No matter how vivid Ning Zhen’s imagination was, she never expected that behind the safe in Meng Xianwen’s dressing room would be a pair of handcuffs.
Her breathing slowed, then turned rapid.
Even so, she still clung to a sliver of hope. She yanked the handcuffs out in one go, producing a clattering jangle that sounded especially harsh and jarring in the house that belonged only to her.
After examining it meticulously, she realized it truly was just a finely crafted, hyper-realistic toy pair of handcuffs—and she fell silent.
The silence lasted a full minute. Then she erupted.
Tossing the handcuffs aside, she grabbed her phone. Her fingers had never moved that fast in her life, typing nearly at the speed of light: 【Hahaha I opened your safe! What’s with the thing inside??】
What answered her was silence as well.
She waited patiently for several minutes, but no reply came from Meng Xianwen.
In that brief span of time, she tasted what it felt like to be on a roller coaster of emotions. For a split second, she wanted to race over to Hengxing Group and smash the thing in his face—but that was just a thought. She didn’t even call to confront him.
In Ning Zhen’s personal dictionary, the word “give up” didn’t exist either.
She steeled herself and stood up.
If she could crack open one safe, she could crack open a second. With that thought burning in her mind, she stormed out of the master bedroom. But that fierce, competitive mood deflated like a balloon with a pinhole the moment she reached the study door.
Forget it.
Meng Xianwen’s study…
She really didn’t dare to enter without his permission.
Who knew if this bout of amnesia had made him as suspicious, anxious, and overthinking as his grandfather?
Still holding onto a shred of reason and restraint, Ning Zhen immediately turned and retreated back to the master bedroom’s dressing room. After admiring his watch display cabinet, her thoughts drifted once more to the handcuffs she’d tossed onto the carpet.
Could it be that she simply didn’t recognize quality goods? Maybe this wasn’t an ordinary pair of handcuffs—maybe it was priceless?
Her mind began to churn.
“Let me take another look!” she muttered to herself.
After all, it was already hers!
…
When the phone rang in the drawer, Meng Xianwen furrowed his brow and instinctively glanced at the computer clock: 4:58.
A strange emotion rose in him, one he could only describe as odd.
Plenty of people texted and called him every day—why would his first reaction be that it was Ning Zhen?
Seeing that it was still early, he let out an almost imperceptible sigh of relief. But when he pulled open the drawer and glimpsed the name “Zhenzhen” flashing on the screen, his calm expression froze for an instant. It wasn’t even 5:30 yet—why was she calling?
Even so, he answered.
Before he could speak, her breathless voice came through: “Meng Xianwen, it’s me.”
“I know,” he said. “What’s wrong?”
Based on his understanding of her, she was most likely calling to wheedle the safe’s password out of him.
He said, “Don’t ask me. I don’t know the password either.”
If he remembered correctly, it had been delivered by Jiaran. Two years ago, a friend of Meng Jiaran’s had started a smart security company. Jiaran, being the loyal sort, even while studying abroad, placed the first order of dozens of safes to support his friend’s business and gave them away as gifts.
Ning Zhen immediately shot back: “Who do you think you’re looking down on? I opened it!”
Meng Xianwen’s tone took on a hint of teasing. “Impressive.” A brief pause. “So?”
“Can you just leave work and come home right now?” She went quiet for a rare few seconds—no quarreling, no fussing—her voice subdued. “Meng Xianwen, come back now, okay? I know it’s only five—”
“4:59.”
“…” Ning Zhen gritted her teeth. “Fine, 4:59. Then this time I owe you thirty-one minutes. You remember that. I’ll use it later, deal?”
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“Promise me first!”
Meng Xianwen leaned back, lost in thought.
Ning Zhen grew anxious, but she also knew now wasn’t the time for a head-on clash. She sniffled into the phone. “Forty minutes, okay?”
“What exactly is going on?”
“Come back first!”
Through their time together recently, Meng Xianwen had formed a whole new understanding of her. In the image she had torn down and rebuilt, she was willful and flamboyant, occasionally unreasonable, but always maintaining just the right measure of restraint.
That was also one of the reasons he still considered their relationship so puzzling.
In a way, she knew him very well.
She knew when to stop, and she knew his boundaries.
“Fine.”
“Then I’ll wait for you!” As if afraid he might change his mind, she hung up the moment he agreed—without wasting a second.
Silence returned to his ears. Meng Xianwen’s gaze shifted back to the computer screen, lingered briefly, then he picked up the desk phone and dialed an internal line to notify Xiao Ding, his driver, to wait for him in the underground garage—he’d be down in five minutes.
Meng Jiaran, on his first day of work, didn’t have an official position yet.
