Sweet Chief Secretary

When Wanru was in college, she had a close friend who came from the countryside and always invited Wanru to spend the summer vacation there. So Wanru was quite familiar with the countryside life and was sure to know a place of that sort was used for storage. Walking further a few paces, she found a board on the door saying “Grain Barn” as she had expected.

It was her first time to see a place like this in the hotel. Wanru was so curious that she opened the door and walked in, making a convenience that she could stay alone as she was surrounded by no one. After she entered, she saw a yard which was not large, laid with some old stools and broken clay jars, not knowing where they came from.

Sometimes, city dwellers were believed to be pretentious because they squandered money building a counterfeit farm to satisfy their curiosity over country life while they could barely get it through if they were left to live in the mountains.

Holding the wine glass in her hand, Wanru walked inside to see what the grain barn of the hotel was like. The moment when she stepped on the stairs, she heard the door behind was pushed open with a creak.

Wanru looked back, a figure walked slowly from the back of the fence.

The moonlight was dim, and the shadows of the trees were dancing in the mountain wind. The surrounding was tranquil as the bustling sound in the banquet hall in the front faded away. There was even no chirping here. Only the figure was turning around from the back of the fence.

With another creak, the old door was opened wider. A person walked inside quickly until the whole body appeared at the door. The process was like a lengthy slow motion in a horror movie. Finally, Wanru saw clearly….

In the moonlight, the person had a gloomy face, a rigid body, and dark eyes, approaching her step by step with a long shadow.

Wanru couldn’t help holding tightly the glass and handbag in her hands.

She had a sense that the person came with ill-intent and she was prompted by her instinct to keep stepping back. However, the person at the door had entered the yard, walking to her step by step, passing those stools and the row of clay jars in the corner. Wanru didn’t stop and force herself to calm down until her back nearly knocked on the door of the grain barn, with no place to escape.

The man on the stairs remained silent and didn’t cease to walk. His shadow had climbed onto the stairs and looked distorted in the moonlight due to reflection.

Wanru subdued her breath and said, “President Zhang!” Her terror couldn’t be concealed in her sound.

President Zhang? How could this woman address me like that? Zhang Hanyu felt a bit annoyed in his heart.

Wasn’t there a saying that a day together as husband and wife meant endless devotion in the rest of one’s life? The man in the front suddenly raised his hand and snatched Wanru’s neck out of her expectation. He wanted to ask, where their devotion in the past had gone?

Without any preparation, Wanru was forced by the sense of being choked at her throat to scratch his arm with one hand. The handbag in her hand then was dropped to the ground. She used so great strength to scratch that she left some blood marks on the back of his hand. But it didn’t work. What’s worse, it fueled his rage.

“Scratch! Keep scratching! Try harder!” His voice was like a ghost, coming at Wanru’s face cruelly.

The man’s facial features popped up in front of her eyes. She couldn’t see them all clearly, but his eyes were so near, which made them look dark and sparkling.

Wanru was struggling between choke and terror. She paused. Her mind became knotted and then snapped.

Wanru started to feel cold all over her body, but she had a strong desire for living, “Let me go!”

“How?” Zhang Hanyu’s fingers snatched her neck even more tightly, “I wanted to, but I couldn’t make it.”

“You once said I was mean to Xia Yu, which I admitted. So, I tolerated your behaviors when you made a fuss. But I had never expected that you made a fuss in front of me, in front of me. Who gave you the guts?” Zhang Hanyu’s voice turned from cold to aggressive, with rage and resentment full of his chest. How could he swallow it all?

The more Zhang Hanyu thought, the more he hated her and became crueler to her. Unconsciously, he snatched with a bit more strength, which made Wanru’s cheek flush and her fingers keep struggling against his arm but in vain for his palm was as fastened as a nipper.

Feeling she couldn’t breathe.

“Let go….”

“Feel uncomfortable, don’t you?”

“Let… let go….”

“Why? Why can’t you stand in my shoes?” Zhang Hanyu almost roared it out. He was many times much better than that prodigal Zhang Peng.

However, that old dog would rather be pissed off by Zhang Peng than cast a look at me.

Just because I was a bastard?

Others could laugh at him, but how could that old dog have the right to? Did he remember whose bastard I was? Zhang Hanyu endeavored to make him know that he was better than that prodigal even though he didn’t rely on him.

Certainly, it turned out that he was much better than that prodigal. However, when everyone appreciated him, this woman stabbed him in his back, sending him to prison.

Even though she did so, he forgave her anyway. But how should this woman push her luck? He tightened his fingers again and his face inched forward, almost touching hers.

She smelled the odor of cigarettes, wine, and sweat….

Wanru struggled to bow reversely to alleviate the pressure on her neck, but she had no way to avoid his eyes, which seemingly wanted to swallow and tear her into pieces.

“It was you who forced me!” In the past years, Wanru lived a bitter life, which she knew fully. He thought she brought harm to him. But didn’t he hurt her, too?

Since they only brought harm to each other when they were together, she wanted to break up with him to begin their own new life respectively, wasn’t she right?

