Li Jinyu remained quite calm, showing a stance of being ready for whatever might come, and said coldly: “Oh, is that so? Do you want to see me fight with Cheng Kairan? Or do you just want to see Cheng Kairan beat me up?”
“Don’t worry, if you get beaten up for me, I’ll offer myself to you in return,” Ye Meng said with a smile.
She was also implicitly warning Cheng Kairan—if you dare touch him, I’ll have the perfect reason to marry him.
Cheng Kairan finally understood—these two shameless people had already gotten together. He stood there for about five or six seconds, and if facial expressions could change with anger, he could have worked at a nightclub for free at this moment. In the end, his face turned ashen, and he stormed out without a word, slamming the door, which caused the group of men at the entrance to stand up sporadically and follow him out one after another.
“Hey, hey, hey—not eating anymore?” the owner hurriedly chased after them, “The… the bill hasn’t been settled yet!”
Ye Meng smiled gently at the owner, “I’m sorry, give me the bill.”
The owner hesitated reluctantly: “This…”
Ye Meng was polite and considerate, making it impossible to refuse: “It’s fine, I’ll pay in a moment.”
Cheng Kairan hadn’t gone far. He stood outside making a phone call, then led a group of men to smoke for a while. Beside them were several neatly arranged Audis, ready to roll. Ye Meng stared at them for a while, then said to Li Jinyu: “Guess who he’s waiting to meet?”
Li Jinyu couldn’t be bothered to guess, “Are you done eating? Let’s go if you’re done.”
Ye Meng’s attention returned to him, looking at him as she earnestly warned: “Next time I hear you say I’m someone’s girl, I’ll teach you a lesson.”
“He likes you, can’t you see that?” Li Jinyu couldn’t be bothered to beat around the bush with her, “I told you, I just want to spend the rest of my life with my grandmother in this town, without complications. The last time I helped you was purely out of respect for Sister Ya’en and the money, but I won’t get on his bad side and cause trouble for myself because of you.”
Actually, when he wasn’t around Li Lingbai, his emotional regulation was very good, almost like a normal person. Occasionally he would feel irritable or anxious, but he could control it. Li Jinyu didn’t know why, but while others couldn’t tell, Ye Meng somehow could.
She asked: “Then why are you dating Jiang Luzhi?”
“Because she’s in Beijing, I don’t have to spend money on dates, and it gives my grandmother a perfect reason not to introduce me to other girls. I told you, I’m trash,” he sneered.
Ye Meng smiled with ease, composure, and warmth, looking at him and saying: “As it happens when it comes to relationships, I’m trash too. As for Cheng Kairan, all these years he’s been like a blank canvas in front of me. His thoughts are written all over his face.”
That’s why she later cut ties with him—not because she was afraid of his revenge, but because she didn’t want to give him any more hope. Who would have thought that now, with circumstances changed, Cheng Kairan was riding on this momentum and had gotten to where he was today, and she couldn’t easily provoke him anymore? When you’re young, you can make clean breaks, but as adults, you have to leave room for maneuvering.
Neither of them spoke for a while.
In a moment, Ye Meng saw a gleaming black Mercedes slowly drive by outside. Shortly after, Cheng Kairan and his group tossed away their cigarette butts and got into the Audis parked nearby, majestically and orderly backing out of the small alley.
As the black Mercedes turned the corner, the rear window lowered about a third of the way, and a hand reached out through the gap, throwing out a cigarette butt. The thumb wore an old-fashioned yet rare jade-inlaid gold thumb ring.
Ye Meng didn’t recall it at that moment, not until she and Li Jinyu left the crab restaurant and were about to get a taxi. Then she suddenly froze like a monk in deep meditation. Li Jinyu walked quite far before noticing she hadn’t followed. Looking back, he saw Ye Meng hurriedly walking in the opposite direction.
Li Jinyu caught up and grabbed her, “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to find Cheng Kairan.”
“Why are you looking for him now? Missing him?”
