The Devil Doctor's Spicy Love

Chapter 504: Symphony of heartbeats

Mingshen stared at the box for a long moment. If he was being honest, her "evidence cards" were plenty enough that took his heart to the highs and lows like a rollercoaster ride. More than the cards being novel or amusing, the words within them had struck him hard. Harder than a plane crash landing.He would have pounced on her the moment she sentenced him to the sweetest life imprisonment in his Spicy’s heart. But Jia had been extremely earnest in reading aloud the cards one by one. She would have killed him on the spot for disturbing her, and he wanted to be alive for the night to come.

But as he held the box, jitters and flutters only smashed harder in his chest. He felt like his ride was climbing to the top slowly and steadily, and then he would be completely at gravity, aka Jia’s mercy.

He unwrapped it, much more like how he imagined unwrapping a naked Jia. It was a midnight-blue box and he unlocked the lid. Unknown to him, he had been holding his breath this whole time.

One peek and it suggested to him that it was some kind of a show piece. It was when he took it out that what was left of his breaths had stopped completely.

Nestled inside the midnight-blue gift box was a crystal sculpture unlike any ordinary showpiece.

It was neither cartoonish nor a romantic ornament. Instead, it was an anatomically accurate human heart, carved from flawless crystal. Every chamber, every vessel and every curve had been crafted with astonishing precision. Fine crimson veins glistened beneath the transparent surface, shimmering with even the slightest movement. The anatomical heart crystal rested upon a polished wooden stand.

"A heart..." he found his voice lacking despite his brave attempts to speak. His gaze then travelled from the crystal heart to Jia’s eyes.

"Your heart?"

Jia nervously tucked a few strands of hair behind her ear, despite not a single strand fluttering past her face.

"Well...didn’t you always say you have literally touched my heart, so it belongs to you? So that’s what it is. Song Jia’s heart is yours, Dr. Yang," she said, looking straight at his eyes. "All of it."

Before Mingshen could process the sentiment, she said, "The gift is not done yet. Look down."

"You shouldn’t stir me anymore than this, Jia," he said slowly.

She coughed. "I don’t remember you sparing me on my birthday."

Mingshen glanced down and at first, the wooden stand appeared ordinary - but he then caught a tiny metallic strip embedded at the center.

"Open your sound app and tap your phone against it," Jia said, gesturing toward it.

He followed. The moment he tapped it against the strip, the stand responded with a soft chime. A recording began to play. For several seconds, nothing really played. Then a healthy heartbeat echoed gently through the quiet room.

His expression shifted. As a doctor, he had listened to countless hearts throughout his career - healthy hearts, failing hearts, hearts taking their very last beat.

Yet somehow...

This heartbeat sounded different. Far from steady. It felt fast and messy, hammering and thudding like beats of a drum - just like his own were in this very moment.

His gaze slowly lifted from the crystal heart to Jia. The heartbeat continued to play softly between them, filling the silence with its rhythm.

She scratched the back of her neck awkwardly, avoiding his eyes.

"I...took Bojing’s help in recording it. I..I was thinking about you during the whole process. That’s why they sound so erratic because that’s how much you mess with my heart. I thought...y-you should know how my heart beats when I think about you. And also..."

She ramped up her courage and took her hand in his, her throat feeling hot this entire time.

"I will c-continue to live here. I won’t leave because I don’t want to. Actually, I never wanted to, but I thought that was the...right thing to do. But I realize it now. I will be even more miserable wi-without seeing your goofy face every day. Also, you look handsome so it’s a treat to the eyes anyway-"

Time was ticking slowly for Mingshen. Very slowly. Jia’s every heartbeat swelled his own, more furious, more chaotic than ever. Because the melody reaching his ears weren’t simply Jia’s heartbeats.

It was her proclamation of love.

The moment he realized that that was her true present for him, the world stilled around him. Only her voice and the rhythm of her heartbeats stayed that surged the rush of blood into his veins and heat into his throat, urging him to grab the back of her head and pull her into a kiss that would put all other kisses to shame they had shared up until now.

A kiss so hard, a kiss so fierce, a kiss so possessing that made one giant, tangled mess of their heartbeats combined. He sensed her startle with the sudden kiss, but it didn’t matter to him. He pushed her back against the bed, drowning her in his onslaught. His left hand clutched her head while his right gripped the crystal heart tightly.

At one point, he felt her hands smacking upon his chest as though putting up a light resistance, but all he could think was not ending the kiss for a very long time. And it didn’t. Teeth sinking into her lips, tongue clashing into her mouth, breaths roughly mingling as if he would die if he parted. The devil didn’t allow his prey to escape anywhere.

It was only when Jia gave one hard push that finally forced him back.

"Let me breathe idiot...!" She sucked in one long, deep breath as if she hadn’t breathed for years. She gasped and panted, the world already spinning before her eyes.

His hand traced from the back of her head to her chin, lifting it up to meet his eye-level.

"You should have thought about that before imprisoning the devil in your heart." his hoarse voice whispered only between them. From her chin, his fingers travelled down, tracing the curve of her chest. He pressed his index finger at the center.

"Right here. So now..." his voice dropped lower, a hint of predatory ring to it.

He gripped a fistful of dress, straining and pulling it until the fabric began to snap and tear at her shoulders.

"Take responsibility for making the devil fall for you so damn hard."