◎ “He’ll absolutely die of jealousy!” ◎

That evening’s gathering had actually been arranged to welcome Lu Rangchen and the others back from the competition.

Beyond the club members, some of the staff would be coming as well — plus Zhou Jin and Li Tie. By that count, roughly a dozen people in total.

Which was exactly why Yunque had been worried the ingredients wouldn’t be enough — she’d been planning to make another supermarket run before Lu Rangchen got home.

And then Lu Rangchen had walked in without warning.

Not only that — he’d completely upended her rhythm, indulging the two of them in that corner of privacy together.

Ordinarily Yunque was quite rule-abiding.

Even after Lu Rangchen had pulled her into the car, her thoughts were still drifting back upstairs to the laundry room.

Like a good student who’d done something wrong, constantly afraid of being caught.

After all, the laundry room had a bathroom.

That bathroom was near the study. If Deng Jiao happened to wander over and see something she shouldn’t —

Lu Rangchen, however, said: “What is there to see — it’s not like she’s a dog who goes looking through the trash.”

Still that same unrestrained, unfazed manner.

Sharp and cutting.

And yet that careless ease made you feel safe, made your heart secretly pleased.

Yunque couldn’t help the flicker of a smile at her brow.

Lu Rangchen helped her fasten her seatbelt, then tilted her chin up and kissed her lips, saying: “Don’t worry. It’s all cleaned up. The bin’s spotless too.”

“……”

That low, warm voice — attentive and perfectly timed.

Warmth spread slowly to her ears.

The lingering haze of what had just passed between them — barely dissipated — seemed to be coaxed back to the surface by this man once again.

Yunque was increasingly convinced that when it was just the two of them, this man was like some irresistible addiction — impossible to escape.

The tangled thoughts crowded in. She turned and looked out the car window. “Let’s go quickly — we’ll be late.”

Still flushing, same as ever.

Catching the red tip of her ear from the corner of his eye, Lu Rangchen let out a brief, light laugh, and stepped on the accelerator with clean, decisive ease.

Summer vacation differed from the winter break in one particular way — everywhere was lively.

And on top of that, the two of them were heading to a supermarket inside a shopping mall.

The crowd surged and milled in every direction.

Tonight’s plan was BBQ on the second-floor open-air terrace. They had enough BBQ ingredients, but Yunque worried it was too simple, so she made her way to the snack and fruit sections as well.

Perhaps it was the years she’d spent living alone in the capital.

Yunque selected everything with great care, comparing prices, weighing up value for money.

Lu Rangchen, on the other hand, had no such patience. His approach to shopping had always been: pick it up and go. He never checked prices, never made comparisons. If he wanted it, it was in the cart.

So inevitably, after watching this happen two or three times, he genuinely couldn’t stand it anymore, and stepped in to make choices for Yunque.

Somehow, by some mix of luck or instinct, everything he picked was precisely what Yunque had been eyeing and hadn’t let herself buy.

Into the cart they went, one after another.

Yunque looked at him, caught between wanting to say something and holding back.

Lu Rangchen caught it from the side of his eye. “What? Wrong choices?”

“……”

Was it a matter of wrong or right?

It was a matter of too expensive.

Two pieces of durian flesh — fifty yuan. A small box of cherries — eighty. He’d picked up two.

What kind of prices were these? Was this not daylight robbery?

And besides, with this many people sharing everything, there still wouldn’t be enough of these for everyone — she’d never intended them as gathering fruit to begin with.

She didn’t want to argue over it. Yunque quietly put everything back where it came from.

Lu Rangchen picked it all up and put it back in the cart.

Yunque laughed in exasperation. “So you’re just going to do the exact opposite of everything I do?”

Lu Rangchen raised an eyebrow, putting on an air of genuine grievance. “Do the opposite? Teacher, would I dare?”

He gestured with his chin at the items. “Wasn’t it you who wanted them?”

