The abandoned daughter of the Lu family turns around and marries a celibate tycoon.

The black sedan followed closely behind Lin Chen's car, and no matter how he changed lanes or made sudden turns and stops, he could not shake it off.

Lin Chen's forehead was covered in fine beads of sweat, but his eyes were as sharp as an eagle's.

He gripped the steering wheel firmly with one hand and quickly dialed the car phone with the other.

It was answered after only one ring.

"Mr. Gu, we're being followed."

"Gu's Shopping Mall, Basement Level 2." Gu Yanshen's voice came through the loudspeaker, calm yet carrying a reassuring power.

"clear."

Lin Chen slammed on the gas, and the car accelerated abruptly. With a near-perfect series of lane changes, he narrowly escaped between two parallel trucks, instantly creating some distance between them. Utilizing his exceptional familiarity with the city roads, he made several sharp turns and merged into the dense evening traffic, temporarily submerging his pursuers in the flashing taillights.

Lu Xiran, sitting in the back seat, gripped the armrest tightly, her knuckles turning white. Every sharp turn made her heart almost stop.

Lu Hao stared at the cars whizzing by ahead, slammed his fist on the steering wheel, and honked his horn, piercing the night. He quickly dialed another number: "Immediately track down a license plate number, XX·XXXX! I need its real-time location!"

The entrance to the underground parking lot of Gu's Shopping Mall is right in front of you.

Lin Chen did not slow down at all. The tires screeched as they rubbed against the ground, and the car suddenly plunged down the steep slope and disappeared into the dark underground space.

Almost the instant they entered the B2 area, several black SUVs that had been parked in different locations suddenly turned on their headlights and slowly emerged from the shadows.

Lin Chen precisely found a gap, floored the accelerator, and the car slid across. The next second, he heard a sharp braking and a crash from behind—the pursuers' path was briefly blocked.

At the same time, the lights in area B2 went out one after another, plunging the entire area into near-absolute darkness, with only the emergency signs emitting a faint green glow.

"Miss Lu, hurry!" Lin Chen shouted in a low voice, and the car had already come to a steady stop next to a hidden pillar.

In the darkness, a warm yet strong hand precisely grasped Lu Xiran's icy wrist. Before she could even cry out, she was pulled out of the car by a force and stumbled into the spacious passenger seat of another car.

The car door slammed shut, and the engine started.

The car, without its lights on, moved like a ghost in the shadows, taking advantage of its absolute familiarity with the terrain to quietly drive out through a rarely used exit, leaving the chaos and darkness completely behind.

The car was silent except for the two people's slightly rapid breathing.

Lu Xiran's heart was still pounding. The exhaustion from surviving the ordeal and the lingering fear from the intense tension made her unconsciously clench the nearest thing beside her with her left hand—the hem of Gu Yanshen's shirt, her knuckles turning white and trembling slightly.

Gu Yanshen was about to shift gears and accelerate when he suddenly stopped.

He turned his head and his gaze fell on her hand, which was gripping the hem of his clothes tightly.

Slender, pale, yet she exerted all her strength.

She lowered her head, her loose hair obscuring most of her face, her thin shoulders trembling slightly. An unprecedented and unfamiliar emotion, like a tiny electric current, suddenly surged through Gu Yanshen's heart.

He paused for only a second, then looked away, his right hand unconsciously adjusting its position to make the hem of her dress more compliant. The car accelerated silently, smoothly merging into the main road and speeding towards the western mountains, far from the city lights.

It wasn't until the car entered the mountain road that Lu Xiran's violent heartbeat calmed down a little. Only then did she realize that she had been holding onto something, and she quickly pulled her hand back, the expensive shirt fabric already wrinkled from her grip.

"I'm sorry..." Her voice was hoarse, still carrying lingering fear.

Gu Yanshen stared straight ahead at the winding mountain road, his tone calm: "It was my oversight. I didn't expect Lu Hao to be able to get the vice mayor to use his authority to directly locate and track me."

His words were like a key, unlocking the floodgates of Lu Xiran's suppressed emotions. All her long-held doubts, self-deception, and pathetic glimmer of hope were utterly crushed by the cold reality at that moment.

"I've never understood..." her voice trembled, "why my dad... would condone it, even participate in it?"

Tonight, the relentlessly pursuing black sedan and that phone call extinguished the last glimmer of hope in her heart. Lu Hao was the mastermind from beginning to end.

"Why did he want to kill me?" Hot tears finally streamed down her face uncontrollably. "All that love, all that care over the past ten years... was it all a lie? How can a person change so easily?"

Her sobs were exceptionally clear in the enclosed carriage, filled with utter despair and helplessness.

Gu Yanshen tightened his grip on the steering wheel. His thin lips were slightly pursed, and the lines of his profile appeared cold and hard in the light and shadow flashing past the window. A few seconds of silence followed before he spoke: "Perhaps it's not that he's changed. It's just that he's never taken off his disguise." He paused, then added, "So, don't easily trust any man."

The car slowly glided into the garage of a secluded villa on the mountaintop and came to a smooth stop.

The engine shut off, and the world fell into an absolute silence.

Lu Xiran raised her tear-filled face and looked at him.

Those eyes, usually clear and bright, were now brimming with tears, their rims and the tip of their nose red, like a frightened fawn with nowhere to run, so fragile yet revealing an unyielding stubbornness behind the tears.

Gu Yanshen turned his head and met her eyes.

His breath hitched almost imperceptibly for a moment, as a strong urge to reach out and wipe away the tears on her face struck him without warning.

This unfamiliar impulse surprised even himself.

He quickly turned his face away, opened the car door, and his voice regained its usual calm and composure:

"Compress your emotions. You don't have time to wallow in sadness and questions." He got out of the car, walked over to her, and opened the car door. "Now that Lu Hao has confirmed you're not dead, he will use all his resources and any means necessary to find you and then make you disappear 'reasonably'."

"Until his people find this place," he said firmly, "you cannot leave this villa, nor can you contact anyone outside. This is the safest place right now."

Lu Xiran looked up at him, biting her lower lip hard to force back the tears welling in her eyes. All the weak sobs were swallowed, leaving only a clear, trembling word:

"it is good."

That night, Lu Xiran couldn't sleep at all.

She curled up on the soft sofa in the guest room, her mind racing, coldly piecing together all the fragments of information.

How can she transfer the land in the suburbs to her own name? This is her most important bargaining chip in future negotiations and her return to the Lu family business.

More importantly, it's about how she "appears." She must appear before everyone in the most unmistakable way possible. She cannot give him any opportunity to suppress the news or handle things secretly.

However, the reality is that she is currently a "dead person," an "undocumented person" without legal status. Even if she were to reappear, she would likely face legal issues related to suspected illegal entry or identity fraud.

Lu Hao could easily use this opportunity to control her first.

The thorny issues are interconnected.

She didn't even dare to step out of that door.