The Overnight Chosen Wife: darling, kiss me deeper

Lanni had to stay in the hospital for a few days for observation and the whole time, Xiehan was glued to her side. He only moved when he needed to use the restroom and clean up. Li Yuming would bring them both food but when she saw Xiehan’s dark circles on the third day, she couldn’t take it anymore.

"Xiehan, dear, you should go home and have some rest. I will take care of Lanni while you are away." She persuaded him. If he heard her, he did a good job pretending not to. His hand tightly clasped Lanni’s as he held a document on the other hand.

Lanni ran her hand over his. He would assure her that he was alright each time she tried to persuade him to go home. Clearly, he was not.

"Honey, I’ve been craving your specialty." She cooed.

"I’ll cook you anything you want once you get discharged." The topic finally brought a smile on his face and he no longer looked anxious.

"But I want it today." She whined. "Could you cook me some?"

He would never say no to that, she was certain. So she took it up a notch. "But since I’m already full, you can go home, sleep a little first since you are better off in the kitchen while alert anyway, and cook later."

He saw right through her but his expression softened. They must be going crazy worrying for him if she had resorted to using such a strategy to get him to rest.

"How about this? I’ll go to sleep in the hotel across the street. It has high ratings. If you really want pork ribs..."

"The pork ribs can wait." She wasn’t actually in the mood for any. The hotel was a good idea too. She wanted to scold herself for not thinking about it sooner.

He pressed a kiss on her forehead. "Then I’ll see you later."

Li Yuming was relieved when he left. She couldn’t blame him for wanting to morph into his wife’s shadow, with what happened as soon as he left her alone. However, it would be tragic if he drove himself crazy with worry. The hotel must be the farthest he could allow himself to go.

"Xiao Yu is coming over in a minute. Will it be okay if you stayed with her? I need to get some work done." She asked.

Lanni nodded. "You guys really don’t need to worry about me. I’m alright."

Li Yuming kissed her cheek and straightened up to leave, and nearly bumped into Cheng Yu at the door. 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

___

When Xiehan got to his suite, the first thing he did was call the security details in charge of Lanni’s safety. He had been postponing this meeting because he knew that he would kill someone if he couldn’t control himself.

"You only had one task." He glared at them. They were standing on a line before him and he wanted to shoot all of them dead.

"I hired you to protect my wife but what did you do?" He growled.

"Sir, I’m sorry."

The frail attempt at an apology infuriated him all the more. If Lanni and Xiaomu lost their lives, would they still be sorry? Would their frail apology bring back his wife, child and niece?

They were not to blame for the drunk biker’s overspeeding but if they had been there, there was no way no one would have noticed Xiaomu slip away towards the road.

"All of you are fired." He dismissed them before taking a shower and flopping onto bed. The nights of little sleep finally caught up with him and he was asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.

When he woke up, he had received an email from the woman he had contacted the day before, so they met up to discuss and went back to the hospital together.

Lanni was playing with the kids when he arrived and she was excited to see him. "Honey, you are back. Yeah, you definitely look more handsome after a good rest."

The kids giggled at her words before Xiaomu drawled, "Uncle is more handsome than daddy."

"No. Daddy is more handsome than uncle." Linhou argued. The duo went back and forth bickering while Lanni studied the woman behind Xiehan curiously.

He finally introduced them.

"Honey, this is Lu Ziyao. She will be your new bodyguard. Miss Lu, this is my wife."

Lanni wanted to protest. "I don’t need a..." She clamped her mouth shut when he shot a glare her way.

"Miss Lu will be on your heels all round the clock. When you eat, she will be there. When you go to the powder room, she will be there too. Don’t even think about leaving her behind when you go anywhere."

She knew he was referring to how she had told the bodyguards that she didn’t want them to follow her when she went for a walk with Xiaomu. But to her defense, she didn’t think there was any security concern when going for a walk in such a highly guarded neighborhood. Besides, Xiaomu was intimidated by them.

"It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Ji." Lu Ziyao shook her hand and, just as she was instructed, positioned herself at the door where she could keep a good eye on Lanni. She was taking her duty quite seriously.

"Lu Ziyao was in the military for ten years." He explained. "You will be in safe hands when I go back to the company." Besides, she was trained to be loyal. There was no possibility of her getting pulled to the enemy’s side to work against Lanni. How the hell had he never thought of this before?

____

"Why don’t you leave the cooking to the chef?" Lin Jian asked when he entered the kitchen. Ruby had gone out of her way to cook something but it looked like a total disaster just like she did. She had flour all over her and her apron couldn’t stay in place anymore.

"I’m almost done. I’m making something for Lanni now that she can eat more." She wiped her forehead with a handkerchief and dumped it into her apron pockets. Catching sight of the eggs starting to burn, she rushed over to turn off the stove but ended up knocking the knife on the kitchen counter on her way. It fell with a clutter. She hurried to pick it and jumped when she remembered the eggs.

Lin Jian turned off the stove for her and picked the knife she had decided to ignore after all.

"Here, let me help you." He dusted the flour off her and looked around the counter where she had a pot of rice ready, as well as ingredients for another meal. There wasn’t anything that required flour in it.

He held back a laugh. "How about you order something for Lanni? There’s a restaurant I know that she orders from when at work."

It would be a relief since the kitchen was obviously not trying to cooperate with her, but she was doubtful. "Can she really eat restaurant food right now?"

"It’s a well known restaurant and there has never been any complaints about the quality and hygiene." Besides, if there was anything that would wreck Lanni’s stomach, that would be the food that Ruby had just cooked. He would have found it funny under different circumstances but she was trying so hard to do something nice for her sister-in-law. It was lovely. Now that he thought about it, she would prefer to do it herself.

"Or if you want, I can teach you." He offered.

"You can cook?" She was taken aback. Though that should never have been a surprise. Xiehan, Xingyu and Lin Jian were like clones of each other’s skills and Xiehan might as well be a chef.

His smile confirmed it. "When Xiehan learnt to cook, I didn’t want to be outdone so I learned too. It’s a pretty useful skill, I would say."

She followed him like a shadow as he cleaned the kitchen and got the ingredients ready for another attempt.

"For a young master with everything at the palm of his hands, I wouldn’t call that useful." She peeked at him and added, "Right? I mean, your parents do everything for you. If you didn’t want to learn, they wouldn’t make you."

"Yeah, that’s true." He pulled an apron and draped it on. "But, my mother believes that everything can change in a minute. She and father worked hard enough to ensure their grandchildren could live off their wealth for a lifetime, but she would still joke about her son starving if anything were to happen to her, just because he can’t cook to save his life. So she urged me to learn."

They shared a laugh at his mother’s antics.

"I’d say, it’s quite useful to impress girls." He joked.

"Hey!" She playfully jabbed him. "That was in the past. You are not allowed to impress girls now."

He pulled her in for a hug in response. "And you are not allowed to impress guys."

"That’s okay. I don’t need to impress anyone anyway. Except Linhou, for the cute hugs. He’s so adorable." She chuckled. It was almost unbelievable that she was allowed to play with Luna’s kids and even hug them, when just a few years ago, Luna wanted nothing more than to slice her into pieces.

The doorbell rang, prompting them to pull apart.

"I’ll get it." She rushed out of the kitchen and when she got to the door and opened it, her gaze darkened. "What are you doing here?"