Yan looked sorrowful in her current state. With her messy hair, swelled up cheek, tear stains, and his blazer over her, she looked like she had been through a great ordeal.
“What about your wounds?” Han Qing lowered his voice and asked gently.
“I’m not going to the hospital no matter what. I don’t want to go home either.” She buried herself in her knees and said through a muffled voice, “Just drop me off at a hotel.”
He was speechless. What nonsense is she talking about? Even if I don’t take her to the hospital, I can’t take her to a hotel in this current situation. After contemplating for a bit, he brought her straight to his house. It was not the Han residence where he usually lived; it was his private residence where there were no housekeepers. Yan felt perplexed when she got out of the car. “Where is this place?”
“My house.” Then, he proceeded to carry her in his arms again and headed inside. Yan let him carry her and felt his breath next to her. Just yesterday, she decided never to see him again. But today, he showed up at her most desperate moment and saved her. He made her feel safe and secure. Unable to help herself, she slowly burrowed herself in his embrace.
He came to a slight halt and glanced down at her. He also felt the change in her but took it to mean that she was scared. Curling his arms around her tighter, he had an obscure tenderness in his deep voice as he said, “Don’t be scared. This won’t happen again.”
At the reminder of what happened, she started to feel a sense of fear. What would have happened to her tonight if Han Qing did not show up to save her? She shuddered involuntarily when she thought of all the different possibilities.
He carried her up the stairs then carefully put her down on the cushiony sofa. “Wait for me here.”
When he turned around to leave, she quickly grabbed onto his sleeve. “Don’t go.” She found the emptiness of the spacious room slightly eerie.
Seeing her like that, his gaze deepened, and he said gently, “I’m just going to get the first-aid kit. I’ll be back in a minute.”
A minute? She looked at him doubtfully with an expression that said, ‘Really?’.
He nodded. “Very soon.”
“Okay, then hurry back,” she said, then reluctantly let go of his sleeve so he could go get the first-aid kit. When he left, Yan lowered her head and realized her white shoes had dark stains on them. It was rather abrupt which led her to think of her appearance earlier. Just like the pair of white shoes, she was tainted by Li Sihan. I must be so dirty right now. She remembered how Li Sihan grabbed her arm and tore off her clothes. He even grazed over my shoulder and skin…
The scene automatically popped up in her head and got more intense. She cried out in fear. Quickly getting up, she ran out and bumped into Han Qing’s embrace.
“What—” Before he finished speaking, she took several steps away from him like she was avoiding the plague. He had a first-aid kit in his hand to treat her wounds. He had gone and came back almost immediately. But once he returned, he realized that Yan did not look right. I was just away for a moment. Why is she like this now? He took a tentative step toward her.
“Don’t come close!” Yan cried and took a big step back. She glared at him with a detested look. “Why did you save me? Didn’t I say I didn’t want to cling to you anymore? Didn’t I tell you not to show up anymore? Why did you still save me?”
He pursed his lips and his eyes turned cold. “Who was going to save you if I hadn’t?”
She lowered her gaze. “It could’ve been anyone. Why you? Why did you have to see me in this disheveled state? I’m… so dirty.” She bit her bottom lip and tried to push out the disgusting scenes that were filling her mind. But the harder she tried, the more it worked against her.
Han Qing frowned as he looked at her. Is it because she’s emotionally unstable right now? If only I had known she would be like this in that short moment that I was gone, I would have just kept her by my side the whole time.
“I’m so, so dirty now. You never liked me before, but you probably think I’m disgusting now, right?” She turned gloomy. “If I knew this would happen, I would have rather been raped, so you didn’t have to save me.”
Initially, his heart was hurting for her. But after hearing that last sentence, he was rendered speechless. He narrowed his eyes at her. Would have rather been raped? So that I didn’t have to save her? He wanted to go over and look into her brain to see what was in it. However, she was crying in sorrow and her lips were also red. She looked exceptionally pitiful.
He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, it was clear that he had made a decision. “With my personality, I prefer not to do this in this situation. But…” With that, he took big strides toward her. Pinching her chin and forcing her head up, he bent down and kissed her.
“Mmph.” Yan completely froze. Her eyes widened in astonishment. At that moment, those dirty and disgusting thoughts instantly disappeared from her mind. Her mind became blank and she could not remember a thing, except for the peculiar feeling she felt then. It was the temperature on her lips. When he first kissed her, his lips felt cold. But it gradually grew warmer until it was almost burning her.
She quivered in shock and lost her strength as she fell back. However, his big hand grabbed her waist. He seized the opportunity and pulled her into his big and warm embrace. The kiss did not end but only deepened. The world was spinning around them, and they lost track of time.
Time flew by. Yan did not close her eyes once from the start to the end of the kiss. When Han Qing pulled back, she still stood there stupefied and stared blankly at him. He lifted his forehead off her slightly then put it back down after some thought. It was probably because of the kiss that his voice turned raspy and even possessed a trace of longing. A kiss that was hammered into her heart. “Do you still feel dirty now?”
She only saw his handsome face and felt his breath along with the warmth on her lips. How could she have thought of whether she felt dirty or not?
Seeing her reaction, he knew that he had made the right decision. But he also realized something serious—he was unable to restrain himself and had kissed her for so long. He only wanted to give her a peck to put her heart at ease, and also to tell her that she was not dirty. But the moment he kissed her, he lost control. I must have been out of my mind to kiss her for that long when she just came back from experiencing something so traumatic.
That gave him a headache. He pursed his lips then slowly said, “Why don’t you take a shower first?”
