Chapter 195: Scalp Tingling

Chapter 195: Scalp Tingling

“Brother-in-law, that is—” Li Ruotai could not get it out. Something was plainly wrong with him.

It was the sound of a man who had done something wrong and did not know how to own up to it. Li Ruotai was Young Master Li across the whole of Donghai. In this city, Li Ruobing should have been the only person who could put him in that state. With anyone else, wrong or not, he would simply have said it.

He had opened with such urgency, and now he was stuck.

Clearly Li Ruotai felt he could not say it plainly and was hunting for the right words.

Listening to the hesitations on the other end, Wu Chen sat up. He turned his head, looked out the window, and thought for a moment.

“Old Dao got away?” he asked directly.

“Ah— Bro— Brother-in-law, how did you—” Li Ruotai was floored.

It had happened only a short while ago, and he himself had only just heard. There was no way Wu Chen could have known before he did. Every man guarding that hospital was his.

It felt like a guess.

He could even guess that?

It was not a guess.

Wu Chen had simply reasoned it through. At the moment there was only one matter in play: Old Dao. And it had been only yesterday that Wu Chen had told Li Ruotai something of how important the man was. Li Ruotai understood it perfectly. That very morning Wu Chen had called again to ask after him and to fix a time to go to the hospital and talk.

Wu Chen also understood Old Dao.

The man had lost a great deal of blood the day before. He had been pulled back in time, but weakness was unavoidable, and the wounds had not healed — they had only been stitched shut. If he moved, pain would be the least of it. The wounds could split open and start bleeding again, and his life would be back on the line.

Old Dao had rested one day and one night.

With injuries like that, anyone else would have struggled to sit up. Once the anesthetic wore off, the pain alone would have been unbearable.

But Old Dao…

He was what people meant by a man of iron and blood. And his skills had been forged in and out of death. His methods ran crooked, off any expected line. Let anyone’s guard slip for a moment and he would take the opening.

Li Ruotai’s bodyguards were all elites, but obviously they could not have stayed sharply wary of a man that badly wounded.

Keeping Old Dao from escaping, and keeping anything from happening to him, were both Li Ruotai’s job.

If the man got away, it was Li Ruotai’s fault.

Which was why he now sounded like someone with no idea how to explain himself.

And there was more to it than that.

“Brother-in-law, it was half an hour ago. That bastard went out the window. Third floor. The bodyguards think he climbed down a drainpipe — Old Dao has definitely trained for that kind of thing.” Li Ruotai was desperate to explain, words coming faster and faster. “I put plenty of men on it. Upstairs, downstairs, in the room, outside the door. But someone stepped into the bathroom, and when he came back the man was gone. Don’t worry, Brother-in-law, I’ve already sent people out looking. He’s hurt that badly, he can’t get far. We’ll find him. Don’t worry!”

They had simply let their attention slip.

Nobody stays fully alert around a man injured that severely. From what Li Ruotai said, the one watching him in the room had gone to the bathroom — and VIP rooms had their own bathrooms, so the man had not even left.

It could not have taken long at all.

But Old Dao had taken that sliver of time and run without hesitation.

Wu Chen knew better, though.

Old Dao truly was not afraid of death. He was extraordinarily willing to gamble his life.

But willing to gamble it did not mean eager to throw it away. Otherwise he would have died long ago. He must have understood that with wounds this bad, running today could very easily mean dying on the road. He might not even clear Donghai.

They had saved him, dragged him back from the edge. He should also have understood that he had value.

Which meant they would not dispose of him lightly.

He could have strung it out for a few more days, recovered a little, then looked for his opening. His odds of getting out of Donghai alive would have been far better.

Instead he chose to run at once, at the risk of dying.

That was obviously not normal.

Something was behind it.

And that something was Li Ruotai.

“You’re pouring all this out in one breath. What are you covering up?” Wu Chen punctured him straight through.

“Uh…” Li Ruotai had no answer at all.

“Ah, Atai.” Wu Chen sighed, then went on. “What was the hurry? Didn’t I tell you I’d let you sit in?”

His voice was perfectly level — a stark departure from his usual easy, faintly amused tone.

That was what set a man’s nerves jumping.

