The doctor came back to himself.
He called over a young nurse from the ER.
The two of them together helped Gu Mianmian down from Lin Ci’s back and set her straight onto a nearby mobile gurney.
The electronic thermometer gun let out a beep on Gu Mianmian’s forehead.
The nurse glanced at the reading and her face changed slightly.
“39.4 degrees. She has to get a fever shot and an IV right now.”
Lin Ci stood in place gasping.
Rainwater kept dripping off his chin.
The soaked white short T-shirt clung tight to his body and carved out a slim, eye-catching waist-and-abdomen outline.
The nurse turned to look at him and held out a clean towel.
“This classmate, you’re soaked through too. Want to get your blood pressure taken and check into the ER together?”
Lin Ci casually wiped the water off his face and waved a hand to refuse.
“Don’t worry about me. I… cough. My body’s plenty strong. Hang the drip for her first.”
Cold white fluorescent lights were on in the ER observation room.
Gu Mianmian was settled onto the single bed closest to the window.
The nurse walked over with the IV line and needle, ready to find a vein.
Gu Mianmian, half-unconscious, struggled violently on the bed.
She kept her eyes tightly shut, brows knotted together, both hands grabbing wildly in midair on instinct.
Suddenly her hand accurately seized the hem of Lin Ci’s dripping-wet clothes.
She gripped especially hard.
Every finger joint went white.
“Don’t go…”
A faint, trembling murmur spilled from her purplish lips.
“Don’t leave me… don’t throw me here…”
The nurse tried to pry her fingers open.
“Classmate, loosen your hand. Let go of the clothes first. We need to give the shot.”
Gu Mianmian gripped even tighter instead.
Her body curled into a ball.
Large tears seeped from the corners of her eyes.
Lin Ci looked at this terrified, helpless appearance of hers and sighed in his heart.
Just how much suffering had this unlucky kid eaten in the orphanage, that even a high fever made her afraid the whole world would throw her away.
Lin Ci pulled over the round stool beside him and sat down.
He stretched out his palm and gently covered the back of Gu Mianmian’s ice-cold, pale hand.
“Not leaving.”
Lin Ci’s voice was very blunt.
“I’m sitting right here. Not going anywhere.”
Hearing Lin Ci’s voice, Gu Mianmian’s tightly furrowed brows slowly eased.
The fingers clutching the hem gradually relaxed.
Then she groped her way into Lin Ci’s palm and slowly slid her slender fingers between Lin Ci’s.
Ten fingers locked tightly together.
A young nurse pushing the medicine cart beside them saw this scene and could not help turning her head to murmur to her coworker.
“Girls these days really have good feelings for each other. Looks way too shippable.”
The corner of Lin Ci’s mouth twitched hard several times.
He jumped internally.
Shippable my ass. I’m a pure full-on guy. Pure!
But feeling that slowly returning hint of warmth in his palm, Lin Ci ultimately did not pull his hand out.
Forget it. What grace was there to fuss over with a little patient running a 39-degree fever.
The medicine dripped down drop by drop.
By the time three bottles of IV were finished, the wall clock already pointed to 2:00 AM.
The fever medicine took effect.
The cold sweat on Gu Mianmian’s body receded.
Her breathing became steady and long.
The ward was so quiet only the faint hum of instruments remained.
Lin Ci had originally planned to tough it out all night on the hard plastic chair.
But he had run a whole way through a rainstorm, his clothes were still wet, and the chill drilled straight into the seams of his bones.
Waves of sleepiness surged up.
Lin Ci really could not hold on.
He let his head pillow on the edge of the bed and closed his eyes, falling asleep.
The lights in the observation room were dimmed by more than half.
After an unknown stretch of time, Gu Mianmian on the bed slowly opened her eyes.
After the fever broke, those eyes were especially clear.
The deep-black pupils held not the slightest just-woken murk in the dim light.
She turned onto her side.
Her gaze landed on Lin Ci slumped at the bedside.
Lin Ci was sleeping very deeply.
Jet-black long hair spilled across the ward’s white sheet.
A few stray strands covered Lin Ci’s straight nose bridge and coldly beautiful brows and eyes.
Gu Mianmian slowly lifted the left hand that did not have the IV.
Her movements were extremely light.
Fingertips hung in midair as she carefully picked the hair from Lin Ci’s forehead.
The pads of her fingers did not truly press down.
They only traced lightly across a tiny distance.
Lin Ci had not actually fallen completely dead asleep.
As a former STEM guy, he had a strong sense of alertness toward movement around him.
The faint sensation on his face snapped him awake at once.
But he did not open his eyes immediately.
Instinct told him that waking up at this bizarre moment would make the scene awkward enough to launch him into orbit on the spot.
Lin Ci held his breath and decided to keep pretending to sleep.
Then the direction of things went completely wrong.
Gu Mianmian’s slightly cool fingertips slid slowly down along his brow bone and lightly brushed his straight nose.
Finally her fingers stopped above Lin Ci’s soft lips.
The slightly cool pads of her fingers traced very slowly all the way around the edge of Lin Ci’s upper lip.
Gu Mianmian’s warm breath spilled lightly against Lin Ci’s neck.
