The next morning, a series of sharp knocks sounded at the door. Fu Ling smiled to himself and delayed for a few seconds then went to open the door.
Yu Ting raised her hand to knock again when the door was opened from the inside. She looked at the disheveled man standing there with dark circles and was taken aback. She glanced at her partner and they raised their guard.
"Hello, we're looking for Mr. Fu Ling"
Fu Ling answered
"That's me"
The officers exchanges glances again and Yu Ting frowned
"Do you have a daughter?"
His expression became unnatural for a second and then he looked back inside the house frowning when he didn't see the familiar figure
"Did something happen to her?"
Before they could answer, Rong Hua came over aggressively.
"Fu Ling how could you do such a thing? Yanxi considered you her father and this is how you treat her?"
Fu Ling frowned
"What are you talking about?"
At this point, the gossiping neighbors had already started doing random things from sweeping the front door repeatedly to cleaning the leaves of the potted plants.
Fu Ling knew exactly what she wanted to do and was setting the stage the for her. Sure enough Rong Hua exploded.
"Fu Ling I don't care that you're incompetent and useless. I always thought you treated Yanxi as your own daughter who knew that you had such thoughts about her and would do such a beastly thing?"
There were some faint gasps which were quickly surpressed as the neighbors stretched their ears to listen more carefully.
Fu Ling scowled
"Are you crazy? What kind of person do you think I am? What makes you think I would have any interest in the child I raised myself? What part of her looks attractive to you? "
The series of questions left Rong Hua speechless. She didn't expect Fu Ling to become so sharp tongued today. But she couldn't let him exonerate himself so she called out to one of the ladies they were closer to.
"Auntie Lan, we're going to the station now. My little Xixi it is a bit frightened could you please let Xiao Meng come along to console her?"
She said it was to console Fu Yanxi but everyone knew it was just for him to hear the latest news and come back to inform the neighbors. Naturally Wu Lan didn't have any objection. She also wanted to know what happened. She had been neighbors with this family for a long time and this man Fu Ling was an honest man. She couldn't believe that her judgement was wrong but she could only watch and see.
Yu Ting and Long Feng looked at each other. This was getting out of hand. They wordlessly escorted Fu Ling to the police car under the explicit gaze of various aunties and took off.
The ride was extremely awkward. Fu Ling looked out the window in a daze the whole time.
They got to the station followed by Rong Hua and Xiao Meng. They walked in and quite a few people were gathered.
Fu Ling spotted the male protagonist at first glance. He stood beside Fu Yanxi with a team of lawyers behind him and Fu Yanxi was wrapped in a blanket shrinking into a female officers embrace.
Whenever a man tried to approach her she would whimper and shrink back. The male protagonist paced around and raked his hair in frustration. When he sighted Fu Ling, he walked forward briskly and grabbed Fu Ling by the collar.
"Look what you did to my daughter you beast!"
Fu Ling looked at him calmly
"Sir if you don't let me go, I'll sue you for assault."
The moment those words came out, everybody looked straight at him.
Yan Mo was shocked by the look in his eyes. For some reason, it reminded him of his uncle and he unconsciously let go.
Fu Ling straightened his collar.
"Thank you."
When Yan Mo came to his senses and realized he had been frightened by this low level bastard, he became even more angry but he didn't act unscrupulously anymore.
The atmosphere stagnated until Fu Ling broke the ice
"I was taken away from my home before I even had the time to wash up this morning. I would appreciate if we can wrap things up quickly so that I can go have a bath"
Yan Mo sneered.
"You think you'll be able to leave?"
Fu Ling raised an eyebrow
"Won't I?"
Yan Mo took a deep breath
"My name is Yan Mo. I'm Yanxi's biological father. I and Rong Hua only reconnected recently and old sparks were ignited. I felt guilty to you and decided that after everything was cleared up, you would be rewarded handsomely. Who knew that you would do such a cruel thing?"
"When did you guys 'reunite'?"
Yan Mo felt uneasy but answered regardless
"Last week"
Fu Ling looked thoughtful
"Oh. But I saw your family of three together last month. That was when I decided to get divorced with Rong Hua but she refused. You should ask her why."
Everyone turned to look at the beautiful woman who was now trying to make herself smaller.
"Fu Ling what are you talking about?"
Her eyes rolled and then she burst into tears
"Is this why? I should have known you would be stimulated. You have always treated Yanxi as your own daughter I knew you wouldn't just do something like this for no reason. You must've been stimulated by the fact we were going to leave and so you resorted to this. But you shouldn't have done that. Yanxi would still recognize you as her godfather but now... How can my daughter live?"
She said so much in one breath and Fu Ling silently rolled his eyes
"Your words are quite clear for someone who's crying. Besides, what makes you think I have any interest whatsoever in children? If I wanted to torture her, I'd write a few programs and not let her go out until she figures them out"
Rong Hua was slightly speechless. Thinking back it seems like that was the only method of punishment Fu Ling had ever used on Yanxi.