Rose Manor: Tycoon's Relentless Chase-Chapter 289 - 271: Caught Him

Shen Jianian woke up in the middle of the night wondering if the neighbor was male or female. Those notes didn’t seem to reveal any gender-related information; she had just assumed that the neighbor was a lady.

"Sigh..."

Shen Jianian slapped her forehead, let out a long sigh, and found herself unable to sleep. She picked up her phone from the bedside table and glanced at it; it was past two in the morning.

She scrolled through her social media feed, but there was nothing worth reading. In her message list, the only frequent contacts were Fu Jichen, Bai Changxia, and Zhao Shunyi, who was on vacation recently.

She opened up her chat with Fu Jichen.

The latest message was from around eight last night, asking if she had eaten.

At that time, she was at a hotpot restaurant with Zhao Shunyi and hadn’t replied to his message.

Shen Jianian scrolled up through the screen, and the messages were all about daily concerns, reminding her about the cold weather and to keep warm and avoid catching a cold.

Suddenly, her eyes locked onto one message—it’s below ten degrees Celsius tonight, your constitution is weak, susceptible to colds; if it’s nothing urgent, stay home and rest.

At the time, she had found it puzzling, but thinking back now, just before receiving this message from Fu Jichen, she had just returned from outside and knocked on the neighbor’s door.

Could it be...

No way, no way; Fu Jichen couldn’t possibly be so perverse as to follow her here.

But you never know; what wouldn’t he do? Previously, he even kidnapped her from Jiang City and locked her in a villa; he isn’t someone who plays by the rules.

Once the seed of doubt is planted in her heart, Shen Jianian becomes more and more convinced that her suspicion is correct, only lacking verification.

She set an alarm for five o’clock, put down her phone, and closed her eyes to sleep again.

When the alarm went off, Shen Jianian was in a deep sleep. It took her a while to open her eyes, and when she remembered her plan of lying in wait, she suddenly became alert, got up, put on her clothes, opened the door slightly, and sat inside on a small stool to wait.

She checked the time occasionally, waiting from five until six. Shen Jianian yawned countless times, nearly dozing off with her head drooping.

At ten past seven, there were sounds of a door opening from next door, and Shen Jianian was jolted from her half-asleep state, standing up straight.

Without hesitation, she yanked the door open and walked out.

After staying here for so many days, she had finally caught him!

Fu Jichen was locking his door, unprepared for the figure that suddenly appeared by his side, and was startled when he turned his head to face her.

The air froze, and everything around seemed to slow down and become clear.

Leaning against the doorframe, Shen Jianian sneered at the man, "Amusing, isn’t it?"

Fu Jichen’s brain, momentarily stalled, began to function again, quickly guessing the reason for Shen Jianian’s sudden appearance: "You were deliberately waiting for me here?"

Shen Jianian: "If I weren’t, who knows how long you would have made a fool out of me?"

"I wasn’t trying to make a fool out of you." Fu Jichen walked over to her, pushing her inside to avoid the cold breeze in the hallway since she had just recovered from a cold, needing to be cautious, "Let’s talk inside."

"Wait, I didn’t mean to talk to you." She stayed there only to confirm her suspicion.

Fu Jichen followed her inside; without male slippers, he remained in his shoes, stepping onto the floor, closing the door with his hand, and once again sincerely explaining to her: "I wasn’t trying to make a fool of you." Looking into her eyes, every word he spoke came from the heart, "In fact, if you hadn’t discovered me, I wouldn’t have planned to meet you in this building, no matter if you never found out who your neighbor was, I wouldn’t feel any regret."

Shen Jianian was defeated by his simple words, unable to understand why, clearly, she was the one in the right, and yet, in an instant, their positions had reversed, making her seem unreasonable.

"You are spying on me!" Shen Jianian attempted to regain the upper hand.

"Are you suggesting?"

"How did you know I live here? How did you know I was sick? And... you even know when I go out!"

Shen Jianian squinted her eyes, her gaze sharp and forceful.

Fu Jichen sighed silently; he had indeed sent people to follow her.

The incident from three years ago was a lesson learned; he didn’t dare to take any chances. Overtly, the people tailing her were Zheng Yi and another man, reporting her situation to him promptly. In reality, there were eight people secretly protecting her. However, the people hired were more than eight, swapping between shifts to ensure eight people per shift.

These things he couldn’t tell her, not wanting to incite her fear.

Fu Jichen thought for a moment, patiently explaining: "You mentioned your rental to Bai Changxia, who happened to attend a business event with her husband that day, where I also was, and I learned about it by chance. As for your illness, it was the morning I arrived here; I overheard your conversation with the delivery runner. Regarding when you leave the house..." his tone slowed, "I don’t understand what you mean."

