Chapter 104: Emotional Crisis

This story is purely fictional.

In the exquisite hotel room, Dai Yunjou realized it was Xiao Yi and felt ashamed of his poor eyesight.

Yunjou was quite embarrassed and wanted to slip away. Seeing that he couldn’t escape, he simply walked up to Xiao Yi.

“You should get up and leave quickly. Everyone here knows me well; if someone sees us, it won’t be good,” Dai Yunjou said anxiously.

“What’s there to be afraid of? Neither of us is married. It’s perfectly normal for a man and a woman to have fun together. I’m a man, and I’m not afraid at all. I don’t see what you have to fear,” Xiao Yi replied indifferently.

“You’re not afraid, but I am. Though I haven’t officially registered my marriage with Gao Yating, we live as husband and wife in fact. We’ve been living together for a long time, and she owns this place. If she decides to fire me, it would be over in an instant. She brought me here from MC to Dahe; I owe her a great debt. I can’t be ungrateful to her,” Dai Yunjou explained.

“That woman? Are you saying you want to be loyal to that old lady? What’s so great about her? I’m younger and much more feminine. She’s rich, right? Well, I have money too. My father’s wealth is enormous—I once saw his bank card balance; you’d be shocked. So, if you want to stay loyal to that woman, does that mean you’re going to betray me?” Xiao Yi shouted loudly.

Dai Yunjou had thought this girl would be easy to handle, but he never expected she would be so difficult. The usually gentle and refined Xiao Yi revealed her true nature today—like a wild horse that could not be tamed.

“My little darling, please leave quickly. I’m begging you,” Dai Yunjou said, glancing nervously at his watch. Usually, if he didn’t return to the villa by this time, Gao Yating would definitely come to the exquisite hotel room the next morning. He was truly afraid of the awkwardness that would follow her arrival.

“All right, all right, I’ll leave,” Xiao Yi said nonchalantly as she slowly put on her clothes.

Once Xiao Yi was dressed, Dai Yunjou eagerly opened the door for her.

He peeked out into the hallway and found it completely quiet, then urged, “Hurry, hurry.”

Xiao Yi grabbed her leather bag and put on a red hairpiece. As she stepped out, she tiptoed and kissed Dai Yunjou on the cheek, shouting, “Goodbye, Uncle!”

As Xiao Yi left the room, Dai Yunjou quickly shut the door.

He placed his hand on his chest, feeling his heart pounding wildly. He thought to himself, at last, he had sent this difficult girl away, then helplessly shook his head.

Under Dai Yunjou’s urging, Xiao Yi hurriedly left the exquisite hotel room.

When the elevator reached the first floor and the doors opened, she quickly stepped out.

Waiting for the elevator on the first floor was Gao Yating, her expression anxious. She had spent the entire night trapped in nightmares, dreaming vividly of her beloved Dai Yunjou entwined intimately with a young woman.

The scene was so clear it felt real, as though it truly happened. She had a foreboding feeling that her man had someone else.

At the moment the elevator doors opened, Xiao Yi stepped out and stood face to face with Gao Yating. Gao Yating felt as if she had seen her somewhere before.

When Gao Yating reached the hotel room, she brushed her hair and tried to calm herself.

She entered by entering the door code and found Dai Yunjou still asleep on the bed.

She searched the room carefully for anything suspicious but found no sign that anyone had been there.

Gao Yating sat on the sofa in the living room, heart pounding with worry but unwilling to wake Dai Yunjou.

She thought back on past events. Since arriving at MC and then Dahe, men had always coveted her beauty, yet she never found one she truly liked, so she never kept a steady partner.

It wasn’t that she couldn’t, but that she didn’t want to.

Everyone around her knew her heart was lonely—this was a fate she could never escape. She could only watch her spirit, overgrown with weeds, remain in a place untouched by any man, growing old and dying gradually.

She and Leng Junfeng had built the company together—it had been ten years in a flash.

Since meeting Dai Yunjou at MC, although she couldn’t say she had truly fallen in love with a man, when she heard from Lv Jiahui that her man had taken up with a young girl—not even eighteen yet—she began feeling a crisis of losing him. Her head was spinning as she kept telling herself, “It can’t be, it can’t be...”