Ye Meng couldn’t be bothered to explain to him and solemnly pushed him aside: “Little brother, big sister isn’t joking with you. I have something very important to confirm right now, so you go play somewhere else.”
His expression cooled, “Tell me what it’s about first, and I’ll tell you where to find them.”
“You know where they went?”
Li Jinyu crossed his arms over his chest, leaning against the wall at the entrance of the alley, chuckling as he said: “Do you want to find Cheng Kairan, or that Mercedes with license plate 5567?”
Ye Meng was startled, “You recognize it?”
“No,” he shook his head, “But I always glance at out-of-town license plates. Can’t help having a good memory—one look and I’ve remembered it.”
Ye Meng asked: “Then how do you know where they went?”
Occasionally satisfied customers would come out of the small alley. Li Jinyu pulled her aside before saying, “Just a guess. At this hour, with a bunch of subordinates and an out-of-town visitor, they changed locations at the last minute. There are only a few restaurants in town.”
She looked at him hesitantly, not knowing why, but feeling he might be trustworthy, so she said: “A few days before my mother died, she met a man wearing a jade-inlaid gold thumb ring. I want to confirm if it’s him.”
“And then what?” Li Jinyu leaned against the wall, waiting leisurely for her to provide a more precise plan, “How will you confirm? Call Cheng Kairan and ask if the man with the jade-inlaid gold thumb ring next to him is your mother’s friend. Or rush in and confront him face to face, asking if he killed your mother?”
Ye Meng rolled her eyes: “Do you think I’m an idiot? If he is the murderer who killed my mother, how could he possibly admit it to my face? And if my mother had some secret, wouldn’t I be putting myself in the line of fire? I just want to confirm his identity.”
Li Jinyu smiled, staring at her discreetly for a moment, then sent a voice message. With his finger pressed on the screen, aimed at the microphone, his eyes stared straight at her, saying: “Yang Tianwei, check if there’s an out-of-town Mercedes outside, license plate 5567.”
Ye Meng immediately heard a swoosh sound.
Yang Tianwei quickly replied with a voice message, “5567? Beijing license plate? I think there is one, right on the back hillside.”
“Keep an eye on it for me,” Li Jinyu replied.
He then opened a map and marked several locations for her to see, “At this time, with so many people, there aren’t many places they could go. Also, Cheng Kairan is dressed formally today, and the visitor has a Beijing license plate, so the venue definitely won’t be too shabby. The crab restaurant is popular on social media, which means this Beijing person is quite young, under forty at least. There are two other popular restaurants in town, one near the hospital and one near the Three Water Tower. But to go to the Three Water Tower, you have to cross the bridge, and it’s rush hour now—look how congested the bridge is. The only thing is, they can’t enter the hospital parking lot, so they can only park on the abandoned back hillside of the inpatient department, which is something Cheng Kairan often does.”
“…” Ye Meng was rendered speechless by his analysis.
After they got into the car, he asked, “Has that person seen you before?”
“No, I only saw this man with the ring from a distance, giving something to my mother,” Ye Meng didn’t want to involve a third party in matters concerning her mother. If there was any trouble, she was, after all, her mother’s daughter, while others had no connection—especially Li Jinyu. So she said, “Li Jinyu, just send me the address, and I can go by myself.”
Li Jinyu withdrew his gaze from the window, glancing at her and saying lazily: “I never said I’d accompany you. I’ve given the address to the driver, and I’ll go straight back to the hospital later.”
“Good,” Ye Meng breathed a sigh of relief.
There was silence for a long time. The scenery outside the car gradually became familiar, as the car turned onto the main road of the old city center, with the buildings on both sides becoming increasingly dense and low.
“There’s something strange,” Li Jinyu stared out the window and suddenly said.
Ye Meng: “What is it?”
He turned back, “Why did Cheng Kairan suddenly decide to change locations? If this Beijing person is so important to him, why would he temporarily leave with everyone just because we upset him? He shouldn’t be that impulsive.”
“So what do you think?”
“He didn’t want you to see this person, of course. So actually, without needing confirmation, we can be sure this man is connected to your mother. Are you sure you still want to go?”
