The Sweet Rival (Mango Shen and Nathaniel Ye)

Chapter 185

Right now, Mango deliberated on the best method to attempt suicide.

Mango's hands and feet were bound together, so it would be impossible to slit her wrists. Her mouth was gagged so she could not bite her own tongue off and die of blood loss. "What do I do then?" She mused to herself.

"Should I smash my head into the wall?"

Even if that was a viable plan, it would not work. Mango was too near to the wall and she could not move her body at all.

Mango felt absolutely pathetic in that very moment. She could not kill herself even if she wanted to!

Abyss was far more ruthless than she had thought.

Mango felt helpless and she stared at the ceiling until she went cross- eyed. Then, she paused. It seemed to her that someone was trying to remove the ceiling tiles.

"How is that possible?" Mango thought.

This was the basement, and the so-called ceiling was actually just tiling below the floorboards.

Mango blinked her eyes in disbelief. The ceiling tiles really seemed to move.

"Ahem! Ahem!"

Mango coughed twice. Although no one could hear her coughs, she still wanted to make some noise. There was no sound outside the door at all, so obviously, no one was out there anymore.

Mango stared fixedly at the ceiling until the tile was moved away. Then, someone's head poked out of the hole and her eyes opened wide in surprise.

"Someone's really coming for me!" She rejoiced internally.

"This person is using one hell of a strange method to come in, though."

Nevertheless, Mango felt some surprise and joy, especially when she identified the owner of the head, and her eyes filled with elated tears.

It was Nathaniel!

"He is finally here!" She thought to herself.

"Nathaniel is finally here to save me!"

"Surely he found me during his last visit, right?"

After Nathaniel removed the tiles, he felt someone's gaze trained on him. When he looked down, what he found was unbelievable. Nathaniel's heart hurt so much until he was suffocated.

"That son of a b*tch, Abyss!"

"How dare he treat Mango like this?"

Mango was sprawled out and tied up on the bed. Furthermore, her mouth that had been gagged, and the blood oozing from her wrists and ankles had deeply infuriated Nathaniel.

He had thought of many ways to see Mango again, but he never imagined he would see something as heinous as this. Nathaniel's heart felt as if a thousand knives had sliced into it. Then, Nathaniel hurriedly jumped down to Mango.

Mango's eyes were fixed on Nathaniel constantly, for fear that he would disappear suddenly. She was afraid that she had hallucinated the whole scene and that Nathaniel was merely an illusion.

" Oh, Mango!" Nathaniel cried out to her.

Nathaniel came up to her and he got rid of the gag in her mouth.

"Nathan!" Mango called his name excitedly.

Mango's voice was hoarse, it seemed that her body was so thin that she was practically skin and bone.

Nathaniel's hands shook in anger.

"What happened? I thought Abyss loved you? How could that b*stard treat you like this? I'll f*cking kill him!"

Nathaniel was so livid that his entire body shook. Even then, he carefully released the shackles on Mango's body.

The moment she was free, Mango threw herself into Nathaniel's arms.

When she smelled his familiar scent and touched his warm chest, Mango felt as if her spirits had lifted and she came back to her life.

She did not believe that she would be alive to see Nathaniel again after her encounters along the way. Now that he was really in front of her, she felt as if she was in a dream without any hint of reality.

Nathaniel felt a little suffocated by her tight grip, but he didn't dare push her away.

Mango had indeed lost weight tremendously. Her skinny body wasn't even as toned as they used to be.

He didn't know how much Mango had suffered this far, but he found himself wanting to know every detail.

However, he dared not to ask what Mango had gone through. Nathaniel feared that he would not be able to cope after knowing it.

"Come on Mango, I'll take you home."

Nathaniel's voice quivered and he swallowed the lump in his throat.

"This, this is amazing!" He thought.

Finally, he found her!

Nathaniel finally saw Mango safe. This was more important than anything else in his life.

Mango did not say anything but just cried. Her cries were filled with mixed emotions. There was exhaustion, sadness as well as happiness. Mango's heart skipped a beat when she saw Nathaniel.

At this moment, she had a profound realization that she loved this man deep in her consciousness.

As Mango cried, she suddenly kissed Nathaniel.

Mango's unique scent stunned Nathaniel slightly but he reciprocated her kiss gently. Nathaniel was being careful since he was afraid of injuring Mango further.

She took in the sight, smell and taste of him greedily like how a drowning person needed oxygen. Mango needed to remind herself that what she saw was real and not some illusion. It was continued until Nathaniel felt a little out of breath.

Ultimately, he pushed Mango away gently and said in a low voice, "Let's go home, Mango. When we get there, we'll do whatever you want, okay?"

Mango looked like an unsatisfied child and she blinked her teary eyes at him. Her gaze made Nathaniel aroused and he almost lost control of himself.

But he knew that he was in Abyss's territory now, and Abyss could return at any time.

