Chapter 60

Chapter 60

As touching as this is, now's not the time for that.

Bian Han quickly blinked her stinging eyes, swiftly picked up the bag of clothes, took out a towel, and wrapped it around Jiang Jining. "Hurry, change your clothes first, sweetie."

Seeing her urgency, Jiang Jining (Guai Guai) followed her instructions to the shower room. He changed into dry clothes. He was halfway through drying his hair when Bian Han started knocking on the door. "Can I come in?"

"Okay."

Jiang Jining opened the door himself.

Bian Han touched his hair, which was already half-dry, and took him to sit in the living room. She ruffled his wonderfully smooth cheek, then plopped down opposite him, almost breaking a sweat herself. "Good thing I hadn't left yet."

Jiang Jining also realized he had seemingly caused trouble.

_Was everyone worried?_

"I'm really sorry, Miss Bian, I still haven't found your earring—" Aunt Tao turned, saw who it was, and froze, as moved as if she were seeing him after a long absence: "Xiao Ning, you're willing to come back?"

"You had a fight with Fu Yuze, got upset, and secretly asked your grandparents to take you home." Bian Han immediately jumped in with the cover story.

So that was it!

Jiang Jining received the signal and quickly pulled a long face. But after a month at home being pampered by his parents, his healthy, rosy glow gave him away. He could only press his lips together in silence.

"Will you go see the master?" Aunt Tao's first thought was to soften things up on behalf of her employer: "The master really and truly realizes he was wrong. He went to soak in the backyard pool in the middle of the night just to give himself a high fever..."

"Where is he now?"

Jiang Jining pushed himself up from the sofa.

Seeing that she couldn't hide it anymore, Bian Han cut in calmly: "Since you made the special trip, you should go. Have a good talk and clear things up."

Aunt Tao kept fretting about him being careful.

Climbing stairs wasn't easy for Jiang Jining in his late pregnancy. Bian Han shooed Aunt Tao off to inform Uncle Lu of the situation and accompanied him into the elevator. "Fu Yuze went looking for you, did you know? Didn't you plan to come back together?"

"We had." Jiang Jining suddenly remembered something, his eyes reddening. "A-Han, how could you play such a trick on him."

Bian Han was confused. "What?"

Remembering those days, Jiang Jining felt a mix of sweetness and heartache: "He was dying to see me but couldn't speak. You have no idea... If I had recognized him a moment later, he would have been beaten by Father for accidentally seeing me change clothes."

Oh my.

Bian Han covered her rising smile with her hand. She couldn't joke when Jiang Jining was feeling down, so she told the truth: "There was no other way. Last time I went to your place, I was too anxious. It wasn't good to go around asking everyone for their birth dates, so I could only find an honest child to pump for information."

Basically, I used money to grease the wheels.

This time, things were much more convenient for Fu Yuze.

Everything has its pros and cons—

The identity Bian Han arranged for Fu Yuze was that of a mute servant boy named Shi'an, who worked sweeping and cleaning in the front courtyard of the Jiang residence all day. His appearance was nondescript, but the advantage was that this identity was inconspicuous and safe. He wouldn't starve, lived within the Jiang residence, and could see Jiang Jining in a matter of minutes.

"I kept reminding him to be careful."

Bian Han knew the Jiang family treated their servants quite well and wouldn't casually beat or scold them. Thus, her morals and her sense of humor were at war: "You didn't take Fu Yuze into your room to do your laundry and cooking, did you?"

"..."

Seeing the excitement and curiosity in Bian Han's eyes, Jiang Jining explained: "After Father and Mother found out I was pregnant with Ya'er, they secretly hired a physician to live in the residence and take care of me. Ever since Shi'an was caught entering my room at night, Father, in a fit of anger, sent him to the South Gate, the farthest from my courtyard, to collect horse manure. Whenever I mentioned him, Mother would get angry, saying he stared at me with ill intentions..."

Shi'an was the mute servant whose body Fu Yuze had possessed.

After returning home for about a month, Jiang Jining really had no chance to ask for Fu Yuze to enter his courtyard. He could only have the small kitchen, which prepared delicacies for him, set aside a portion of each meal and have a maid secretly deliver it to Fu Yuze.

During the day, his family surrounded him.

At night, the two only had a chance to meet and talk every few days.

And Fu Yuze couldn't even speak!

Perhaps because he was wearing Shi'an's skin, and Fu Yuze knew memories would remain, he was unwilling to touch any part of Jiang Jining using another's body. Forget intimate matters; he wouldn't even stay in the room after helping his wife with the foot-washing water, refusing to look.

Fu Yuze didn't want a single inch of Jiang Jining's skin to remain in someone else's deepest memories, living a life of utter abstinence.

He never said a single suggestive word.

He even declined several invitations from Jiang Jining to feel Dou Ya'er.

Jiang Jining thought of those days when Fu Yuze, after collecting horse manure and finishing his work, would squeeze into a room with other servants at night. Exhausted from the day, he would still miss him and couldn't sleep. He would sit outside Jiang Jining's courtyard for most of the night, occasionally finding time to write him stacks of letters, sharing interesting gossip from the residence.

Fu Yuze, borrowing Shi'an's body, never slacked off in his work. Except for the first time he was caught by the master peeking at Jiang Jining, he worked diligently and never tarnished the other's reputation.

He was genuinely experiencing life in the Jiang residence.

"But—"

"Aunt Huanqing helped me a lot."

Jiang Jining remembered some interesting things and told Bian Han: "Several times, when Fu Yuze missed me terribly, he would still climb the wall into my courtyard. I would secretly move a stool and wait. He said Aunt Huanqing, carrying a lantern, saw him but pretended not to know. Later, she even helped deliver letters for him and put in a good word for him in front of Mother."

Huanqing?

The head maid by the Duchess's side.

Bian Han quickly understood the whole story.

Having been possessed by her, Huanqing naturally knew about this soul-swapping technique. This girl was clever and perceptive; there was no need for her to say something thankless like reminding her mistress that Shi'an was attentive to Jiang Jining.

It seems...

Huanqing guessed that Shi'an had the same experience as her. Later, after Fu Yuze left, by confiding in him, she could also learn from Shi'an's mouth what kind of person her young master's husband was.

What a clever girl.

Shi'an was an honest child. The Jiang residence steward usually took good care of him and understood sign language. When Shi'an woke up and wanted to tell Huanqing everything Fu Yuze had done and thought while in his body, it wouldn't be completely impossible just because he was mute.

Good, good, good...

Let's hope Fu Yuze, who was always thinking of sneaking into Jiang Jining's boudoir, didn't leave too much evidence behind!