Chapter 22: Cat and Mouse Game
The driver’s window rolled down, and a white, chubby uncle in his fifties with a kind face spoke with a smile.
“What’s wrong, young man? Can’t catch a taxi?”
Qin Wan hurriedly walked up and bowed slightly. “Yes, Uncle. I want to go back to the city. Could I trouble you to give me a ride for part of the way?”
The chubby uncle thought for a moment, then nodded. “Sure, get in.”
A smile bloomed on Qin Wan’s small face. “Thank you, Uncle!”
The front passenger door opened, and Qin Wan climbed in.
Once inside, he found that the luxury of this car exceeded his imagination.
Aside from everything else, there was a leather partition screen between the front and rear rows, isolating the back seat perfectly and tightly. This was quite novel to him.
The car started, and Qin Wan relaxed, chatting with the uncle.
“Uncle, your car must be very expensive, right? It looks very high-class.”
The uncle nodded. “Mn, not cheap. But it’s not my car; it belongs to the boss. I’m just the driver.”
Qin Wan was full of interest. “It can even be partitioned off in the back.”
“Yes, it has that function.”
“Oh, so is the back for sitting people or carrying cargo?”
The uncle laughed. “For a car of this price, of course, it can’t be used to carry cargo!”
At that moment, in the back seat, Gu Xinglan took a bottle of red wine from the simple car rack and poured himself a small half-glass.
Leaning against the soft seat back, his long legs crossed.
Sipping the wine, he stared at the person in front with great interest.
He wasn’t in a hurry to catch Qin Wan.
He wanted him to think he had escaped, and when he thought he was closest to freedom and relief, he would pull him back into the abyss.
Perhaps this would teach him a deeper lesson, one he would remember for a long time.
In the rearview mirror, Qin Wan’s handsome little face was filled with the joy of rebirth.
His smile was brilliant.
So beautiful that Gu Xinglan couldn’t suppress the itch in his heart.
Right now, he was chatting enthusiastically with his driver as if they were old friends.
From this angle, Gu Xinglan could see two or three dark red hickeys left on the side of his neck.
Against the fair skin, they revealed an innocent sense of having been ravaged.
Gu Xinglan held the crystal goblet and took a sip of wine.
Last night, his actions couldn’t be counted as gentle; they carried the flavor of punishment.
He had made him cry several times.
He kept begging for mercy, but Gu Xinglan didn’t grant it.
Thinking back to the days he had imprisoned him, apart from the story he told the night before last, the content of his speech was mostly various forms of submission and begging for mercy.
Or asking and answering whatever Gu Xinglan questioned.
Now, seeing him chatting so warmly with a stranger, Gu Xinglan actually felt a twinge of jealousy.
His eyes darkened.
He took another sip of wine.
He pressed the button for the driver’s intercom earpiece. “Ask him where he’s going.”
Front-row driver: “Child, we’re almost in the city. Where are you going?”
“Third Hospital,” Qin Wan replied.
The driver didn’t make a sound, waiting for his master to speak.
Gu Xinglan: “Approved.”
Driver: “Alright! We’ll be there soon.”
Entering the Imperial Capital city limits, Qin Wan’s heart rose again.
He looked vigilantly out the window, worried that Gu Xinglan might rush out from some street at any moment and catch him.
“Uncle, could I trouble you to drive a little faster?”
The driver didn’t answer.
Only when he heard his boss in the earpiece indicate approval did he nod to Qin Wan. “Okay.”
The luxury car sped all the way and soon arrived at the entrance of the Third Hospital.
Qin Wan got out of the car, turned back to thank the uncle again, and then trotted all the way into the hospital.
The driver asked, “President Gu, shall we leave?”
Gu Xinglan drank the last mouthful of wine in his glass and shook his head.
“Wait for him.”
He knew that within ten minutes, Qin Wan would run back.
He could also guess what his next move would be.
Gu Xinglan felt that playing this originally boring cat-and-mouse game with Qin Wan didn’t seem so boring after all.
