Sir, Your Wife Has Signed For You 

Did you sell yourself to me?

The word "sell" was like a curse, and each time Qin Shuang heard it, she could feel the coldness spreading from the bottom of her heart through her blood and into every last limb.

Her lips trembled, failing to utter a word of the flattering, cheeky phrases she had practiced over the past year and had almost carved into her being.

There was dead silence inside the car.

Her distraught appearance irritated He Zhiyao to no end.

Every time he saw this expression of hers, it was as if a fire was lit inside his heart.

He wished he could drag her into the flames and let them both burn to ashes.

"Don't give me that dead look; I've told you, I don't like it," he said.

"Don't think that just because you act cute occasionally, I will indulge you forever," he continued.

He Zhiyao grabbed the suit that was tossed aside, threw it over Qin Shuang's face—blocking her doomsday-like expression—pushed her from his lap to a seat beside him, straightened his clothes, and with a "whoosh," opened the car door.

Then with a "bang," he slammed the car door shut.

He Zhiyao stood with a hand on his hip for a few seconds, looked through the tinted car window into the car for a while, and then got into the driver's seat.

He lit a cigarette, took it in his mouth, and slammed the gas pedal fiercely.

...

Back at the apartment, He Zhiyao threw Qin Shuang onto the bed and pressed down on her.

All night, Qin Shuang felt both physically and mentally exhausted, without the strength to resist, letting him do as he pleased.

It wasn't until she could no longer hold on and drifted into a heavy sleep that she faintly sensed that she seemed to have been placed in warm water.

The temperature of the water agitated the marks he had forcibly left on her body, bringing waves of stinging pain.

But she was too exhausted, so tired she didn't have the strength to open her eyes for a glance before falling back to sleep.

Not until the jarring alarm rang did she abruptly open her eyes and vaguely realize something, subconsciously glancing beside her.

The pillow next to her was wrinkled, but it was already empty of its previous occupant.

Did He Zhiyao... stay over last night?

Qin Shuang's mind flashed with He Zhiyao's image; she immediately shook her head, wishing she could shake this person out of her life.

She gave a short sneer, mocking herself for such daydreaming.

Out of habit, she reached to the side of her pillow but didn't find her phone.

After a while, she sat up, and her gaze swept the room, finally spotting her bag on the sofa at the foot of the bed.

Without getting out of bed, she crawled to the edge and reached out her arm to fish out her phone from her bag, pressed the button, and found that it had somehow turned off by itself.

Qin Shuang charged her phone, got up to wash up in the bathroom, and as she got off the bed, her legs went weak for a moment, nearly causing her to fall.

She steadied herself on the bed for a while before entering the bathroom.

After coming out of the bathroom, she saw her phone, now turned on automatically, continuously beeping with new messages.

She furrowed her brows slightly, walked over, picked up the phone, and saw one message after another:

Shuangshuang, take the call; I know it's you.

Shuangshuang, can't you talk to me?

Shuangshuang, are you in some sort of trouble? Can you tell me about it?

Shuangshuang, do you know what I've been going through this past year...

...

As the messages kept popping up, Qin Shuang felt as if all her blood had been drained in an instant.

Just then a hand reached for her phone:

"What are you looking at?"