Sweetie, don't look at him, kiss me.

She picked up the document and flipped through a few pages. The paper felt cool to the touch, the printing was clear, and the terms were listed clearly. When she turned to the last page, she saw a line of handwritten notes next to the signature line. The handwriting was Fang Shiyang's: "Wishing you a successful trip to Paris. Also, could you check if the big boss ate properly while he was away on his business trip?"

Lin Qingmian stared at the words for a moment, then looked up at Ji Linzhou sitting next to her: "You're going to Paris too?"

He leaned back on the sofa, turned his head to look at her, and said in a flat tone as if he were talking about something unimportant: "It's unreasonable for the person in charge of the brand to not attend the exhibition."

That night, she flipped through the agreement for a long time, looking at it over and over again, before finally signing her name in the signature column.

When Ji Linzhou came out of the study, she was already asleep on the sofa. She was lying on her side, her face buried in the sofa cushions, one hand hanging over the edge of the sofa, her fingertips almost touching the ground. He stood there for a while, then walked over, bent down, supported her back with one hand, and put the other hand under her knees, lifting her horizontally off the sofa.

She groggily opened her eyes for a moment, saw his jawline swaying above her head, then closed them again, mumbled something indistinctly, and buried her face in his chest. He put her on the bed in the bedroom, pulled the blanket over her, stood by the bed for a few seconds, then turned off the main light, leaving only a wall lamp on.

Over the next few days, Lin Qingmian busied herself with visa and travel arrangements. When Fang Shiyang sent her the flight information, she glanced at it; their seats were adjacent. She stared at the seat number for a few seconds, then saved a screenshot to her album. Three days before departure, she received a sample garment from the brand in Paris. The misty blue shirt had been changed to runway-specific fabric, of better quality than the one she had received before. A small label was sewn inside the collar, embroidered with her initials.

She hung the sample garment in the walk-in closet, stepped back to look at it for a while, then took a picture and sent it to Ji Linzhou: "The sample garment has arrived."

He replied, "Does it fit?"

As she typed, a smile played on her lips without her even realizing it: "The runway shows used male models, not clothes for me."

After a while, they replied: "This one was originally made to your size. The men's version is for the exhibition, but I had a special one made for you to wear."

She stared at the message, unable to decide how to reply for a long time. In the end, she only sent three words: "I understand." But as she stood in the dressing room looking at the sample garment for a while, she suddenly reached out and touched the small button on the collar.

The afternoon before her departure, Jiang Yao asked her out for bubble tea. The two sat in a small bubble tea shop on the back street of the school, the afternoon sun shining through the window. Jiang Yao lifted the lid of her pudding bubble tea, took a sip of the tapioca pearls, then put the cup down and looked at her: "So, your trip to Paris this time is your honeymoon?"

"It's a business trip," Lin Qingmian corrected her. "He has a job, and so do I."

"Oh—" Jiang Yao drawled, her face saying, "Do you think I believe you?" "Business trip, on the same flight, staying at the same hotel, itinerary synchronized—"

Lin Qingmian was amused by her expression and poked the taro paste in the cup with the straw: "It really is just a business trip."