The three of them were each lingering in bizarre postures.
The room was eerily quiet.
Cui Yunchu glanced at Shen Xiabai, then looked up at Zhou Yuanmo.
Shen Xiabai said all of a sudden, "Do you enjoy looking at him that much? How about I tie you to a pillar so you can stare to your heart's content?"
Cui Yunchu quickly averted her gaze. "I don't enjoy it. It's making my neck sore."
She was sitting on top of something. As soon as she shifted, Shen Xiabai's chilly gaze shot toward her, freezing her in place.
"Just now, those two lines you addressed to Lord Zhou, 'Lord Zhou,' were exceedingly melodious and charming," Shen Xiabai said, eyeing her sidelong.
Cui Yunchu was speechless.
"I was just fooling him. If others don't know what I'm really like, Lord Shen, you should know all too well, shouldn't you?"
Shen Xiabai looked at her. "Is that so?"
Cui Yunchu suddenly recalled that he had just said she must not deceive others.
Shen Xiabai continued, "Say it again for me to hear. If I'm satisfied, I'll let you leave."
"You're insane."
Cui Yunchu grumbled inwardly, but on the surface she appeared obedient. "Lord Shen."
"That doesn't sound like it. Do it again."
Cui Yunchu dragged out her tone, "Lord Shen~"
She made her voice excessively soft, more winding than a mountain path, clearly trying to annoy Shen Xiabai on purpose.
Shen Xiabai turned his gaze to her lips, his eyes dark and inscrutable, which made Cui Yunchu's heart tighten.
"I'm not saying it anymore. I want to go back." Cui Yunchu jumped down from the table.
She wasn't his soldier—why should she do whatever he commanded?
Most importantly, she was now quite certain that Shen Xiabai wouldn't kill her, which was exactly why she dared to be so audacious.
But just as she took two steps, her wrist was grabbed, and her waist was pressed against the table.
They were extremely close. Shen Xiabai stared at her, then suddenly leaned down and covered her lips with his own.
Cui Yunchu didn't dare move, but she was much calmer than the last time.
Their lips and tongues tangled, the same sensation as before—somewhat domineering and suffocating.
She lifted her gaze and looked toward Zhou Yuanmo, who was hanging from the roof beam. He was also looking at her. Their eyes met.
Cui Yunchu's face flushed bright red.
In her heart, she thought Lord Zhou was truly pitiful. Twice now he had been engaged, and both times he had ended up in this kind of situation.
She had thought Prince An was losing his mind, but she never expected Shen Xiabai to be an even bigger bastard.
Shen Xiabai sensed that she wasn't resisting, and felt somewhat at ease, as if a little boat was slowly rowing across the sea of his heart—ticklish and warm.
When he raised his eyes, he noticed Cui Yunchu's gaze.
He stopped immediately and stood up straight.
Feeling his sharp look, Cui Yunchu snapped back to reality and made an excuse, "I twisted my neck. I can't move it."
"So your only option was to stare at him?" Shen Xiabai said. "In that case, why don't I cut his head off and hang it by my bed, so you can gaze at me every day?"
That mad, unhinged tone was just like Prince An's.
Cui Yunchu's heart turned ice cold. "No need. I'm better now."
She looked away, her mouth twitching a few times before she finally said, "I'm done for."
She blinked, and large tears began to fall.
Shen Xiabai bit his lip, which burned hot, and the grip on her waist tightened.
Cui Yunchu said, "Cui Qingyuan is going to beat me to death."
Hearing that, Shen Xiabai frowned deeply.
Cui Yunchu sniffled. "Zhou Yuanmo will definitely go back and tell him. Do you know how I've been treated? To force me into marriage, he locked me in the ancestral hall for two days with no food or water. I was finally let out, and you've blown everything for me again."
This time she wasn't pretending. She was genuinely heartbroken.
Shen Xiabai hanging Zhou Yuanmo from the beam was a humiliation for Zhou Yuanmo, but her actions with Shen Xiabai were no different from having an affair.
Just based on that, that stubborn old man would kill her.
