Chapter 31 Part 2

Wen Zenian smiled and reached out with one finger to tilt up her chin. “What are you singing?”

Caught by the touch on her jaw, Meng Ning stopped humming. But drunkenness had another effect: she no longer shied from Wen Zenian’s gaze.

Amid the revelry, her mind relaxed, and she pondered those deep, expressive eyes once more.

Earlier, when she’d asked who the dancing woman was, Wen Zenian had said, “It doesn’t matter.”

Yet Wen Zenian had accepted the invitation—and looked back at her more than once.

Perhaps Wen Zenian wasn’t merely tolerating her possessiveness.

She was deliberately stoking it.

Humanity’s shared flaws are not so easily overcome; otherwise, how could they rank among the seven deadly sins?

At that moment, someone outside began pounding on the door. “Hey! Is anyone in there? Got any more booze?”

Wen Zenian burst into delighted laughter.

Meng Ning played up her drunkenness, wrapping her arms around Wen Zenian’s slender waist and resting her head on the woman’s shoulder.

Wen Zenian lifted a hand to stroke the back of Meng Ning’s neck, her index finger gliding back and forth over the delicate bones there like the softest feather.

Meng Ning felt herself acting spoiled. “No other people.”

Wen Zenian didn’t quite catch it. “What?”

“While you’re on C Sea Island, no other people.” Meng Ning lifted her head to gaze into those eyes. “Just me.”

Perhaps that was why Wen Zenian hadn’t worn her diamond earrings tonight—all the brilliance had shattered and fallen into the depths of those mesmerizing eyes.

The people outside kept banging on the door, venting their drunken high.

But Wen Zenian ignored them completely. She pinched Meng Ning’s chin and drew her into a kiss.

The dessert on tonight’s menu had been like fragile jelly, rich with plum flavor—but it paled against the softness of Wen Zenian’s lips.

Meng Ning’s kissing skills had improved; she left Wen Zenian breathless, her rhythm faltering.

Meng Ning’s hands stayed firmly on Wen Zenian’s waist the whole time, never wandering. Wen Zenian wasn’t sure whether to praise or tease her. “You’re being awfully well-behaved.”

“No.” Meng Ning shook her head, still tipsy. “We can’t do anything else.”

She leaned close to Wen Zenian’s ear. “I don’t even want to imagine them catching a glimpse of you aroused.”

Wen Zenian in those moments was her exclusive secret.

It could only happen in a quiet, secure space. She wouldn’t risk it otherwise.

Wen Zenian pulled her shoulders closer and deepened the kiss, as if breathing was optional. Meng Ning realized she was just as drunk.

Finally, they parted. Wen Zenian scooped up her high heels in one hand and draped the other arm over Meng Ning’s shoulder, striding toward the door with commanding poise.

She yanked it open. The people clustered there were about to snap at her, but they froze at the sight of the two tall, entwined women—one radiant and captivating, the other fresh and ethereal.

Wen Zenian swept past with Meng Ning in tow.

Meng Ning ducked her head and smiled. Once they were off the boat, tomorrow’s rising sun would burn away the night’s haze—who would even recognize each other then?

It was already the wee hours. There were no clocks in the cabins, as if time had been deliberately forgotten here. Meng Ning gauged it from the blue-purple light filtering through the portholes.

No one had the energy to dance anymore. Yet these guests clung to some unspoken vow: the party didn’t end until dawn, not a minute sooner.

So they all migrated to the second deck in unison—some shooting pool, others munching nuts, a group huddled around a table watching a movie, everyone in loose clusters.

Wen Zenian and Meng Ning joined the movie watchers. A white projector screen unrolled, displaying an old film: The Lover.

Young Liang Jiahui exuded a sharp handsomeness laced with fragility. The overly mature girl bolstered her presence with fiery red lips. They stood together at the bow as their boat sailed the Mekong River, made love in a street-side apartment where wooden slats let in patches of mottled sunlight.

The decor inexplicably evoked C Hotel.

The decadent aura seeping from the screen stirred memories of Meng Ning’s own entanglements with Wen Zenian.

Wen Zenian sat close beside her now, knee pressing against knee, the soft red velvet of one brushing the stiff denim of the other in subtle friction.

Wen Zenian looked weary. Her usually straight-backed posture slumped against the cushions in lazy repose.

A small bamboo basket of popcorn sat untouched on the table, growing soggy and stale. Everyone else seemed exhausted too. Meng Ning wasn’t sure if they’d seen the film before, but no one was paying it any attention.

They chatted in fits and starts—about fashion weeks, purebred racehorses worth tens of millions of dollars.

Only Wen Zenian stayed quiet, her eyes half-lidded, occasionally flicking toward Meng Ning with a flirtatious glint that only she could read.

Bringing her to the party tonight had seemed bold at first glance, but really, it wasn’t so scandalous. Apart from the intimate couples dancing, they hadn’t done anything improper in public. Besides, Meng Ning glanced around.

These women all carried a relaxed air, just as she’d quickly grasped upon arriving: in their world, rules didn’t exist.

They wouldn’t even bother speculating about her and Wen Zenian. Perhaps each had her own such girl at some point—young, beautiful, a fleeting vision at a midnight party, vanishing like the Little Mermaid at dawn’s first light.

Meng Ning turned her attention back to the white screen.

