After being separated from my family, I became a darling of the military region thanks to my medical

His warm breath almost brushed against Ye Zhen's earlobe, carrying his unique scent of tobacco and gunpowder, forcefully penetrating her breath.

"This is not cohabitation."

His low voice, like cheap sandpaper, sent shivers down her spine and made her ears tingle.

"It's close-fitting protection."

Ye Zhen froze, instinctively wanting to back away, but he braced himself against the edge of the dining table behind him with one hand, trapping her in a small space between him and the table.

She suddenly looked up, meeting his dark eyes that gleamed with cunning and domineering light, and laughed in exasperation.

"Commander Gu," she mimicked him, deliberately lowering her voice, but her tone was full of cold sarcasm, "Isn't your 'close protection' a little too 'close'? Anyone who didn't know better would think Commander Gu had some kind of special fetish."

She thought these words would enrage him, or at least crack his complacent expression.

Unexpectedly, the smile on Gu Zheng's lips deepened.

Instead of backing away, he leaned even closer to her, their noses almost touching. The light in his eyes was intensely aggressive.

"Dr. Ye, don't you know best what my 'fetishes' are for you?" he said lazily, his tone dripping with undisguised innuendo. "Or perhaps, you'd like to experience it again?"

"You!" Ye Zhen's cheeks flushed instantly.

That bastard! That scoundrel!

She reached out, trying to push him away, but just as her fingertips touched his hard chest, a sharp, untimely pain shot through her stomach, and then everything went black.

The nerves that had been under immense pressure all night snapped at this moment, and a wave of dizziness from low blood sugar washed over me.

Her body swayed slightly, the force she had exerted instantly vanished, and she slumped softly against his chest.

"What's wrong?" Gu Zheng's playful expression vanished instantly. He immediately reached out and steadied her waist, his voice carrying a barely perceptible hint of nervousness.

"It's the same old problem, low blood sugar." Ye Zhen gritted her teeth, closed her eyes for a few seconds to recover, and her voice was a little weak.

She struggled to stand up straight, but Gu Zheng didn't give her a chance to speak. He pulled her up in his arms and scooped her up in his arms.

"Hey! Gu Zheng! Put me down!" Ye Zhen exclaimed, instinctively grabbing his neck to prevent herself from falling.

"Shut up, a patient should act like a patient." Gu Zheng completely ignored her protests and carried her to the next-door lounge. His previously limping "injured leg" now moved with great strides.

With a clang, the metal cane he treasured was kicked aside without any mercy.

Nestled in his arms, Ye Zhen felt the steady, powerful rise and fall of his chest as he walked, and a thought inexplicably popped into her mind: This guy... his leg is healed?

Gu Zheng kicked open the door to the lounge, carefully placed her on the cot, and turned to rummage through the cabinet. Soon, he returned with an enamel mug and a paper package, dissolved a few pieces of rock sugar in hot water, and handed them to her lips without saying a word.

"I drank it."

Ye Zhen was indeed feeling unwell, so she stopped pretending and sipped the sugar water from his hand. His fingers were rough and calloused, yet surprisingly steady. The warm sugar water slid down her throat, dispelling the cramps in her stomach and strangely calming her restless heart.

After drinking the sugar water, Ye Zhen's complexion softened considerably. Leaning against the headboard, she looked at the man squatting in front of her, staring at her with a serious expression, her heart filled with mixed emotions.

He took the jingling bunch of keys out of his pocket and tossed them onto the bedside table next to her.

"The military compound has provided me with temporary accommodation, a two-bedroom apartment. The guesthouse you're staying at now isn't safe." He stood up, looking down at her, and said in an official tone, "After dinner, I'll take you there. From now on, you'll stay at my place."

Sure enough, we've come full circle.

Ye Zhen looked at the bunch of keys as if they were a hot potato. She slowly said, "Commander Gu, this is not appropriate. We are only nominally engaged." She pronounced the last four words very slowly, as if reminding him, and also as reminding herself.

"I know." Gu Zheng's expression didn't change much. "So, I'll sleep in the living room."

Ye Zhen was taken aback by his matter-of-fact attitude. Just as she was about to say something more, a commotion suddenly broke out outside the window, mixed with a woman's shrill cries and a man's angry curses.

"A life for a life! What right do you have to arrest my man?!"

"Get that woman out here! Bullying others with her power, is there no law anymore?!"

They are Qian Weiguo's family members.

Ye Zhen frowned and instinctively wanted to get out of bed.

A large hand pressed down on her shoulder, its force steady and leaving no room for resistance.