When she finished speaking, she started coughing again, her face flushed red, which troubled Shen Xiabai to the extreme. His dark eyes seemed to harbor surging tides beneath them.
"So, today you were forced here by Prime Minister Cui?"
"What else could it be?" Cui Yunchu glared at him.
Shen Xiabai was silent for a moment, gazing at her.
Cui Yunchu hugged her arms and coughed softly again.
"You got sick from kneeling in the ancestral hall?" He furrowed his brow tightly.
Cui Yunchu nodded. "Yeah. I hadn't kneeled in a while, and suddenly having to do it for two days in such cold weather—I couldn't take it."
Her tone was indifferent, as if kneeling in the ancestral hall was a very ordinary occurrence.
"Why would you rather kneel in the ancestral hall than marry?"
Cui Yunchu looked up at him, as if the man hanging from the beam had completely slipped her mind. "Because he's poor. I want a good life, so of course I don't want to marry him."
Shen Xiabai fell silent, and Zhou Yuanmo fell silent too. Perhaps because he had exhausted himself from struggling, Zhou Yuanmo just stared wide-eyed at the two people below him.
His eyes were filled with anger and humiliation, like the gaze of an unfortunate husband whose wife has cuckolded him, forced to watch their illicit affair unfold.
Shen Xiabai asked, "Besides that, there's no other reason?"
Cui Yunchu shook her head.
Shen Xiabai frowned.
Cui Yunchu knew what he wanted to hear, but she wouldn't say it, nor would she admit it. Her eyes were clear and bright, remarkably so.
"Lord Shen, flawlessly handsome, may this humble girl leave now?"
Shen Xiabai didn't reply, so Cui Yunchu immediately tried to dart away.
But her wrist was grabbed again. "Cui Yunchu, if I helped you leave the Cui family, would you be willing?"
Cui Yunchu's body stiffened slightly.
Shen Xiabai said, "You know what I mean."
Cui Yunchu turned back and smiled faintly. "I wouldn't want that."
Without his control, Shen Xiabai's grip on her wrist tightened, his eyes darkening.
Unwilling. So from the very start, her flirtations had been purposeful, and she had never been remotely moved.
Shen Xiabai released her wrist and instead pinched her chin. "Leaving the Cui family—would you be willing?"
The same question, but his tone carried more stubbornness than before.
Cui Yunchu thought, if her answer were the same as just now, that hand might seize her throat and ask again.
She pressed her lips together, then forced a smile. "That's not necessarily true either. If you said you were going to strangle me right now, I'd definitely agree. And if going back to the Cui residence meant freezing to death under Cui Qingyuan, then I'd definitely choose to marry Lord Zhou."
She had been a coward clinging to life for over a decade.
Whichever danger was closer, she would obey whoever threatened less.
Her sycophantic, spineless, good-for-nothing demeanor made Shen Xiabai furious.
"He won't have the energy to beat you," Shen Xiabai suddenly said.
Cui Yunchu raised an eyebrow but pretended not to hear.
She looked up at Zhou Yuanmo and asked, "What about him?"
Shen Xiabai said, "I was acting under His Highness Prince An's orders to teach him a lesson."
Meaning: it has nothing to do with me.
Cui Yunchu was silent for a few breaths before saying, "Isn't that a bit too harsh? Even though he's a jerk, he's still my brother-in-law, Yunfeng's husband."
"The Crown Prince said he quite admires you and wants to give you a reward."
"Really?" Cui Yunchu's eyes lit up, and she smiled.
That scoundrel Xiao Yi was only worth a brief moment of her guilty conscience, and that was barely because of Cui Yunfeng.
"When did he say that? Where's the gift? Is it being delivered or should I go pick it up?" Cui Yunchu pressed urgently.
"I'll take you to get it," Shen Xiabai said, raising an eyebrow, his eyes laced with a sly and meaningful glint.
The Crown Prince’s move must be even more generous than Prince An’s.
“Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go now.”
The two left the room, completely forgetting about the person hanging from the beam.