Shen Jianian took out her phone and found the WeChat message he sent her previously: "This one. I just came back from outside, and you sent me a message right away. Dare you say you weren’t monitoring me?"

Fu Jichen smirked: "So you saw the WeChat I sent you, then why didn’t you reply?"

"Answer my question first!" Shen Jianian was like an angry little beast now, not giving him a chance to change the topic.

"I was at home when you knocked on the door." Fu Jichen pointed at the peephole on her door, "I looked out from the door lens, you were wearing an outdoor down jacket, and had a hat and scarf on."

Shen Jianian stared with wide eyes for a while, speechless.

"Any more questions?" Fu Jichen stepped forward, his voice low, "Go ahead and ask them all at once, so you won’t suspect me of having ulterior motives."

Having said that, he seemed to realize the inappropriate choice of words and nodded to himself: "I do indeed have ulterior motives."

Shen Jianian’s eyes sore from glaring: "You... you rascal!"

"Yes, I am a rascal." Fu Jichen accepted her assessment of him untroubled, considering it as a kind of compliment.

Shen Jianian was so angry she felt dizzy, pressing her lips tightly.

Fu Jichen chuckled again, his dark eyes narrowing, the authority and coldness he showed to outsiders nonexistent here: "You’ve waited long to catch me, huh? Have breakfast and then sleep a bit more. I’m off to the company; there’s an important meeting this morning, need to go early and prepare. We can talk when I come back tonight." 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

Shen Jianian watched his smiling face, feeling he deserved a punch, as if there was anything she wanted to talk about with him!

"What do you want to eat? I’ll have Aunt Cheng send it over later." Fu Jichen noticed how wrinkled her eyelids were from fatigue, probably lacking energy to make breakfast.

Shen Jianian: "The previous meals for a patient were made by Aunt Cheng?"

"Yes."

"And the note?"

"I wrote it." Fu Jichen added, "With my left hand."

Shen Jianian cursed quietly as a "pervert," who could write such beautiful regular script with their left hand.

Fu Jichen raised a hand to pinch his brow, sighing: "I suddenly realized, you wouldn’t recognize my handwriting after losing your memory; even if I wrote with my right hand, you wouldn’t recognize it as mine." He had overthought it.

Shen Jianian no longer wanted to talk to him and pointed outside: "Aren’t you rushing to work? Why haven’t you left yet?"

Fu Jichen obediently opened the door, glancing at her place before leaving. The layout was the same as his next door, but she had decorated it differently, bright and cozy.

The door closed again, leaving Shen Jianian alone. After a long while, she regained her composure, biting her lip as she paced in the living room, uncertain whom to tell about this matter. Finally, she dialed Bai Changxia’s number.

"Hello..." Bai Changxia was still asleep, awakened by the ringing phone, his eyes didn’t open, and his voice was drowsy.

Shen Jianian took a deep breath, striving for calm: "Do you know who lives next door to me?"

"Ah?" Bai Changxia was in a fog, thinking for a moment, said, "A kind aunt. You’ve mentioned she brought you patient meals when you were sick."

Shen Jianian informed her: "It’s Fu Jichen."

There was a brief silence on the phone, followed by vague rustling sounds, probably Bai Changxia sitting up, "Who did you say? Fu Jichen?"

She actually heard clearly, but asked again due to disbelief.

"The person living next door isn’t any kind aunt, it’s Fu Jichen." Shen Jianian said with indignation, "I purposely got up at five this morning to catch him!"

"How did you suspect him?"

"A female resident in the building brought him some pastries yesterday. We chatted for a bit; that’s when I realized my neighbor is a man. Following the clues, I guessed it was him." Shen Jianian’s emotions were quite complex, "He actually lives next door to me!"

"You said a female resident brought pastries to Fu Jichen?" Bai Changxia clicked her tongue, "Probably interested in him. Fu Jichen’s face does attract attention wherever he goes."

Shen Jianian said expressionlessly, "Is your emphasis misplaced?"

Bai Changxia coughed and shifted back to the main topic: "What do you intend to do then?"

Shen Jianian slumped onto the sofa, her neck thrown back, resting on the backrest, looking at the ceiling and sighing: "What can I do, I signed a year-long rental contract, can’t move out immediately. Besides, no matter where I move, Fu Jichen will find me."

"Boss Fu is clearly pursuing you. Instead of avoiding him, why not enjoy it; after all, he hasn’t forced you to accept him quickly." Bai Changxia said earnestly, "Jianian, you’re not losing anything."