The girl in the film had a pale face, vivid freckles dotting her skin, cheap red lipstick that smudged easily, making her look like a flower that had bloomed too soon and would wilt just as fast. She sat in the black sedan of a wealthy overseas Chinese heir, so close that at some point, their knees must have touched like hers and Wen Zenian’s.

Their intimacy hid behind the car’s partition.

Hers and Wen Zenian’s hid beneath the retro wood-grained table.

A faint fish-belly white began to tinge the sky beyond the portholes. Dawn always brought reason in its wake, or perhaps the twilight between night and day stirred sentimentality.

If she dissected the reality of her relationship with Wen Zenian, it boiled down to bedmates.

Or, in more vintage, artistic terms: lovers.

Just like in the movie on the screen.

No one else was watching. The others kept chatting idly. Maybe noting Wen Zenian’s silence, someone tossed a question her way. “Gwyneth, no plans to buy a yacht?”

Wen Zenian shook her head. “My job has me jetting around the world. A yacht would sit idle too much, and maintenance is a hassle.”

Meng Ning snapped back to the conversation, realizing one of the women was planning to buy a yacht and racking her brain for a name.

Hunter Hawk.

Infinity.

Golden Times.

The topic looped back to Wen Zenian. “Gwyneth, if you had a yacht, what would you name it?”

She was the smart one, so everyone turned to her with smiles, awaiting her answer.

Wen Zenian lounged against the cushions, lazy as ever, her thin lips parting unhurriedly.

“G,” Meng Ning thought—that would be perfect.

She remembered the first card Wen Zenian had written her, signed simply “G”: concise, elegant, intimately secretive.

But Wen Zenian drew out the word slightly. “Morning, I suppose.”

Meng Ning’s heart stirred.

With Wen Zenian’s distinctive inflection, the English word almost sounded like her Chinese name.

The others clearly didn’t make the connection, nodding in sudden understanding toward the brightening portholes. “That’s clever.”

“Our parties always drag into the morning, don’t they?”

Wen Zenian curved her lips. “But you can’t use it. I thought of it first.”

The others laughed. “So possessive.”

It was just a name—no one pressed the point.

But the tipsy Wen Zenian wore a smug satisfaction, as if guarding the name, a slow smile playing on her lips. One hand propped her head; the other drifted habitually to her earlobe.

No diamond earrings tonight—just that soft lobe, yielding under her slender fingers.

Meng Ning ached to tell her to stop fiddling; every time that little bit of softness was under her tongue, it twisted and molded just like this—the only difference being how much slicker it grew.

Dawn had broken. The party that seemed eternal was finally winding down.

Scattered across different islands, the birthday girl dutifully ferried everyone home, one group at a time.

As they neared C Sea Island, Wen Zenian slipped her high heels back on and headed to the deck with Meng Ning.

Her dark red dress turned the morning mist rosy.

Where she’d boarded the yacht yesterday, why she’d come aboard, whether she’d sealed that business deal beforehand—Meng Ning neither knew nor cared.

She was still drunk, still dreaming.

Only when she returned to her dorm, sobered up, caught the first speedboat off the island, then took the subway to the Old House Rental to meet Qi Xiao would this extravagantly gorgeous night truly end.

It was too early; they walked along the coastline without encountering anyone.

Meng Ning’s dorm came into view first.

“I’ll head back then,” Meng Ning said.

Wen Zenian glanced at the staff building, then let her gaze drift farther to the fairytale main structure of C Hotel. Her administrative suite was on the top floor, at the far end.

Her voice still held echoes of the night, perhaps laced with a distant star. “But you haven’t picked up tonight’s sci-fi story.”

She leaned to Meng Ning’s ear. “I’ll be waiting.”

High heels weren’t made for sand, so she slipped them off and dangled them casually from her fingers as she walked away alone.

Meng Ning returned to her dorm first.

She twisted the faucet for fresh water to brush her teeth and splash her face, then peered into the bathroom mirror at her furrowed brows, twisted in strands. She cupped more water and patted her face.

Hopeless.

Dawn was still battling the last of the night. A new day wouldn’t truly arrive until she was clear-headed.

Taking advantage of the early hour and empty paths, she made her way to Wen Zenian’s administrative suite.

A soft beep as she swiped the door unlocked—the motion so practiced it scared her.

Habits were hard to break, after all.

Wen Zenian must have drunk too much; she hadn’t made it to the bedroom. She’d kicked off her high heels and lay twisted on her side across the white sofa, resting.

Did she do this often—party all night? Was she happy?

Meng Ning approached on tiptoe, torn between waking her and letting her sleep.

But with eyes closed, Wen Zenian murmured, “Meng Ning.”

Like calling her name, or murmuring “Morning” in a tender drawl.

Meng Ning went to her, sat down, and tucked a cushion under her own abdomen, the way she’d once nestled in Wen Zenian’s lap that night. She gently lifted Wen Zenian’s head to rest properly, then bent to kiss her.

Wen Zenian was too lazy to move, knees curled up, content to lie there and kiss.

Between kisses, she mumbled, “You brushed your teeth.”

“Mm.”

Minty freshness.

“But I didn’t.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Meng Ning kissed her delicately. “You’re sweet.”

The lingering wine had fermented into sweetness on her lips and tongue.

After a while, Wen Zenian said, “Meng Ning, I’m rested now.”

“You can do to me what you wanted in the storage room.”