Upon hearing this, Tan Mo felt an inexplicable pang in her heart: “Mm…”
She wanted to say something else, but saw Xie Qichen close his eyes, cutting off any possibility of communication.
Her words caught at the edge of her lips and she swallowed them back, too afraid to speak again.
Besides, after such a night, she no longer had the heart to say anything.
Outside, it had just rained, and now the icy wind from the slightly open car window blew in, brushing against her face.
Some harsh words from tonight resurfaced in her mind, piercing her heart like countless tiny needles, as if a healed wound had been torn open again, a pain she had long since become accustomed to.
Tan Mo turned her head to the other side, tiredly blinking her eyes.
The two remained silent all the way.
Eventually, the Rolls-Royce returned to Jiayu Tiancheng.
Back at the villa, Tan Mo went to her bedroom to take a shower, hesitating over whether she should still go to Xie Qichen’s room tonight.
She walked out of her room, intending to get a glass of water, and passed the living room where she saw Yang Xialan chatting with Xie Qichen.
Yang Xialan spotted her and smiled: “How was your grandmother’s birthday banquet today? Did she like the gifts?”
“Thank you, Mom. Grandma liked them very much.”
“Good. It’s getting late. You and Mo Mo should go to bed. I’m going to rest too.”
Yang Xialan stood up and went to her room. In the living room, Tan Mo lifted her head and met Xie Qichen’s unfathomable gaze.
He looked away and, saying something, went back to the master bedroom, leaving the door slightly ajar.
Seeing this, Tan Mo had no choice but to follow him inside.
Xie Qichen went to the bathroom while Tan Mo sat on the edge of the bed. After a while, the man came out. She wanted to talk to him, but he immediately grabbed his phone from the sofa, not looking at her, his tone indifferent:
“You go to sleep first. I have work to do in my study.”
She felt a pang of disappointment, her gaze slightly stunned: “…Okay.”
The door closed.
The room, lit by only one lamp, felt empty.
Eventually, Tan Mo turned off the light and lay down, staring at the dim ceiling, her eyes gradually darkening.
—
The whole night, Tan Mo felt as though something was pressing on her heart, making her sleep restless, waking her up repeatedly.
She only vaguely remembered that each time she awoke, she looked toward the sofa but saw no sign of Xie Qichen.
From the deep darkness of night,
to the sky gradually turning pale at dawn.
Tan Mo finally fell asleep and woke up again at around eight in the morning.
She sat up, using the light coming through the window, and saw the neatly folded blanket on the sofa, exactly the same as last night—clearly, no one had slept there.
So Xie Qichen hadn’t returned to the bedroom at all last night…
Tan Mo got out of bed, left the room, and went downstairs to ask the housemaid.
“I saw Mr. Xie come out of the study this morning. He left for the group headquarters early after breakfast,” the maid replied.
Tan Mo was momentarily stunned.
“Oh, and Mr. Xie said he won’t be home for dinner tonight, so we don’t need to prepare a meal for him.”
Tan Mo nodded, unable to say anything.
There was no need to think further—clearly, he was deliberately distancing himself from her.
All day long, Tan Mo felt as if a layer of gray had shrouded her heart—heavy and inexplicably suffocating.
She locked herself in the kitchen, focusing on cooking dishes and shooting videos, trying to distract herself with other things.
At dinner time, Xie Qichen indeed didn’t return. It was already past nine when Tan Mo was watching TV with Yang Xialan in the living room. Suddenly, there was a noise downstairs. Moments later, the tall, cold figure of the man indeed came up the stairs.
Seeing Xie Qichen, Yang Xialan smiled: “Why are you working so late today? You must be tired. Come over and have some fruit.”
“Just finished a meeting.”
Tan Mo turned her head and met Xie Qichen’s cold gaze in midair.
Her eyes rippled slightly, and she quickly looked away.
Xie Qichen came over and sat with Yang Xialan for a while.
