Tang Man also felt a bit embarrassed. She didn’t know whether to withdraw her hand or not. Just as she was struggling, the phone in her pocket vibrated, the sound loud enough to be impossible to ignore.

She glanced at Du Henian and pulled out her phone from her pocket with one hand. At this moment, Du Henian also reacted, feeling that he had been a bit embarrassing earlier.

However, when he met Tang Man’s gaze, he resisted the urge to look away and instead directly faced her gaze, tightening his grip on her hand.

“Is it him?”

They both knew who he meant by “him”.

Tang Man didn’t answer the call first, but instead looked at Du Henian for a while. The two of them were at a stalemate for more than ten seconds. The call in her hand was hung up once. Just as she was about to breathe a sigh of relief, it rang again, almost like a kind of omen. Tang Man felt that no matter what, she had to answer this call.

“Du Henian, let go.” Tang Man said helplessly, “Do you think it’s interesting for us to be at a stalemate like this?”

But Du Henian said, “Are you afraid of him knowing that you’re with me right now?”

Tang Man looked at Du Henian, her eyes growing cold.

Du Henian smiled, his eyes still red, but the tears in his eyes were completely gone. “It seems you two don’t trust each other that much. Man Man, do you really think a marriage like this will last?”

Tang Man’s face completely darkened. Du Henian had started to touch on her boundaries. She sometimes hated this kind of perceptiveness in Du Henian, able to see at a glance some of the shadows hidden in the dark.

She ignored Du Henian. Since he wouldn’t let go, she couldn’t be bothered to struggle. Disregarding Du Henian’s suddenly gloomy face, she directly answered Xie Li’s call right in front of him.

The other party’s voice quickly came through, “Not home yet?”

Tang Man hesitated for a moment and made an affirming sound.

Lying in front of Du Henian was not a good choice, as it could easily become a handle against her.

“Still at school?” the person on the other end inquired.

Listening to the voice on the other end, Tang Man found it very quiet, as if in a hidden location, perhaps in an office or some other place.

But somehow, her eyelids suddenly started twitching, feeling an ominous premonition. This sign made her feel that there was a pitfall in front of this question. The words that had reached her throat were held back and not spoken.

“No longer at school. I ran into an acquaintance at school earlier who suddenly had a stomach problem. I took him to the hospital and am about to leave now.”

After she said this, the other end fell silent for a moment. In an instant, Tang Man seemed to sense something. A feeling suddenly came to her mind. She subconsciously asked, “Where are you now? Still at the company?”

“No.”

The voice on the other end seemed to be right next to her, penetrating through the air currents to reach her ears. “Take a look to the side.”

Tang Man blinked. Du Henian should have heard these words too. Following her gaze, he also looked towards the end of the corridor to the side. Indeed, they saw a man appear in the corridor, walking towards them.

Tang Man hung up the phone.

Xie Li walked over, glanced at Du Henian’s hand that had been tugging on Tang Man’s wrist and not letting go, smiled, and said in an allusive manner, “Mr. Du’s body shouldn’t be so weak, right?”

Du Henian released the hand that had been tugging on Tang Man. His expression was not very pleasant. After all, who would be in a good mood when encountering their ex-girlfriend’s current boyfriend and fiancé at their most wretched moment?

Moreover, Xie Li could now be considered his rival in love, and an epic one at that. Due to his long-term irregular lifestyle and illness, he now looked haggard and even a bit decadent, completely incomparable to Xie Li, who had just come out of the meeting room and was impeccably dressed from head to toe.

However, sometimes when a man looks a bit haggard, it can more easily arouse a woman’s pity. This may also be considered a nature engraved in the female genes, which can be summarized as maternal instinct.

This genetic nature was initially engraved to a greater extent for the reproduction of a species. The maternal instinct allows females to better care for the young in the natural world, allowing them to grow up better. Over time, the scope has expanded to all weak and small things. The maternal nature in the female instinct makes them give more love to these weak and fragile creatures.

Du Henian smiled, “Mr. Xie, long time no see.”

His hand was on the box on his knees. He put the lid on the side, not taking a single bite. His other hand was on his stomach, a very secretive action, but at least the two people present saw it.

Tang Man frowned slightly.

Xie Li tugged at the corner of his mouth, his gaze sinking. He looked at Du Henian sitting in the chair, smiled, and said, “I heard from Man Man that Mr. Du’s stomach problem acted up and she took Mr. Du to the hospital.”

“Yes, Man Man brought me here.”

For a moment, Tang Man felt the sparks flickering in the air. She was being pulled by Xie Li and could still feel those sparks vaguely tending to spread towards her. She couldn’t help but move her feet and take a step back, but felt the strength of Xie Li holding her wrist.

She moved her wrist and raised her head to glance at Xie Li.

The man’s expression didn’t change. In this situation, Xie Li wouldn’t do anything foolish. Moreover, because Tang Man had concealed a bit earlier but didn’t lie to him, his mood was still relatively calm.

What was Du Henian?

He had encountered even more excessive situations. All the loss of self-esteem he had experienced when dealing with Tang Man’s ex-boyfriends in the past had taught him to endure. He had seen plenty of such situations before. If he didn’t have the standing in the past and now had it, would he still go crazy and lose this standing?

Until now, Du Henian was still not clear that to be with someone like Tang Man, one first had to learn to be calm and collected, to learn to endure, to learn to ignore some things, and not to push the other person too hard. Otherwise, the end result could only be a breakup.

So, he smiled and said in a particularly gentle tone, “Mr. Du probably didn’t drive here. After finishing the drip later, why don’t Man Man and I send Mr. Du back together? It’s so late, it’s not very convenient to take a taxi.”

The demeanor of someone who had already taken the superior position.

Du Henian’s eyes grew cold. He glanced at Xie Li, his gaze falling on Tang Man. After a long while, he finally said, “Then I’ll trouble Mr. Xie.”

Then he closed his eyes and leaned against the wall behind the chair, not speaking anymore. The piercing aura around him seemed to suddenly withdraw, turning from facing outward to facing inward.

His entire aura quieted down.

The corridor returned to silence.

Xie Li pulled Tang Man to sit on the row of chairs on the opposite side of the corridor, about seven or eight steps away from Du Henian.