Little Miss Witch: Revenge of the Tainted Angel

Chapter 181 - Forever With You (1)

The drive back at Li Chuntao's penthouse was silent as she pondered how to narrate about the child she'd lost years ago to Shen Zichen. So many thoughts crossed her mind but Li Chuntao still couldn't find the right words. 

Even after she had her shower and found Shen Zichen seated on the edge of her bed, she was still pondering how to talk about their baby. She felt conflicted and guilty at the same time. 

Shen Zichen who had showered and dressed in the guest room was in his sleep shirt and pajama pants. This was the first time they would be sleeping together in the same room after a long while. 

Li Chuntao climbed up on her bed and laid on her stomach as she looked at Shen Zichen who was also deep in his thoughts. She wondered what he was thinking about. 

"What do you want to know about him?" She asked curiously. 

Shen Zichen didn't answer immediately, as if he was sorting out the questions he should ask her. He glanced at her face and couldn't help but imagine how hard it was for her to deal with everything on her own while he was here, ignorant of her pain and the death of their son. 

"You can ask me anything," Li Chuntao told him as she saw the hesitation in his eyes. 

"Then… did the doctor find out what caused his death?" He was curious to know. The medical records had neither indicated the cause of Li Zirui's death nor stated any issues during his gestation. 

Li Chuntao sighed and held his hand as she sat at the center of her bed. She bit her lip as her eyes stung with tears. The memory of her child still caused her heart to ache. 

"Zirui was a healthy baby. He'd been growing well in my womb until one day I realized he stopped making any sort of movement. I was worried. I could feel there was something wrong but at the back of my mind, I wished I was wrong." She paused and shut her eyes, trying to stop her tears from flowing. 

"It must be my maternal instincts kicking up, as I ended up being correct. Zirui's heart stopped beating two days before I admitted myself to the hospital." 

The cry that followed after the doctor told her that she'd lost her baby even before she was able to give birth to him was like a nightmare for her. 

Several times, Li Chuntao wished that it was just a bad dream, that she would wake up from it soon. However, when the doctor and the nurses told her that she needed to deliver her stillbirth baby on the same day, she felt like her world had fallen apart. 

She wouldn't be able to continue her life after Li Zirui died. Only her Uncle Yuren was there to watch her break down and lose herself in grief for those weeks that turned into months. Even now, when it had been six years since he died, Li Chuntao hadn't truly moved on from the pain of losing him.

"I wondered where I went wrong. Did I do something I shouldn't? Or was it because I did nothing in the first place?" She opened her eyes and realized she'd been crying and Shen Zichen had moved and pulled her into his embrace. 

"I'm sorry. I was unfair to you, Zichen. It was because of my indecisiveness that you lost your chance to become a father to him." She covered her face with both hands and wept. 

Maybe everything wouldn't end up as it had now if she was brave enough to face her fears. If she was brave enough to muster the courage to accept whatever Shen Zichen would be at that time. 

"It's not your fault. You didn't want to lose him. It was me who should've paid more attention to you before." Shen Zichen rubbed her back soothingly, hoping that she would stop her tears as it caused him distress just by looking at her. 

The guilt of not being able to take care of her and Zirui came back at full force. Shen Zichen pressed his face into her hair and let her cry her heart out. It made sense why she tried to build walls around her; it was to protect her heart. 

Silence ensued between them with only Li Chuntao's sobs could be heard inside the room. It took some time before her tears dried as she succumbed in Shen Zichen's embrace. 

"Do you wanna see what he looks like?" Li Chuntao broke the silence between them after minutes of not saying anything. She pushed herself away from his embrace and looked at his confused expression. 

"I took pictures of him…" she explained, "before they took him away from me." 

Li Chuntao was given a few hours to hold her stillbirth baby and to take some keepsakes she might need at that time. 

Shen Zichen froze and looked at her with shock. "You have?" 

This wasn't something he expected to hear.He still had the chance to see what their baby looked like even though he was gone? 

Li Chuntao hummed before reaching for her phone at the nightstand. She saw several blocked phone calls from Mu Jianyu, which wasn't surprising at all. She didn't think the bastard would give up easily after 'Ying' divorced him. 

Clearing the notification from her phone, she logged in to her cloud account and opened a private folder that contained Little Rui's picture. 

"Here," she passed her phone to Shen Zichen to see, "he's beautiful, isn't he?" 

Shen Zichen looked at the newborn child on her screen and felt astounded. Their Little Rui was pale, unlike the other newborn babies that were pinkish upon birth. However, their baby was indeed a beautiful child, like what Li Chuntao said. 

There was a sparse of thin black hair on top of his head, his skin was white but looked soft and smooth. Shen Zichen wanted to know what his eyes looked like but they were close. His size was a little larger than other newborn babies that he'd seen before. 

"He's beautiful…" he murmured. 

A complex feeling roused inside Shen Zichen's chest as he scrolled and checked the other pictures. He didn't even notice the tears that were flowing from his eyes while looking at his dead son. 

This was something he'd missed and the regret of not being to hold Little Rui was one of the greatest regrets he had in his life. He'd lost his chance no matter how hard he repents on it. 

Seeing him crying made Li Chuntao shed tears as well. She'd seen him like this before. Looking so desperate and yet helpless at the same time. A part of her blames herself for being the cause of it. 

Her silence and cowardness caused unnecessary drama. She should've talked it out with him instead of running away like a coward. She had thought that by running away, she was sacrificing herself for Shen Zichen's happiness, when in fact she was just afraid to face the possibility that he might hate her. 

Li Chuntao knelt beside his and wrapped her arms around him, his head leaning on her chest. 

"Zichen. I'm sorry.. I'm really sorry."