Tan Mo exchanged a few casual words with him, seemingly no different from before, but both knew they were pretending not to let Yang Xialan notice anything.
Eventually, Yang Xialan went to her room, and Tan Mo still followed Xie Qichen into his bedroom.
The man walked to the sofa, his back to her as he took off his suit jacket. Tan Mo stood at the door, watching him. After a moment’s hesitation, she said, “I’ll go back to my room tonight. I’ll get up early tomorrow morning, so Mom won’t notice.”
Xie Qichen smirked, his tone as cold as ice:
“No need. You won’t see me tonight. I’m going to the study.”
Tan Mo was at a loss for words.
She only wanted him to be able to rest well in his own bedroom and thought that their current situation was too awkward…
She couldn’t find the words to speak. In her lowered gaze, she saw the man walk past her and out of the bedroom.
Tan Mo felt an emptiness in her heart, a dull ache spreading slowly.
…
Thus, their relationship, like the winter temperature in Licheng, suddenly plummeted to freezing point.
Earlier that day, while shopping, everything between them had still been fine. At the birthday banquet, they hadn’t even had an argument. Yet everything had suddenly changed.
Tan Mo couldn’t figure out why Xie Qichen was in a bad mood. She wanted to talk to him, but every time she faced him, she didn’t know how to begin.
From childhood, she had always been used to keeping her thoughts to herself.
Even when she suffered injustices in the Tan family, she never dared to tell anyone, only silently absorbing everything alone.
Deep inside her heart, only she could give herself a sense of security.
She didn’t know how to handle intimate relationships, nor did she know how to face a contractual marriage.
Her relationship with Xie Qichen was special and delicate. She couldn’t act like a normal wife, going to him to act affectionately and seek reconciliation. She was also afraid that if she approached him, she would once again receive his cold attitude. So she preferred to wrap herself up and avoid facing it.
Time passed quickly. Two days later, the last weekend before the New Year had passed.
In a few days, it would be New Year’s Eve.
On Monday morning, Yang Xialan went out shopping with her friends. In the afternoon, Tan Mo, with nothing to do at home, went to the third floor media room to pick a movie to watch.
As she leisurely watched the movie, her phone rang—it was Ji Shu calling.
Tan Mo lazily answered the call. Before she could speak, a trembling female voice came from the other end: “Mo Mo…”
Tan Mo immediately sensed something was wrong and sat up from the sofa: “What’s wrong? What happened?”
“Mo Mo, my grandpa is missing…”
“Missing?!”
“In the afternoon, I lost sight of him for a moment and he walked out of the house. I just went to look for him but couldn’t find him. I don’t know where he went. You know my grandpa has Alzheimer’s and doesn’t recognize the way. The mountains are dangerous everywhere. What if something happens to him…”
Ji Shu, usually calm, was panicking, her voice trembling with uncontrollable sobs: “Mo Mo, I’m so scared…”
Tan Mo stood up and left the media room, going downstairs to grab her bag while calmly comforting her: “Don’t think too much. Grandpa will be fine. Have you told your parents?”
“I did. Dad is stuck at work, and Mom is on her way now.”
Hearing her crying, Tan Mo continued to soothe her: “Don’t cry. If you don’t calm down, how can you find Grandpa faster? Listen to me—ask more people to help you look. First, check the places Grandpa usually likes to go, especially the bus stops in the mountains to see if anyone noticed an elderly person getting on the bus. Confirm whether he took the bus down the mountain.”
“Okay, I’ll go right away.”
Tan Mo reached the first floor: “I’m coming over to be with you. Don’t be afraid. Grandpa will be fine.”
Tan Mo’s calm voice immediately soothed Ji Shu’s panic.
“Okay, but will it be too much trouble for you to come…”
“No, it’ll only take me about two hours. You start looking first. We’ll stay in touch on the way.”
Ji Shu agreed.