He was idling in the assistant’s office, since no one had assigned him anything. Like all new hires, he was stuck familiarizing himself with Hengxing culture. The dense wall of text had him yawning nonstop. But just as one yawn was about to escape, a photo of his grandfather and father popped up on the screen, instantly jarring him awake.
He was so sleepy.
And it was still nearly an hour until the 6:00 PM end of the workday.
Meng Jiaran stretched at his desk, stood up, and headed to the restroom to splash some water on his face and clear his head. But just as he stepped out of the assistant’s office, a few yards away, he ran straight into his brother, who was hurrying over with the clear intention of leaving early.
He blinked and raised his wrist to check his watch.
Wasn’t it still before 5:30?
The two brothers crossed paths in the hallway. Meng Jiaran called out, “Brother, you’re leaving this early?”
Meng Xianwen glanced at him.
While shutting down his computer, he had also glanced at the message Ning Zhen had sent. She had called him in a pleading, aggrieved tone asking him to come home early, and though she refused to say what was wrong on the phone, he guessed it had to do with that safe from Meng Jiaran.
“I’ll deal with you tomorrow.”
He left that one line, walked past the utterly bewildered Meng Jiaran, and was gone.
Meng Jiaran stood there, baffled. “…?”
-
It wasn’t yet rush hour, so the drive from Hengxing Group to Yun Garden was smooth and unobstructed. Xiao Ding glanced in the rearview mirror and saw Meng Xianwen repeatedly checking his watch. He got the message, pressed down on the accelerator, and arrived at the underground garage two minutes earlier than usual.
Xiao Ding initially planned to get out as well—even unbuckling his seatbelt—but Meng Xianwen, already pushing open the car door, instructed in a low voice, “Stay in the car and wait.”
“Understood, Mr. Meng.”
Meng Xianwen got out and walked briskly into the elevator.
All the way, he was curious, guessing what could have happened to her. But the situation was too sudden; he had no clue. When he entered the house, his expression unconsciously turned serious, and his footsteps lost their usual composure.
He stepped into the master bedroom and called out, “Zhenzhen?”
“I’m in here!”
Almost immediately, her delighted voice came from the dressing room.
Meng Xianwen: “…”
It didn't seem like anything serious had happened.
He felt a little relieved and turned into the dressing room. He only stood at the door, glancing quickly at the situation inside, when he locked eyes with Ning Zhen by accident. After more than ten seconds of silence, he looked away, a low laugh escaping his throat.
“Don’t laugh!”
Ning Zhen was both embarrassed and irritated.
A few strands of hair stuck messily to her flushed cheeks.
She had always been good at accusing others first and twisting the facts, and this time was no exception. She wiggled her cuffed hands and said crossly, “You were messing with me on purpose, weren’t you? You knew the safe had that thing inside, and you still tricked me into opening it—you—”
“And then you cuffed yourself?”
Meng Xianwen, after he’d had his fill of laughing, walked toward her step by step. She was sitting on the sofa while he stood, his figure seeming to completely envelope her.
“Do I look that dumb?” she defended herself. “I saw there was a key, so I was just studying it…”
But what she hadn’t expected was that once she’d cuffed herself, her hands were trapped, and the range of movement was extremely limited—not enough to use the key to unlock them. She’d tried every possible way, over and over. Several times, the key almost went into the lock, but she couldn’t apply enough force and it slipped away.
“Help me unlock it,” she said pitifully. “My hands hurt.”
Meng Xianwen bent down and picked up the key from the black obsidian coffee table beside him.
The distance between them kept shrinking, until their breaths intertwined.
His was calm; hers was quick and shallow.
Ning Zhen held back, resisting the urge to glare at him—she wasn’t deaf to his muffled laughter.
Click.
The moment the cuffs came off, she was instantly revived. She was an expert at crossing the bridge after burning it, and she shoved him away, accusing, “Why is that thing in your safe? Are you—”
A total pervert!
Meng Xianwen didn’t get annoyed by her shove, but the suspicion in her words displeased him. He cut her off. “What nonsense are you talking about? Jiaran had it delivered. I never even opened it once.”
He had no idea who made that safe.
How could he ever use it? And why would he put anything valuable inside?
“Jiaran gave it to you?” Ning Zhen was taken aback.
Luckily, she had a good memory. She suddenly recalled that there was indeed such a thing—it must have been quite a while ago. One night, she’d gotten a call from Meng Jiaran, who said some acquaintance of his had started a smart security company and had ordered several safes. He offered her one.
At the time, she was suffering through a lowly internship, so she’d coldly refused. It wasn’t like she could use it anyway, right?
Did she have a ton of savings, or a pile of diamonds and gold?
“Otherwise, do you think I’d have let you open it?”
Meng Xianwen shot back.
“So, you were still messing with me!” Ning Zhen fumed. “You did it on purpose!”
And she’d actually been genuinely excited about it for the past half hour.
