Chapter 318: Ding Ruilong, You Really Were Cuckolded!

Chapter 318: Ding Ruilong, You Really Were Cuckolded!

It did not connect.

Jiang Hongguang still could not get through. He tried several more times with the same result. The line simply would not open.

The whole business felt more bizarre the longer it went on. If someone meant to threaten him, whether they wanted money or wanted him to do something, they had only to say so. At the very least they ought to talk.

He walked the room as he thought, and found nothing.

Nothing worth a second glance.

He checked his watch. This restroom trip had already run over ten minutes. Even if he’d gone in there to take a dump, he should have been finished by now. It was time to go back.

But with his life possibly on the line, he decided to wait a little longer.

Five minutes later.

Nothing had happened.

He finally left Room 1029 and went back.

Soon he was in the ninth-floor corridor outside the private room again. Ding Ruilong’s other bodyguards all glanced at him, and one he was friendly with even asked, “That long?”

“Stomach trouble,” Jiang Hongguang murmured.

Inside the room the card game went on. Wu Chen and Li Ruobing still stood behind Li Ruotai, offering advice now and then.

When it came to needling a man, Li Ruotai was in a class of his own. He was winning Ding Ruilong’s money and running his mouth the whole while.

Ding Ruilong’s expression was plainly off. He wanted to keep his composure, so he kept swallowing it.

Before anyone noticed, it was five in the afternoon.

Wu Chen glanced at his watch to confirm the hour, then turned to Li Ruotai and asked with a faint smile, “Shall we eat?”

Li Ruobing looked at Wu Chen, checked the time herself, and nodded.

“All right. Let’s go.”

She hooked her arm through his, and the two started for the door.

They had not gone two steps when Sun Yongzhang’s voice came from behind them.

“Bingbing, where are you going? We still have a guest.” He looked at her with a slight frown.

“You keep playing. We’re going to eat,” she said, glancing back.

Displeasure showed on his face. He even shot Wu Chen a sidelong look before he said, “We’ll eat together. We’re nearly finished here. No need to rush.”

“Third Uncle, Sis, why not eat here?” Li Ruotai offered. “I’ll have the fifth-floor restaurant start now.”

Then to Li Ruobing: “Sis, let us play a few more hands. I’m winning. Once the restaurant’s ready we can go straight down.”

She did not answer at once. She looked at Wu Chen.

“Fine. We’ll do as A-Tai says.” Wu Chen smiled and glanced at Li Ruotai.

Their eyes met.

Exactly as arranged.

They had settled it on the phone the day before. They would not leave the club, and dinner would be here as well.

Wu Chen and Li Ruobing returned to their seats behind Li Ruotai and watched him play. Li Ruotai took out his phone, made a call, and said only, “Prepare dinner. The best you have.”

Then he hung up.

The game continued. Li Ruotai looked utterly absorbed in it; even while making the call his eyes had never left his cards.

Another hour passed.

Six in the evening.

Creak.

The door opened. A bodyguard stood there and said to Li Ruotai, “Boss, dinner’s ready.”

Li Ruotai nodded, swept his gaze over the table, and stood.

“Come on. Let’s eat.”

Then he looked at Ding Ruilong, raised his brows, and smiled. “Ding Ruilong, I don’t run tabs here. Remember to settle up.”

“Don’t worry. You won’t be short a cent.” Ding Ruilong rose, even forcing a smile as though none of it had touched him.

He had lost nearly nine million yuan that day.

The money meant nothing. The trouble was that Li Ruotai was insufferable, yapping at him without pause.

And with Wu Chen and Li Ruobing carrying on behind Li Ruotai the entire time, Ding Ruilong’s agitation had only grown. His whole frame of mind was off.

Talking among themselves, they left the private room.

Downstairs.

On the north side of Crown Entertainment’s fifth floor stood a restaurant with a handful of private dining rooms, only a few in all.

Before long the group entered the largest of them.

The food was already on the table.

Eighteen dishes crowded an enormous round table that could have seated twenty without crowding. There were nowhere near that many diners, so everyone sat where they liked with room to spare.