After hanging up, Tan Mo called the family driver and hurriedly told the housemaid, then quickly got into the car and headed for neighboring Lin City.
On the way, Ji Shu called Tan Mo again, saying that the bus drivers hadn’t noticed Grandpa getting on the bus today. Since the elderly man usually didn’t carry cash or a phone, if he hadn’t paid the fare when boarding, the driver would definitely have noticed.
No one at the bus stop had seen him arrive, so it was likely that Grandpa was still in the mountains. However, Kewu Mountain was vast, making the search no easy task.
Tan Mo asked Ji Shu to draft a missing person notice and first inquire among tourists and local residents in the mountain area. She also helped share the notice online to expand the search scope.
After hanging up, Tan Mo suddenly thought that Tan Yuanzhou had attended high school in Lin City and probably had some connections there.
She quickly called him: “Uncle, can you help me with something?”
On the other end, Tan Yuanzhou put down his work and immediately agreed after learning about the situation: “I have some friends in Lin City. I’ll contact them and ask them to send some people to help search the mountain. The more people, the better. Send me Ji Shu’s phone number.”
“Okay, thank you, Uncle.”
“You’re still thanking me?”
Then Tan Mo sent Ji Shu’s number to Tan Yuanzhou. A while later, the man sent a message saying he had already arranged for help to be sent.
After hanging up, Tan Mo looked out the window at the speeding highway, her heart filled with anxiety.
The private car sped down the highway.
When she arrived in Lin City, it was already dark.
At night, not to mention the dangerous terrain of the mountain, the outdoor temperature was approaching freezing, which would be extremely hard on the elderly man’s body. For them, the search would become even more difficult.
The car climbed Kewu Mountain and finally entered the town, arriving at Ji Shu’s doorstep.
Getting out of the car, Ji Shu and her family came out to meet Tan Mo. Seeing her best friend, Tan Mo asked: “Have you found him yet?”
Ji Shu gripped Tan Mo’s hand, shaking her head and sobbing: “No, we searched for another hour and already reported it to the police.”
At home, only Grandpa and Grandma usually lived together. Grandma had leg problems and was now also anxiously worried, “This old man is going to make us all die of anxiety…”
Tan Mo comforted Grandma and asked: “How many people are helping with the search now?”
Ji Shu’s mother replied from the side: “There are more than twenty people, including those from the town and those sent by your uncle. But the mountain is just too big. I’m worried that the old man might have wandered into the woods instead of staying on the road.”
In that case, they would need to conduct a grid search.
Tan Mo comforted them: “I think Grandpa probably didn’t wander aimlessly. He might have a destination in his mind. Auntie, don’t worry. We’ll continue searching separately. We’ll definitely find him.”
“Okay.”
So they comforted Grandma, letting her wait at home for news, and Tan Mo asked the driver to stay at the doorstep in case of emergencies.
She and Ji Shu and the others began their search.
Meanwhile—
Back in Licheng.
The silver-blue sky held a bright moon.
The Rolls-Royce slowly stopped in front of the villa.
The rear door opened, and a pair of leather shoes stepped out. The man pulled his coat tighter and walked into the house.
Today, Xie Qichen had deliberately slowed down his work at the group company, thinking that Yang Xialan had been out all day and the house was left only with a young girl, so he wanted to come home early.
After all, he couldn’t keep ignoring her any longer.
He remembered that the girl had been repeatedly asking for hotpot recently, so he planned to take her out for dinner.
Walking into the house, Yang Xialan was indeed still out. Xie Qichen went upstairs but didn’t see Tan Mo, slightly surprised. He called the housemaid:
“Isn’t Tan Mo home?”
The maid nodded: “This afternoon, she received a phone call and told us not to prepare dinner for her tonight. She left in a hurry.”
The man frowned: “In a hurry? Where did she go?”
“I only heard her call the driver and say she was going to Lin City to help with something…”
Xie Qichen immediately took out his phone to call Tan Mo.