Lin Ci only felt the hairs on his nape stand up.
His back snapped taut into an iron plate.
This little girl isn’t sleeping in the middle of the night. What is she touching?
Before Lin Ci could finish roasting in his heart, Gu Mianmian leaned slightly forward.
She lowered her head.
The tip of her nose almost touched the crown of Lin Ci’s hair.
She closed her eyes, drew in a deep breath, and greedily took in the clean, sweet milky fragrance coming off Lin Ci’s hair.
That scent made a strange fervor surge in the bottoms of her eyes.
The ward was frighteningly quiet.
Gu Mianmian slowly drew her hand back, lay down on the pillow again, and tugged the quilt up a little.
She looked at Lin Ci’s quiet side profile and murmured a line in a voice so low only she could hear.
“Senior Lin Ci…”
“You’re mine, right?”
Lin Ci kept his eyes shut.
His heart nearly jumped straight out of his throat.
She’s crazy!
What nonsense did this girl just say?!
Who belongs to who?
What dangerous thoughts were female college students rolling around in their heads all day?!
Lin Ci squeezed his eyes shut and did not dare move until even, long breathing came from the opposite side.
Only then did he dare secretly let out a breath.
…
At the same time.
Thousands of kilometers from Jiangcheng University in the north, the storm had just let up.
On the top floor of a high-end office building in the capital, the windows were bright and the rooms clean.
A young woman in a custom gray professional skirt suit, gold-rimmed glasses on her nose, walked quickly into the CEO’s office.
She held a kraft-paper file envelope in her hand.
“Director Gu, we found her.”
The woman walked to the rosewood desk and respectfully held the envelope out.
Sitting behind the desk was the Gu family’s current executive director, Gu Tiancheng.
Gu Tiancheng clipped a cigar unhurriedly and asked without lifting his head.
“Confirmed she’s in Jiangcheng?”
“Confirmed.”
The woman pushed up her glasses and reported in a calm tone.
“Our people used a school-enterprise cooperation shell to pull student records from Jiangcheng University.”
“On the list of people who were adopted from the orphanage and then transferred schools because of family upheaval, only one person fully matches the age and biological features.”
The movement in Gu Tiancheng’s hand paused.
He lifted his head.
The woman opened the file and pointed at a one-inch bareheaded black-and-white photo on it.
The girl in the photo had heavy bangs, a gloomy look in her eyes, and was skinny to the bone.
In the name column, three characters were written clearly: Gu Mianmian.
“Gu Mianmian…”
Gu Tiancheng blew out a mouthful of blue-gray smoke.
His eyes turned cold.
“The old master’s side is making a lot of noise. Private detectives are already checking the southern provinces.”
The woman asked in a low voice.
“Director Gu, should we take the person ahead of time…”
Gu Tiancheng lifted a hand and cut her off.
The corner of his mouth hooked into a playful smile.
“No rush.”
“A wild girl raised in a garbage heap. Even if she gets found and brought back to the Gu family, how big a wave can she kick up?”
“Watch her first. See who she usually comes into contact with.”
“Yes.”
The woman closed the folder and quickly withdrew from the room.
…
Early the next morning, the heavy rain stopped.
The sky over Jiangcheng University had been washed exceptionally clear.
Golden morning light spilled across campus.
Lin Ci brought the fever-broken Gu Mianmian back to the dorm building.
After tossing all night, both of them were a wreck.
Once inside Room 302, Lin Ci shut the door behind him and grabbed a set of clean change of clothes straight from the wardrobe.
“Go wipe down first. Use hot water. Don’t shower yet. Don’t catch another chill in a bit.”
Lin Ci tossed her a towel.
Gu Mianmian nodded obediently, hugged the clothes, and walked into the bathroom.
Water started up with a whoosh.
Lin Ci collapsed into the chair, rubbing his sore neck.
Remembering last night’s scene of Gu Mianmian touching his lips, his scalp still went numb.
This girl usually looked introverted and insecure.
How did she get this bold in private?
Right in the middle of that wild thinking, the water in the bathroom stopped.
The white frosted-glass door was pushed open, bringing out a big cloud of warm, damp steam.
“Senior, I’m done wiping down.”
Lin Ci turned his head to look on instinct.
That one look froze his whole person in place.
Gu Mianmian’s dripping-wet black long hair lay casually over her shoulders.
Her pale cheeks had been steamed into a healthy pink by the hot water.
The deadly part was, what she was wearing was not her own shabby pajamas at all.
It was an oversized pure-white loose short T that belonged to Lin Ci.
The wide collar had slipped slightly to one side.
A large stretch of pale, fragrant shoulder and a slender collarbone were exposed to the air.
The hem of the shirt just covered the tops of her thighs.
Two long, straight, clean white legs showed outside.
The ankles were thin enough to hold in one hand.
Water droplets slid from the wet ends of her hair onto her collarbone and ran all the way down the pale skin into the depths of the loose collar.
Lin Ci’s brain buzzed.
Twenty-two years of straight-guy blood qi surged upward hard.
He jerked up from the chair, finger trembling as he pointed at Gu Mianmian.
“Gu Mianmian! You… why are you wearing my clothes?!”