Xiao Chacha, of course, wasn’t going to listen to Lin An.

But in the end, she didn’t bring that hand down. She stepped back a little instead.

She stared into Lin An’s dark eyes. She was unwilling to accept it. She couldn’t accept him deleting her just like that, trying to pull away from her life.

“I won’t let you delete me. Add me back.” Xiao Chacha pulled out her phone.

“I don’t want to.” Lin An shook his head.

“Is it because of what I did to you in front of Su Yuejin? Did I scare you? Have you fallen for her?”

“No.” Lin An shook his head again.

After taking Su Yuejin home, he had still left her place. That alone proved it.

“Then why did you delete me?”

“Because I don’t like excitement, Miss Xiao Chacha. I feel like if I keep getting involved with you, something terrifying will happen sooner or later.”

Xiao Chacha gave a cold laugh. “I don’t even love you. What are you afraid of?”

“Huh? I know that. But I’m not so desperate to sleep with you. We have nothing to do with each other, so why keep in contact?”

“Aren’t we friends, Lin An?”

Xiao Chacha repeated the words slowly, one by one.

They had played countless games together. Truly, if one counted carefully, they were fairly familiar friends.

But right now, Lin An didn’t want her as a friend.

“You scared me, Xiao Chacha,” Lin An said.

“Because I know Su Yuejin? Because I… teased you?”

A trace of bewitching beauty showed through her cold smile.

“Yes.”

“Then don’t you want to conquer me? Hmm?” Her eyes held a hint of madness, but her reason remained perfectly clear. “Train me until I’m as obedient as Su Yuejin.”

That was why Lin An didn’t want to get too close to Xiao Chacha.

She was a higher-level player than Su Yuejin. She was smarter. She knew better how to be loved, and she knew better how to tempt a man.

“No one dislikes excitement. Everyone likes it.”

“They follow old rules. They’re bound by those rules. They think they’ve gotten used to them.”

“But once the rules are broken, things become unexpectedly interesting.”

Xiao Chacha reached out and grabbed Lin An’s arm. She pulled him into the stairwell of the apartment complex.

The elevator was broken, so this stairwell was in use. There were no lights inside. It was dim and secluded.

It was a perfect place to do certain things.

Her fingers lightly caught hold of Lin An’s hand and pressed it against her chest.

“Let’s do it here… If we were caught outside Su Yuejin’s door, that wouldn’t be exciting. It would just be asking for trouble.”

“But no one will find us here. This is exciting.”

Lin An felt that she was a wolf, not a cat.

He liked cats more than wolves.

Yet her calf was gently brushing against his leg. Her body was soft, and her lolita dress gave her an added air of elegance and alluring beauty.

Before he knew it, Lin An had put an arm around her.

He lowered his head and saw the triumphant smile on Xiao Chacha’s face. Even so, he still sank into the moment and kissed her lips.

Xiao Chacha breathed softly. Her voice was light, like a cat’s cry—faint, yet plaintive and sweet.

She lifted her skirt slightly and moved her fingers toward her waist. Then she rose onto her toes, trying to make herself stand in a more inviting pose.

But if she wanted to make things easier, she would have to bend her knees a little more.

“It’s inconvenient for me to take it off. You do it.”

As she spoke, she faced the wall and glanced back at Lin An.

She believed the man behind her wouldn’t be able to resist rushing over and doing something rough.

But several seconds passed.

Lin An simply looked at her with his arms crossed and a mocking smile on his lips.

“Keep going? Are you going to keep acting shameless?”

“Hmm? Keep putting on a show?”

Lin An looked at her posture and the desire in her eyes. The mockery in his smile was completely undisguised.

Suddenly, Xiao Chacha’s pose made her look like an idiot.

“Come here. I’ll take a picture to commemorate that expression.”

Lin An took out his phone and turned on the flash.

The panic on Xiao Chacha’s face became even more amusing.

She immediately lowered her skirt and lunged at him, pinning him against the corner of the wall.

“You think I’m funny like this?!” she shouted. “Lin An!”

This time, Xiao Chacha was genuinely furious.

Lin An showed her the photo.

It captured a young woman with flushed cheeks, caught completely off guard while being photographed.

Then he deleted it.

“What exactly are you so proud of?” Lin An said.

“At Su Yuejin’s place just now, that woman tried everything to get me into bed. And you?”

“What gives you the right?”

Though Xiao Chacha had him pinned down, and though her furious fingers had closed around his throat, Lin An’s smile remained careless and teasing.

This was another side of him.

He had a particularly nasty sense of humor.

“You may be more tempting than Su Yuejin in certain ways. But so what, Xiao Chacha?”

“Su Yuejin is obedient. You aren’t.”

“But I don’t want to turn you into someone obedient. If I did, you wouldn’t be you anymore.”

“Su Yuejin obeys because she loves me. She wants my love, and she understands what she has to do. She isn’t stupid.”

“But you only find this exciting. You think it’s fun. Maybe it’s just your feelings being redirected.”

“Is it because you couldn’t have Su Yuejin’s love? Or is it because of your twisted desire to control people?”

“Stealing someone else’s beloved is very interesting, isn’t it? It’s satisfying. It’s thrilling. So that’s why you find this exciting?”

Xiao Chacha’s slender fingers were making it hard for Lin An to breathe.

He moved one hand lower. He wanted to punch her in the stomach, but he obviously couldn’t do that.

Instead, he lightly squeezed her waist.

That was her weakness. Her sensitive spot.

Xiao Chacha instantly lost her strength and released his throat.

The strange thing was that she was the one who had attacked him, yet her eyes turned red as she stared at him. She couldn’t say a word.