“……”

And there it was — the honeyed flattery rolling out, smooth as anything. She had no idea where he’d picked up that trick.

Though to be fair, it was that last line that left her speechless.

Right. He’d noticed she wanted them ages ago.

Lu Rangchen gave her a knowing look. “It’s just two items of fruit. It’s not as though we can’t afford it.”

“……”

“I’m not buying them for other people,” Yunque said.

Lu Rangchen tilted his head toward her. “Who said I was buying them for other people?”

Turning the logic over once more, he let out a short, dry laugh. “What are you implying, Yunque? Hmm? Who exactly are you insulting?”

He swept the remaining boxes of cherries from the shelf and into the cart with lavish, unbothered ease. “If I can’t even afford this for you, do I deserve to have married you?”

“……”

Yunque was suddenly at a loss for words.

Lu Rangchen, on the other hand, was worked up now, shooting her a look of suppressed displeasure. “Yunque, are you deliberately trying to annoy me?”

She felt, for some reason, a twinge of guilt.

Yunque moved her lips. “No,” she said quietly.

“Then are you short on money lately?” Lu Rangchen asked, with the exact tone of a parent gently questioning a child.

Yunque’s lips twitched. She raised her clear eyes to him. “Do I look like it?”

That was said with total confidence.

That expression, those eyes — all but stamping the words on her forehead: I am a woman of means. I have money.

Lu Rangchen was immediately charmed into a laugh.

He made a goading little sound, drawling with easy nonchalance: “Oh yes, very much a woman of means. Fifty thousand in pocket money plus one month’s salary as a public school teacher.”

“Spent over ten thousand on a new washing machine.”

“And about to foot the bill for a dinner party of fifteen.”

“……”

Laid out like that, it was genuinely a little hard to look at.

Even so, Yunque held her ground with magnificent, defiant pennilessness: “I still have thirty thousand, don’t I. Thirty thousand is plenty.”

She said it and immediately looked away, fidgeting slightly — entirely unaware of how soft and endearing she looked in that moment.

Lu Rangchen watched her. His throat moved. He laughed.

At least now he had a rough picture of the actual depth of her funds. Better than never knowing, forever unable to give her money, forever worrying about whether she had enough.

As it was, this girl hadn’t a shred of conscience — she pressed her lips together and refused to look at him, pushing the cart forward without a word.

That slender back, beautiful and stubborn all at once.

Lu Rangchen tugged his mouth into a faint arc, matched his steps to hers with unhurried ease, and settled an arm around her shoulders, drawing her to his side. “There’s something I want to discuss with you.”

The tone had lost its earlier flippancy. Something more sincere had taken its place.

Yunque stopped walking and looked at him.

Lu Rangchen, with the patience of a saint: “How about this. From now on, I put all my money with you. Whatever the amount — you manage it. Does that work for you?”

She hadn’t expected him to bring something like this up so directly and seriously.

Yunque blinked, caught off guard.

“Why?” she asked, when she’d found her voice.

“What do you mean why — isn’t that just how it works?”

Lu Rangchen said it with a careless, matter-of-fact air: “Don’t most men hand their earnings over to their wives?”

That wasn’t wrong, in principle.

But in reality — how many actually followed through?

Take Zhu Ping’an, for example. He didn’t. He kept things from Deng Jiali, hid money away.

Some of the female friends Yunque knew had partners the same way — men who did precise, calculating arithmetic about their own pockets while their girlfriend saw none of it.

So she’d genuinely never imagined that Lu Rangchen would think this way.

Or that he’d be this open about it with her.

For a moment she didn’t know what to say — she just looked at him, wordless.

Lu Rangchen’s gaze drifted, without quite meaning to, to her faintly pink lips.

His eyes narrowed slightly. “Keep looking at me like that and I’ll kiss you right here.”

“……”

Her heart lurched like a branch caught in a sudden warm wind.

