Chapter 47
Lu Xiao felt as though he’d just heard something utterly fantastical. He apologized instinctively.
“Sorry, I—this is my responsibility.”
Meng Xueyuan was startled inside. That wasn’t right—he truly hadn’t slept with Lu Xiao. The specialist had wronged him, so why was Lu Xiao admitting it?
“Tsk, listen to my mouth running. Without an ultrasound we can’t conclude it’s a false pregnancy,” the specialist said. “Xuanxuan, lie down. I’ll do an abdominal ultrasound.”
Meng Xueyuan obediently lay down, lifted his shirt, revealing a flat lower abdomen.
The probe swept over his abdomen once. The director stared at the monitor. “Nothing visible, but we can’t rule out very early implantation—we might not have found the gestational sac yet.”
“When was your last sexual intercourse?”
Meng Xueyuan glanced at Lu Xiao. “Two months ago.”
The specialist said, “Don’t cover for him. Say it as it is. If he disregarded your body and exhausted you, I’ll report it to President Shen.”
Meng Xueyuan replied, “It really was two months—”
As he spoke, he raised his eyes and met the director’s look that clearly said tell the truth. A flash of white light went off in his mind.
Wait!
He hadn’t slept with Lu Xiao, but his progesterone had risen again—meaning he’d been stimulated by sperm again.
Where did that sperm come from? A s-storage vesicle? He’d never known where that thing was, but last time when Lu Xiao used his fingers on him… it did feel like he pressed some spot, and his whole body reacted.
Meng Xueyuan thought what flowed was just “fluid,” but was it actually “pollen”?
Ahhh! Realizing the truth, the little queen bee was about to collapse. He was still just a baby—how was he supposed to explain something this obscene to Lu Xiao, who didn’t even have antennae?!
The fingers hanging at his thighs instantly clenched his pants. Under the doctor’s all-seeing gaze, Meng Xueyuan opened his mouth. “I—it wasn’t Lu Xiao, it was me—”
No. He couldn’t tell the director.
“Lu Xiao, I’m sorry. There’s something I’ve been hiding from you,” Meng Xueyuan said, avoiding the director’s eyes and staring guiltily out the window.
The director’s expression stiffened. She suddenly realized something—she’d been overly focused on pinpointing the pregnancy timing. She quickly looked at Third Young Master Lu’s face, stood up, and discreetly positioned herself between them, wary of a physical altercation.
Lu Xiao stood frozen, unable to see Meng Xueyuan’s expression. He tried to regulate himself again and again, but failed. “Mm. The lounge door seems to be open. I’ll go close it.”
He fled in panic.
Meng Xueyuan pulled his shirt down and put on his shoes. This was hard to explain—he’d explain it in the lounge.
“Xuanxuan.” The director stopped the innocent-looking big star. “Don’t go in yet. Let him calm down first—it’ll be better for you.”
Meng Xueyuan looked confused. “What does he need to calm down about?”
Seeing he was still out of the loop, the director gently prompted, “You didn’t sleep with him, yet you have a second false pregnancy. What’s the reason?”
Meng Xueyuan: “……” Because I’m a bee.
The director said, “Let him cool off. He loves you so much—he’ll figure it out soon.”
Only then did Meng Xueyuan understand her implication. “You mean… Lu Xiao thinks I cheated?”
The director: “Uh…”
Meng Xueyuan panicked. “No, that’s not it. I need to explain.”
He slipped past the director and ran after Lu Xiao. Lu Xiao was capable of working in a tin box in summer—who knew what madness he might be up to now.
Meng Xueyuan had never run this hard, not even during his college 100-meter sprint. Panting, he reached the tightly shut lounge door and twisted the handle. Thankfully, it wasn’t locked.
Lu Xiao sat quietly on a wide, classical long bench, back hunched, elbows on his thighs, hands clasped.
Just as Meng Xueyuan breathed a sigh of relief, he saw it—drop by drop, a spreading pool of crimson on the Chinese peony carpet.
Looking again at the wall, there was another bloodstain—clearly Lu Xiao had punched it in a fit of rage. Blood was winding down the back of his hand.
