The room fell silent. We all stared at her in shock.
This was the woman who had claimed he was a monster. The woman who had shown me her bruises. The woman who had begged for protection.
Now, she was weeping for his freedom.
"Zhu Ri," I whispered, stunned. "He held a gun to us. He tried to kill Yichen."
"He wouldn't have!" she sobbed, looking up at me with desperate, tear-filled eyes. "He's sick! He needs help! Please, don't send him to prison. He... he loves me! He did all this for me!"
She crawled over to Lixuan, reaching out to touch his face with trembling hands. "I'm sorry," she whispered to him. "I'm sorry I ran. I won't run again. Just let him go!"
Lixuan stopped struggling. He looked down at her, his blue eyes softening for the first time. "Ri'er," he rasped.
I looked at Yichen. His face was a mask of cold realization. He had been right. It wasn't about the boy. It wasn't about the money. It was about them. A toxic, destructive, inseparable orbit of two broken people.
