Chapter 169: You Really Are Multitalented!

Chapter 169: You Really Are Multitalented!

Out in the corridor, Song Xuan froze in the middle of her call.

A young woman’s voice!

And she said Senior Wu was in the shower?!

Song Xuan’s imagination filled in the rest at once, and she hurried to explain. “Um… I’m sorry… I’m calling Senior Wu because… um… please don’t misunderstand. You’re Senior Wu’s girlfriend, aren’t you? I…”

Song Xuan was terrified of being misunderstood. She had no wish to come between anyone.

Li Ruobing’s habitual speaking voice was simply that cold, so Song Xuan assumed she had been misread—and it made her nervous too.

“If you need something, say it. I’ll pass it on.” Li Ruobing stood by the window, speaking in her ordinary voice, which was to say still as cold as ever.

“Um… it’s about the song… Oh, and I have to apologize to Senior Wu first. I misunderstood him yesterday…” Song Xuan did not quite know how to put it, and her nerves left her stumbling over the words.

“The song… apologize? For what?” Li Ruobing frowned slightly. She had no idea what game Wu Chen had been running on Song Xuan.

“It’s…” Song Xuan began, then stopped.

Something felt wrong.

This woman, who seemed to be Wu Chen’s girlfriend, apparently had no idea what her boyfriend had done yesterday?

He had failed to sell the song, released it himself, and watched it explode—and she knew nothing?

“You are Senior Wu Chen’s girlfriend, aren’t you?” Song Xuan asked again, having thought it over. She had not gotten a clear answer the first time.

“Yes! What of it?” Li Ruobing was still frowning.

“Nothing. I only wanted to be sure. Then how could you… not know…” Song Xuan kept it vague. She was being very careful. If this really was Wu Chen’s girlfriend, she certainly owed her an explanation. If it was not, she would never casually reveal anything concerning Wu Chen. That was the most elementary courtesy.

“Know what? What is it that I don’t know?” Li Ruobing’s frown deepened.

“You really don’t know? Are you really Wu Chen’s girlfriend?” Song Xuan was genuinely suspicious now.

For an ordinary person, the explosion of “Antidote for the Soul” was the sort of thing that changed a life. And his girlfriend did not know? Did not know how it had come about?

Song Xuan had heard about Wu Chen’s family circumstances.

Yesterday afternoon, after the two of them parted, she had gone back to the recording studio. Later, chatting in her class group about buying songs, she had mentioned in passing that someone had fooled her again.

She had not said which song. She had only said the man quoted a hundred thousand yuan, and then asked whether anyone in the group knew Wu Chen.

Nobody knew him personally, but they were all Donghai University students, so of course some had heard of him. They said Wu Chen really had just graduated from Donghai University, that his family circumstances were ordinary, and that asking a hundred thousand meant he had gone out of his mind for money—that sort of thing.

“You doubt me?” Li Ruobing was almost angry enough to laugh.

She had been in a foul mood all day, and from Song Xuan’s first words on the phone that voice had given her the distinct impression of some seductive little fox.

Why did she have to sound so sweet, so syrupy?

And yesterday Wu Chen had said Song Xuan was prettier than Li Ruobing, gentler than her, and so on…

“It isn’t exactly doubt… it’s just that if you’re Wu Chen’s girlfriend and you don’t know, that’s rather strange.” Song Xuan phrased it delicately, but what she meant was doubt.

“Wait there!” Li Ruobing said decisively.

She turned and walked briskly to the bathroom door, heels clicking, and called inside. “Darling!”

The rush of water stopped at once. Wu Chen had shut off the faucet.

“What is it?” he called back.

“When will you be done?” she asked.

“Soon.”

“Nothing. Just asking.”

Phone still in hand, Li Ruobing walked back to the window. Behind her the water started up again.

“Hear that?” she said when she reached the glass.

“I heard, I heard. I’m sorry…” Song Xuan answered quickly, apologizing again.