Faced with her unreasonable accusations, Meng Xianwen didn’t comment. He lowered his eyes, staring at the marks on her wrists, and let out a silent sigh.
He admitted it—he’d also caused himself no small amount of trouble.
Without another word, he turned and walked out.
Ning Zhen couldn’t believe her eyes as she watched his retreating back. She’d only said a few words, and he was already giving her the cold shoulder? With that thought, she got up abruptly and chased after him, muttering, “If you’d just told me earlier that it was a safe Jiaran gave you and there was nothing in it, I—”
“I wouldn’t have called you to come back early…”
She said that last part very softly.
She wasn’t unaware of how important work was to him.
But at that critical moment, other than him, she didn’t know who else to turn to.
Truthfully, at first she’d thought about calling her parents or Guo Xia, but that wasn’t practical either. They all lived far from Yuyuan, and even if they came over, they couldn’t get in.
Meng Xianwen reached the living room.
He ignored her muttering behind him. Following his memory, he found the first-aid kit in a cabinet, glanced back at her, and tilted his chin to signal her to go to the sofa. “Stop fussing. Go sit down.”
Ning Zhen froze for a second.
She stared at the first-aid kit in his hand, then shifted her gaze, as if the dull ache on her wrists had just caught up with her.
“Oh…”
She pressed down on the corners of her lips that kept curling up, turned lightly like she was floating, and sat down. “It is a little sore now, so that’s why I called you.”
Meng Xianwen sat down beside her.
He opened the kit, fumbling through it somewhat awkwardly, and found some ointment and cotton swabs.
His movements weren’t particularly careful, but he still applied the ointment as gently as he could to the marks on her wrists.
Ning Zhen flinched.
He wrapped his hand around hers, not allowing her to move.
“Can you save your curiosity for somewhere else from now on?” he said.
“I’m not that curious!” she insisted stubbornly. “Who wouldn’t want to open a safe if they saw one?”
“Me.”
That single word hit Ning Zhen’s funny bone, and she burst out laughing.
When she laughed, her eyes curved like crescent moons. “Well then, aren’t you something special.”
Meng Xianwen wasn’t actually as annoyed about his work being interrupted as she’d assumed. Even if he were, it had been drowned out by the little “comedy” she’d put on. He tossed the used cotton swab into the trash can and, for once, cracked a joke with her. “Alright, then. Let me show you a real safe.”
“Really?”
She perked up instantly, then quickly got up and chased after him, asking questions.
A smile tugged at the corner of Meng Xianwen’s mouth. As if taking a leisurely stroll, he led her into his study.
Ning Zhen had been to Yuyuan once before, but she’d only lingered in the living room briefly. Today, she’d seen his master bedroom for the first time, let alone his study.
“This is it?”
He’d built it up so mysteriously, and it turned out to be just an ordinary safe.
Ning Zhen couldn’t hide her disappointment and gave a fair assessment: “It doesn’t even look as fancy as the one Jiaran gave you.”
Meng Xianwen said flatly, “Alright, let’s go.”
“Hey, hey, hey, wait!” Ning Zhen quickly grabbed his arm and looked up at him. “I meant, this one isn’t worthy of you.”
“Not many people keep too many valuables at home.”
“Then where do you keep yours?” she pressed.
Meng Xianwen glanced at her with amusement. “Tell you?”
Ning Zhen gave a light snort. “Fine, don’t tell me if you don’t want to.”
She’d find out sooner or later!
She stared at the safe with clear disappointment. Although it looked ordinary, she could guess by the slight that it wasn’t empty—whatever was inside would be worth a fortune. She sighed. “I wish I’d said I wanted to open the safe in the study instead.”
Meng Xianwen looked at her wrists.
Then he thought of the pathetic way she’d cuffed herself, and he laughed very softly. “Give it a try. If you open it—”
Before he could finish the sentence, she asked full of energy, “I get everything inside?”
Meng Xianwen gave her a look that said, “How many drinks have you had to think like that?” and said, “Pick one thing you like.”
“Really?”
“Try it.”
Ning Zhen was naturally eager to give it a shot.
This time, she didn’t start with six zeros. Given how smugly he seemed to assume she’d never guess the password, she ruled out six zeros immediately.
Ning Zhen took a deep breath and slowly entered the code.
4.
The moment she typed the first 4, a flicker of surprise crossed Meng Xianwen’s composed face. His gaze gradually moved from the keypad to her bright, shimmering eyes. She was fully focused, with a hint of a smile at the corners of her lips.
All six digits were entered.
The safe swung open.
Ning Zhen had a look of triumphant glee on her face, as if her tail were about to wag right off. She exclaimed in delight, “It’s Granny Wang’s birthday—I knew I hadn’t gotten it wrong!”
-----------------------