“Your love for Su Yuejin isn’t shallow. You’re deeply obsessed with her.”

“She loves me. Once you realized the truth of your own feelings, that love somehow shifted onto me.”

“That’s why you’re interested in me.”

“I’ve explained it clearly for you. Think it through yourself.”

“Stop playing this childish, thrilling game. If you want to play, find someone else. Play however you like. I don’t care.”

“What if that slut Su Yuejin sleeps with another man?” Xiao Chacha asked with a cold laugh. “Would you care then?”

The moment she finished speaking, Lin An turned and slapped her without hesitation.

The blow was clean, sharp, and loud.

Xiao Chacha covered her cheek, frozen in shock.

From childhood until now, this was the first time anyone had ever hit her.

“You dared to hit me?!” she exclaimed. “Just because I insulted Su Yuejin once?!”

“Exactly. So what are you going to do now? Take revenge on me, Xiao Chacha?”

Lin An sighed helplessly.

“Su Yuejin told me what your family does. I can guess the rest.”

“If your family operates in the gray areas, making my life miserable probably wouldn’t be difficult.”

“But just like you said, excitement is what makes things interesting.”

“Why did you have to say something so vile? I lost control and hit you. Now I’m the one who has to worry.”

The cheek he had struck was bright red and burning with pain.

Xiao Chacha stood there as if she had fallen into a trance.

“Just because I insulted Su Yuejin?”

“Yes.”

“Just because I insulted her once… you hit me?”

She stared blankly at Lin An’s face.

When he nodded, she continued murmuring the same words over and over.

Lin An said nothing.

The night no longer seemed quiet.

The calm surface had begun to churn.

“You’ve fallen for her, haven’t you?” Xiao Chacha asked. “You’ve become possessive of her, haven’t you?”

“That’s why you hit me.”

“Lin An… So you aren’t completely heartless after all. You aren’t flawless and untouchable. You’re human too.”

“You have weaknesses. You want to be loved.”

“So you make mistakes too!”

“A person who never makes mistakes would be far too boring, wouldn’t they?” Lin An shrugged.

Xiao Chacha was still covering her face.

Several seconds later, she bit her lip. Large tears welled in her eyes, then rolled down one after another.

Her voice became blurred with emotion.

“You hit me… You actually hit me…”

“You slept with me last night. When we were together, you were so gentle.”

“And the next day, you turned around and slapped me. All because of a woman who supposedly means nothing to you?”

She cried as she spoke, her words coming in broken fragments.

She suddenly seemed to lose all her strength. Tears continued falling down her cheeks.

Lin An knew he was in the wrong.

He shouldn’t have hit her.

No matter how badly he and Xiao Chacha argued, the moment he raised his hand, he had already lost the advantage.

He had panicked.

He had exposed his weakness right in front of her.

Xiao Chacha stepped forward again.

She looked at Lin An’s shoulder, lowered her head, and bit down.

It was a vicious bite.

Lin An didn’t make a sound.

Though it really hurt.

“You’ve fallen for Su Yuejin,” Xiao Chacha said. “You thought that if you didn’t sleep with her, you could avoid loving her.”

“But you still lost control just now.”

“So you need to face your desires honestly.”

“If you can become like me—if you can do what you want without caring, and only chase the thrill—then you won’t fall for her.”

“Or perhaps one Su Yuejin is simply too much for you.”

“You want her, but you can’t have her. That only makes your torment deeper.”

“At a time like this, you need someone without any emotional burden. Someone who takes what she needs and gives you what you need.”

“Only then can you stop loving Su Yuejin completely.”

“So you lost, Lin An.”

She raised her head.

Tears still clung to her face, but her voice had turned cold.

Lin An gave a bitter smile and nodded.

He looked dejected because he had to admit that the clever Xiao Chacha had guessed his thoughts.

“Yes,” he said. “I lost.”

“So come with me. You’re not sleeping tonight.”

Xiao Chacha grabbed his hand.

Lin An lowered his head slightly and glanced at her long, slender legs, wrapped in black thigh-high stockings.

She was very tempting.

“Just this once,” he said.

“You’re such a useful tool. How could I stop after using you only once?”

“I’ll make you cry,” Lin An said furiously.

“Go ahead. Try it.”

Xiao Chacha’s smile was gentle and sweet.

She leaned close to Lin An and pointed at the tear marks on her face.

Lin An kissed them one by one.

Her tears tasted slightly salty.

Xiao Chacha seemed quite pleased by his attempt to appease her. Like a victor, she caught his hand and led him out of the stairwell.

Together, they left Su Yuejin’s doorway behind.

Xiao Chacha had already called for a car.

Lin An stood beside her, feeling the slightly damp breeze.

He watched the wind lift the hem of her skirt and looked at her beautiful, lovely face.

Xiao Chacha really was a useful tool.

And to her, he seemed to be a useful tool as well.

They used each other, each taking what they needed.

Suddenly, Lin An’s phone rang.

He absentmindedly took it out and answered.

“My dear little brother, can you come home now?” Xu Qinghuan’s voice carried a faint, breathless quality. “I’m all alone tonight. It’s so boring.”

Lin An froze.

Then he suddenly smiled.

He lowered his head and gave Xiao Chacha a gentle smile.

“I haven’t lost yet, Xiao Chacha.”

“Huh?” Xiao Chacha blinked.

“I’m going home now, teehee. Someone’s waiting for me there.”

“I won’t lose. Never.”

Still smiling, he released Xiao Chacha’s hand.

He walked to a waiting taxi, gave the driver his address, and drove away.

Xiao Chacha didn’t stop him.

Because she knew…

She could no longer stop him.