Zhou Jin looked at how uncomfortable he was, and felt something complicated stir inside her that was difficult to put into words. She pulled a tissue from the box and handed it to Jiang Hansheng, asking, “You can’t eat spicy food?”

Faced with Zhou Jin’s question, Jiang Hansheng had no choice but to nod.

A strange, inexplicable flash of irritation rose in her. Zhou Jin was a little annoyed. “Why didn’t you say so?”

“I’m sorry.” He apologized again, lips pressed lightly together.

She grew more exasperated. “I’m not asking for an apology.”

Jiang Hansheng could handle almost anything — but he could not handle Zhou Jin’s anger. He showed a rare flicker of helplessness and explained, “I remembered. You like spicy food.”

Zhou Jin went still for a moment.

She had never told Jiang Hansheng that she couldn’t stand the smell of fish, yet he knew. She had never mentioned that she liked spicy food either, yet he said he remembered.

But the one who liked spicy food wasn’t her. It was Jiang Cheng.

As a child she had been spoiled and willful, with a possessive streak, and when she developed a secret crush on Jiang Cheng she had wanted to cut down every admirer around him too — so she had stuck to him day in and day out like a piece of taffy that refused to let go.

When Jiang Cheng went out to eat with classmates, she tagged along. Bowl after bowl of fiery red chili, and after just a few bites her eyes would be streaming with tears, the root of her tongue numb and burning, and no amount of water helped.

Jiang Cheng would watch her and burst out laughing, ruffling her hair the way you’d pet a puppy, telling her she didn’t know her own limits.

But when she saw him laugh, she could endure any amount of heat, and over time she simply got used to it. When she went back to eating mild food afterward, it tasted bland and empty by comparison.

“It’s not as though I love it that much,” Zhou Jin said lightly, glancing down at the time. There was still some to spare. She made up her mind. “Let’s go somewhere else.”

Jiang Hansheng quickly said, “I’m fine.”

Zhou Jin saw that he wouldn’t budge, his expression carrying a rare trace of apology in that gaze that was usually so composed and cool.

“You may be fine — but I’m not, alright?” She exhaled a soft sigh, rose from her seat, and walked to Jiang Hansheng’s side. She took his hand in hers. “Let’s go, Professor Jiang.”

Zhou Jin’s hand was slender, the skin somewhat rough, but her bones were soft. The unexpected sensation made Jiang Hansheng pause for a beat, and she pulled him to his feet before he could process it. “Zhou Jin?”

Zhou Jin was already thinking to herself out loud. “But wasting food really isn’t right — we should have it boxed up. Tonight might well be an all-nighter, so I’ll just eat it as a late-night meal.”

Jiang Hansheng couldn’t take in a word she was saying, and simply nodded along. The warmth of Zhou Jin’s hand rested over the back of his, and he found himself suddenly remembering the night before — the sensation of Zhou Jin’s fingers tracing across his back.

Jiang Hansheng’s breathing became subtly uneven.

Zhou Jin, having persuaded him to move, was about to withdraw her hand — but Jiang Hansheng reached after it, catching her hand and folding it back into his palm.

Jiang Hansheng was rarely a man of dramatic emotional swings. Even when he was in very high spirits, he showed it with nothing more than a slight curve of his lips — as he did now.

Zhou Jin felt the broad, steady warmth of his grip.

“I’ll follow your lead,” Jiang Hansheng said.

Zhou Jin smiled and teased, “You’re wonderfully easy to have around.”

Without their noticing, the entire afternoon had slipped by, and the sky was gradually darkening.

Jiang Hansheng had other work to attend to and couldn’t stay with the Major Crimes Unit indefinitely. After their meal together, the two parted ways.

Zhou Jin returned to the Major Crimes Unit to find two unfamiliar faces in uniform waiting in the office, with Yu Dan in the process of receiving them. When she asked, she learned they were officers from the Guoshan Police Station.

Yu Dan explained, “Professor Jiang asked us to look into the details surrounding when Lai San’er’s hand was crippled. These two colleagues were on duty when the call came in.”

Zhou Jin shook hands with each of them. “I’m Zhou Jin. Thank you for making the trip.”

The two officers smiled in greeting. “The city bureau is putting weight behind this case — we’re happy to cooperate. It’s what we’re here for.”

They made their way to the reception room, where the officers gave a brief account of what had happened at the time.

About a year ago, the location where Lai San’er had been beaten was within Guoshan Station’s jurisdiction — in a pitch-dark dead-end alley.

The alley was undergoing renovation at the time, with no people and no lighting. A passing resident happened to hear gut-wrenching cries from inside and paused to investigate the situation more carefully.

He had seen five or six people surrounding a single person and laying into him. The sounds were enough to make your blood run cold. Fearing someone might end up dead, he immediately called the police.

After the station received the report, the two officers had arrived at the scene in roughly ten minutes, rapidly brought those involved in the fight under control, and took them directly back to the station.

“The one who’d been beaten was Lai Zhengtian. Because his arm was seriously injured at the time, he was sent to the hospital, so we questioned the people who’d beaten him first.”

“Right. The man who led the group was surnamed Hu. He had a younger sister who was a student at Guoshan Experimental High School. One evening when she was on her way home after night study sessions, she ran into Lai Zhengtian. The boy had been drinking and was behaving recklessly, and he raped her. The girl was too frightened afterward, and didn’t dare tell anyone for a long time — until she had an emotional breakdown and attempted suicide, and that’s when her family finally found out what had happened to her. But because so much time had passed since the incident, gathering evidence was extremely difficult, and so…”

The officer shook his head with a regretful sigh. “Her older brother simply couldn’t accept it. He tracked down some street toughs and had Lai Zhengtian dragged into that alley for a beating. If I remember right, one of his arms was broken?”