The red stabbed Meng Xueyuan’s eyes.
Hearing movement, Lu Xiao shifted his dress shoes to cover the bloodstains, his left hand covering the injured one. “All the tests done? No problems, right?”
Meng Xueyuan walked closer, step by step. “There are.”
Lu Xiao frowned. “Don’t worry. It shouldn’t be serious.”
Meng Xueyuan took a deep breath. “Lu Xiao, about the second false pregnancy—it’s actually a misunderstanding. I haven’t slept with anyone else during this time. I’ll explain the reason to you in a few days. Just think of it as the last time not being completely finished.”
“Anyway, this false pregnancy was a fluke.”
Lu Xiao shattered himself completely. “Yes… not finished. The last time was also a fluke.”
Meng Xueyuan froze. “What?”
Lu Xiao raised his head. The darkness in his eyes was bottomless. “That night you were too tired. I didn’t go all the way.”
Meng Xueyuan’s face went white. “What did you say?”
Lu Xiao stood up and moved closer. Their heights were nearly the same, yet an invisible, terrifying pressure suddenly bore down—then was reined in entirely.
His IQ had long gone offline; all his reason was spent on self-regulation and restraint. “I can accept this fluke, honey. Let’s live well together.”
Meng Xueyuan saw Lu Xiao’s eyes redden, like a deeply wronged child about to burst into tears.
“Explain it clearly,” Meng Xueyuan grabbed his sleeve.
Lu Xiao said, “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Meng Xueyuan was so angry he wanted to hit him. “You didn’t sleep with me—you used your fingers?”
Lu Xiao pressed his lips together tightly, as if unwilling to admit it.
Meng Xueyuan understood everything at once.
“So,” Meng Xueyuan said, “you didn’t contribute sperm, but your wife got pregnant, so you think you were cuckolded? And you magnanimously endured it all these days?”
Lu Xiao frowned. “Enough.”
Meng Xueyuan sneered. “Why didn’t you keep enduring it? Why punch the wall? Where’s the ‘peaceful years’ now?”
Lu Xiao wrapped his injured hand in humiliation.
Meng Xueyuan said, “Didn’t I tell you more than once that the child was yours? If you suspected I cheated, why didn’t you ask? In your heart, am I someone who would cheat?”
Lu Xiao stiffened his neck. “I don’t think you cheated. It’s all other people’s fault! The child is mine.”
Meng Xueyuan laughed in anger. “In your dreams.”
Lu Xiao was instantly enraged, his voice rising. “I’m telling you, Meng Xueyuan—no matter whose child it is, I will never divorce you. Our marriage is unassailable. Ask a judge a hundred times and it’ll still be ‘no breakdown of affection’!”
Meng Xueyuan was so angry at this jump straight into defending the marriage mode that he retched.
He really retched.
Crouching by the trash can, he gasped for air. Tears hit the floor before Lu Xiao’s did.
Lu Xiao panicked at once, patting his back. “I’m sorry. I’m an idiot. I argued with you at the hospital.”
Meng Xueyuan pressed his lips together, his beautiful, furious eyes staring straight at Lu Xiao. Even now, Lu Xiao hadn’t realized his real mistake wasn’t arguing—but bottling everything up inside.
Meng Xueyuan didn’t know how to make him realize.
Did Lu Xiao really not understand how serious it was to keep his mouth shut?
After two seconds’ thought, Meng Xueyuan said, “Fine. Bottom line—I don’t have a gestational sac. It’s just hormonal changes in my blood. Even medicine can’t explain false pregnancy mechanisms yet. Why did you insist I cheated, instead of thinking I might be sick?”
He deliberately said something that would tear Lu Xiao’s heart open. That should make him understand.
“Why didn’t you ask whether I was sick?”
Lu Xiao’s composure instantly collapsed. Green hats, mistresses—all of it turned to ash in a heartbeat. All that remained in his eyes was Meng Xueyuan’s pale face.
He wished he could turn into an MRI machine and swallow Meng Xueyuan whole for a scan. Anxious and pitiful, he said, “Honey, are you sick?”
Meng Xueyuan said coldly, “I’m not sick. Your brain is.”