Beep… Beep… Beep…
But it went unanswered.
The man’s expression darkened as he called the driver. A few seconds later, the other end answered. He asked in a low voice:
“Where is the madam?”
The driver explained: “…Right now, the madam is in the mountains with her friend, searching for someone. I wanted to follow her, but she asked me to stay at the doorstep.”
It was already dark and cold in the mountains. How dangerous it was for a girl who didn’t know the area well to be there alone.
And what kind of big matter had happened that she didn’t even inform him…
Xie Qichen’s face darkened. He hung up the phone, went downstairs, and told Wen Cheng something.
Finally, he returned to the car:
“Go to Lin City, Kewu Mountain.”
—
In the mountains, the night was bitterly cold, with howling winds.
Two full hours had passed.
The group still hadn’t received any good news.
On the phone, Tan Mo was soothing the increasingly anxious Ji Shu while continuing the search with others.
At a fork in the mountain trail, the four-person team Tan Mo was leading decided to split up: “No matter if we find anything or not, let’s meet back at the fork in ten minutes.”
“Okay.”
Tan Mo, flashlight in hand, walked alone into one of the paths.
In the forest, it was pitch black, so dark that you couldn’t even see your fingers. There were only thorns and rocks everywhere.
The wind howled, and Tan Mo, who had only worn a coat when she came, now felt the cold seeping into her collar and bones, making her shiver.
She tried to tighten her coat, shouting Grandpa’s name and searching for his figure.
Fatigue and cold gradually clouded her mind.
Tan Mo gritted her teeth, determined to find the person, struggling to keep going.
The mountain path was dark and winding. She raised her hand to push aside the obstructing grass and plants, her hands scratched by the thorns, stinging with pain.
Still, she couldn’t see the elderly man. Considering her own safety, she dared not go deeper and decided to return the way she came.
As she walked, she gradually lost her sense of direction.
She tried to figure out the direction, but didn’t notice her footing and was tripped by some weeds, falling to the ground.
She sucked in a breath from the pain, panicked for a moment, but calmly stood up. She analyzed her sense of direction and finally chose a direction to walk forward.
Gradually, the path ahead became clearer.
She let out a breath of relief when her phone in her pocket vibrated.
Picking it up, she saw it was a call from Ji Shu.
She answered, and a joyful voice came from the other end: “Mo Mo, we found Grandpa! We found him!”
“Found him? Is Grandpa okay?”
“He’s fine, just some minor injuries. I heard he was found near the dam. Mo Mo, come back quickly!”
A heavy stone lifted from Tan Mo’s heart, and she smiled with relief: “Okay, it’s good he’s found. I’ll come back soon…”
After hanging up, Tan Mo quickly walked out of the path when she suddenly noticed a car approaching and stopping in front of her.
The car lights were blinding.
In the hazy vision, the rear door of the car opened, and the man inside stepped out. Seeing her, he quickly walked toward her.
With the help of the lights, a few seconds later, Tan Mo finally saw the man’s face clearly:
“Xie Qichen?”
He approached, and Tan Mo, not expecting to see him, was momentarily blank: “How did you…”
Before she could finish her sentence, the man’s sharp question came down like a hammer:
“You ran off to Lin City alone to look for someone and didn’t even tell me about it? You didn’t answer my calls. Do you think you’re so capable, Tan Mo?!”
Stunned by the sudden questioning, Tan Mo hadn’t expected him to be so worried. Looking at him, the fear she had suppressed all night, the anxiety of almost getting lost, and the sadness from their cold war in the past few days suddenly surged up, making her nose tingle:
“I’m sorry…”
As she spoke, her body was suddenly pulled forward.
Xie Qichen raised his hand and pulled her tightly into his arms.
The man’s dark eyes burned with emotion. He gripped the back of her head, his voice hoarse as he spoke:
“Tan Mo… Do you know how worried I was about you.”
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