Just as Li Jinyu finished speaking, the car slowly stopped at the entrance. Ye Meng slammed the door with a heavy and determined bang that made his ears ring. She bent down and said to Li Jinyu through the car window, “You say you’re here to spend the rest of your life with your grandmother, and it’s the same for me. I just want to know why my mother committed suicide back then. Because you don’t know how much she loved me—she couldn’t possibly have abandoned me to die.”
Ye Meng’s mother was from out of town, a young girl who grew up in the north. Later, she followed her father to the southern provincial capital to do business, where she met Ye Meng’s father, who was studying at the university in the provincial capital at that time. She then married and moved to Ning Sui. The young girl who had grown up carefree and cherished by her parents never imagined she would marry into a family that was in the eye of the storm. None of the aunts in the Ye family could bear children, so all their hopes were placed on her. Although the old lady didn’t say anything, those expectant gazes and daily prayers, along with the gossip and cold stares of those watching the spectacle in the small town, more or less affected Ye Meng’s mother, who had always been sensitive. Add to that the changes in her figure before and after pregnancy, and her husband’s silent cowardice, it was almost unsurprising that she developed depression.
But all this never affected her love for Ye Meng.
Ye Meng was a person who understood the value of reciprocity. All these years, she knew in her heart that her grandmother and aunts had wanted a boy, but even though she was a girl, they had always treasured her like a jewel. But this love had a barrier. The only one who loved her unreservedly was her mother. She kept everyone else outside that barrier, giving them a very polite, official, and considerate response.
Only with her mother could she surrender herself completely. She seemed enthusiastic, but in reality, she was quite cold-hearted.
So she always held a grudge about her mother’s death. If there was even the slightest clue, she wouldn’t miss it.
…
Dai Ji Restaurant.
At that time, a bespectacled hotel attendant with a crew cut came out of private room 502. He silently calculated in his mind that there were still five minutes until the next dish would be served. He could go to the entrance for a smoke. Just as he took out his lighter, he looked up to find a stack of bright red Mao bills in front of him.
Ye Meng had waited a long time but couldn’t find a female attendant. Fortunately, the male and female attendants at this hotel wore the same uniforms, differing only in size. Ye Meng’s pants were too big and she couldn’t wear them, so she loosely put on just the top. Luckily, her pants were already black suit pants of the same color system, so they looked quite matching. By the time she finished changing and came out, the bespectacled crew-cut attendant had already changed into another set of work clothes that he kept in the break room.
“You have a lot of clothes,” Ye Meng teased him.
The crew cut guy had a look like she was inexperienced, “I have several sets. Working in a restaurant, spilling dishes happens all the time. Hurry up, the next dish is about to be served, I’ll take it for you. And don’t think I’m helping you because of that five hundred yuan. I also have a heart for justice and an axe of love. I definitely won’t tolerate outsiders committing crimes on our turf.” After thinking a bit, he cautiously added, “If that person is a fugitive, you—you—you—you… wait until they leave before calling the police, okay?”
“Okay, okay, okay,” Ye Meng perfunctorily agreed while tying her belt, “You are a passionate good youth.”
The private room door opened a crack, and Ye Meng gently pushed it open. That man was also wearing an ill-fitting suit. He was burly, with a delicate Hermès belt cinching his round belly. Li Jinyu was right—he was quite young, about thirty-five or thirty-six, wearing a jade-inlaid gold thumb ring on his hand, which he kept turning.
Somehow, seeing him sitting with Cheng Kairan, Ye Meng immediately visualized a scene of a fat monk and a skinny monk doing business together, only to be swindled out of their investment.
A stick of sandalwood incense was burning in the private room, with wisps of smoke rising. Even through the hazy smoke, Ye Meng could be certain she had never seen him before. This man was not the one her mother had met a few days before her death.
But she could confirm that this jade-inlaid gold thumb ring was the same one worn by that man back then.
“Your vinegar fish,” Ye Meng bent down and said softly.