The driver looked at the thin back of the young man disappearing from sight and sighed silently.
The last time he saw him, he was tear-stained and unconscious, being carried into the car by his master.
What was the situation today?
Where exactly did this child provoke his living Yama of a boss?
Such a simple, innocent young man would be played to death by his master in minutes.
The uncle sweated for him in his heart.
Qin Wan ran non-stop to the inpatient department and pushed open the ward door, only to see another person lying on Aunt Rong’s bed.
He panicked and immediately found the nurse station.
“I paid a lot of money before; why did you kick the patient out?”
When the nurse told him that Zhou Rong had been picked up and transferred two days ago, Qin Wan froze.
“Transferred?” he repeated.
“Sister nurse, can I borrow your phone for a moment?”
The nurse handed the phone over.
Qin Wan hurried to dial Aunt Rong’s mobile number.
But what made him even more uneasy was that the phone was turned off.
“Who transferred her?” Qin Wan asked, the expression on his small face turning ugly.
The nurse shook her head. “They didn’t say.”
“Then, where was she transferred to?”
The nurse shook her head again. “We don’t know that either.”
Qin Wan panicked.
His first reaction was that Aunt Rong must have been taken away and controlled.
Either by the debt collectors, or…
Gu Xinglan!
Qin Wan rubbed his face hard.
Calm down.
He needed to call the police.
He had to go to the nearest police station and have them open a case immediately.
Qin Wan rushed out of the hospital and found that the luxury car that had brought him here was still parked on the driveway.
He hesitated for a moment, then ran over and tapped on the window.
“Uncle, I’m really sorry to trouble you again, but… could you take me to the nearest police station?”
The uncle naturally agreed.
Ten minutes later, Qin Wan ran into the local substation of this district.
When he stated his name and the content of his report, the duty officer responsible for recording looked up at him.
“Wait a moment.”
He made a phone call.
A moment later, a middle-aged officer who appeared to be of higher rank walked over.
“You are Mr. Qin Wan?” the officer asked.
Qin Wan was somewhat confused but nodded.
The officer continued, “Mr. Qin, I am the substation chief.”
“It’s like this: President Gu of the Huiyao Group just called and said that Ms. Zhou Rong was picked up and settled by his people.”
“President Gu instructed that you should go find him; he wants to talk to you.”
The chief spoke respectfully, but his words set off terrifying waves in Qin Wan’s heart.
Gu Xinglan had not only controlled Aunt Rong but also had the police chief notify him personally.
Qin Wan felt his breathing stop for an instant.
It felt as if his throat was being strangled to death.
Gu Xinglan was undoubtedly using this extremely cruel method to make him realize that even without leg chains or confinement, he could not escape his grasp!
Qin Wan didn’t know how he walked out of the police station gate.
When he saw the “timely rain” luxury car still parked by the roadside, he seemed to realize something.
He could see that the driver uncle now wore a look of worry on his face.
Speaking to him from the window: “Mr. Qin, get in the back.”
Qin Wan stood fixedly in front of the luxury car.
People came and went around him, but in his vision, they became blurred shadows.
The street was noisy with human voices, but in his ears, they became a faint humming.
Separated by a car door.
Outside was the clear, bright world, while inside was the fiery abyss of eternal damnation.
He seemed to feel the man’s gaze from the other side of the door staring at him.
Qin Wan’s entire body was trembling.
It was noon, and the sun was shining high.
He was wearing thick clothes, yet he still felt a bone-chilling cold pouring fiercely into his heart.
But he had absolutely no room to choose.
The man in the car had ruthlessly seized his fatal weakness!
After a long time, Qin Wan took a deep breath. He reached out and gently touched the door handle.
The door slowly opened from the inside.
Qin Wan lowered his head, his lips pressed into a tight, straight line.
He lifted his leg, his movements slow and stiff like a video buffering, and climbed into the car cabin.
The door closed automatically, completely cutting off the world behind him.
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