Chapter Twenty-Two: Uncontainable Grief

Mai Xijun dared not let herself imagine what she would do if the man before her truly was the man from that Venetian night—she simply could not fathom it. In the aftermath, all she knew was that she had been too impulsive, too reckless, even absurd.

“I have,” Shen Yanlie replied coolly, attempting to withdraw his hand to mix another drink. But Mai Xijun grasped him again, as if she would hold on forever, tormented and entangled until she had her answer.

Her brows knit tighter still, holding her breath, though her heart was already a tangled mess. When she spoke again, her voice was tentative, barely daring to disturb herself, afraid she might flee in panic if she pressed too hard.

“Have you ever been to Venice?”

Time slipped quietly past her fingertips. As Shen Yanlie gazed at the forlorn woman before him, ripples stirred in his heart; her bright eyes shone like stars, and he could not look away. A gentle light flickered in his gaze, his dark eyes deep as a pool. He arched an eyebrow ever so slightly, as if to tease her, to keep her guessing—did it matter so much to her whether he was the man from that Venetian night? After all, it was he who had first awakened her memories...

“I have,” he said again.

Those two simple words struck Mai Xijun like a bolt from a clear sky, leaving her frozen in place. Her grip on his wrist relaxed and loosened, as if her strength had been sapped away.

Had he been asking for the return of the item worth tens of millions—the necklace—this entire time? Had she failed to understand his meaning from the very start?

But hadn’t he once said he gave it to her because she saved him? Why, then, had he come to upend her life, to become so entangled with her now?

Shen Yanlie watched as Mai Xijun’s troubled face grew desolate, her hand slowly slipping from his grasp, her expression filled with boundless sorrow.

“I was in Milan some time ago,” he said, his tone rising, as if he could not fathom her quiet grief. “Spent a while in Venice, then stopped in Rome before I left... Why do you ask?” He turned to her, suspicion edging his voice.

Mai Xijun’s reply was choked, her throat tight as if something were lodged inside, her words halting and broken. Tears shimmered in her eyes as she hastily dabbed them away with her fingers. “My eyes sting. Are you making a drink? Can I have a whiskey?”

Her demeanor shifted in an instant, her smile returning as she addressed Shen Yanlie.

Perhaps it was better not to know the answer—ignorance might spare her some measure of sorrow.

He only wished to retrieve what was his; he had never intended to quietly sit with her, mixing drinks, watching as she drank, her head bowed over the table.

If only she were not that little girl from more than a decade ago, the one he had met but once—then he could truly act without restraint, do as he pleased, take what he wanted.

Mai Xijun was not much of a drinker. After just a few glasses, the world began to blur before her. Alcohol, so easily both a torment and a solace, could sweep a person into oblivion—if only she could drink herself into forgetfulness. But visions of her time with Xue Lizan played out before her eyes, scene by scene.

How could he? How could he betray her so completely, without the slightest warning?

She remembered all too well the years when her mother left early and returned late, lips painted a vivid red, a strange perfume clinging to her skin—Mai Xijun was only seven then.

By the time she was nine, her mother finally found them a home, living with a man who, impoverished and unmarried at thirty-five, became her so-called father.

Then, at twelve, her mother turned to drugs. Her father, led astray by her mother, took up gambling. That same year, the man was beaten to death over enormous debts.

She had begged her mother to call the police, sobbing, but her mother had covered her mouth with both hands. “Jun, mama uses drugs—we can’t call the police. If we do, I’ll go to jail too.”

After she turned fourteen, Mai Xijun never saw Chen Xuemin again—the woman who used to tie her to the table leg before going out to “work” had vanished from her life. Chen Xuemin’s addiction was so severe that Mai Xijun sometimes still fantasized her mother might be alive somewhere, and would one day return for her.

But the years slipped by, and Chen Xuemin never returned. Instead, her biological father, Su Shengyuan, sought her out, insisting she come home to the family she was always meant to have. Yet she stubbornly refused, vowing never to set foot in the Su household.

As these memories flooded her mind, tears burst forth like a torrent. Over the years, though she had tasted alcohol, she had never allowed herself to become drunk—she dared not, could not. She needed to stay clear-headed, to remind herself again and again not to fall, not to despair.

Yet tonight, in her drunkenness, all the emotions she had long suppressed surged forth, along with memories of the past. She could not help but crouch on the floor, clutching her head in anguish.

“Why is everyone so heartless, leaving me all alone? Why do you all push me away? Why does no one want me? Why?”

Her sobs were wrenching, her heart torn to shreds. In an instant, her tears fell like rain.