“Have you slept with Wu Chen? Had sex with him?” Li Ruobing cut in with brutal directness.

The line went silent.

Song Xuan was frightened.

That settled it. She really had been taken for a mistress trying to steal another woman’s boyfriend.

What she did not know was that Li Ruobing was doing it on purpose. She did want to know whether Wu Chen had gone looking for Song Xuan again last night and succeeded—but more than that, she wanted control of the conversation’s rhythm.

She had already taken the measure of Song Xuan’s state of mind.

Song Xuan was so rattled that several seconds passed before she rushed to explain. “No, no! You really have misunderstood! There’s nothing between Senior Wu and me. He came to see me yesterday because he wanted to sell me a song, but his price was too high, so I didn’t buy it, and then the song…”

She spoke astonishingly fast.

Terrified of being misjudged, Song Xuan poured out the whole story in a single breath.

More than ten minutes later.

Thoroughly clean at last, Wu Chen came out of the bathroom in a bathrobe. Li Ruobing was no longer in the bedroom.

He glanced around, went to the bed, and dressed. Once dressed, he put away his wallet and keys—and realized his phone was gone.

He turned and looked over the room again. Nothing.

“Ruobing, where’s my phone?” he called, walking out of the bedroom.

Nobody answered, but he heard a voice from the study.

Li Ruobing’s.

Wu Chen walked over. The study door stood open. He paused in the doorway and looked in.

Li Ruobing sat behind the computer with his phone, talking to someone.

“…He’s here. You talk to him,” she said into the phone when she saw him.

“Who is it?” Wu Chen asked, smiling, as he came in.

“Listen and you’ll know.” Her face was expressionless.

He crossed to the desk and took the phone. One glance at the number told him.

“Student Song.” He put it to his ear, but his eyes stayed on Li Ruobing.

“Senior, you’re finished… Do you have time? I’ve explained everything to your girlfriend, so she won’t misunderstand… Could you come out? Let’s pick a place and talk properly…” Song Xuan spoke rapidly, as though she were worried on his behalf that his girlfriend had gotten the wrong idea.

“Sure. This afternoon,” Wu Chen said with a smile.

They settled a time and a place, exchanged another line, and hung up.

Wu Chen put his phone away.

“I really never would have guessed, my dear Mr. Wu. You really are multitalented!” Li Ruobing said, looking at him.

Her tone was strange. There was no telling whether it was praise or mockery.

As she finished, her eyes flicked to the computer screen without her meaning them to.

Wu Chen noticed. He stepped up beside the chair and looked at the monitor.

Penguin Music’s charts.

He understood.

“You’re too kind,” Wu Chen said, smiling.

“So what is this? Are you planning to debut as a singer? Or is it simply another way to pick up women?” Li Ruobing asked—and actually smiled.

She truly could not help it.

Because she had just discovered yet another side of Wu Chen.

Talent.

Talent at the level that produced miracles.

Her man was this formidable. He was always stronger than she imagined.

Why would she not smile?

“Debuting is out of the question,” Wu Chen said.

“So it is about the women?” she asked.

“The love of beauty is common to all mankind.” He had said it before.

“Wu Chen, can you tell me what else you know how to do?” She leaned sideways against the desk and propped her chin lightly on one hand.

“That’s hard to say. On the whole, I suppose—”

Ring, ring…

The ringtone cut him off.

It came from Li Ruobing.

She took out her phone and glanced at the screen. The smile vanished on the instant. Her face turned to ice, and her eyes sharpened.

Wu Chen glanced over.

Ding Ruilong.

Li Ruobing was about to answer—she had already composed several choice greetings for Ding Ruilong’s ancestors—when her thumb paused above the screen.

She turned to Wu Chen, and something flickered in her eyes, as though a rather “entertaining” idea had just occurred to her.

“Come here. Sit.”

She stood, pulled Wu Chen over, and put him in the chair. Then she turned and settled herself in his lap, and only then answered Ding Ruilong’s call—and switched on the speakerphone.