The Inconceivable Flame: A Fallen Angel's Disguise

"Yes, but why do you want it?" He asked while his eyebrows drew together.

"I want to learn how to dance." Her derisive tone made him purse his lips. "Obviously, if I’m asking for it. I have some use for it." She added.

"And I’m just asking about your purpose. Why are you always in the mood of an argument?" His jaw was clenched as he glared at her.

"Keep your temper in control. The drug might flare-up again if you’re stimulated like this." Ru replied and got up to rummage through her bag of clothes.

"If you talk like a normal person then I won’t be provoked if you’d just stop infuriating me." He said in annoyance.

Ru took the same shirt which he had gotten for her and turned to look at him saying, "I tried acting like a normal person once. Apparently, people don’t like normal." With those words, she went inside the bathroom to change out of her gown.

Xiao Zhiren scowled as he looked at her back in her normal clothes. "Why did you change?"

"You can’t go back to the banquet. And for sure, I won’t go either. So, why should I suffer in that long gown?" She gave him a look as if looking at an idiot. "Now, your laptop..." He pointed towards the table and she turned it on. "What’s the password?"

"Why don’t you just use your hacking skills for that?" Ru coughed at his reply.

"I’m trying to be civil." She replied.

"Little chili..." He said.

"Hmm..."

"Little chili..." He said again.

"What? Just tell me the password already! I’m in no mood to play." She shouted angrily.

"I’m trying to tell you that the password is ’littlechili’ in lowercase with no space." He elaborated himself making her face twitch.

She typed it and it actually unlocked which made her expressions to shift again. She had no words for him. "Now would you like to tell me what are you trying to do?" He asked again because the silence wasn’t comfortable to him while he was still poked with so many silver needles.

"I’m trying to find the culprit behind your spiked drink," she replied calmly while her fingers kept typing on the laptop and her eyes were stuck to the screen in concentration. She had tied the hair in a low pony which was the only hairstyle she knew. Her face was clean without even that thin layer of make-up. Xiao Zhiren couldn’t move his eyes away from her.

"Why do you think that it was intentional?" He inquired.

"Why don’t you?" She gave him a fleeting glance of disbelief.

"There is a possibility that I wasn’t the target..." He trailed.

Ru snickered, "You want me to believe that such coincidences actually happen in this world?" He thought about her words and nodded. "I wouldn’t believe that even if you kill me." She was firm as she continued, "And by the way, don’t you find it weird that when you were upset, a waiter conveniently offered you a glass of champagne?" Now that she said it like that, he indeed had a weird feeling about this. "And that too in an empty corridor where that waiter wasn’t even supposed to be in the first place."

"You really think someone is behind it?" Ru nodded her head and continued back to type.

"Exactly that’s why I’m trying to look through the surveillance cameras to find the culprit."

"You’re gonna hack into their control room?"

"Bloody Bugger!" Ru cursed and slid the laptop away in horror.

"What’s wrong?" He was alert immediately. Her face expressions were odd. As if she encountered something she was scared of. Huh? Scared of? And my little chili? Doesn’t sound very right.

"I can’t hack their security system," Ru answered him in a small voice.

"Really? There is something that you can’t do?" Xiao Zhiren was astonished, to say the least. It was so unlike her. "But why can’t you?"

"It’s not that I can’t. Of course, I can. But... I don’t want to anymore." She answered sorting her words carefully. Xiao Zhiren’s expression told her that he wanted her to explain herself but he wasn’t voicing out his question. There was tension between his brows but he wasn’t willing to push her for an answer. Unknowingly, Ru smiled at his reaction. She knew how hard he was trying to hold in his curiosity and it touched her heart.

Aish! He definitely was seducing her again. But how much more was he planning on seducing her? Wasn’t she already lost in this game of seduction?

"Do you want me to tell you why I don’t want to?" She asked looking at his face.

"I do but if you don’t want to..." He didn’t continue his words as he saw her coming to sit beside him on the floor again.

Her hands started taking back the needles from his body as she spoke, "The reason why I stopped the hacking is simple. The security system is designed by the Xenos."

"Those mysterious Tech experts?" He widened his eyes in surprise.

"Indeed." She nodded her head. "And this cruise ship also belongs to Xenos Group. I just didn’t pay attention before."

"What do you mean?"

Ru cleaned her silver needles and continued, "You can say that Xenos Group belongs to someone from my family. Naturally, it’s the same person who made me the hacker I am today. If I hacked into this system, it’ll alert everyone in my family. It won’t take them long to trace it back to me and then..." With a long sigh, she said, "Then they will tie me up and take me back home."

Obviously, she was exaggerating but it worked on Xiao Zhiren very well as his expressions were unsightly. As he was free to move now, he sat up and held her hand, "Don’t hack. I don’t want you to leave me."

Ru smiled at his reaction. "I’m not leaving. And relax, I won’t hack as well. I have other ways..."

She still didn’t mention that her family was Xia Clan because if Xiao Zhiren knew his reaction would have been over the top. Ru vaguely remembered that she heard once that although her clan never participated in this High Summit of other six clans, her clan was indeed responsible for the security measures. She never thought that to ensure the safety, her clan provided this place of meeting over the sea.

As for the Xenos Group, it was operated by the elders of Shadowwick State. And Ru had learned all her hacking skills from those elders directly. Unlike other people of her generation, her masters had always been the real elders.

Even though she was faced with this problem, she didn’t want to give up. She would definitely find out the culprit.

"Why don’t you just let it go? I’m alright now." Xiao Zhiren brought here to relax but her mind games were still going on.

"Someone tried to mess with something that belongs to me. How can I let this go so easily?" She gritted out unconsciously.

"So..." He slid close to her and added, "I belong to you now?"

"Don’t you?" She turned her face to find him only a few inches away from her.

"I naturally believe that I belong to you. It was a matter of time when you’d accept this fact." He stroked the side of her face lovingly.