"Eat your food." Gu Zheng's voice turned cold. "The men outside aren't all dead yet; it's not your place as a woman to stick your neck out."

After saying that, he let go, picked up the crutch he had abandoned, and became the limping "wounded man" again, walking straight towards the door.

Ye Zhen sat on the edge of the bed, and as if possessed, she didn't listen to him. Instead, she stood up and quietly followed him to the door, peeking out through the crack in the door.

In the small square in front of the hospital building, a middle-aged woman wearing a polyester shirt was sitting on the ground throwing a tantrum, while several men surrounded the guards and cursed at them. The scene was chaotic.

Then, Gu Zheng appeared.

He simply put one hand in his pocket, leaned on his cane, and slowly strolled over to the group of people. He didn't say anything, not even the faint smile on his lips changed.

But when his dark eyes swept across the area indifferently, the entire noisy square seemed to be instantly shut down.

The sound of the woman crying, which had been making a scene, caught in her throat. The shouting man shut his mouth and subconsciously took a step back.

Ye Zhen saw Gu Zheng's lips move and he whispered a few words to the woman.

She was too far away to hear what was being said, but she clearly saw the arrogance and anger on the woman's face vanish as quickly as if doused with ice water, leaving only a deep-seated fear. She scrambled to her feet, not even bothering to brush the dirt off herself, and grabbed her relative, running away in a panic.

It took no more than three minutes in total.

He crushed the farce in an almost silent way.

Ye Zhen watched his back as he turned and walked back. His body, though not particularly burly, exuded a strength that could hold up a sky for her and shield her from all storms.

At this moment, her heart, which had always believed only in scalpels and evidence, was shaken for the first time by a completely different force.

Gu Zheng pushed the door open and came in, as if he had just gone out for a smoke, his face calm and collected. He didn't look at Ye Zhen, but went straight to the table and pushed her unfinished lunchbox in front of her.

"Can I eat in peace now?"

Ye Zhen didn't speak, silently sat back down, and picked up her chopsticks. But this time, she ate absentmindedly.

She couldn't help but ask, "What did you say to her?"

Gu Zheng lit a cigarette for himself, and his face was somewhat blurred in the swirling smoke.

"It's nothing," he exhaled a smoke ring, his tone as casual as if he were discussing the weather. "I was just reminding her that her son's position as deputy section chief at the steel mill isn't secure yet, and the military region's logistics department happens to be the steel mill's biggest client. If their future cooperation is affected because of a family member's 'disruption of military order,' I wonder what their factory's leaders will think."

Ye Zhen tightened her grip on the chopsticks.

This is no longer a threat; this is a precise strike. He doesn't even need to use any power; with just a single sentence, he can seize control of a family's lifeline.

This man was more unfathomable than she had imagined. And...more dangerous.

After dinner, Ye Zhen was eventually "forced" by Gu Zheng to get into his jeep.

The car stopped in front of an inconspicuous red brick building. The "temporary residence" that Gu Zheng mentioned was a large suite of over 100 square meters. It had two bedrooms, a living room, a separate kitchen and bathroom, and was fully furnished, bright and clean.

"You'll stay in the master bedroom, which has an ensuite bathroom. I'll stay in the second bedroom." Gu Zheng put her luggage down by the master bedroom door, pointed to the sofa, and said, "Or, if you insist, I can sleep here."

Ye Zhen stood in the center of the living room, looking at this house that didn't look like a "temporary" place at all, and her awkward feeling intensified.

"Gu Zheng, we don't need to..."

"It's necessary." He interrupted her, walked to the window, and drew back the heavy curtains. Outside the window were the straight tree-lined path of the military compound and sentries standing guard in the distance.

He turned around, backlit, so his expression was unclear, but his voice was more serious than ever before.

"Ye Zhen, do you think Qian Weiguo was just acting out of momentary greed? Would a general use a military-grade nerve agent to kill a political commissar just to protect a subordinate? He has someone behind him. And that person may already see you as a thorn in their side."

His words made Ye Zhen's heart sink.

Just then, the old black telephone in the living room suddenly rang.

"Ring—Ring—"

The piercing ringing echoed in the quiet room, like a death knell.

Gu Zheng walked over and answered the phone.

"Feed?"

Ye Zhen saw that his expression instantly turned cold after hearing just a few words from the other end of the phone. It was a chilling look she had never seen before, as if he were facing a formidable enemy.

He hung up the phone, turned around, looked at her intently, and said, word by word:

"My men just sent word."

"On the black market, someone will pay a fortune to take your life."