“Let me go. Calm down and have a talk!”

“Today is Ningjing’s father’s birthday and there are so many people. Do you want to make trouble and draw everyone’s attention?”

Wanru tried to calm herself down and wanted to distract his attention but in vain. The man in front of her burst into laughter.

“Everyone’s attention? Do you think I care about that?” Zhang Hanyu answered with a sneer.

Wanru just felt her back collapsed. Her pupils dilated.

“No… don’t….” She shook her head in terror as if her soul had been taken away from her, even releasing her hand which was on Zhang Hanyu’s arm earlier.

“What’s wrong? Afraid? Didn’t you threaten me that you would make a scene just now?” Zhang Hanyu said with irony. He lightened a bit the strength on his hand because he began to enjoy the terror in Wanru’s eyes.

Zhang Hanyu’s eyes moved from Wanru’s face to her lower parts. She breathed heavily and the white curve of her bare breast in the low-cut clothing rose and fell to her inhalation and exhalation. It was a seductive angle, by which one could view vaguely her bustline and her protruding collarbone while her slim neck was snatched by his hand.

Now, Wanru was like a frightened white swan, struggling between death and terror, which made her eyes and body look more tempting.

Zhang Hanyu took a breath subconsciously and lightened her fingers more, which left her a fantastic opportunity.

“Bastard!” She shouted, raised her hand and came at Zhang Hanyu’s head.

Zhang Hanyu was so careless that he forgot she had the wine glass in her hand. Wanru used all her strength because she risked her life when smashing him with it.

Zhang Hanyu swayed for a moment by the attack. Then the pain assailed him after short dizziness, a stream of something hot, thick and stinking running from his head, then to his forehead and eyebrows. He numbly touched it and found his hand was full of blood. Then he raised up his head.

The stagnant air was instilled with the smell of blood, which began to spread…

One second, two seconds…

Wanru gathered up her mind. Her instinct for living prompted her to push Zhang Hanyu away and run to the door. But how could she escape away successfully?

In her high-heeled shoes, she stumbled down the stairs. Before she could keep her feet, her arm was pulled back by someone behind her. Zhang Hanyu caught Wanru without effort and pushed her, which made her lose balance and knock into the row of clay jars in the corner.

The clay jars were knocked into pieces. She slipped off the ground and felt great pain as if her bones had been apart.

“President Zhang, stop!” Xia Yu came in, pushed Zhang Hanyu away and helped Wanru stand up.

Her arms, hands, and back were cut open by the fragments of the clay jars and her blood kept running down.

Seeing this consequence, Zhang Hanyu felt very regretful. “How could I be so impulsive? Was I mad at Wanru revenging on me? Or mad at her standing with Zhou Yan?”

Perhaps both. “You get hurt?” Zhang Hanyu took two paces toward Wanru, wanting to see her conditions.

“Don’t come over.” Wanru backed down with terror and evaded him.

“Take back your hypocritical apology. We won’t accept it!” Zhou Yan went to look for Wanru when he found she didn’t return after she left for a long while.

As a result, he saw she was tortured seriously by Zhang Hanyu which made him so angry that he punched Zhang Hanyu on his right eye. Zhang Hanyu backed down quite a few paces before he could land on his feet again.

“Zhou Yan, such a good woman like Wanru was misled by you scoundrel.” Thinking it over, Zhang Hanyu drew the conclusion that Wanru harmed him and their relationship was because she was incited by this scoundrel.

This man was the worst. Why was I so stupid? Why not ask this scoundrel out instead of heckling a little woman?

“Zhang Hanyu, enough! Today is Uncle Ning’s birthday. I don’t want to quarrel with you, but it doesn’t mean I’ll let this go. One day I’ll get even with you for this.” Though Zhou Yan was very angry, he didn’t want to make a scene on President Ning’s birthday banquet.

With great concern, Zhou Yan took over Wanru from Xia Yu’s hands and held Wanru into his chest, “Let’s go to the hospital.”

Wanru leaned against his chest and said to Zhou Yan without casting a look at Zhou Hanyu, “OK.”

The two got out of the grain barn. Zhang Hanyu wanted to catch them, but Xia Yu blocked his way, “President Zhang!”

“Are they in a relationship?” Zhang Hanyu was not blind. He could recognize the emotion in the two people’s eyes just now.

“What do you think?” Xia Yu replied with a rhetorical question angrily. Zhang Hanyu was a good person in many aspects except his self-conceit.

Otherwise, Wanru and he wouldn’t have come to such a pass, which certainly was also related to his childhood experiences. To be frank, he was an unfortunate person. Xia Yu felt great sympathy for him.

Therefore, she didn’t feel like telling off him too harshly.

“Wanru is a divorced woman with a child. Will Zhou Yan accept her?” Zhang Hanyu asked aloud with discontent. Even though Zhou Yan wouldn’t care, what about his grandparents? Wouldn’t they care?

“Haven’t you seen the situation with your own eyes?” Xia Yu heaved a sigh in her heart. She looked up at his right eye, which had a dark bruise. She was afraid that he’d better not show up among the guests again.