Chapter 147 — The Long-Awaited...

"I'm glad you like it. I'll make it this way from now on." Auntie Li was clearly delighted by Zhou Yanning's praise. "My hometown is Shanghai, so my yangchun noodles are authentic. But up here in the north, proper noodles like these really are hard to find."

"Auntie Li, it seems the salary I pay you rather wastes your talents. If you opened a noodle shop yourself, you'd make more than two thousand a month," Yang Yanzhou said.

"Oh, I couldn't. I don't know the first thing about business. If I opened a shop, I'd lose everything down to my last penny." Auntie Li waved her hand hurriedly. "I think things are quite good as they are."

After Zhou Yanning finished her noodles, Auntie Li went off to wash the dishes. Yang Ce checked the time—Chen Shutang and Zhou Yanning ought to be resting soon. "Then, Mengyan, you stay here and look after Jiajia. As for Uncle Chen—"

"I've already called my father. He knows I'm not coming home," Chen Shutang said.

"All right, then I'll be going." Yang Yanzhou finished, then deliberately waved to Zhou Yanning. "Jiajia, I'm off. Get a good rest."

Zhou Yanning's face flushed, and she lowered her head, but still managed, in a voice like a mosquito: "Take care on the road."

Yang Yu nodded. He needed to leave Zhou Yanning time to adjust—after all, with more than a year of memories gone, anyone would feel out of place. For now, having Chen Shutang keep her company and chat was a decent approach.

Yang Ce left the villa and walked toward Wang Yanqiu's house. The lights were already on in Wang Yanqiu's villa—it seemed she had returned.

Yang Ce pressed the doorbell twice and waited a while, but no one came to open the door. He pressed it twice more, still no answer, and began to grow annoyed.

Damn it, this little minx—she tells me to come find her, and then won't open the door when I ring the bell? The lights are plainly on. What kind of empty-fortress trick is she playing?

Yang Ce glanced at the fence around Wang Yanqiu's villa. It had been modified a little, but that was no problem at all for Heng. Yang Ce limbered up, gripped the edge of the fence, and with a push and a spring, vaulted over it.

As for the lock on the villa door inside, that was even less trouble for Yang Ce. He simply picked it open with a skeleton key and strode right in.

Since this little girl Wang Yanqiu wasn't coming out to welcome him, Yang Ce decided to play half host himself.

"Anyone here?" Yang Ce looked around the empty living room, searching left and right for Wang Yanqiu, but caught no sight of her. Surely she isn't really not home? So he called out: "Wang Yanqiu, are you in?"

But there was no response. Yang Ce had no choice but to sweep the house with his ability. Nothing on the first floor—the second floor... Oh, come on, no way. Wang Yanqiu, that little minx, is actually taking a bath?

Fair skin, small breasts, and a tiny butterfly tattoo on her rear. Yang Ce's blood ran hot at the sight, and he had a certain physiological reaction despite himself.

Yang Jincong laughed. The first time he'd seen Wang Yanqiu, at Zhao Ying's house, he hadn't reacted nearly so strongly as this. That heart-gnawing hex of Lan Ling's was truly a scourge—it had stealthily turned him into a great lecher.

Still, that was as good an excuse as any for Yang Minlan's own lechery.

You're the one who got looked over while bathing—don't blame me. Who told you to have me come find you? And if you were going to have me come, why weren't you waiting properly out here? What were you doing taking a bath?

Wang Yanqiu was lathering herself with foam when she suddenly felt a chill. A killer's sensitivity made her frown, though she could find nothing amiss. She shook her head and went on lathering.

Yang Ce looked once, then looked again, then looked once more. Only after several looks did he finally withdraw his gaze. Wang Yanqiu's identity made him more and more curious.

At first he'd thought she was just a small-time delinquent girl from the streets, but now it seemed Wang Yanqiu was more than that. And that little butterfly on her rear—could it be the emblem of some organization?

At this thought, Yang Ce felt it very likely. He set aside his earlier notion that Wang Yanqiu had been ridden by a thousand men. Seen this way, she was really rather perfect—apart from being a bit short, a bit small in the chest, a bit small in the rear, she had no flaws; and she was, after all, neatly shaped.

Yang Ce feared that if he kept looking he would lose control, so after withdrawing his gaze he tried hard not to think about it—but his thoughts kept circling back to Wang Yanqiu's figure.

Yang Ce shook his head and sat down in the second-floor living room to wait for Wang Yanqiu to finish her bath. The sofa faced the bathroom door directly, so the moment she came out, he would see her.

"I love taking baths, the turtle trips and falls, ah-oh ah-oh, watch out for fleas, so many bubbles, ah-oh ah-oh, the submarine is praying—"

"Scrub up, scrub down, wash and wash. Rub left, rub right, rub and rub—"

Yang Ce had not sat long when he heard humming from the bathroom—it was actually "Bath Song," a children's song sung by Fan Xiaoxuan. Yang Xutang was utterly speechless. This was what Wang Yanqiu sang, that unreasonable little minx?

Just as he was pondering this, with a click, the bathroom door was pushed open, and Wang Yanqiu walked out completely naked, a towel in her hand wiping her hair as she went on singing: "I scrub up and scrub down, rub left and rub right, my bathtub's such a nice place to sit—"

"Gah!" Yang Ce's eyes went wide. Could this be the legendary scene of a beauty emerging from her bath? Yang Ce rubbed his eyes—no mistake, he hadn't used his ability, so how was he seeing a naked Wang Yanqiu? Could she really be wearing nothing at all?

Wang Yanqiu was by nature a girl who paid little heed to convention—otherwise, back at Zhao Ying's house, she could not have been caught exposed by Yang Ce time and again. As a rule, she didn't bring a nightgown or a change of clothes when she went to bathe; she simply returned to her bedroom after leaving the bathroom to change.

There was no one else in the house anyway, so there was no need to be so careful. Just as she always did after a shower, Wang Yanqiu dried her hair as she stepped out of the bathroom and headed for the bedroom.

But after two steps, Wang Yanqiu suddenly sensed something was wrong—because there seemed to be an extra person on the sofa in the living room.

Wang Yanqiu whipped her head toward the sofa and let out a shriek—"Ah!"—then instinctively clamped her hands over her private parts.

"You—how did you get in here?" Wang Yanqiu cried out in alarm.

"I rang the doorbell for ages and nobody answered, so I climbed in through the window." Yang Duo had no intention of telling Wang Yanqiu about the Lily Key.

Wang Yanqiu was on the verge of going mad. What the hell was Yang Ce playing at, sneaking in without a word and then—her fright gave way to the sudden realization that she was still naked. Panicking, Wang Yanqiu scrambled back into the bathroom and slammed the door shut with a bang.

Yang Ce shrugged. Can't blame me, he thought. You're the one running around the house without any clothes on—I just happened to see something I shouldn't have.

Wang Yanqiu was ready to murder Yang Juehuan on the spot. The bastard had seen everything! She ground her teeth in fury, wishing she could gouge out Yang Juehuan's eyeballs and stomp on them like bubbles.

After locking the bathroom door, Wang Yanqiu patted her chest and began plotting how she would deal with Yang Ce in a moment. You had a road to heaven and chose not to take it; hell has no gate, yet in you walk.

Do I, Wang Yanqiu, look like someone easy to push around? Originally she'd only meant to teach him a lesson, but now that this pervert had seen her body, how could Wang Yanqiu possibly let Yang Ce off lightly? This time Wang Yanqiu was truly angry.