The Overnight Chosen Wife: darling, kiss me deeper

Downstairs.

Lanni was about to retire to hers and Xiehan’s room as well when Lin Jian stopped her.

"Lanni, can we talk? I need you to do me a favor." He flew to her side anxiously.

"What is it?" She was sleepy so she wanted to get this done fast.

Seeing that Xiehan was shooting him a mean look for bothering his wife, he cut the chase and went to the main point. "It’s an emergency. In fact, a life and death kind of emergency... There’s this shocking piece of news that was discovered about a celebrity. However, I don’t like how the articles were written. I have already received almost a hundred of them but none of the proposed headlines is attention-grabbing enough and the articles... Urgh... instead of keeping the reader gl;ued, they will make the news lose the desired effect."

He looked like he was about to die from the nonsense that his subordinates had written, making Lanni’s lips twitched. "Are you the CEO or the chief editor?"

"While I am the CEO, I gave the Chief Editor some time off to deal with a family emergency. Besides, I like getting it done myself sometimes."

Lanni found him strange. "Then why don’t you get it done yourself?"

He immediately looked miserable. "If I could do it myself, I would not be seeking you. Please help me, friend-in-law! You are the prettiest and kindest friend-in-law one could ever ask for. Can you really bear to see a handsome man so sad?"

Lanni was speechless. What the heck was friend-in-law? Also, his words...

Xiehan glared daggers at his friend and took Lanni’s hand.

Lin Jian was about to ask what he had done wrong when he realized that Lanni and Ruby looked uncomfortable as well. He finally understood it. The tone he had used to speak to Lanni...

Damn it... That was the tone he had always used to get anything from women. It was incredibly charming, but it made it sound as though he was trying to Lure Lanni.

He coughed at his own mistake. "Anyway, the point is, I really really need your help. If you don’t help me, I will bug you every time I see you."

Lanni was amused. Xiehan was about to rebuke his friend but Lanni stopped him. She then smiled sweetly. "Okay. Just tell me what the piece of news is. I will come up with an amazing title and write the article tonight."

Lin Jian was overjoyed. "Awesome! I will send it to your email right now."

"May I go now?" She raised an eyebrow at him.

"Yes yes." He nodded then hugged Ruby on the couch. He was so elated that he couldn’t conceal it. Ruby wondered what was so exciting about having an article written for him, but she did not ask. It wasn’t her business anyway.

"Do you want to do something fun together?" Lin Jian inched closer to the beauty, realizing that he had almost neglected her.

"Like... Like what?" She blushed from his proximity.

"You decide. We could watch another movie, go to the top floor to gaze at the stars, play some games... Or Anything else you want to do. Wait. If you are not sleepy, that is."

"It’s okay." She had just slept not too long ago and although it was just a short nap, she no longer felt sleepy. "We can go to the top floor. I just happen to need some fresh air."

"Okay." He grabbed her hand excitedly and, thinking that she might be cold later, he grabbed a shawl before leading her upstairs.

...

The breeze was a little cool, giving off the soft scent of nature. It was indeed calming.

"I knew this would be the best choice." She opened her arms and spun on the spot, taking in the cool breeze like an excited child. She grabbed his hand and pulled him to the concrete balcony. "look! There’s Orion!" She pointed to a part of the sky.

He followed her gaze and burst into laughter. "You cannot see Orion in summer."

"Oh." She chuckled awkwardly then decided to admit it. "I’ve never gazed at the stars."

"Why not?" He tilted his head to ask curiously. Weren’t most girls interested in stars? For some reason that he didn’t understand even after dating so many girls, he still couldn’t fathom this little interest of theirs.

Ruby sighed with a shrug. "I just... Couldn’t."

Seeing how sad her expression had turned, he didn’t interrupt and waited for her to gather herself.

At last, she laughed dryly. "It just never interested me."

Although that was what she said, he knew she was lying. Besides, based on Neil Chan’s overprotective and paranoid character, he could guess the reason. He took her small hand in his gently. "You can watch with me if you like."

He then went ahead and started pointing at the stars and naming the constellations for her. The topic slowly shifted into planets and space, and she asked all the questions she had always been curious about, all of which he answered with detailed explanations.

"How do you know so much about astronomy?" She finally couldn’t help asking.

His lips eased into a charming smile. "It was one of my momentary interests. So I studied it on impulse."

"Why did you stop?" She looked aside when she realized that she had almost been charmed silly by that smile. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

"It was, after all, an impulsive choice. I left the school of astronomy when the curiosity faded."

They were talking about his interest in astronomy. Why did his words make her so uncomfortable?

"Did I say something wrong?" He panicked when he saw her droop her head in disappointment.

"No, I... I’m just tired." She lied.

He held her chin and looked into her sad eyes. "Ruby, you know you can tell me anything."

She frowned and thought about it then simply blurted her question. "Your interest in everything is momentary... You have never liked anything for more than a few days. Does... Does this..."

"You are wondering whether my interest in you is a fleeting impulse as well?" He finished the question on her mind.

"Yes." She nodded, then immediately regretted asking. What if he said yes? What if her question triggered him to dislike her?

She had wanted to push him away on the basis that he might just ditch her later, but she couldn’t. Even though she already knew the kind of pit she was digging for herself by getting closer to him, she just kept sinking deeper and deeper.

Lin Jian gazed at her lovingly, a warm smile on his lips. In the next moment, he suddenly became serious. "Ruby, I don’t know if I told you this before but I really like you. It is neither an impulse nor a momentary interest. To be honest, I never really liked any of my exes. I was just playing around but with you..."

"How many girls have you said that to?" She interrupted coldly.

"Wait, what?" when he heard her words, he finally realized the crisis he was facing.

"Your reputation of being a playboy will one day make you untrustworthy. No one will believe you even if you tell the truth." He repeated Xiehan’s and Xingyu’s words in his head. Those two had been right. He indeed didn’t ever like any of the girls he dated before and merely liked the attention he got from them. When he told her this, she said nothing and merely gave him a disdainful look. He was telling the truth but he didn’t believe her...

"How many girls have you dated in total?" She asked the question he was most scared of.

"Uhm... I don’t know. I lost count years ago."

Ruby almost rolled her eyes. According to the rumors, he had his first girlfriend when he was nineteen or twenty years old. If he had been switching girlfriends once or twice every week for all these years, it was hard to imagine how many they were. "How many thousands?" She exaggerated, looking at him seriously.

"Thousands! No way... Even though I lost count, I know that they cannot be that many. They could probably exceed four hundred by just a few." He quickly defended himself.

"Four. Hundred?!" Her mouth gaped in disbelief.

"No, no! Three. Three hundred." He shook his head and waved his hands quickly.

"Three hundred?" Not only was Ruby not relieved, she was even angrier. "You... You dated all those women?! You..."

She paused and asked, "And you slept with all of them?"

Seeing her gaze turn increasingly angry, he had the impulse to lie and say that he had never slept with any of them, or just a tiny percentage of them. However, he knew that lying would only extinguish the tiny trust she had in him. So he shamefully admitted, "Yes. But Ruby..."

She flung his hand away. "Don’t touch me!"

She must be disgusted by him...he couldn’t blame her. But he couldn’t give up either. He grabbed her hand just as she made the third step to get away from him. "Ruby, I’m sorry for being such a jerk in the past. But I’ve stopped playing around, I promise. I will only be with you from now on."