Because she was using her left hand to answer the phone, she moved her phone aside. Her voice was just loud enough for Qing Muye to hear.
"Xiao Cheng genuinely likes you and treats you very well. Look at yourself, as a girlfriend, you don't even treat him well. If you continue like this, people will gossip about you after you get married.
Daughter, Xiao Cheng is a good boy. You two are mutually in love, so you should cherish each other. Your father and I have discussed it, and you're not young anymore. We plan to visit Xiao Cheng in Lancheng in a while to discuss your marriage, to see when you two can get married..."
Hearing this, Meng Jingwei immediately held her phone up to her ear and said, "Mom, Mom, what are you talking about? I'm still young."
She was almost going crazy.
Her relationship with Xiao Cheng was just a performance from beginning to end. How could it be that her adoptive mother was already talking about marriage?
As Meng Jingwei chatted with Du Juan, she completely failed to notice Qing Muye's frigid expression as he sat beside her.
Mutually in love?
Discussing marriage?
At that moment, his hand, resting on the steering wheel, tightened involuntarily. He felt a blockage in his chest, making his mood increasingly irritable.
"Oh, Mom, stop talking. Hurry up and eat cake with Dad. I have to get busy now. Bye, I'm hanging up."
After speaking, she directly hung up the phone.
"Hoo~~"
She let out a long sigh. Suddenly, she felt that continuing to deceive them was not a solution. She needed to find a way to explain things to her adoptive parents as soon as possible, otherwise, she feared they would eventually approach Xiao Cheng to discuss marriage.
Indeed, one lie truly required countless lies to cover.
Putting away her phone, Meng Jingwei looked at Qing Muye, who was driving, and couldn't help but mutter, "Are you all having birthdays around the same time recently? You even have your birthday on the same day as my dad."
Qing Muye's expression was cold, and he remained silent, ignoring Meng Jingwei.
Meng Jingwei pouted, unsure why the man had suddenly become so withdrawn. However, she figured that as the owner of a wedding planning company, she had to cater to the wealthy patron.
After all, her wedding planning company's only client was Qing Muye.
"Stop, stop, stop."
Meng Jingwei suddenly spotted something and yelled for him to stop.
The man thought Meng Jingwei wanted to buy something for his grandmother and stopped by the roadside.
She got out of the car and ran off.
In a short while, she returned with something in her hands, got into the car, closed the door, and fastened her seatbelt.
Then, she took out a small pink pig-shaped cake from the paper bag. It was still the mini cake priced at 39 yuan; she wasn't willing to spend a penny more.
"Come, come, big… brother, it's your birthday today, so I bought you a birthday cake."
Meng Jingwei flashed a fawning smile, took out a candle from the bag, and stuck it next to the pink pig's ear. She lit it with a lighter, held the cake, and tilted her head to look at Qing Muye. "Brother, happy birthday. I'll sing you a birthday song. Make a wish quickly."
Although Meng Jingwei didn't know when Qing Muye's birthday was, she had heard that Qing Muye never celebrated his birthday.
So, when Qing Muye asked her to celebrate his birthday today, although she felt a bit displeased, she was more surprised.
The sedan stopped. Qing Muye looked at the fawning woman, always suspecting she wasn't up to anything good.
This scene involuntarily brought to his mind the image of her celebrating Xiao Cheng's birthday, and what Du Juan had just said about them being "mutually in love." Suddenly, the cake didn't seem so appealing.
"No need."
He said coldly, started the sedan, and drove off directly.
"Are you… crazy? You're the one who asked me to prepare a cake for you, and you're the one who won't eat it!"
Her small face instantly fell. She looked at the single candle on the small cake, pouted angrily, and blew out the candle with a puff.
She rummaged through the paper bag for a fork and sat in the passenger seat, eating it herself.
They say women change their minds faster than they turn a book. Why did she feel Qing Muye changed his mind even faster?
She vowed never to buy Qing Muye a cake again.
However, just as she had taken two bites, the sedan suddenly stopped by the roadside.
The man's indifferent gaze flickered over, and he reached out to take the cake from her hand. "If you're not celebrating your birthday, why are you eating cake?"
"Just because I'm not celebrating doesn't mean I can't eat it? What kind of unreasonable rule is that?"
Meng Jingwei, with a fork in her mouth, glared at him and muttered.
Unexpectedly, Qing Muye directly snatched the fork from her hand, scooped a spoonful of cream cake, and began to eat.
Meng Jingwei, lost in anger, continued to grumble, "You said you wouldn't eat it? Why are you eating it now? Qing Muye, do you have a problem with your brain? You're so annoying, what kind of person are you."
Qing Muye, who rarely ate sweets, ignored Meng Jingwei's muttering and slowly savored the cake. To his surprise, he found the taste quite good.
From his earliest memories, Qing Muye remembered his parents not allowing him to eat cake, saying that such items were too high in sugar and bad for his health. Therefore, the cream cakes he had eaten were all specially made, not like the cakes sold on the market.
Conversely, tasting it now, he found it to be very good.
He ate bite after bite, perhaps because the cake tasted good, or perhaps because it was bought by someone specific. Qing Muye ate several mouthfuls.
Even while eating the inexpensive cake, his demeanor remained elegant, as if gentleness and refinement were etched into his bones, radiating nobility everywhere.
Meng Jingwei stared at Qing Muye, lost in thought, captivated by his exquisite appearance, and unconsciously fell into a trance.
"Want to eat?"
Seeing her dazed gaze, the man assumed she wanted to eat the cake and offered her a piece.
Meng Jingwei, with her thoughts jumping, looked at the piece of cake he offered. Then, thinking of her adoptive father, she sighed, "It's all your fault. If you hadn't forced me back, I would be celebrating my birthday with my dad right now."
She pouted and sighed, her face filled with disappointment.
At that moment, the man's hardened heart was gently caressed, and it softened a little.
His movements paused, and he stared blankly at the woman in front of him, saying inexplicably, "Do you want to go back now?"
"Now?"
Meng Jingwei nodded vigorously, then reconsidered. It would take at least three hours to get home from here. How could she possibly go back to celebrate her father's birthday?
"Tsk, it's too far, there's no way I can make it back."
Meng Jingwei gave a self-deprecating laugh.
But as soon as the words left her mouth, she noticed Qing Muye shoving the cake into her hand and turning the car around, driving away rapidly.
She blinked, realizing they weren't heading towards the Qing family's old residence, and asked, "Hey, where are you going?"
"Taking you home."
"Home?"
Meng Jingwei's eyes widened in disbelief. "You… you're taking me?"
"What, do you want to walk?"
The man glanced at her sideways, his handsome face illuminated by a beautiful smile, captivating the soul.
The sunset glowed through the car window, falling on the man's face and casting a golden halo, giving him a blurred handsomeness, exceptionally alluring.
"No… no… I…"
Meng Jingwei felt like she was hearing things. She touched her head and asked incredulously, "Are you okay? Why do you suddenly want to take me home?"