Something You Can Never Cover Up
Chapter 7/9. Support us on Patreon!
The decor inside the restaurant was full of medieval gloom. The lighting made it as dark as night even though it was daytime.
All around were lighted aromatherapy candles, along with rose petals which seemed to be randomly scattered, yet still creating a pleasing aesthetic. Old news periodicals of past years, an old-fashioned gramophone, the posters of old-time celebrities—different ornaments which looked completely unrelated to the rest of the restaurant were arranged everywhere with great ingenuity.
Lin Ruoxi located the Cromwell siblings without difficulty, because there weren’t too many people as lunch time had just passed. So it was easy to notice the waiter standing beside the ordering couple.
“Hey, Miss Lin, we’re here!” Alice waved excitedly. “They’re known for their butter garlic giant lobster—we’ve ordered one, should we get one more?”
“The beef here is also air-shipped from Kobe, Japan, so it’s very fresh. The braised beef with mushroom is also not bad,” suggested Stern with a grin.
Lin Ruoxi took a seat opposite them with a helpless expression. “I’m not very familiar with the food, you guys may order on my behalf.”
“Miss Lin, you are a kind person indeed.” Alice clutched at her chest, and spoke in a touched voice.
Upon seeing her antics, Lin Ruoxi smiled. “Miss Alice is so easily satisfied.”
Being more familiar with each other, Lin Ruoxi had also relaxed and made a joke.
“Babe Ruoxi, you’re underestimating them.” Yang Chen sat down next to Lin Ruoxi, and said gloomily, “How are they easily satisfied? Do you know how much the dishes they ordered will cost? It’s basically extortion, and you’re still acting like they ordered randomly?”
“Hey now, Mr Yang, Miss Lin had already promised us. Do you want her to go back on her promise?” Stern said with a righteous expression.
Yang Chen picked up a knife from the table and made as if he was going to hurl it at Stern’s head.
Stern rose hurriedly, and adopted a Bruce Lee pose with a loud ‘Oh!’, thumbing his nose and staring provocatively at Yang Chen, daring him to throw the knife.
“That’s enough! What are you guys doing?!”
Lin Ruoxi almost fainted observing this scene—it was bad enough that Yang Chen tried to scare Stern, but this British guy actually played along like they were in an action film.
Fortunately the waiters at these posh restaurants had undergone vigorous training, and merely stood there with a smile upon seeing the ‘mystical’ actions of these customers, and waited to take their orders.
Lin Ruoxi gave the waiter an embarrassed smile to indicate that he should proceed with Stern’s orders. Only then did the waiter retreat respectfully.
Yang Chen wouldn’t actually throw the knife. After scaring Stern, he said with a curl of his lips, “The lobster here is shipped from Canada, the price of just one will be over five hundred euros; that Kōbe beef, if it’s for four it’d cost at least eight hundred euros. For just this one meal, they would have you spend over ten thousand Chinese yuan, and that’s not even including drinks.”
Lin Ruoxi was stunned. She really didn’t know that the two dishes the siblings ordered were so expensive.
“Tsk tsk, it looks like Mr Yang has eaten far and wide to actually know the prices so well.” Alice stared at him with despise. “Or don’t you want to let your own wife try what you’ve had before? I’m absolutely sure that women don’t like men who are just all about saving money.”
Hearing this, Lin Ruoxi blushed slightly, and asked in puzzlement, “Miss Alice… How… how did you know that he’s my… that… that that’s our relationship?”
Alice chuckled. “Miss Lin, when you’re with Mr Yang, anyone attentive can tell that your relationship is no ordinary one, from the way you talk to your glances. Plus it doesn’t feel like you guys are actively courting each other, it’s more like you’re a family.”
“Miss Lin, you’re too confident in your own acting. Last night, my love and I had already figured out your relationship,” Stern added.
“Haha! Buying you guys this meal is worth it indeed—turns out you guys are still able to say such nice things,” Yang Chen spoke leisurely as he was glad for what he heard. He then leaned back in his chair.
Lin Ruoxi reached out and pinched Yang Chen’s thigh savagely. She felt like running out the door—initially she thought that her relationship with Yang Chen was hard to detect, but it turned out it was her own misperception. Accordingly, most people in the company must have realized something was out of place but just didn’t dare say anything.
“What are you afraid of? It’s bound to become public knowledge sooner or later.” Yang Chen felt helpless for her shyness.
Although Lin Ruoxi understood this, but because something she thought was well-hidden was actually easily seen through by others, she still felt uneasy.
“Miss Lin, did you know?” Alice came close to Lin Ruoxi, and said mysteriously, “In this world, there are two things that people always want to cover up although it is impossible to do so.”
“Huh?” Lin Ruoxi didn’t get it.
