we can’t justify ourselves.”

Qin Jinhuan grabbed Mu Yu’s hand and gently put it down with a chuckle. “Your thoughts are so complicated. We can hide the surrogacy from them, so you can tell them with great confidence that you carried them to term and gave birth to them. You can even overstate the pain and the risk of carrying them infinitely to seek their sympathy and let them obediently love you, respect you, listen to everything you say, and obey you.”

His words inspired Mu Yu with boundless fantasies, and she leaned in his arms while happily fantasizing about the happy life of their family of four in the future.

“All right, it’s almost dawn. Let’s rest.” Qin Jinhuan carefully helped her lie down before lying down next to her.

Mu Yu lay on her side while raising her head slightly. Understanding what she meant, Qin Jinhuan immediately stretched out his arm beneath her head. After shifting a little with her body in his arms, he chose the most comfortable posture for her and slept while holding her in his arms.

Perhaps the conflict between them had been resolved, or perhaps because they had wonderful dreams about the future, they slept unusually soundly this time until the nurse woke them up in the morning because the doctor had to give Mu Yu a checkup.

Just then, Mu Yu’s parents had also arrived with the soup they prepared. Seeing that Qin Jinhuan was very sleepy, they immediately told him to rest in the room Rong Ying had previously prepared for them.

However, Qin Jinhuan refused to leave and waited until the doctor finished examining Mu Yu before entering the ward to take a look at her. Seeing that she was on a drip and had fallen asleep again, he no longer insisted on staying in the ward. After leaving her in her parents’ care, he went to the room next door to catch up on his sleep.

This time, he slept all the way until evening. After washing his face and rinsing his mouth, he left the room and prepared to go to Mu Yu.

Bian Zijun, who had been staying outside the door for a long time, caught sight of his boss and immediately went up to him. “Boss, there’s some good news.”