Lin Shuyue smiled. She was not afraid of Ah Xi asking for money. She said, "Then I want to see if your information is worth the price."
"I won't let you down." Ah Xi said to Lin Shuyue.
"Okay then." Lin Shuyue agreed.
Ah Xi led Lin Shuyue into the yard, and as they walked, she warned her: "Don't talk nonsense later. If someone asks you, just say you are my classmate."
"Okay." Lin Shuyue nodded in agreement. Now, she also remembered Ah Xi. She was in Class 1, a key class, and Ah Xi was in Class 5. It was said that she was awarded the title of school beauty. At that time, Lin Shuyue knew about her without knowing anything else. Because she was good at singing and dancing, and eloquent, she was also very popular.
But later she skipped a grade and went to a different high school, so the two never had any contact again.
She didn't look much like the one in Lin Shuyue's memory. If she hadn't said it, Lin Shuyue wouldn't have dared to match them up.
•••••
This is a very large yard. Apart from a small two-story building, the rest are two rows of bungalows with doors facing each other. Each room is not big. There are many ropes pulled between the two rows of bungalows, and they are hung with clothes and bed sheets of various colors. Several pregnant women are sitting in the shade at the door of the bungalows to chat and enjoy the cool air.
Seeing Lin Shuyue behind Ah Xi, they looked at her curiously. Someone who was close to Ah Xi asked directly, "Ah Xi, who is this?"
The one who asked this question had a very big belly. She held her waist and was about to give birth. She looked at Lin Shuyue with curiosity and vigilance.
"My classmate." Ah Xi ignored her and pulled Lin Shuyue towards the innermost part. As the most expensive pregnant mother in the yard, she lived in a single room, unlike the women who lived in triple or quadruple rooms they had just seen.
Ah Xi's room was very small, only ten square meters, with a small bed of one and two meters in size. Next to the bed was a bedside table with various nutritional supplements for pregnancy on it. There was a small double-door wardrobe at the foot of the bed. Through the gap that was not closed tightly, she saw the bulging clothes inside.
Ah Xi asked Lin Shuyue to sit by the bed, and she got a plastic stool and sat opposite Lin Shuyue. She looked at Lin Shuyue and asked, "Is Zhao Minghui really dead?"
Lin Shuyue was stunned for a moment before she realized who Zhao Minghui was. He was the secretary who had offended Zhang Zhencai with his rude words and went to Guo Bingchang's house that day, but happened to run into the murder and dismemberment scene. That unlucky guy: "Yes, he's dead."
Ah Xi's tears started to flow. She reached out and wiped them away. "I told him a long time ago not to get involved with Liu Yuyuan, but he didn't listen and insisted on getting involved in Liu Yuyuan's affairs. Is this his retribution?"
When Lin Shuyue heard this, she knew something was wrong. She took out a tissue from the bedside table and handed it to Ah Xi.
Ah Xi took it, wiped away her tears, lowered her head and said, "Forget it, I won't charge you any money, I'll tell you whatever you want to know."
Ah Xi's tears fell one by one, and no matter how hard she tried to wipe them away, they could not be wiped away.
Lin Shuyue said: "My condolence."
It would have been fine if Lin Shuyue didn't comfort her, but when she did, Ah Xi started crying even harder: "We've been together since we could walk and talk, and I've liked him since I was in junior high school. After so many years, he just left when he said he would. How can I mourn for him?"
The taste of secret love is like lemon, sour and bitter, but after the sourness comes endless sweetness. For Zhao Minghui, Ah Xi was even willing to be a surrogate mother because she knew there was no possibility for them.
"Zhao Minghui is my cousin." If it was a hundred or eighty years ago, before liberation, Ah Xi could still try, because at that time cousins were a natural match. But now it's no longer possible, she and Zhao Minghui are close relatives, whether it's the secular world or their parents, they can't get past this test.
Lin Shuyue understood as soon as she heard it.
Ah Xi calmed down and began to tell the story of her surrogacy.
"My mother got sick a few years ago with uremia. She has been taking injections, taking medicines and doing dialysis since she got the disease. All the money in the family has been spent on her medical treatment. The money for my college tuition was scraped together from everywhere. Last year, my father was also hospitalized because of overwork while working. His leg was broken by the brick he was pulling, and he is still lying in bed recuperating."
"When my family was in the most difficult time, Zhao Minghui found me and asked me if I was willing to be a surrogate mother. After the child was successfully born, there would be a reward of 200,000 yuan. After thinking for a long time, I agreed, so I was brought here. Because the price was high and I was a college student, I had no business for a month or two after I came here."
"Later, he brought Liu Yuyuan here. Liu Yuyuan chose me after being introduced by the head Ahu. From that day on, I became Liu Yuyuan's surrogate mother. We worked hard for more than three months, and Liu Yuyuan's egg and sperm with Guo Bingchang finally combined. It was put into my body."
"During this period of experiment, I found out that Zhao Minghui likes Liu Yuyuan. I even saw them hugging each other." Ah Xi closed her eyes, as if that scene appeared in front of her again.
Her secret love, which she could not express out loud, took shape at that moment as an apricot that would never grow. The sour and painful feeling she had at that time is still fresh in her memory.
"I advised him that Liu Yuyuan was not a good woman and told him not to rush into it. But it was of no use. My words fell on deaf ears. Look, it was his retribution. He died." Ah Xi hooked the scattered hair to her ears.
"The night before he disappeared, he was with me. He went to Guo Bingchang's house after receiving a call from Liu Yuyuan." When Ah Xi said this, his eyes were full of hatred.
