Chapter 14

It had not snowed often in Wu City lately. Instead, it normally got rainy. I put my phone to my ear and heard Dixon's mild complaint. "It's just pouring outside. I got drenched. Won't you open the door for me?"

When I listened to him carefully, I could hear that he sounded a little upset.

I looked back around my room. "Why have you come to me?"

"Caroline, do you forget that I'm your boyfriend now?"

So he did still remember this...

"I thought you regretted it," said I.

"Why? Because I haven't called you?"

I said yes in a low voice and sounded upset.

"Silly girl. Didn't I tell you that I'd be handling some company affairs? If there isn't anything important going on in the next few months in the company, I'll stay with you." Dixon paused and said in a gentle voice, "Even if I have to attend to something, I'll take you with me."

His words made my heart melt, and he even called me girl. It was such an intimate form of address. I had always thought I was only a woman to keep him company in his eyes.

"Hello?"

Maybe I had stayed silent for too long, and I heard a word come from the depths of his throat.

I called his name. "Dixon."

"Yes?"

"I'll open the door."

I hung up and moved away from the French windows to hide my painkillers in my bedroom. Then, I sat before my dressing table to make myself up carefully, concealing the scars I received from falling on the ground.

I had scratched the scars on my face heavily. I had been venting my anger and also reminding myself that he had done this to me. Now, when I thought about it, I had been maudlin. I should not have hurt myself.

I sighed and went downstairs to open the door for him.

I opened it and stood at the gate. Dixon flicked my forehead lovingly. I froze, and he slightly smiled and asked, "What took you so long? You want to freeze me into ice?"

I lied with a smile. "I went to the bathroom."

Dixon glanced at me and suddenly asked, "Did you just put on makeup?"

I started to deny it, saying, "No."

Dixon wouldn't let it go. "Especially for me?"

I was speechless and said again after a while, "No."

Dixon took off his coat, which had almost been drenched. He smiled and said in a deep voice, "I didn't see you wear lipstick just now and you were looking pale. Now you look much better."

At that moment, I found an excuse. "I'm used to meeting people with my makeup on."

Dixon accepted the explanation and casually stroked my hair. He walked past me into the living room. "Ever since I've known you, every time I've seen you, you've been wearing makeup. I don't really remember seeing you without it."

I seemed to get lost in thoughts a lot. I raised my hand to scratch my head and followed him, explaining gently. "I've headed my entire family since I was 14. I became the chairman and CEO. I looked really immature back then, so I liked to wear makeup to hide my age. At this point, I don't feel comfortable without makeup on my face."

Dixon was walking to the sofa but he stopped. "You took over your entire family when you were 14?"

In the three years of our marriage, he never had really tried to get to know me. I did not feel too disappointed and just explained in a light tone. "My parents both died in a plane crash and we don't have any proper relatives. The people in the company were all desperately counting on me, so I had to drop out and became the CEO."

Dixon did not know how to react and only asked after a while, "What about after that? Did you go back to school?"

"No. In the beginning, I didn't even know much about doing business so I buried myself in learning about it from my seniors. I learned how to be a leader, how to lead the Shaw family to a more promising path. I did that until I married you at 20. How could I have had time for school?" Seeming to remember something, I started to make fun of myself. "No one in Wu City knows that the Shaw Corporations CEO only has a middle school diploma."

Hearing my words, Dixon realized something and said, "I used to think you were a mature woman, no matter whether I was judging by your aura or your makeup, but you were actually just 20 when you married me. You're only 23 now. Girls at this age should all be out-going like Cici, thinking about expensive makeup and beautiful clothes and chasing after their idols every day."

I reminded him with a smile, "Cici is three years older than me."

Dixon was a little stunned. "Right. You're even younger than her."

I was younger than Cici Gregg and also seven years younger than Gwen Worth.

That day, Dixon did not leave and watched movies in the living room, while I played on my phone. He would ask me some things intermittently as he watched. It was all small talk. For example, now, he was causally asking me, "Haven't you dated anyone before?"

I said honestly, "No."

"Then didn't you have a crush on some boy?"

I couldn't help remembering the Dixon Gregg I had met when I was 14.

Did he know that I was the girl who had tailed him?

When he had called me lass that night, had he recognized me or did he just call every girl that?

That night, Dixon Gregg had been too gentle.

When I was thinking of that night, I smiled gently and said, "Yes, I did."

Dixon squinted and asked, "Do I know him?"

He suddenly circled me in his arms and his lips came near me.

I found myself feeling uncomfortable at that moment.

The corner of his lips gently stroked my cheek. "Do I know him? Huh?"

If he was asking this, then as expected, he had not realized that I was the girl back then...

Because he had asked me at that time, "Why do you keep following me?"

I had been nervous so I timidly said, "Because... I like you."

"You don't know how it feels to like someone yet."

I asked him in hope, "Then can you wait for me until I know how it feels to 'like' someone?"

He smiled and did not reject or agree. However, after that night, I had failed to find him again. I only heard students from the next classroom saying that he was a volunteer temporarily teaching here for a few months.

Yesterday had been his last day there.

It so happened that I had said I liked him.

If I hadn't known that he was scheduled to leave yesterday, I would have thought that he had left to avoid me.

Nevertheless, I had been just an ordinary person in his eyes.

He had not needed to avoid me at all.

Once the realization dawned upon me that Dixon did not know I had been the girl at that time, I felt upset. When he played Street Where Wind Resides and called me lass, I had indeed been fantasizing about things.

Nevertheless, Dixon Gregg that night had been just like the man in my memory.

The rims of my eyes turned red and I stared at him, smiling mockingly, "You don't know him. He was a man I liked when I was young. I was little then, so little that he didn't even believe it when I said I liked him."

Dixon Gregg's kisses suddenly assaulted the corner of my lips.

"Now? Do you love me?"