Trapped in the Same Day for a Thousand Years

Chapter 336: Apologize! Now!

by cnwebnovels

Li Ruobing’s makeup was light as ever today, but she wore vivid lipstick and a pair of decorative frames with no lenses. The whole effect gave her the full presence of a woman who ran things.

“Miss Li.” Zhuang Xiaodie reached her and greeted her again, softly.

“They’re all here?” Li Ruobing asked casually.

She already knew Li Ruotai, Sun Yongzhang, and Tang Jingbin had come. Li Ruotai had spoken to her on the way over.

“They are,” Zhuang Xiaodie said. “Upstairs, discussing something with Mr. Wu…”

She trailed off, looking as though there were something more she could not bring herself to say.

Li Ruobing noticed that something was wrong with her face.

“What’s the matter with you?” she asked lightly.

“N-nothing. Nothing at all.” Zhuang Xiaodie’s manner was unnatural, and she reached up without thinking to smooth her hair.

She had been frightened a little. Earlier, while Li Ruotai explained the fire to Wu Chen, he had been in a fury almost the whole time, and Li Ruotai in that state was frightening. Zhuang Xiaodie had seen all of it.

Before coming here, Sun Yongzhang had returned Li Ruotai’s gun, and it had been at his waist ever since. When he grew agitated earlier and stood to gesture as he talked, his clothes had ridden up slightly.

Zhuang Xiaodie had seen that he was carrying a gun.

And he kept glancing at her.

She could feel his attitude toward her, and she knew why. Which made all of it genuinely terrifying.

Zhuang Xiaodie, who had always been given to filling in the blanks, had already staged whole dramas in her head, and the more she imagined, the more frightened she became. She had even begun to wonder whether Li Ruotai might do away with her for his elder sister’s sake.

And she felt that Li Ruobing could protect her.

Li Ruobing had always treated her well.

But Li Ruobing and Li Ruotai were brother and sister by blood, so she felt she could hardly say anything about it.

Li Ruobing’s sudden return brought her an enormous sense of safety.

Talking as they went, the two of them came into the living room.

“Sis.”

“Miss Li.”

Li Ruotai, Tang Xinbao, and Guo Qiqi all greeted her. Then Li Ruotai looked at her and asked, “Sis, what brings you back? Everything settled at the company?”

“For now. There’s another event tonight.” Li Ruobing sat down as she spoke, then glanced at her brother. “Have you found out what happened with the fire?”

“It was the Ding family behind it, no question. Eight chances in ten it was Ding Ruilong himself!” Li Ruotai declared, flatly certain.

“Have you established that? Can you be sure?” she asked, and it came out sounding almost like an interrogation.

The two of them knew the truth of the fire. Her manner now was somewhat confrontational. What she was really telling Li Ruotai was that his elder sister was extremely displeased.

Displeased about what?

About Li Ruotai joining forces with Wu Chen and keeping her in the dark.

Li Ruotai felt her mood and panicked briefly. He said at once, “Sis! We haven’t finished the investigation, but Brother-in-law said it was the Ding family, it was Ding Ruilong. If Brother-in-law says so, he can’t be wrong!”

Clever of him. He shifted the whole thing onto Wu Chen.

“Is that so.” Li Ruobing let the words sit, gave him a look that said work it out for yourself, then relaxed and changed the subject. “Never mind that. Oh—did any of you watch the launch livestream?”

“Uh…” Li Ruotai had nothing. Of course he had not watched it. At noon he had been making a scene at the hospital.

“I did, I did!” Guo Qiqi said with a smile, tugging at Tang Xinbao. “We watched it together, with Brother Wu and Zhuang Xiaodie. All of us watched… Tao Manying is so beautiful.” She sighed admiringly at the end.

And just like that the talk turned to Li Ruobing’s company.

Li Ruobing’s presence was formidable. The moment she returned she became the center of the conversation. From the launch it flowed naturally into cosmetics. Zhuang Xiaodie offered an opinion on the A-Bao shade of eyeshadow, and Guo Qiqi had things to say about the straight-guy-killer lipstick…

All from Huancai’s newly released high-end makeup line.

An intensely feminine subject.

Yet Tang Xinbao managed to contribute a few remarks, bringing up death Barbie pink and the like. He seemed to know a little, probably under Guo Qiqi’s influence.