“No, Brother-in-law— I— actually I— I just—” Li Ruotai could not explain himself. And he was rather dazed besides, because once again Wu Chen knew exactly what he had done.

“All right. I understand. I’ll find him.” Wu Chen hung up.

He did not need Li Ruotai’s explanation.

He could already reconstruct the whole thing.

Before Wu Chen sat down with Old Dao, the only person capable of putting pressure on him was Li Ruotai. Li Ruotai’s men would not act on their own initiative, and Li Ruotai himself had just sounded exactly like a man caught out and unable to say so.

The answer was obvious.

Li Ruotai had gone to talk to Old Dao the moment he woke, before Wu Chen could.

He ran hot, and what Ding Ruilong had done this time had genuinely enraged him, so he had wanted to learn something in advance.

He must have threatened Old Dao.

He must have said some vicious things.

Li Ruotai was ruthless enough to follow through, and Old Dao would certainly have looked into him before coming to Donghai, so—

He had to run at once.

Old Dao knew that if he refused to cooperate the next time they spoke, Li Ruotai might well shoot him dead on the spot.

Not running meant waiting to die.

Running left one thin thread of life.

Clearly it was only after Old Dao vanished that Li Ruotai realized he had made a mistake. What he had done might not have been wrong in itself, but the moment he failed to keep the man under watch, all of it became his fault.

Which was why it had been so hard to say.

…

In the hospital corridor.

After Wu Chen hung up, Li Ruotai’s expression shifted again.

He felt as though his brother-in-law might be angry. Wu Chen had not said a single harsh word. His tone had merely gone flat.

But Li Ruotai felt it all the same.

Afraid of Wu Chen — that was not quite it. He simply approved of this brother-in-law more and more, and—

He was genuinely afraid of his own sister.

After thinking a moment, Li Ruotai dialed another number.

It connected quickly.

“Atai.” Li Ruobing’s voice came through.

“Sis, that is—” Li Ruotai stopped there.

“Hm?” Her tone changed instantly. She knew her younger brother far too well; one syllable in that register and she understood. Coldly, she asked, “What have you done this time? Talk.”

Li Ruotai steeled himself and laid out the situation.

The real trouble with it, in truth, was that it could affect Li Ruobing’s future.

Old Dao mattered.

Wu Chen wanted to talk to him in order to deal with Ding Ruilong.

Li Ruotai had gone to him early, pushed him into immediate flight, then failed to keep hold of him.

He had not merely interfered with Wu Chen’s business.

He had interfered with Li Ruobing’s.

Li Ruotai was very much afraid his sister would hit him.

And he blamed himself bitterly.

Li Ruobing heard him out without a word. Then she was silent.

Even the silence set him panicking.

“Sis! I know I was wrong! I’ll find him, I swear it! Sis, believe me!” Li Ruotai rushed in before she could speak, then added, “Oh, and Sis — I told Brother-in-law. He seems angry…”

“He’s angry? Did he curse you out?” Li Ruobing asked at once, her voice climbing.

Her heart dropped.

Wu Chen never got angry.

If he truly was angry—

Even Li Ruobing’s scalp tingled.

“He— he didn’t curse me. It’s just… it felt like…” Li Ruotai said.

“You— you— what am I supposed to do with you?” Li Ruobing’s breathing had gone heavy. She wanted to tear into him and did not even have the heart left for it. “Hurry up and find him. Get him back, now. As for your brother-in-law, I’ll talk to him. I’ll put in a word for you.”

In the end she cared too much about her younger brother.

She even felt that if Wu Chen truly became angry, it would be a far, far worse thing than Old Dao slipping away.

…

In the president’s office at Huancai Fashion.

The moment she finished with her brother, Li Ruobing dialed Wu Chen.

He picked up at once.

“Darling, Atai told me. It’s just that his temper is too—” She was already explaining for Li Ruotai as the line opened, and she called Wu Chen “darling” outright.

“I’m not angry,” Wu Chen cut in.

Then he laughed softly.

“He won’t be lost. I’m driving. I’m going to see Old Dao.”

“Hm?” It took Li Ruobing a beat. Then it burst out of her. “You know where Old Dao ran to?”