She recalled the pain left by the man she once loved dearly before meeting Wei Er. Each memory was like pouring salt into a wound.

Imagine a woman, braving bitter cold to get an abortion in a hospital, while her boyfriend held another woman in his arms elsewhere—a heartbreak and despair beyond words.

That day was one she would never forget. After leaving the hospital, she just wanted to die. She tried the simplest method—wrist-cutting—but fate did not grant her wish.

Later, at the MC hotel, when a guest attempted to assault her, the seventy-something Wei Er saved her. Since then, she maintained a relationship with him.

During the ten years with Wei Er, he relied on medication to maintain their intimacy, so for her youthful self, satisfaction was scarce.

After Wei Er let her leave MC, she took the five million he gave her, came to Dahe where no one knew her, bought the music bar she now managed, and her career flourished to its current scale.

She knew love was selfish. After so many years with Wei Er, she didn’t love him—only gratitude. On the other hand, though she and Dai Yunjou had only known each other a short time, she felt something close to love. Thinking of his words, “I may not make you happy for a lifetime, but I will make you joyful for one,” she smiled brightly.

Just then, Dai Yunjou opened his eyes and saw Gao Yating sitting silently on the sofa.

“When did you get here?” he asked.

“That doesn’t sound very comfortable. Are we really just ‘you’ and ‘your’ to each other?” Gao Yating said unhappily.

“Oh, I forgot. Of course, we’re not like that,” Dai Yunjou said casually as he got up and dressed.

“Did you sleep late last night? Why do you still look so groggy?” Gao Yating asked.

“Yeah, I went drinking at a farm with a friend and got back late. Still a bit out of it,” Dai Yunjou answered, glancing at his watch as he went to the fridge and handed her a vitamin drink she liked.

She placed the drink on the coffee table and said, “We haven’t been close for several days. Is there a woman in your heart or what?” Gao Yating’s words cut straight to the point.

Dai Yunjou was startled but feigned calm and looked at her indifferently.

Their eyes met, and neither spoke.

At that moment, both were lost in their own thoughts but unwilling to speak openly. Dai Yunjou thought that telling Gao Yating he liked another woman would be too cruel. He knew he had started to like Yi Yi, a girl younger than him. Had he known her true identity earlier, he wouldn’t have ended up sleeping with her. He blamed only his poor eyesight; after such a long time, he never realized Yi Yi was Officer Xiao’s daughter.

Now, they had already crossed a line.

Yunjou knew Gao Yating could never accept this, not to mention Yi Yi’s parents.

Thinking of all this, Dai Yunjou flatly denied the relationship with Yi Yi: “That girl is much younger than me; how could it be possible? From what I understand, the greater the age difference, the bigger the generation gap—a barrier impossible to cross. Don’t doubt my sincerity towards you. Please don’t hold her in your heart.”

“By your logic, the age difference is a generation gap. But you and I differ by almost ten years. Isn’t that also an insurmountable barrier?” Gao Yating asked.

“Our age difference is less than ten years, which is normal. The generation gap is negligible. Honestly, we are both experienced adults, both have been or are married. That girl just graduated high school. Our situation is sensitive. To put it bluntly, what we’re doing is like what mice do. And her father is a public servant, a police officer. Although he helps us, he would never approve of her marriage. I don’t need to think twice—cats and mice can never truly be friends.”

“I want to ask you directly: do you love me or not? Just answer yes or no. Don’t talk to me about cats and mice or natural enemies,” Gao Yating insisted, unwilling to let Dai Yunjou evade the question.

Caught off guard, Dai Yunjou hesitated, unsure how to answer. He struggled to find the right words.

Seeing his hesitation, Gao Yating read his mind and said, “Don’t deliberately hide your true feelings. Answer honestly.”

“Since you say so, I won’t hide it anymore. From the moment you brought me from MC to Dahe, my heart has been filled with immense gratitude,” Dai Yunjou said, looking at her.

(To be continued)