“The first is poverty. No matter how hard poor people try, they can never change their depressing reality.” Alice’s pretty eyes shone humorously. “The second thing… well, it’s when one person loves another—with their heart.”
A hot sensation was burning in Lin Ruoxi’s ears. Alice’s words were a fine needle piercing in her heart, making her cool protective shell collapse into an indistinguishable heap.
“Woah! Miss Lin is blushing, it seems like I guessed correctly!” Alice smiled delicately and threw herself into Stern’s lap, giving him a few kisses as if in celebration.
Lin Ruoxi touched her cheeks—her face was as red as an apple—with her head bent and her lips pursed. Now it was her turn to be overcome with the urge to throw a knife over.
Although Yang Chen heard what Alice said, he didn’t go on teasing Lin Ruoxi, but simply watched her reaction silently from her side.
Lin Ruoxi also sneaked a glance at Yang Chen from the corner of her eyes. When she saw that Yang Chen was staring at her with something like a tight smile, she turned away quickly to avoid seeing his face anymore.
In the following moments, other than Stern and Alice discussing by themselves where to go after the fashion week was over, Yang Chen sipped the specially made lemon tea quietly, quietly observing the people surrounding him and the streets. Whereas Lin Ruoxi stayed in her seat in silence, occasionally saying a word or two to the siblings, but more often staying lost in wordless thought.
The lobster and beef were served only after over half an hour later. Stern further ordered a thirty-year-old Lafite and was lectured again by Yang Chen. On the contrary, Lin Ruoxi who was paying, didn’t bother with their actions. No matter how absurd the spending would be, it would only carry on for a few more days. Despite the fact that Yang Chen was much wealthier, she felt that she was a lot more generous.
Because of the butter and cream in Italian cuisine, although Lin Ruoxi thought that the lobster and beef were tender and delicious, she felt bloated after a few mouthfuls and couldn’t eat anymore.
The siblings didn’t have big appetites either. Although they were very picky, they weren’t big eaters.
In the end, it was Yang Chen—who didn’t order any dishes—who stuffed himself with half of a huge lobster and a large portion of the leftover beef, finally letting out a burp. “What a wastrel,” said Yang Chen in response to the smirking Stern.
“That’s enough. It’s not like the food is bad. Why do you always have to argue with Stern over a bit of money for a meal?” Lin Ruoxi frowned.
“Don’t you know your own husband started out by selling mutton skewers?” replied Yang Chen in shame. “How could I compete with you businesspeople and aristocrats?”
Lin Ruoxi said softly between gritted teeth, “Can’t you control yourself? It’s come to the point that I’m more embarrassed for you than yourself. It’s clear that you’re the richest one, why is it that ultimately it’s also you who seem the most modest?!”
Still, when it was time to settle the account, after the waiter printed the bill, he assessed everyone at the table, and instantly placed it in front of the most senior Yang Chen.
Yang Chen stared at the bill before him. “Two thousand four hundred and eighty-six euros?!”
Yang Chen blinked to make sure he wasn’t seeing things, and immediately placed the bill in front of Lin Ruoxi with a smile. “Wife, you handle it.”
As if she’d known that Yang Chen wouldn’t carry money with him, Lin Ruoxi had already taken out her purse, retrieved five purple five hundred euro notes, added on a yellow two hundred euro note as a tip, and handed it all to the waiter.
The waiter’s eyes almost fell out when he spotted the large stack of five-hundred-euro notes in Lin Ruoxi’s purse. The customers here usually used a credit card; not many of them carried large sums of cash like this lady here.
In fact, it wasn’t that Lin Ruoxi wanted to use cash specifically, it was just that for someone of her personality, using a card required a signature which would take time. She had wanted to leave as quick as possible.
Before leaving, Lin Ruoxi didn’t neglect to put in her bag the indigo flowers she ‘bought’ with fifteen euros—although it was nothing valuable, she didn’t want to leave it behind snobbily.
Seeing Lin Ruoxi’s carefree extravagance, the meal-scrounging pair of siblings couldn’t stop praising her as they exit the restaurant.
Although spending almost twenty thousand Chinese yuan for a lunch was rather excessive, Lin Ruoxi didn’t feel that it was too much; conversely she was embarrassed by what the siblings had said.
Just as the four were about to head to their car to go for the afternoon fashion conference at Louvre Museum, a wizened Caucasian wearing short sleeves and ripped jeans suddenly ran in front of them.
“This beautiful lady over here, do you have time?” The man’s face had thin skin and protruding bones, with heavy dark circles under his sunken eye sockets. His speaking voice was raspy—at first glance he seemed like a heavy drug addict.
Lin Ruoxi subconsciously took a step back, subconsciously drawing in closer to Yang Chen. “Who are you?”