Yunque was immediately transported back — to the two of them in those early days of dating, sneaking away from Feng Yanlai and Cheng Liru to some deserted corner behind the supermarket, and the deep, lingering kiss they’d shared there.

Even the taste of his lips had been exactly the same — clean and fresh.

That memory was vivid and near.

As if eight years had been nothing more than a brief snap of the fingers.

And the girl she’d been then — how could she have dared imagine that the person who would one day share her life would truly be Lu Rangchen?

She drifted for a few seconds.

When her focus returned, Lu Rangchen had already leaned in close. He pressed his lips to the shell of her ear — controlled, intimate — his voice dropping low and warm, coaxing and just barely laced with something that pulled at her: “Think of it as doing me a favor. Looking after things on my behalf. Is that alright?”

Is that alright. Those three words — they were like a command written specifically for Yunque.

Every time he said them, she crumbled.

She steadied herself, then looked up at him. “What would you need me to do?”

Lu Rangchen smiled. “The money goes to you. You spend it however you like.”

A generous thing to say. Plenty of men had said it.

But the circumstances here were plainly different from those other men.

For them, a monthly salary of ten or twenty thousand — strip away mortgage, car payments, daily expenses, and not much remained. Saying something like that was mostly empty words to keep a girlfriend happy. When money ran short, the blame would come soon enough.

Lu Rangchen’s situation was in a different category.

Everyone knew his income started by the year. He ran an entire club. The weight of what was in his accounts — Yunque understood it better than most. Which was precisely why his words felt so heavy.

But the way she received them — that slightly overwhelmed, uncomprehending look — read differently through Lu Rangchen’s eyes.

He didn’t want her overthinking.

Lu Rangchen dropped his gaze and added plainly: “You don’t need to worry — other than this mortgage, I have no debts.”

She genuinely hadn’t expected him to think of something that specific, that practical.

Yunque’s lips twitched. Without quite meaning to, she raised her hand and pressed it gently over his lips, stilling their movement.

Lu Rangchen’s throat shifted. His brow furrowed slightly with the curve of a quiet laugh. “What?”

Yunque looked at him directly, her pulse beating too fast. “You don’t need to tell me all this.”

“……”

“I married you. There’s nothing left to be afraid of.”

Love words are sometimes like that.

The ones said deliberately — sweet, but cloying.

The ones that slip out unguarded — born from the truest feeling — are the ones that move people most, the ones that are most impossible to withstand.

Like Lu Rangchen in this moment.

Feeling the soft, warm pressure of her fingertips, he smiled. His eyes were clear and deep, full of warmth. “Yunque — if you keep looking at me like that, I really am going to kiss you.”

Said it, and did it.

Lu Rangchen pulled her hand away, cupped the back of her head, and pressed his mouth to hers.

Her lips parted. His tongue swept lightly across.

It happened so suddenly that Yunque’s mind went blank. She hadn’t even closed her eyes before she was already aware of the glances from other shoppers around them.

She pushed him away immediately.

Lu Rangchen looked at her, eyes lazily shameless.

Yunque’s ears burned red. She gave his shoulder one firm, helpless tap in protest, and said: “Public place. Know your limits.”

That tap landed, and Lu Rangchen let out a muffled, satisfied laugh.

“The Teacher is absolutely right.”

…

Alright, when Yunque put on her stern face it was still soft and feather-light.

But it had some effect.

After that gentle reprimand, Lu Rangchen behaved well enough for the rest of the shopping trip. She said buy something, he helped pick it. If she didn’t want something, he didn’t push.

The boxes of cherries went back — all but one. The durian stayed.

As Yunque put it: money doesn’t blow in on the wind. No matter how wealthy you are, that’s no reason for waste.

The logic of a teacher — delivered differently from anyone else.

Lu Rangchen shook his head and sighed, thoroughly resigned, but somewhere in the back of his mind quietly thought: they’d eventually be raising children, after all. It really would do to be a little more careful.

Of course a promise isn’t made just to be spoken.

