Truth be told, the young miss could appear a bit foolish at certain moments.
Like now, despite being entirely in his arms and under his control, she still had the audacity to try and threaten him. It was like... Lu Tu pondered for a while before coming up with a fitting comparison.
It was like a toothless tiger cub, full of temper, roaring "awoo awoo" without any real threat. Instead, it made one want to cradle it and play with it.
However, Lu Tu, the butler, knew that the person in his arms was still the young miss. He could only endure her ineffective attempts that tickled rather than hurt, as he placed her on a chair in the bedroom.
Jiang Yan didn't want to cooperate, but Lu Tu was tall and strong. He stood directly in front of the seat, blocking her path.
After struggling in the chair a few times, Jiang Yan lost her patience and could only question Lu Tu, "What exactly are you trying to do?"
Lu Tu remained silent. He pressed his hands on the armrests and pushed the chair, with her in it, towards the table. The chair had wheels, making it easy to move. On the table sat a first-aid kit.
But Lu Tu's legs still blocked the chair.
Lu Tu was doing something, and Jiang Yan thought she heard the sound of a bottle cap being unscrewed.
In the silence, as her anger from the tablet incident subsided, a genuine displeasure began to surface. She drooped her eyebrows and eyes, saying calmly, "If you don't speak, I'll get angry."
Lu Tu's heart inexplicably skipped a beat, and he immediately responded, "I'm looking for some lotion to treat your sunburn. I want to apply it for you."
Jiang Yan still didn't speak, so Lu Tu probed further, "After applying the medicine, shall I bring you the tablet?"
"Wasn't it out of battery?" Jiang Yan quibbled.
Lu Tu was quick to respond, "It's charging now. It'll be ready soon."
Jiang Yan agreed with a sound, the corners of her mouth curling up in triumph. And so, the matter was settled.
Lu Tu took a damp cloth and gently wiped the young miss's face.
...
In the end, all that fuss was for naught. Lu Tu dutifully returned the tablet and earphones to the young miss, making sure it was fully charged.
If you can't beat them, join them?
The butler watched as the young miss sat on the sofa, engrossed in her earphones, and politely inquired, "May I listen together with you, Miss?"
Audio dramas are rather private things, often containing sounds that might make one blush... In short, they're not really suitable for sharing with others, especially those of the opposite sex.
But Jiang Yan was too bored, with only audio dramas to listen to. If she had someone to discuss the plot with, it might be interesting. After a moment's thought, she reluctantly agreed.
So, the two of them sat together on the sofa, listening to the same channel.
Outside, the maids were either cleaning, pruning the rose bushes in the garden, or tidying up... All doing their honest work under the bright daylight.
Yet just a wall away, in the young miss's room where no one dared to disturb, on an expensive sofa, the new butler Lu Tu sat with the haughty young miss, sharing earphones to listen to an audio drama.
Perhaps that's not quite right. It was more accurate to say that Jiang Yan was earnestly listening to the audio drama. Her attention was fully on the sound, even unconsciously breaking into smiles that Lu Tu had never seen before.
Lu Tu was amazed. So the young miss could smile like this too. Whenever Jiang Yan smiled, he would instinctively hold his breath, afraid to break the moment.
He couldn't immerse himself in the world of the earphones at all. He only noticed the young miss's smile, the pink tinge on her fingertips as she took off the earphones to pass to him, and the adorable fine hairs on her profile...
Jiang Yan focused intently on the sounds in the earphones, while Lu Tu focused intently on the young miss. The two of them reached an unprecedented level of harmony.
Although Lu Tu had no intention of deliberately causing friction with the young miss, his position and duties as a butler had already predetermined their discord.
As a butler, he needed to consider the young miss's health, forcibly wake her up, urge her to exercise when she didn't want to, and constantly monitor her every move.
Not just the young miss, but almost anyone would dislike such supervision, Lu Tu thought.
But now, they were sitting together on the sofa in the young miss's bedroom, connected by a thin earphone wire. Occasionally, their inadvertent movements would cause them to touch each other's skin, feeling each other's body heat.
Lu Tu kept his eyes lowered, still unable to understand why the young miss repeatedly threw his heart into disarray. But he knew this would continue to happen—as long as the young miss appeared before him.
Lu Tu wasn't his father's only son; Mr. Lu had many illegitimate children. But Lu Tu had known from a young age that if you wanted something, you had to reach out and take it.
So he had always excelled in his studies and performance, until he became the son his father most approved of and valued. Even now, when he couldn't immediately return to the Lu family, his father, who valued profit above all else, would still keep a place for him.