Cheng Kairan instinctively looked up, his expression changing immediately. Ye Meng calmly winked at him, indicating that he should remain calm: “Please enjoy. The next dish will be ready in three minutes.”
The fat monk didn’t pay much attention, merely glancing up at Ye Meng, his eyes slightly appraising, “Why did they change to a female attendant? She’s quite pretty.”
Cheng Kairan looked at her for a while, then picked up the conversation: “The town isn’t that particular, whoever’s free comes.”
Ye Meng gently closed the door and walked to the staircase corner, leaning against the wall, counting in her mind: 1, 2, 3…
10—
“What are you doing here?” Cheng Kairan grabbed her and pulled her into the corridor, “How did you know I was here?”
Ye Meng smiled, “Who is that man?”
Cheng Kairan held back his anger, “Where’s Li Jinyu?”
Ye Meng looked at him persistently, turning a deaf ear, already 70-80% certain in her heart. Afraid of eavesdroppers, she calmly took out her phone and typed a string of words—
[Are you investigating my mother’s matter?]
[I’m doing business with him. You leave first, I’ll tell you about it later.]
The crew-cut guy hadn’t been able to smoke earlier as he was interrupted and had his clothes taken by Ye Meng. Now, wearing a new set of work clothes, he was happily preparing to go to the entrance for another smoke. Just as he took out his lighter, miraculously, another bright red Mao bill appeared in front of him.
The crew cut guy thought he had soul-transmigrated into Doraemon’s pocket. He couldn’t believe it and stuffed the lighter back to see if he could pull out more—but the Mao bill remained steadfast, just one hundred.
He looked up to see an extremely handsome man standing in front of him, smiling harmlessly and saying, “Come on, handsome, thanks for your hard work. Take off your clothes and give them to me.”
Crew cut guy: Again?!
Ye Meng was just about to go to the bathroom to change back into her clothes when she heard steady, calm footsteps in the corridor that somehow seemed familiar. She instinctively turned to look.
The bathroom was in the corner, and the corridor was long without a single light. Only a faint glow from the small window at the end provided some illumination. It was quiet and dim. Against that faint light, Ye Meng could only see a tall dark figure approaching her. Before she could make out who it was, a lean arm with a distinctly masculine presence reached out and, with lightning speed, not giving her time to react, directly and unexpectedly hooked around her neck and unceremoniously dragged her into the adjacent men’s bathroom.
Li Jinyu’s movements were clean, efficient, and orderly. Ye Meng was pushed against the door panel, still unsteady and tilting, when through the haze she saw that he had already calmly checked each toilet stall one by one, ensuring no one was there, before leaning against the sink and saying to her: “Did you find out? Is that man connected to your mother’s death?”
Ye Meng shook her head, “Although I haven’t seen him up close, I would still recognize him if I saw him, and it’s not him. But, weren’t you supposed to be at the hospital with your grandmother? How did you come here?”
“Come here,” Li Jinyu leaned against the sink with one hand in his pocket, beckoning to her.
Ye Meng walked over to him.
He said softly: “Cheng Kairan might be in some trouble. That car downstairs, the 5677, has fake plates.”
Ye Meng was surprised, “How did you find out?”
Li Jinyu said: “Because his license plate doesn’t match his car paint. Some plates are old and the paint is new, meaning it’s a new car with old plates. But this isn’t a new car. His paint job is freshly done, and the paint underneath the bumper is the original color of the car. Some cars with fake plates are meant to show off, using fake plates from someone else’s luxury car, but his 5677 plate itself isn’t a prestigious number. It’s a smuggled or stolen car.”
“How did you notice his paint job?” Ye Meng asked again.
“Because I noticed there was someone in his car,” Li Jinyu looked down at her, lowering his voice, which was extremely hoarse, “Cheng Kairan has three cars, and all his men went to eat, leaving no one behind. But this guy left someone in his car. Do you know why he left someone? Because there’s no designated parking at the back hillside of the inpatient department, and during this parking peak time, someone might ask to move the car at any moment. They probably aren’t doing legitimate business, so they don’t dare leave a contact number on the car. If they don’t leave someone behind, others would call 114 (information), which would connect to the original owner’s phone. If the original owner is contacted, they would discover their license plate has been cloned.”