After they finished shopping and restocked, Lu Rangchen stepped up to pay, and transferred another twenty thousand to Yunque on top of it, planning to hand over the main account into her management when they got home.

Shortly after, the group of younger ones called — announcing they were already on their way and would arrive soon.

Jiang Sui’s voice crackled through the car’s speaker, bouncing and full of energy.

Lu Rangchen’s manner with him was nothing like gentle or accommodating — he told the lot of them to get there early and help set up the food.

Jiang Sui, cheerful as always, said absolutely, on it.

Even just listening, Yunque felt her mood lift.

They got back to the house to find the club boys already there.

A roomful of bright, lively faces — pleasantly chaotic.

It was then that Yunque remembered there was still a little one studying upstairs. They’d been out a while — she had no idea whether she’d been behaving herself.

She glanced at Lu Rangchen. “Why don’t you go check on her? I’ll get some snacks out for everyone.”

Lu Rangchen gave a nod. “Alright.”

Before leaving, he gave her head a brief, casual ruffle, and told the group of younger boys: “Don’t give my wife any trouble.”

These young men — with all that youthful mischief — naturally leapt at the opportunity to tease. Laughing and nudging each other, they all said: as if we’d dare, as if we’d dare.

Yunque’s face turned red on cue.

She said nothing. She turned her back to them, went back to cutting the fruit in her usual unhurried way — and quietly curved her lips.

Upstairs was far too quiet.

Lu Rangchen had barely reached the top of the stairs when he noticed the study door was ajar.

The small figure inside was hunched over something at the desk, absorbed in it, a barely concealed excitement flickering in her eyes.

As the saying went: when a child goes suspiciously still, mischief is being made.

Lu Rangchen’s brow pulled together. He pushed the door open directly, his voice dropping low in a clipped command: “What are you looking at. Hand it over.”

That single burst of sound nearly sent Deng Jiao sliding off her chair in fright.

She blinked her wide, dark eyes, soul half-departed. “Holy—” she said, “—when did you come back!?”

Even as she said it, she was already trying to hide whatever was tucked under her arm, as though she’d been caught looking at something deeply inappropriate.

That act of concealment.

Made the expression on Lu Rangchen’s already sharp face go darker still.

He didn’t bother engaging with her wriggling. He simply held out his hand and said: “Hand it over.”

“……”

Deng Jiao clutched the item to her chest, voice unsteady. “Are you sure?”

Lu Rangchen gave a short, cold laugh. “Say that again, why don’t you.”

“……”

She knew perfectly well that arguing with Lu Rangchen was useless.

She pouted and said: “Fine.”

She placed it in his hand. “I’m giving it to you, but you better not go telling her it was me who found it — and don’t tell the Teacher I looked.”

She paused, then added with an exaggerated expression: “I only looked a tiny bit. The tiniest bit—”

She hadn’t finished her awkward laugh when Lu Rangchen’s expression cooled.

“You were looking at her things?”

“……Well, what else would I be looking at.”

Deng Jiao said: “Did you think I was reading something—” she lowered her voice “—restricted?”

“……”

Before he could even deal with her further, she added: “Though honestly, my advice is you don’t look either. Because you’ll only get upset.”

Deng Jiao spoke with exaggerated weight. “Very upset, very jealous — that kind of upset!”

She’d have been better off not saying anything.

That sentence managed to hook Lu Rangchen’s curiosity.

Even so.

He didn’t open it. He just clicked his tongue and said: “Can you speak plainly. What is it, exactly?”

A firm word from him —

Deng Jiao pressed her lips together and said: “It’s the Teacher’s secret diary from high school. When she had a crush on someone.”

“……”

Lu Rangchen’s dark eyes went very still.

Deng Jiao, seeing that, helpfully advised: “Really though, Lu Rangchen, you shouldn’t look.”

“I’ve read a bit of it. She was completely, totally, head over heels for this boy — and if you see it, you will absolutely die of jealousy.”