Zhou Jin nodded. “That’s right. His left hand.”

The other officer lit a cigarette and let out a short, sardonic laugh. “Well, it wasn’t just the arm, actually…”

He drew out the end of his sentence, his tone suggestive, and exchanged a meaningful look with his colleague — though in Zhou Jin’s presence, neither of them came right out and said it directly.

Zhou Jin could tell something was off, so she said, “Go ahead and say it. At this point, even a small detail might have a significant bearing on cracking the case.”

“It’s not that we can’t say it, it’s just a bit…” one of them replied. “Simply put — they gave him a taste of his own medicine. The sister’s brother, and the street toughs he’d brought in — they were all rather fond of violating men. When we actually arrived at the scene that night, Lai Zhengtian didn’t even have his trousers on properly…”

He pressed his lips together, somewhere between grimacing and laughing.

A faint, uncomfortable expression finally crossed Zhou Jin’s face.

He cleared his throat a few times, composed himself, and continued. “I’d guess it’s because of that, that Lai Zhengtian kept insisting afterward that nobody had beaten him that night at all — that he’d simply slipped and fallen on his own. Our end had no basis to open a formal case, so it was handled as a common affray and left at that.”

Zhou Jin: “…………”

After seeing the two officers out, Zhou Jin turned around and called Jiang Hansheng.

Over the phone she walked him through the basic details of what she’d learned, then asked, “Why did you want to look into this?”

Jiang Hansheng was sitting at his desk, stirring a freshly ground cup of coffee, his gaze drawing back from a screen covered in a mass of blood-soaked photographs.

He thought for a moment before replying. “Since this was a crime of passion, Guan Ling must have done or said something that Lai Zhengtian couldn’t bear to hear. What would be enough to send him over the edge?”

The leverage Guan Ling was holding over him? Zhou Jin mentally shook her head. That was unlikely.

Guan Ling and Lai Zhengtian had already reached an agreement. She wouldn’t leave a lifeline within reach and then, on top of that, push her luck — risking her life to provoke Lai Zhengtian further.

So what else could be Lai Zhengtian’s raw nerve? Something that would make him, in a single burst of rage, draw his weapon without a thought for the consequences and shoot Guan Ling dead.

Quickly, the answer that surfaced in Zhou Jin’s mind converged with Jiang Hansheng’s calm, unhurried voice: “His left hand.”

Lai San’er had He Wu as a cousin to back him up, and had always swaggered through life unchecked — he didn’t even fear breaking the law, because no one had ever dared cross him.

He had been a man of absolute pride and confidence. And yet after that one night, he became a man with a crippled limb.

What Jiang Hansheng had not expected, however, was that Lai Zhengtian had also suffered sexual assault that same night.

He recalled the testimony Hongyun had given in her written statement, and said to Zhou Jin, “Hongyun once mentioned that after Jiang Cheng…”

He paused.

After roughly two or three seconds of silence, Jiang Hansheng’s voice — carrying little warmth — came through again: “After Jiang Cheng left Haizhou City, Lai Zhengtian subjected Guan Ling to prolonged abuse out of revenge.”

Zhou Jin quickly pulled up Hongyun’s written statement and confirmed what Jiang Hansheng had said.

“From a professional standpoint, this kind of intense sadistic tendency stems from multiple motivations, but it is typically accompanied throughout by sexual release — that is to say, the venting of sexual urges.”

Jiang Cheng. Jiang Cheng.

Jiang Hansheng thought back to when he’d come to the Major Crimes Unit, and the woman named Yu Dan had told him that Zhou Jin had gone to Phoenix Blaze.

He thought of the missing button at Zhou Jin’s collar when she returned, and the way she had looked him directly in the eye when she lied.

Jiang Hansheng found he couldn’t concentrate. He simply removed his glasses, pressed his hand against his brow, and closed his eyes for a while.

After some time, he continued: “Lai Zhengtian was sexually assaulted by another man — which was the equivalent of having his dignity as a man stripped from him entirely. His abuse of Guan Ling was, in reality, a form of self-soothing and compensation.”

Zhou Jin understood now. “You mean Guan Ling very likely brought up this incident, and that’s what pushed Lai San’er over the edge?”

“Even if she didn’t bring it up directly, this particular wound would be a powerful instrument for breaking through Lai Zhengtian’s psychological defenses. Pass that on to Team Leader Tan — it might be worth trying during the interrogation.”

She caught a trace of exhaustion in the tail end of his voice and said, “Understood. Get some rest.”

Jiang Hansheng paused, then, before ending the call, asked, “Are you coming back tonight?”

Zhou Jin was jotting down key points for the interrogation in her notebook and answered without looking up, “No. Everyone’s stretched thin — they need the hands here.”

Jiang Hansheng let out a quiet sound of acknowledgment, then said, “Zhou Jin.”

“I’m listening.”

“The wedding ring — where did you put it?”

Zhou Jin thought carefully for a moment and said, “At my place.”

Working on the front line wasn’t very compatible with wearing a ring. After Jiang Hansheng had proposed to her, she had placed the wedding band in her wardrobe, and had not worn it once.

“Why do you suddenly ask?”

“Nothing,” Jiang Hansheng said. “You stay busy.”