A sick brain that needs herbal medicine for internal heat.
A sick brain that hides in tin boxes to catch mistresses.
A sick brain that wakes in the middle of the night needing to hold him to fall asleep again.
…
So many signs, all along.
Meng Xueyuan had thought two idiots could still have a good relationship. But Lu Xiao was far too foolish. He realized he couldn’t be the idiot in love anymore—he needed to be smarter, to think and anticipate Lu Xiao’s actions.
You can’t date without using your brain.
Meng Xueyuan knew he couldn’t blame Lu Xiao entirely. Shen Ning had borne three children; pregnancy was never unfamiliar to Lu Xiao.
He wouldn’t be like most people—shocked, questioning, suspecting hospital error, suspecting his wife’s health.
He accepted Meng Xueyuan’s false pregnancy as a given and schemed up a “reasonable” explanation for it.
Meng Xueyuan only blamed him for refusing to ask. From the very start of their “public relationship,” it had been Lu Xiao’s refusal to tell the truth.
Lu Xiao fabricated official, businesslike reasons, making Meng Xueyuan believe their publicity was free of personal desire.
Even today, he still wore a flawless mask, making Meng Xueyuan believe their marriage had no cracks.
Two years of secret love hadn’t taught Lu Xiao how to speak up.
What should he do?
Meng Xueyuan looked at him. “If you never ask me anything, then one day if I get a terminal illness and put on a show of cheating, would you also say nothing and break up, letting me die wherever?”
“No!” Lu Xiao tried to cover Meng Xueyuan’s mouth so he wouldn’t make such an impossible comparison. His bloodied hand trembled. He could barely think anymore, pacing around his wife, refuting on instinct alone.
“Impossible. I won’t let you go. I won’t divorce you. No matter who you love, through life, illness, and death, we have to be together.”
Hopeless. The point wasn’t silently enduring the humiliation of cheating—yet all he could think about was divorce.
Meng Xueyuan said, “I get it. The marriage certificate ruined you.”
What? Lu Xiao clenched his fist. That sentence felt familiar—who had said that before?
No one was allowed to say it. Divorce was his bottom line.
Lu Xiao’s eyes darkened instantly. He pleaded, “Honey, take that back.”
A glint flashed in Meng Xueyuan’s eyes. He’d finally found Lu Xiao’s weak spot. “I’m going back to my hometown to handle something. Don’t follow me. If you do, I’ll divorce you.”
The man who’d been arguing red-faced froze instantly, as if petrified, watching Meng Xueyuan walk out of the lounge.
At the door, Meng Xueyuan glanced back at him.
Hope flared in Lu Xiao’s eyes.
Meng Xueyuan said, “I’ll say it one last time. The child is yours. Believe it or not—it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t exist anyway.”
Lu Xiao said, “I believe you, honey. I was wrong.”
Meng Xueyuan didn’t look back. He called a nurse to dress Lu Xiao’s wound.
Inside the room, Lu Xiao rubbed his face in misery, smearing it red.
There was no joy at having the ‘green hat’ lifted—his mind was full of one thought: his wife wanted to divorce him. He was finished.
…
Once outside the lounge, Meng Xueyuan called 028, who was going abroad for training. “When’s your flight?”
“Tonight.”
“Can you postpone it to tomorrow night?”
“Yes.”
In the [Southwest Main Hive] group, Meng Xueyuan sent out a red envelope.
[Travel expenses and lost wages.]
Five thousand per person—paid from the 5.2 million Lu Xiao had transferred to him for Qixi Festival.
[Tomorrow morning, the Bee Clan’s 29th General Assembly will convene to vote on whether Lu Xiao is entitled to the right to know.]
He turned off his phone and leaned against the wall for a while.
Until the nurse quietly went in, quietly finished dressing the wound, and came out with a tray piled with blood-soaked cotton.
He was always distressed when Lu Xiao had blood drawn—yet didn’t care about his own blood.
Smelling the blood, Meng Xueyuan gagged hard. Clutching his chest, he steadied himself, then turned and left.
He didn’t believe he couldn’t cure Lu Xiao of this problem.
