Chapter 512: Chapter 512 - 506: When Did Jing Jihan Wake Up

She grabbed the phone, struggling fiercely as his electric baton was about to hit her again, causing the car to sway and plunge.

"Ah! Damn!" The driver’s hand holding the electric baton trembled, the car shaking, and it hit Shi Su’s calf instead.

The intense pain in her leg made Shi Su’s already pale face instantly lose all its color.

The driver reached out to restrain her, pressing down on her struggles: "Don’t move! Don’t move! Stay still—"

However, it was already too late. Amid Shi Su’s instinctive struggle from the pain, gripping his phone with one hand and a military knife with the other, she continuously stabbed toward him using her remaining strength. As he tried to restrain her, their combined force against the windshield caused the car to completely lose balance, plunging down towards the turbulent river below, straight into the water.

The car door opened during the fall, and ice-cold river water rushed in. The two kidnappers, aside from some superficial knife wounds inflicted by Shi Su, were not seriously injured. Seeing her reckless behavior, they quickly ignored her and swiftly escaped through the car door to avoid being trapped inside.

Shi Su bit her tongue hard to stay conscious, the freezing water stimulating her awareness. The river water flooded her nasal cavity; she looked desperately toward the open car door, biting her teeth and using the knife to stab anything inside the car to gain leverage and escape the windshield. But the piercing cold river mercilessly stole her oxygen, her breath. She struggled to keep her eyes open, but the previous heavy blow made it impossible for her body to endure such torture for so long. Oxygen was dwindling, her senses increasingly numb in the cold water...

She wanted to open her eyes, but in the river, she couldn’t, nor open her mouth, her consciousness growing heavier...

Images in her mind flashed like a whirlwind; she saw Mianmian riding a toy horse asking Mr. Jing and Mrs. Jing when "Mom and Dad would come back?" She saw Jing Jihan smashing a window with a chair in a sea of fire, jumping down the third floor with her. She saw Wen Ke, cold but soft-hearted in a full FBI suit; Jun, Miss Chen, the first nine days... She saw that Bentley parked by the roadside seven years ago... She returned to the side of her living mother’s bed, holding a large bunch of baby’s breath picked up near the garbage bin, asking her mom if this flower looked nice...

No.

No way.

Jing Jihan is still waiting for her, Mianmian is still waiting for her...

She cannot die.

But her body keeps sinking, thoughts gradually drowned in darkness...

"Awake?"

Shi Su opened her eyes, feeling unbearable soreness all over, a voice near her ear, half-familiar, she turned slightly, confused, and saw Shi Xiangchao’s face.

Why was it him?

Shi Xiangchao looked at her steadily, confirming she had truly woken, sensing her guard and distrust against him, didn’t approach to assist her, merely said: "I’ll call the nurse to feed you something; you’re still feverish."

After speaking, he quickly exited the ward.

Just ten days later, waking again in the hospital, Shi Su gradually regained some consciousness, all memories of the incident rushing back; she hadn’t died in the river.

But trying to move, pain in the calf struck by the electric baton made her shiver uncontrollably, pain across her abdomen and body indescribable, only pain and more pain, coupled with fever, dehydration and weakness, she couldn’t even sit up.

Eventually, Shi Su lay powerless on the hospital bed, glanced around, realizing it wasn’t the hospital room she previously stayed in; this was a hospital she hadn’t been to.

The ward door opened then closed, a nurse entered, followed by another looking into the ward.

Lu Zhao walked in; Shi Xiangchao peered inside from outside but didn’t enter.

The nurse came to feed Shi Su some water, changed a drip bottle, then left, leaving Lu Zhao alone in the ward.

Shi Su didn’t speak, only looking at Lu Zhao.

Lu Zhao also didn’t speak, approached her.

In the silent stare, Shi Su closed her eyes, despite the pain across her body, her mind calmed instantly.

Lu Zhao spoke softly: "Mrs. Jing, you’ve already figured it out, haven’t you?"

Shi Su, eyes closed, took a few deep breaths then responded: "Shi Xiangchao is your man? When I first went to the hospital to visit Mr. Shi, his look at me at the ward door made me wary, but later when I was almost caught, he appeared just in time as Jing Jihan entered. He had already found my phone’s location, worried Jing Jihan might be intercepted outside the hospital, aiming to bring me to Mr. Jing’s ward for safety?"

Lu Zhao neither nodded nor shook his head but silently confirmed.

"And later, Shi Xiangchao didn’t deliberately live at the Shi Family, yet met me a few times, subtly hinted that Shi Lingkang currently posed no threat to me, as long as I followed his direction, at least unharmed, but subtly implying I didn’t need to genuinely invest in father-daughter feelings, just self-preservation was enough." Shi Su’s voice hoarse and tired: "Including Shi Yuan, she must have seen him at the Shi Family earlier, hence trusted me wholly as a good sister to help her; judging from Shi Yuan’s mother and daughter’s seemingly humble life at the Shi Family, she’s not a simple girl, but isn’t guarded against me, showing someone had told her about me before."

"Various signs... not that evident, but before the Six Blessings Building fire, Shi Wancheng suddenly acted impulsively, showing Shi Lingkang and Shi Xiangchao must’ve done something privately, forcing him to take drastic measures, yet the instigator isn’t Shi Xiangchao, but..."

Shi Su paused: "Right, the phone I got from the kidnapper..."

Lu Zhao quickly said: "Mrs. Jing, don’t worry, when rescued from water, you were half-conscious, stubbornly clenching the phone, we’ve processed it, will recover all data and call records after repair, you did very well."

As Shi Su relaxed, she suddenly looked at him profoundly, asking each word slowly yet clearly: "So, when did Jing Jihan wake up?"