Only Li Ruotai had nothing to say for a long stretch. He genuinely knew nothing about it.

He was not idle, though. He kept listening and watching, and whenever Zhuang Xiaodie spoke his gaze traveled back and forth between her and Li Ruobing.

The result was that Zhuang Xiaodie gradually stopped talking again.

And started filling in the blanks again.

Before anyone noticed, half an hour had gone by in idle conversation.

Li Ruobing’s sudden return had several reasons behind it, and having the time was only one of them. At the venue the main program and the media livestream were over, but the media hands-on session was still running, with a crowd of high-traffic beauty bloggers on site trying the products and promoting them live.

That sort of thing was in fashion now, and it genuinely helped sales.

For the moment there was simply nothing there that needed her.

And at noon Sun Yongzhang had called her. At the time he had been struggling to hold Li Ruotai down and had found a chance to make calls, one to Li Maoren and one to Li Ruobing.

He had wanted her to rush to the hospital and keep her brother in check so he would do nothing rash.

But Li Ruobing knew the truth and knew nothing would go wrong, and she genuinely had no time, so she had declined.

Still, she had to come back and see how things stood. Some of it was performance too.

And she could take part in the final negotiations over Tang Xinbao’s affair.

There was one more reason as well: she was taking Wu Chen to an event that evening, so she had come home to find him and get ready together.

“Xiaodie, come here a moment.” Li Ruobing stood abruptly, called to her, and walked out of the living room, turning toward the kitchen.

Zhuang Xiaodie sat frozen a beat, then rose and followed.

To everyone else it came out of nowhere.

The two of them went into the kitchen one after the other, and Li Ruobing turned and slid the door shut.

“W-what is it?” Zhuang Xiaodie was nervous now, with no idea what this was about.

“What’s the matter with you?” Li Ruobing asked instead, folding her arms. She paused, then frowned slightly. “Did A-Tai say something to you?”

She had seen it.

From the moment she came home she had felt something was off with Zhuang Xiaodie. The girl had improved for a while, then gone wrong again and stopped speaking altogether. And then Li Ruobing had noticed her own brother flicking those unpleasant looks at her.

With Li Ruobing’s intelligence, it was only natural she could guess something had happened.

“No, nothing…” Zhuang Xiaodie said, her expression growing even less natural as she denied it. “No. We haven’t spoken.”

In that moment Li Ruobing could feel her unease with perfect clarity.

She pressed her lips together, her face cold. Then she reached back, cracked the kitchen door, and called out, “A-Tai, come here!”

“Huh? Sis… coming.” Li Ruotai answered from the living room.

Footsteps came quickly closer.

“Sis, what’s wrong?” Li Ruotai came into the kitchen.

Li Ruobing reached back and shut the door again. Then she raised a hand, pointed at him, gestured toward Zhuang Xiaodie, and said, “Apologize!”

“Huh?” Li Ruotai froze.

“I said apologize to Miss Zhuang!” Her voice hardened.

“Uh…” He was utterly lost. He looked at Zhuang Xiaodie, then at his sister. “I—I—why?”

He genuinely had no idea. What had he done? What was this over? He didn’t know!

“I tell you to apologize and you ask why? Don’t you know perfectly well why?” Her teeth clenched, and she smacked him on the back of the head.

Li Ruotai ducked and ended up against the door, wearing a don’t-hit-me look.

“No, hold on—Sis, over what? I… what did I do?” he asked again, feeling somewhat wronged now.

At that moment he did not look remotely like an important man. He was simply a younger brother being scolded by his sister.

“Playing dumb, are you? What are you glaring at Miss Zhuang for? Look how badly you’ve frightened her—she won’t even talk. Is something wrong with you? Didn’t I tell you not to meddle?” She grew angrier with every word.

“No, I—I didn’t. I wasn’t glaring at her. I was just looking… just looking, that’s all. I—”

“Do you take me for blind? I watched you flick your eyes at her over and over. Do you take me for an idiot? Every single day you stir up trouble. If your brother-in-law finds out, see whether he doesn’t thrash you… Move! Apologize! Now!”

And when she had finished, Li Ruobing even raised her leg and gave him a kick.