Chapter 068: The Cheating Old Scumbag and His Mistress

Chapter 068: The Cheating Old Scumbag and His Mistress

Germs?

“We’re a couple. Is that a problem?” Li Ruobing shot back. Then she turned to look out at the crowded plaza and muttered, “It’s not as if we haven’t kissed…”

“Oh, right.” As if something had just occurred to her, she sat up straight, planted her elbows on the table, and leaned in, dropping her voice. “I sent people to your home county yesterday.”

“Hm?” Wu Chen paused.

“Ding Ruilong will find out about you sooner or later. Your family could end up a target, so I’ve had people sent to protect them—quietly, without disrupting their lives. Ding Ruilong doesn’t have much reach in Donghai. If he sends anyone here, I’ll know before they arrive. Atai will tell me. There won’t be a problem.”

Wu Chen was a little taken aback. He hadn’t expected her to simply go ahead and arrange it herself.

He’d thought about protecting his family before—no real hurry, since Ding Ruilong wasn’t likely to move that fast. He’d still been weighing which connection to use for it once he had a few more to choose from.

Not necessarily Li Ruobing.

But since she’d already handled it, on her own initiative, so much the better.

“That was thoughtful of you.” Wu Chen leaned his own elbows on the table, closing the distance so they could speak more quietly still.

He asked her for the specifics—exactly how she’d set it up.

This wasn’t something to handle carelessly. Wu Chen could reset time—even if his family met with some accident one day, he could always undo that particular day. And still, he didn’t want them harmed at all, reset or not.

Over the thousand years of the loop, he’d gone home more times than he could count.

Each time, he’d picked a different hour to arrive, so that the moment they met would be different, the first words exchanged would be different, and everything that followed would unfold differently too.

He’d once staked his hope of staying sane on them.

It hadn’t worked.

None of it made a difference. The problem was never his family—it was the repetition itself. However he shifted the timing, his family’s day still followed the same broad shape. Nothing changed much. At the core, it was still the same loop.

Repeat anything long enough, and it turned dull. Grow dull enough, and a person went mad.

Wu Chen and Li Ruobing were leaning close together, speaking softly like a real young couple whispering secrets.

Then, from the next table, a man’s voice rose, loud and sudden.

“Baby, what do you think of this place? It’s new. Italian food. I came last week. The taste is authentic. Have you eaten Western food before, baby?”

A middle-aged man in a baseball cap—a little heavyset, but handsome enough—stood at the restaurant entrance, gesturing broadly, one arm around a heavily made-up young woman who trailed a heavy cloud of perfume.

“Yes, yes, let’s eat here. I’ve never had Italian food in a restaurant before. Let’s sit outside.” The heavily made-up girl was delighted, her voice cloying.

The two of them sat down at the next table.

They were just as loud placing their order, the man waving a hand grandly and announcing at full volume that she should order whatever she liked.

After ordering, the two of them continued speaking loudly.

The heavily made-up girl suddenly pressed the man with a question. “You said you came here a week ago. How come I didn’t know? Did you come with that yellow-faced old woman at home? Didn’t you say you were getting divorced?”

The man hurriedly coaxed and explained, “Baby, listen to me. I am getting divorced, but social obligations can’t be avoided, and the property matters still haven’t been settled. I can’t divorce yet… Keep your voice down, keep your voice down. Don’t talk about that.”

“Hmph. You say that every time.”

“Don’t be mad, baby. I’ll take you to buy a bag later.”

The other tables outside, all frowning at the racket, had the picture by now. Just a cheating old scumbag out with his mistress.

Wu Chen and Li Ruobing were frowning too.

Making a scene in public like that—no manners whatsoever.

They’d been talking quietly about the arrangements for Wu Chen’s family, details that couldn’t afford to be overheard by anyone, strangers included. Now, with this racket going on, they could barely hear each other at all.

Li Ruobing straightened and looked back over her shoulder. Wu Chen straightened too, though he didn’t need to turn—the couple was seated behind Li Ruobing, directly in his line of sight.

