Shi Su first checked the courier box, shaking it gently. There was only a muffled sound inside, not like there was any strange heavy object.
She returned to her room to get a pair of scissors, and as she sliced open the box and saw what was inside, her expression instantly tensed up.
"Mommy, what is it?" Mianmian ran out again, seeing Shi Su squatting next to the cardboard box with a serious look in her eyes, imdiately curious to look.
"Shi Mianmian, get inside!" Shi Su suddenly lifted her eyes, her voice exceptionally stern.
"...Oh." Mianmian blinked innocently at the outburst, quickly retreating back through the door, then leaned on the door fra watching Shi Su squatting outside for a long ti without moving: "Mommy..."
Shi Su slowly closed the box in her hand, her fingers slightly cold, silently lowering her head slowly, her hands gradually balling into fists.
Sensing her mom’s increasingly grave expression, Mianmian hurried back inside and stopped looking around outside.
Shi Su’s legs were a bit numb from squatting, and as she slowly stood up, her phone suddenly rang. Her expression was sowhat blank as she answered the call, not even looking at the caller ID, putting it right to her ear: "Hello."
"A hairpin of yours fell in my car, probably dropped when you ca back from the Jing Family last ti. Do you still want it?" Jing Jihan’s voice ca through the phone, calm and unhurried.
The man’s calm voice seed to soothe imdiately, and Shi Su’s cold hands and body finally seed to regain so sense at that mont, as if she finally realized what had just happened, her expression sowhat stiff as she looked at the cardboard box at her feet.
Clearly, her hairpin was rely used to occasionally fix stray hair when washing her face, sothing worth just a few bucks, not worth him personally driving to bring it to her.
Yet, as she was about to speak, looking at the box at her feet, she said numbly: "I want it."
"I’ll bring it to you next ti I’m there."
Shi Su’s hand tightened at her side, taking a breath, her voice sowhat hoarse and deep: "Can I have it now?"
There was a mont of silence on Jing Jihan’s end.
"Shi Su?"
Shi Su slowly squatted down, reopening the box and looking at the contents, then hugging her knees, her breathing filled with undisguised exhaustion and grievance, not knowing what to say, just holding the phone without uttering another word.
Jing Jihan’s voice ca softly and deeply through the phone, seemingly to calm her emotions, yet also carrying an unmistakable command and assertiveness: "Send your location."
...
-
Twenty minutes later, a black Bentley pulled over near Shi Su’s old neighborhood.
A tall and upright man got out of the car, his black trench coat absorbing the chill of late autumn, the freshly lit streetlights stretching his shadow unusually long.
When he found Shi Su, she was in a small grove near the neighborhood, squatting and digging sothing.
Jing Jihan approached, then saw the box beside her. The box, having been open for a while, released a stronger and stronger foul sll.
"What happened?" He stood by her side, looking down at Shi Su who was focused on digging a pit.
The night wind was chilly, Shi Su didn’t look up at him, still concentrating on digging the pit, sniffing and mumbling, "Nothing much, just soone afraid I’d lead too idle a life after wrapping up filming, sent a horror package."
Hearing this, Jing Jihan glanced at her again, his long arm reaching over to open the box, revealing a brutally dead white kitten lying inside, caked with blood.
He paused, turning his eyes to Shi Su.
...
Shi Su carefully finished digging a pit, took the poor kitten from the box, laid it into the pit, covering it with soil while murmuring, "Poor little thing, in your next life don’t be a stray cat again, and don’t be deceived by a few pieces of cat food and end up abused and killed like this, dying so unjustly."
After cautiously burying the kitten, Shi Su stood by the small mound of dirt, silent for a long while.
Seeing she hadn’t stood up for quite a while, it was easy to get dizzy from squatting for so long.
Jing Jihan extended his hand: "Get up."
Only then did Shi Su lift her eyes, looking at the man in the black trench coat standing in the night wind, then to his hand that seed to offer great safety. She hesitated for a mont before lifting her dirty little hand to show him, her voice nasal from the cold, "My hands are dirty."
Her hand wasn’t just dirty with soil, but also sared with so foul-slling, dirty blood from picking up the kitten earlier.
Jing Jihan said nothing, suddenly grabbing the hand she was about to lower, and pulling her up while his brow furrowed, looking at her pale face in the dark: "Your hands are so cold?"
"Probably because it’s too cold in this little grove." Shi Su sniffed again.
She didn’t think she was scared. She had rescued many injured small animals, with a few dying at ho despite her efforts.
While she was indeed shocked to the point of going cold for a mont upon seeing the gruesoly dead cat earlier, it shouldn’t count as being frightened. Yet now she didn’t know what was happening to her, feeling like even her spirit was drifting, unable to find a place to settle.
She didn’t even know why she had asked Jing Jihan to co here. Clearly, she could have buried it herself, dealt with everything herself, and walked away as though nothing had happened.
Before Jing Jihan took her away from the grove, he picked up the cardboard box and found a blood-stained note inside, with extrely unpleasant, curse-filled words written on it.
Without saying a word, he tossed the box into a garbage bin outside the grove. Shi Su glanced at the motion of him discarding the box, calmly saying: "I saw the note inside."
Then, after a pause, she said: "No matter who sent it, such things are probably quite common in the entertainnt industry. You were right, I really shouldn’t return to that place; it’s indeed too unsafe."
"You didn’t bring Mianmian back?" Jing Jihan changed the subject.
"Mianmian is at ho. I just told her to wait for at ho. Today I only wanted to co back to pack other belongings, the courier box was just a small interlude."
Jing Jihan never let go of her cold hand. After bringing her back to the fifth-floor ho, they were imdiately t with Shi Mianmian’s surprisingly large hug, without a word spoken, he let her pack her things, helping to carry the remaining luggage, directly taking the mother and daughter downstairs to leave.
Reaching his car, Shi Su suddenly wanted to explain herself: "I’m really not scared, you don’t need to take care of so attentively."
Jing Jihan seed not to hear, placed her luggage in the trunk, first letting Mianmian into the car, then unhurriedly looked at her.
"Not going back to Kaixing Mansion?"
"...Of course, I am."
Right now, that’s where she feels safest!
After a mont of pause, just a mont ago adamant about winning back so face, now Shi Su didn’t utter a word, quickly got into the car, obediently fastening her seatbelt cooperatively.
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