As he spoke, someone outside in the corridor loudly called for an attendant.
The crew-cut guy, who had somehow changed into yet another new set of work clothes, smiled and responded quickly, “Coming! How can I help you?”
“Bring two pots of tea to room 502.”
The footsteps gradually faded away.
Ye Meng peeked through the crack of the bathroom door, quietly checked that no one was around, then turned back to Li Jinyu, saying, “Could Cheng Kairan be in danger from him? He left his phone in the car, and just now he was typing on my phone. He seems to be helping me investigate my mother’s matter.”
Li Jinyu had somehow come to stand behind her. When Ye Meng turned around, she faced his solid chest, his breath gently on top of her head. She could only hear the pounding of a heart. The man looked down at her expressionlessly, and insincerely advised: “If he loves you to the bone, just marry him.”
…
The atmosphere in the private room was somewhat stagnant. After Cheng Kairan finished saying “Can we get the goods next week,” the fat monk didn’t say another word. Instead, he leisurely and methodically started drinking tea. Two boxes of premium Da Hong Pao tea, drinking until his eyes were bloodshot, yet the man kept swallowing it into his belly, not afraid of scalding himself.
After a while, the fat monk took a sip of tea, spat the tea leaves back, and said slowly: “You seem to be in a hurry, Brother Kai.”
Cheng Kairan felt he had been too foolish, showing too much eagerness. He should have said the week after next. He had never been an undercover agent and revealed his position as soon as he opened his mouth. This fat guy was already suspicious of him. When it came to paranoia, he had thought his case was severe, but here was someone with terminal paranoia.
It made sense—how else could this guy afford a Mercedes if he wasn’t so paranoid? Thinking of his own second-hand Audi, bought through connections and exaggerated praise, he felt a wave of gloom.
Like a monkey, he showed a simple smile and said sheepishly: “Isn’t it my mother’s birthday next week? I want to buy a suitable gift for her in time.”
The fat monk was in the antique business. The thumb ring he wore, Cheng Kairan had seen in Ye Meng’s mother’s house. Cheng Kairan had always thought this was quite a coincidence. Although he had grown to hate Ye Meng intensely over these years, Ye Meng’s mother had always supported him during those years. When he was looked down upon by the townspeople and beaten like a drowning dog, it was Ye Meng’s mother who took him home to cook for him and take care of him. Ye Meng’s mother’s suicide had left Ye Meng resentful, and Cheng Kairan couldn’t let it go either. So, it had taken him several years to find this lead.
But he had never been clever. That he had made it this far was entirely due to his unwavering loyalty to his boss back then, which had earned him a promotion. When it came to intelligence, he probably wasn’t even half as smart as Ye Meng. Just a casual word or two from Ye Meng could anger him enough to leave without eating.
The fat monk didn’t believe him and showed a very contemptuous smile.
Suddenly, the private room door was pushed open again, and Ye Meng walked in carrying a small plate of fruit. Her posture was standard, like a professional hostess. She bowed to them, displaying professional training from somewhere, and said with a warm smile: “This is a complimentary fruit platter from our manager.”
Cheng Kairan was overwhelmed—why, why, why have you come again?
As Ye Meng turned to leave, she seemed to suddenly remember something and said to Cheng Kairan: “Oh, by the way, Brother Kai, the manager wants to know if you need champagne for your mother’s birthday party next week?”
What nearly blew Cheng Kairan’s mind, however, was that less than a minute later, Li Jinyu also entered wearing work clothes.
The two coordinated well—one engaged the fat monk in conversation, drawing his attention, while the other, while changing the tea water, casually slipped a note into Cheng Kairan’s palm.
Cheng Kairan’s palm was sweating. While Ye Meng was talking with the fat monk, completely blocking the line of sight, he opened the note and took a look.
[Tell him you don’t want it anymore. Don’t be a coward.]