Chapter 138: Getting suspicious
Just as they were worried that things were going to escalate even further, a sleek, black car suddenly drove over. It was a rare sight in their dusty and simple village. Both Han Ruochen and Han Yong paused as they looked at the black car driving toward them. Soon, it was blocking their path.
Han Ruochen frowned when she saw the car blocking her. She was about to question the driver when the back window rolled down, and a familiar face flashed in front of them.
It was Zhai Heng. He had changed his clothes and was now wearing a flashy jacket with a black t-shirt and loose jeans. He was smiling at Han Ruochen as if he had come to rescue her from a big disaster, and maybe he had in a way.
"Get in," said Zhai Heng in a commanding tone that sounded very much like that of the Zhai family.
"Zhai Heng? What are you doing here?" Han Ruochen asked. She was simply stunned, as she had watched Zhai Heng leave with his driver earlier. Why did he return to look for her?
"We are in a hurry to prepare for the banquet, and I was worried that you would end up selling this thing to someone else." His eyes flickered to the two women who were rushing over, and then he said to Han Ruochen, "So, I told the kitchen that I will oversee the delivery of the sea dragon. My driver will take us to the county, and there will be no stops."
Han Yong did not need to be told twice. He took the aerated box from Han Ruochen and then shoved it in the trunk while Han Ruochen also slid inside the car. She sat down on the plush, velvety backseat and did not know what to feel at that very moment. This was the first time she had touched the luxury of this kind. Never before had she even touched a car, much less one that had air conditioning.
She turned and looked out of the window just as the car started pulling out of the village. Her gaze fell on Han Ziyan, who was standing in the middle of the road with a look of sheer fury and jealousy on her face. Han Ruochen did not even have to use her toes to know what Han Ziyan was thinking. In Han Ziyan’s eyes, only she was worthy of sitting in a car such as this one.
The fact that Han Ruochen—the peasant, was able to sit in such a fancy car—it must be tormenting Han Ziyan quite a lot.
Zhai Heng leaned closer to Han Ruochen, his shoulder brushing against hers, and he looked at her bruised knuckles and the sweat stains on her shirt.
"I hear your mother shouting at you," he said softly while eyeing the woman who was jumping up and down in the village. "It seems like she has to say a lot of nonsense."
Han Ruochen was glad that Zhai Heng was not listening to or believing the nonsense that her mother was spouting at the top of her lungs. "She has always been like that; I do not understand why she likes her adopted daughter more than her own children."
After she finished speaking, she couldn’t help but sigh.
She felt tired. It was one thing that she had already given up on her mother, but it seemed like her mother wasn’t even close to letting go of her. She wondered when her mother would let go of her or if she would even let go of her. In her past life, Meng Yunhan didn’t let go of her until her death. Would she be willing to do that now?
Zhai Heng listened to her response and frowned hard. "Are you sure that she is just an adopted daughter? Usually, such things happen when the child is illegitimate."
"Young master...." The driver couldn’t stay quiet any longer when he heard the good words of his young master. No matter what, this was someone else’s personal matter. What was his young master doing by saying such outrageous things?
He turned to look at Han Yong and said to him apologetically, "I am sorry about this; my young master is used to seeing such things. He does not mean any harm by those words."
Han Yong smiled in response, but he had clearly fallen into a kind of pondering, while Han Ruochen looked simply shocked. Not because of Zhai Heng’s words but because of how easily the man had made her eldest brother question Han Ziyan’s identity. Maybe it was because Zhai Heng was an outsider that made Han Yong doubt, because if Han Ruochen had said it, Han Yong wouldn’t have believed it so easily.
Zhai Heng, on the other hand, did not think that there was anything wrong with what he said. He rolled his eyes and turned to look at Han Ruochen before saying very seriously, "You might think that I am saying nonsense, but if I were you, I would have tested it out. I don’t see any other justification other than this."
Zhai Heng, who had seen all kinds of complicated situations, was thus much more clear-minded when it came to situations like these.
Of course, Han Ruochen knew the truth as well but she could not just simply agree with Zhai Heng in front of her brother. Instead, she adopted the same oily and green-tea attitude of Han Ziyan and said in a low, soft voice, "There is no way it is possible. How can my mother betray my father? Even if she doesn’t like him and often berates him—she must like him somewhere or else they wouldn’t have been married for so long as for Ziyan," she stopped and frowned before saying, "There must be some other reason. I mean, there is no way... mom will ever betray our family in such a manner."
Though she spoke up for her mother, there was a note of suspicion in her tone, as if she too was thinking about what Zhai Heng had told her, and that only made Han Yong even more suspicious.