They ate.

They talked.

Wu Chen naturally sat beside Li Ruobing. Neither joined much of the others’ conversation. They behaved like any couple, murmuring to each other, putting food in each other’s bowls now and then.

Half an hour later.

Outside the room, Jiang Hongguang felt his phone vibrate. He had silenced it earlier, afraid an unexpected call might draw attention.

He drew it out and looked.

A message. Four characters:

—Something came up!

From the same unfamiliar number.

He put the phone away, waited a moment, then told the bodyguard beside him, “Restroom. My stomach’s acting up.”

And hurried off.

Soon he reached the fifth-floor restroom and called the number again.

This time it connected.

“Come to Room 1029. I’ll be waiting.” The hoarse voice hung up immediately.

Jiang Hongguang did not even try calling back. He left the restroom and went straight for the elevators. He still had the cleaner’s master card, which would take him to the VIP floors.

More than ten minutes later he returned, his face terrible.

He had gone up.

No one was there.

He had waited a long while. Still no one.

And the phone would not connect.

So he had no choice but to come back.

By now Jiang Hongguang was beginning to feel he was simply being toyed with.

But why?

He could not understand it.

Before anyone noticed, it was half past seven in the evening.

In the private dining room the meal had already run an hour and a half. The real business remained unresolved, but a great deal of wine had gone down. Sun Yongzhang and Tang Jingbin clinked glasses again and again, and Tang Jingbin’s booming laughter rang through the room at intervals.

Wu Chen seemed drunk as well.

His smile had gone slightly wrong, touched with intoxication, and every so often he looked at Ding Ruilong with a mocking, almost knowing expression.

He stared so long and so often that Ding Ruilong finally lost patience.

“Wu Chen, why do you keep looking at me?”

The moment he said it the room went noticeably quieter.

“I was wondering whether you might just be pathetic.” Wu Chen sounded like a man beginning to act out with drink in him. Smiling, he went on, “Tell me, why exactly did you come to Donghai? Aren’t you only making yourself miserable?”

“Wu Chen!” Sun Yongzhang cut in at once.

“Uncle!” Li Ruobing immediately turned to Sun Yongzhang.

Wu Chen ignored him. Still fixed on Ding Ruilong with that drunken smile, he said, “Honestly, I’m starting to wonder if there’s something wrong with you. Do you particularly enjoy being cuckolded? Is being made a cuckold really that much fun?”

Every face in the room changed.

He had gone straight for the throat.

There were few things a man could bear less.

And there was an implication in it. On first hearing, everyone naturally assumed he meant Li Ruobing. She had once been expected to marry Ding Ruilong. She had refused. Now she was Wu Chen’s girlfriend.

Ding Ruilong’s face turned ugly.

He was close to losing hold of himself.

“If you like being cuckolded that much, you should have said so sooner. I could have helped you long ago!” Wu Chen taunted again with a drunken grin.

Ding Ruilong shot to his feet.

He truly could not take it.

Wu Chen was saying this in front of everyone.

Bang!

Li Ruobing slapped the table and stood as well.

She wanted to see exactly what Ding Ruilong dared to do.

He glanced at her, and some of the fire in him was forced back down. In truth he had come to hate Li Ruobing somewhat. Yet the more he hated her, the more he wanted to marry her, so that he could take his “revenge” properly.

“Ruobing, this is the man you chose?” Ding Ruilong gestured angrily. “He doesn’t respect you in the slightest!”

What Wu Chen had said did sound rather disrespectful to her.

But in fact—

that was not what he had meant at all.

“No, no, no.” Wu Chen laughed drunkenly. “Ding Ruilong, let me be clear. I’m not talking about some imaginary cuckolding in your head. Your feelings for Ruobing are entirely one-sided. The two of you have no relationship. I’m saying you were actually cuckolded. For real. And it seems you don’t even know it. Shall I tell you about it?”

The room fell completely silent.

Li Ruobing’s expression shifted and she glanced at Wu Chen.

Was he going to bring up He Shiqin?