He’d already gotten a clear look at both their faces when they first sat down.

He knew them.

The handsome, slightly heavyset middle-aged man was quite wealthy.

Wu Chen didn’t just know them—he knew the old bastard had been bragging the whole time. Divorce? He was just stringing along a young girl. Give him eight hundred lifetimes of courage and he still wouldn’t dare file for divorce. He wouldn’t even dare bring the subject up at home. If he did, a trip to the hospital would be the mild version of what came next.

“Could you please lower your voices? You’re affecting everyone’s meal.” Li Ruobing glanced back and spoke in a cold, direct voice.

She wasn’t the type to pick fights without cause, but she also wasn’t going to sit there and put up with it once it actually affected her.

“Who the hell do you think you are? You own this place? Who told you—” The man snapped his head up, already cursing—no manners at all, and clearly touchy about his own face. But the moment he actually saw Li Ruobing, his voice cut off mid-sentence. The anger on his face melted straight into a smile. “Sorry, beautiful. We’ll keep it down, keep it down. Sorry, everyone, my apologies.”

He didn’t stop at apologizing to Li Ruobing—he stood up and apologized to the other tables too, looking every bit the well-mannered gentleman.

If not for the lustful way he was eyeing Li Ruobing, it might have passed for genuine contrition.

But it was precisely because Li Ruobing was beautiful—beautiful on a whole different level—that his tone had flipped so fast.

His eyes gave him away completely.

Li Ruobing didn’t bother with him further. She turned back to Wu Chen, picked up her watermelon juice, and took a sip.

The man sat back down once he’d finished apologizing. The heavily made-up girl, though, wasn’t having any of it.

“What beautiful woman? What were you looking at?” she snapped.

“I wasn’t looking at anything, baby. We were in the wrong. We disturbed other people.”

“Don’t you always talk like that? Weren’t you being so impressive? Why did you suddenly start acting like a gentleman when you saw some woman was pretty? Did you take a liking to her?”

“No, I didn’t. Baby, I love you the most. All other women are trash in my eyes.”

“Really? Then why are you still talking so quietly? Are you planning to go chase her?”

“When was I talking quietly? Would you stop making a scene?!” The man suddenly barked, flaring up as if genuinely furious. The heavily made-up girl wilted at once, not daring to say more, though she turned her head away and ignored him.

She seemed to want a cold war instead.

“Baby, don’t be angry. The food will be here soon. Look again and see what else you want to eat. We’ll order it.” The man coaxed her again.

“You’ve taken a liking to that vixen, haven’t you?” the girl said, still facing away. Then, with a sidelong glance at Li Ruobing’s back, she added, “Don’t let those clothes fool you. She’s probably just a real estate agent selling houses. Who knows how many clients she’s slept with. Honestly, you’ll pick up any old trash, won’t you?”

As she spoke, her eyes, still fixed on Li Ruobing’s back, burned with naked jealousy.

Li Ruobing had already been thoroughly irritated. The moment the girl finished speaking, she rose sharply from her seat.

The instant she stood, the bodyguards stationed nearby rose with her, moving quickly toward the entrance.

Li Ruobing’s hand closed around the glass of watermelon juice, but she didn’t lift it.

Wu Chen had already pressed his hand down over hers.

She looked at him.

“I’ll handle it.” Wu Chen didn’t say it aloud—just smiled and mouthed the words at her.

With that, he pulled out his phone with his free hand and typed out a text one-handed, without hesitation:

Your husband is out with his mistress right now. The address is…

He entered a number he’d never called before, and sent it.

Done.

Now to enjoy the show.

Perhaps because he simply knew too many people, too many things, Wu Chen had come to feel that he could turn almost any place, any incident, into a new connection.

This time was no different.

The man’s wife was a formidable woman in her own right, middle-aged and sharp. On her own merits, she ranked only as a second-top-tier connection—roughly on par with the dormant Lei Cheng. But her family, here in Donghai, was formidable indeed.