```
"Slap!"
My head buzzed, dazed from the slap.
A burning pain!
"Mom, what are you doing? You hit him? How could you hit someone!" Liu Tian was frantic.
"Who allowed you to go out with him!" the woman said unapologetically, "How many times have I told you not to associate with strangers, especially men? Do you know what he does? He might be a hoodlum, and he could kill you!"
"Mom, he's a doctor!"
"Doctor? So young? It must be a trick, you don't understand. The world outside is full of evil, full of con men and rogues! You can't see, they will only bully you, harm you!"
The woman squinted and sized me up with a sneer.
She appeared to be in her thirties, tall and voluptuous, clad in a black form-fitting dress that traced her seductive curves. She was beautiful and bewitching, with a teardrop mole under her right eye, which accentuated her charming demeanor.
Her expression was stern and filled with bitterness, truly resembling the evil stepmother image Tiantian had described!
