Returning - Chapter 109
Chapter 109: Compensation
Zhuang Ye waited a full hour outside the mall's security monitoring room.
Ordinary people had no right to view surveillance footage. All he could do was ask a friend to help him find connections and see if he could contact the relevant person in charge to make an exception.
He did find a friend to help. The friend explicitly told him they had already made the call and he could go in to take a look.
But unexpectedly, the person in charge of the monitoring room still refused him in the end, saying orders had come from above. A matter like this, if it got out, would damage the entire mall's reputation; no precedent could be set.
Frustrated, Zhuang Ye contacted his friend several more times but failed to get his wish. Finally, left with no other option, he could only pin his hopes on a few friends who were police officers.
If he had truly lost something and reported it to the police, surely the police would have the right to view the surveillance footage? He just wanted to confirm whether the person he saw was really her.
And he had a premonition in his heart. It was definitely her. Otherwise, why would the woman who went to the cashier to pay disappear the moment he arrived? Would she even abandon the item she had her eye on?
"There's a personal matter I need your help with." Speaking on the phone while standing beside the circular guardrail, before he could even explain the situation clearly, Zhuang Ye froze again. Immediately after, he spun around and dashed downstairs with desperate urgency.
He rushed down two floors using the escalators before he finally caught up with the woman wearing the red trench coat. He wanted to call out, but it was as if something had suddenly seized his throat, and he couldn't make a single sound.
What could he say? And what had he chased after her to do?
The woman ahead continued heading downstairs. As she switched to an escalator going in another direction, Zhuang Ye was just able to see her face.
It wasn't the person he thought it was.
Although the clothes, figure, and hairstyle were all identical to what he had seen from the car, the face was clearly different.
When he had inadvertently glanced at the second-floor mall from his car, the face he saw was the one from his memory. Why was it not her now?
Had he hallucinated earlier? Or was it truly such a coincidence that there was another woman in the mall wearing the exact same clothes?
Watching the figure on the escalator below grow more and more distant, Zhuang Ye suddenly let out a scoff.
He must have gone mad.
That was why he had hallucinated, mistaking a stranger for her.
That was why he had lost all reason and rushed into the mall, searching desperately for someone.
"Zhuang Ye? Zhuang Ye, are you alright?" The call hadn't been disconnected; the friend on the other end thought something had happened to him and called out several times anxiously. "Zhuang Ye? What was that noise just now? Are you in some kind of trouble?"
"No." Looking in the direction the woman had left, Zhuang Ye smiled self-deprecatingly. "It's nothing. Thanks."
Only after watching with his own eyes as Zhuang Ye drove away the car illegally parked by the roadside did Shang Lu, who had observed everything from the second floor, turn around, enter the elevator, and go directly to the underground parking garage.
When he opened Zhao Yu's car door and sat inside, he also returned the red trench coat to her. "I'll have someone completely delete the surveillance footage."
Zhao Yu smiled faintly. "Thank you."
To be safe, it naturally had to be deleted. But she also believed that Zhuang Ye wouldn't come looking again.
If she had disappeared mysteriously without a word back then, Zhuang Ye would definitely have tried every possible means to find her and demand an explanation. However, their parting four years ago had been so unpleasant, so resolutely final, that there was absolutely no possibility of rekindling their past relationship.
He might lose control once today, but he would never lose control a second time.
The worst of the rush hour had passed, but due to the light rain outside, the traffic jam on the road was still quite severe.
As they circled onto the street outside the mall, Zhao Yu deliberately glanced up at the second floor. The lights inside were bright; from the main street, one could indeed see the people inside the shop. Yet at such a far distance, it was truly impossible to make out the customers' features clearly.
But even so, Zhuang Ye had still recognized her—just as, when she casually glanced at the escalator moments ago, she could be certain the person rushing up was him.
They had once been too familiar with each other, familiar enough to spot each other in a crowd from far away at a single glance.
She had been avoiding Zhuang Yiqing before, and as long as she didn't run into her face-to-face, it was enough. But the current Zhuang Ye would be impossible to guard against.
She had narrowly dodged him this time thanks to Shang Lu. But what if there was a next time?
"The child was his?"
The sudden voice jolted Zhao Yu out of her contemplation. She turned her head to look at the expressionless Shang Lu in the passenger seat and replied quietly, "Mm."
"Four years ago, the one who hurt you that badly, was it also him?"
Zhao Yu was silent for a moment, then said, "He doesn't know about the child."
Shang Lu looked somewhat surprised.
"Not quite the story you imagined, is it?" Zhao Yu chuckled softly. "Actually, there's not much difference. It's still a cliché. It's just that it wasn't him not wanting the child, but his family not being able to tolerate the existence of me and the child. After all, I was just an ordinary commoner with nothing to my name. What right did I have to marry into a wealthy family?"
Shang Lu's fingertips resting on his leg twitched slightly, curling into a loose fist.
It was also for this reason that, from the very beginning of their acquaintance, he had soberly understood there could be no future with her. He had always maintained his distance rationally.
But looking at her now, full of self-mockery, he suddenly felt that, in truth, he was no different from the man who had just left. He had no right at all to condemn the man who had once hurt her.
Zhao Yu had thought he would ask who the person just now was, and she was prepared to answer truthfully. But he remained silent the entire drive.
Since he didn't speak, she didn't either, until the car came to a stop in front of his villa.
He had asked his driver to take him to the mall. It was just that he had gotten into her car, so she had automatically driven him back.
Watching him open the door to get out, she suddenly asked, "Is it convenient to come in?"
Shang Lu nodded.
Entering the villa, she followed the familiar path to the bathroom and showered. Wrapped in a bath towel, she came out and stood fixedly before him.
Shang Lu understood her meaning.
She was thanking him for his help today, and the only payment she could offer was her body.
Just like countless times before, this was a transaction between them. Once the transaction was complete, they were even again, as always.
Seeing him not move, Zhao Yu took the initiative herself, slowly loosening the bath towel and standing stark naked before him.
Shang Lu's gaze involuntarily fell onto her flat lower abdomen.
He knew very well that a little life had once been nurtured there, but it had been cruelly killed. Killed along with it, probably, was the former Tang Xi.
He bent down, picked up the bath towel, and draped it around her again. Placing his hands gently on her shoulders, he slowly pulled her into his embrace.
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