She and Zhao Minghui had always had a good relationship. Before the incident in her family, the two of them kept in touch frequently. Later, because of the surrogacy issue, she and Zhao Minghui talked even more. That afternoon, Zhao Minghui got off work and came to see her and her belly.
They went out for a meal, and halfway through the meal, he received a call from Liu Yuyuan, who left him on the spot. After leaving, he never came back, his phone was turned off, and he didn't reply to text messages. At that time, Ah Xi knew that Zhao Minghui might have been in trouble, and the next day, the news that Guo Bingchang's family was wiped out was reported in the newspaper.
The newspaper that day did not report that the secretary was among the missing persons, but for some reason, Ah Xi was certain that Zhao Minghui must be among them. Sure enough, the incident was mentioned in the newspaper the next day.
Ah Xi hated Liu Yuyuan so much that she wanted to kill her, but murder was against the law and Ah Xi would not do it because she was the only daughter in the family and she had a father and mother to support.
"Then why did you tell me? You know I'm a reporter and I will report this matter." Lin Shuyue was puzzled.
Ah Xi worked for a while, then took out a box from the cabinet. There was a card in the small box. "I suddenly remembered that Zhao Minghui once said that if I couldn't contact him one day, I would go to his place to check. So I went to his rental house last night and found this. There is a card inside, and the password is my birthday. I checked and there is 500,000 yuan in it."
Ah Xi covered her eyes with her hands. "He also left me a letter saying that this was his compensation to me. If anything went wrong, he wanted me to take the money and abort Liu Yuyuan's child and run away."
Ah Xi's eyes were confused, she wanted to cry but also wanted to laugh. From the moment she saw the letter, Ah Xi knew that her secret love was transparent in Zhao Minghui's eyes. He knew her feelings, but he couldn't respond, not only because of their identities, but also because he didn't like her.
Knowing that she liked him, he dared to find her after something happened in her family and asked her to be a surrogate for Liu Yuyuan. Because as long as nothing happened to him, the child carried by Liu Yuyuan would survive. He was even very sure that if something happened to him, Ah Xi would never give birth to this child, not only because she loved him, but also because the money he gave her was far more than what Liu Yuyuan gave her.
Ah Xi wiped her tears and smiled, which was uglier than crying: "He overestimated me, and my feelings for him. Lin Shuyue, if you hadn't come to me today, I might have kept this to myself. After giving birth to the child to Liu Yuyuan, I would take the two sums of money, take my parents, and run away."
Liu Yuyuan's ability was not that great. She took her parents out of the province and she couldn't do anything about them.
Maybe it was fate. She had already made up her mind, but the moment she saw Lin Shuyue, she hesitated. At that time, she asked Lin Shuyue for a thousand yuan. She thought that if Lin Shuyue wanted to hear her story, but was unwilling to give money or bargain, she would not tell it.
Lin Shuyue's reaction made her decide to tell everything.
Is her information worth a thousand yuan? Of course it is. Not only is it worth a thousand yuan, but it is also worth two lives. One is Zhao Minghui who has died, and the other is the baby in her belly who is already moving.
Ah Xi had no feelings for the child. It didn't matter to her whether the child was born or beaten.
Ah Xi took out a key from the box and put it in Lin Shuyue's hand: "This is what Zhao Minghui kept in the locker at Huaxia Bank. In the letter he left for me, he said that this is enough to ruin Liu Yuyuan's reputation."
Lin Shuyue looked at the key, then looked at Ah Xi, and asked her, "What are you going to do in the future?"
Ah Xi had stopped crying. She picked up the water cup and took a sip of water. She said, "It depends on you. If you can bring down Liu Yuyuan, I will take the money Zhao Minghui gave me and go with my parents to a faraway place where no one can find us."
"But if you can't bring down Liu Yuyuan, I will still give birth to a child for her. After all, she gives me a lot of money, and who would complain about having a lot of money, right?" Although she said so, Ah Xi and Lin Shuyue both knew that as long as these things fell into Lin Shuyue's hands and the report came out, Liu Yuyuan would be finished.
Lin Shuyue felt very complicated. She said, "Thank you."
Ah Xi shook her head, her face showing a rare look of relaxation.
At this time, a man in his thirties walked towards Ah Xi's bedroom. Lin Shuyue and Ah Xi moved quickly. One hid the bank card on her body, and the other threw the items in the safe into the system backpack.
The man walked in without knocking: "Ah Xi, is this your classmate? Is she also interested in this line of work?"
Ah Xi glanced at Lin Shuyue and said, "Yes, her name is Ah Mei. She heard that I wanted to come and see her after I made a lot of money, so I asked her to come and get to know me. Ah Mei, this is Brother Hu."
Lin Shuyue was particularly polite: "Hello, Brother Hu."
Brother Hu's eyes fell from Lin Shuyue's face to her figure, and he nodded with satisfaction: "Hello, hello. Ah Mei, did Ah Xi tell you about the treatment here? Do you have any questions? If so, just ask, I will help you answer~"
Lin Shuyue really had something to ask: "Brother Hu, I want to ask you, if I get pregnant, but my boss doesn't want it anymore, and the baby is too big to be aborted, what should I do?"
"That's so simple. Even if the boss doesn't want the child, there are plenty of people who want it. After all, you know, there are many people in this world who can't have children! Ah Mei, actually, what we do is also charity. After all, our existence fulfills the dreams of those who want children but can't have for various reasons."