Nathaniel stood up only to find that Mango had latched on to the lower hem of his shirt firmly. She looked at him like an abandoned child.

Nathaniel's heart suddenly ached so much that he felt suffocated.

"Mango, I swear I will never leave you behind again. No matter how life challenges us, we'll get through it together. Mango, I'm going to carry you up with me, do you feel strong enough to do that?"

Nathaniel's voice was very soft and gentle. Ever since Mango met Nathaniel, it seemed that he had never spoke so gently to her.

She still felt quite dazed, but she nodded. However, when Mango got up, her body quickly fell on to the ground.

Due to her imprisonment, Mango had no strength at all in her body. Moreover, just living on nutritional fluids given by Abyss had kept her from reserving much strength.

Nathaniel caught her quickly. When Mango was safely carried in his arms, Nathaniel felt that she was so fragile and his heart hurt tremendously. Owned by NôvelDrama.Org.

He narrowed his eyes and he quickly carried Mango onto his back. After that, he climbed up slowly.

Mango lay her head on Nathaniel's back. She suddenly felt that it was so broad, so secure and she felt reassured.

She wrapped her arms around Nathaniel's neck tightly, while her tears had blurred her vision at this moment.

After Nathaniel carried Mango up, she discovered that the place was actually an underground water reservoir.

The underground reservoir was connected in all directions by long tunnels. There was no need for them to exit through the Tang family mansion's front door. However, there was only one drawback, a person had to crawl if they wanted to leave.

Thinking of Nathaniel crawling in like this, Mango felt like crying again.

"Put me down, I'll walk on my own." She said to Nathaniel.

Mango's voice was very soft. If it weren't for the fact that she was very close to Nathaniel, he would not have heard her at all.

He shook his head and whispered, "I'll carry you instead."

The statement was plain, but it touched Mango's heart.

The two of them did not say much else, not even passionate statements from them. But their hearts were very excited for each other.

They had learned to cherish each other in their time spent apart. Their hands clenched together tightly little by little.

After crawling for about half an hour, Nathaniel's knees bled profusely, but he didn't care. He was drenched in sweat and the sweat dripped onto the back of Mango's hand. There was an unexplainable smell spreading between each other.

When they climbed out of the underground reservoir, she squinted her eyes. It was because Mango's eyes had not adapted to the harsh sunlight outside.

Nathaniel quickly took off his coat and covered her head.

"You'll be fine after you get in the car." He told her. "Okay!"

Mango nodded enthusiastically. Nathaniel noted that she behaved well just like a child and her behavior unsettled him slightly.

He picked Mango up and they quickly made their way to his car. Nathaniel helped Mango fasten her seatbelt and they sped away as quickly as possible from the Tang family compound.

When he returned to the hospital, Nathaniel was not in a hurry to let Mango reunite with Rita and the others. He did not even let Madam Ye see them.

Soon, he found a private room for Mango. Afterward, he personally opened the bathtub and put bathwater on her, and then he personally gave her a bath. Even with the hot steam swirling around them, Nathaniel still saw the scars littered all across Mango's body. His eyes narrowed abruptly.

"Did Abyss do this to you?" He asked.

"No, it was the men from those demons. It's all in the past, it doesn't hurt anymore."

Mango said it flippantly, but the more flippant she was, the more Nathaniel's heart ached for her.

Nathaniel did not speak again, but his touch became more gentle.

It seemed that he treated Mango as if she was a porcelain doll.

Mango looked at him and said in a low voice, "You don't have to be so careful with me, Nathaniel. Except for a few wounds, I'm still in one piece. I'm still yours."

Nathaniel's eyes suddenly became wet with tears.

"No matter what you've experienced, I won't blame you for it. It's all my fault. I failed you, Mango. I was the one that made you go through all this."

Nathaniel's eyes became slightly red.

Mango reached out and gently held Nathaniel's hand. She said, "You know what? When they sold me to the ship, I watched people die around me every day for every reason imaginable. We're no better than small insects in those people's eyes. When they threw them into the ocean, they sank so fast that no one could ever find them. Every day, I was afraid that the next one would be me. Even then, the person I thought about the most was you. Nathaniel, be it five years ago or five years later, you are always the person I think about in my last moments."

" Mango!"

Nathaniel didn't know what to feel. He felt touched, unsettled and the feeling he felt the most was sadness.

What kind of pain did a woman have to suffer in order to have such a nightmare?

"It's okay. You're home now. No one will ever hurt you again."

He hugged Mango tightly.

Mango was very thin and she had lost her former elegance. However, Nathaniel did not feel that she was ugly at all.

This was the first time they had met in five years, but there was no animosity between them. Instead, they were so heartbroken that they felt like crying.

Nathaniel saw the burn marks left on Mango's body from five years ago. Even though she had covered it up with a tattoo, he still saw them clearly.

In that moment, he finally understood why Mango, who hated tattoos so much, still wanted to have her whole body tattooed. She still wanted to show him the best side of herself.