Chapter 260: Not Wasting This Day

Chapter 260: Not Wasting This Day

Wu Chen frowned slightly.

Old Dao had said only “He killed himself,” but Wu Chen did not need to ask who he meant.

Jiang Chuan.

“What happened?” he asked.

“Jumped from the building.” Old Dao was terse. He could not see the situation himself; he was still lying in a hospital bed, working from a phoned-in report, and could not give every detail.

“He was being held in a room. While the others were in the living room, he climbed out the window and went down from the eighth floor. His head split open. A lot of people downstairs saw it. They say the police are already on their way.”

“Liu’an Apartments?” Wu Chen asked.

“Yes,” Old Dao said.

After a brief silence he added, “I’m very sorry, Mr. Wu. I didn’t make the arrangements properly. I—”

“It isn’t your fault,” Wu Chen cut in.

There was no blaming anyone over a suicide. If a man truly wanted to die, there were always ways.

Wu Chen had spoken with Old Dao at noon, so he knew where Jiang Chuan was being held.

An old apartment building where renting a room was especially easy. A rather disorderly place. Some women rented rooms there to “do business.”

Wu Chen knew Donghai too well. He knew exactly what Liu’an Apartments was like.

So he found himself wondering whether Jiang Chuan had really killed himself—

or whether he had been trying to escape.

From the eighth floor, had he jumped deliberately to his death? Or tried to climb down the outside of the building and fallen?

Driven into a corner, there was almost nothing a man would not attempt.

And the exterior of Liu’an Apartments—the shape of the window ledges, the air-conditioner platforms, the run of the pipes—really could be climbed.

In theory it was possible.

Wu Chen turned it over, but did not dwell long on whether Jiang Chuan had fallen while escaping or truly taken his own life.

The result was the same.

He was dead.

And whether Jiang Chuan had risked his life trying to escape or simply killed himself, the reason was the same.

Fear.

Fear of the Ding family.

Given his situation, he must have believed his death was certain. So he had not been thinking about himself. He had been thinking about his woman and his children overseas.

On the day he was taken, he had first shaken off the others and gone back alone to that apartment for his passport.

Then he vanished.

The Ding family would not think he had been captured. They would assume that, having botched the Donghai business and fearing for his life, he had fled the country.

The Ding family would certainly look for him.

He had worked for them twenty years. He knew far too many things the Ding family could never let out. For him to disappear without a word—it would have been strange if they did not hunt for him.

And even with his woman and children abroad, the Ding family could still find them.

So—

if it was suicide, his death would make the news. The Ding family would learn he was dead, and then they would have no reason to trouble his woman and children.

And if he had been running, that too was naturally to protect them. If he could only get out of the country and reach them, he would be able to handle everything.

Jiang Chuan’s own capabilities were formidable. Otherwise two successive generations of the Ding family would never have placed such trust in him.

While Wu Chen was on the phone with Old Dao, Wu Yurong finally came back to herself.

She left his lap at once and stood, then moved two steps aside to put distance between them, and looked at Song Xuan with the face of a woman who had no idea what to say.

Song Xuan still had not recovered.

Eyes wide, she looked at Wu Yurong, then at Wu Chen, then at Wu Yurong again.

Back and forth.

Slowly she raised her left hand and pointed. Even her fingertip was trembling. Her mouth opened as if to speak, but no sound came.

Wu Yurong could see it: being caught by her daughter had dealt Song Xuan an enormous shock.

If the man whose lap she had been sitting in had not been Wu Chen but some other man—a middle-aged man especially—Song Xuan would never have reacted like this. She would only have been embarrassed, would have shut the door at once and retreated.

Wu Yurong was single. Whether she found another man or remarried, Song Xuan would support her.

Five or six days ago, Song Xuan had already learned that her mother had a man. She had found out the morning she came home. She simply had not seen who it was.

Song Xuan could accept that.

But this man was Wu Chen.

That was hard for Song Xuan to accept. Wu Chen was her senior, only two years older than she was, and twenty years younger than Wu Yurong.

And her mind began linking it to other things.

The man at the house a few days ago—had that been Wu Chen?

If so, then he had known her mother all along?

Then what was today? A performance staged for her?

Or—

Song Xuan even wondered whether Wu Chen had sold her the songs because her mother had told him to. Had the two of them deceived her together to help her fulfill her dream of making music?

Then who had the cold-voiced woman on the phone been? Wu Chen’s girlfriend? The rich woman keeping him? Or had that been arranged as well?

It was not that Song Xuan’s imagination ran wild. She simply could not find a single reasonable explanation. Her mind was mush, and she was guessing blindly.

One possibility flashed through her head after another.

And above all of it, she simply could not understand.

Her mother had been divorced for more than ten years. Even if she found a man now, how could that man be—

Wu Chen?!

Song Xuan no longer knew what to say, what to ask, what to challenge.

She went on standing there, stunned.

“I understand,” Wu Chen said at last to Old Dao.

He ended the call and checked the time on his phone.

Wu Yurong and Song Xuan were both still frozen. Song Xuan was too dazed to know where to begin. Wu Yurong had no idea how she could explain.

Neither of them had paid the slightest attention to what Wu Chen said on the phone. They did not care in the least.

Wu Chen turned his head, swept his gaze across them, then settled it on Song Xuan in the doorway.

He smiled.

“Student Song, what’s the matter?”

“Y-you… you two… you…” Song Xuan pointed at them.

The moment she spoke she grew so agitated that her face flushed red.

“Xuanxuan, listen to me explain—” Wu Yurong burst out, taking two hurried steps forward.

Her composure was in pieces. Because this was her daughter.

From the instant she said listen to me explain, the thing became far harder to resolve.

She looked guilty.

And that would push Song Xuan straight into a victim mindset—something along the lines of So the two of you really did join forces to deceive me.

In a situation like this, whoever backed down first would look like the one in the wrong.

Wu Yurong had backed down first.

Another few seconds of silence.

“Answer one question first. Why did you suddenly burst in? Answer me.” Wu Chen spoke abruptly, his voice slightly raised, stern with the demand.

“An… An Menglan called me…” Song Xuan answered on instinct.

His sudden interrogating tone had startled her.

“I see. All right. The two of you talk it through properly. I have something urgent.” Wu Chen smiled as he said it and stood.

Then he walked straight out.

He simply left.

His reaction left Wu Yurong dumbfounded. And deeply frustrated.

Wu Chen had dumped the whole mess on her.

What she did not know was that Wu Chen simply had no wish to waste time here.

He needed to look into certain things. He was not going to waste the hours left in this day.

Over the next seven hours, Wu Chen made a great many calls, went to a great many places, and canceled some meetings he had originally planned.

He was almost casual about it.

After eleven that night.

Wu Chen was driving on the ring expressway. The Lamborghini had already climbed to 230 kilometers per hour and was still accelerating.

A fork appeared ahead.

The Lamborghini swerved. It smashed through a NO ENTRY warning sign and swung onto an unfinished overpass.

The speed was still rising.

The road ahead simply ended. The overpass had not yet been joined, leaving a gap of more than ten meters.

The Lamborghini showed no sign of slowing.

It was racing flat out.

And then—

the Lamborghini shot off the broken edge.

It flew!

Whoosh!

BOOM—

It made it. The Lamborghini “flew” the ten-plus meters and landed successfully on the broken edge opposite. The impact produced a tremendous roar. The tires and suspension were all but destroyed.

The car surged on, out of control now.

Five or six meters further and it began to roll.

In the driver’s seat, as the car turned over and over, the curve of Wu Chen’s smile widened.

A successful jump.

Interesting.

The world went abruptly dark.

Reset!