They both needed to calm down.

The door closed, sealing the two of them away from each other completely.

Jiang Hansheng stood in the corridor with his eyes shut, and immediately the image of Zhou Jin’s throat — covered in bruising — surfaced in his mind.

He clenched his jaw and pressed his back against the wall, letting the cold surface steady him.

The nightmare seemed to sharpen in that moment, growing vivid and close — agonized screaming, hideous laughter, gunshots that split the air, and bodies torn open and reeking of blood…

All those sounds and images collapsed from somewhere deep in his memory, twisting and spiraling, until in one instant they were swallowed whole by a suffocating silence.

All that remained before his eyes was a pocket watch. Metal-cased, its edges worn by time, but its owner had kept it with such care that the pine branch engravings on its surface were still crisp and clear.

The pocket watch swung in front of him — back and forth.

With a sharp click, it opened. Inside was a small photograph: the young, unformed face of a girl, brilliant as the morning sun.

His eyes strained as though they might split open, yet he couldn’t produce a single sound. All he could hear was a man’s voice beside his ear, asking —

“Is this your girl?”

Then, with another sharp sound — a door pushed open — and Jiang Hansheng was jolted back from the fractured depths of his memory.

Zhou Jin carefully peered around the doorframe, her eyes meeting Jiang Hansheng’s — which were entirely red.

Zhou Jin couldn’t read the complex emotion in them. The pale light in the corridor was cold and unsparing, washing over the clean line of his jaw, his lips pressed thin, before settling across his shoulders.

Something fragile in him. Like porcelain.

Yet Jiang Hansheng had never been a fragile person.

The anger she’d felt a moment ago had been gradually receding. Seeing Jiang Hansheng now, a thread of guilt welled up.

“I’m sorry.” She let out a quiet breath. “My emotions were off just now. I know — you were worried about me.”

She was about to say something more, but the words never came out. Jiang Hansheng suddenly leaned forward and pulled her into a tight embrace.

Zhou Jin went still, and for a long moment said nothing.

Jiang Hansheng pressed his hand to the back of her neck, bending down to bury his face in the warm hollow of her shoulder, shifting slightly against her — as though confirming she was real.

Zhou Jin: “…”

Jiang Hansheng’s hold was too tight, pressing uncomfortably, but she could feel his breathing coming through the fabric and sinking into her skin.

Warm. Almost hot.

Zhou Jin didn’t pull away. Slowly, she raised her arms and held him in return.

They stayed like that. She listened to Jiang Hansheng’s heartbeat for a while before her thoughts drifted back, and she remembered that she had come out to make her position clear a second time.

She said, in a way that somewhat broke the moment, “…The apology stands. But I still don’t think I was wrong.”

Jiang Hansheng was briefly startled. Then, after a pause, he let out a quiet laugh.

Puzzled, Zhou Jin moved to end the embrace. “What are you laughing at?”

He didn’t answer. Instead he shifted his arm around her waist and guided her back inside.

The door closed. In the instant Zhou Jin looked up in confusion, Jiang Hansheng took hold of her shoulders with both hands and bent down to kiss her.

The kiss caught her off guard, and she instinctively stepped back — stumbling into the light switch. The room went dark.

There was no room left to retreat. His lips came down over hers. Jiang Hansheng’s cool, crisp scent flooded into her all at once, overwhelming, as though it meant to pull her under entirely.

Intense. Consumed. Zhou Jin could barely breathe.

She couldn’t have said how long it went on before Jiang Hansheng finally drew back with reluctance, moving to press against the side of her neck instead — touching it gently, reverently, then following that with soft, careful kisses.

It didn’t hurt. The light, tracing sensation left her slightly dazed.

In the darkness, the sound of fabric shifting against fabric, and each other’s breathing — both perfectly audible.

Jiang Hansheng said, “Zhou Jin.”

Zhou Jin said, “Mm?”

Jiang Hansheng took a long time to steady his breathing, but when he finally did, he said nothing. He simply held her.

The interrogation continued into the late hours of the night, and the process moved forward smoothly.

Tan Shiming called everyone together in the conference room. Yu Dan came to the dormitory to fetch Zhou Jin. She hadn’t expected Jiang Hansheng to be there as well. She pushed the door open and turned on the light, and found Zhou Jin lying on the bed fast asleep.

Jiang Hansheng was sitting at the desk with his chin resting in his hand, also resting. He snapped awake at the sound of the door opening.

“Professor Jiang?” Yu Dan was mildly taken aback. “What are you doing here?”

Jiang Hansheng gave a small, slightly sheepish nod and gestured toward Zhou Jin.

Yu Dan caught on, and teased, “I can tell you two are newlyweds — inseparable, not wanting to be apart even for a moment?”

Their voices stirred Zhou Jin. She turned over and woke, forcing her eyes open — and the moment she recognized Yu Dan, she was wide awake.

Zhou Jin hastily pulled on her shoes. “Is the interrogation done?”

Yu Dan nodded. “Just a kid — much easier to handle than Lai San’er. One question and everything came pouring out.”

The yellow-haired boy’s real name was Huang Song — a first-year high school student from a single-parent household, raised entirely by his mother.

Because of their difficult circumstances, Huang Song had always been marginalized at school. The suffocating social environment made it increasingly hard for him to adapt to school life.

He grew more and more reluctant to study, skipping class regularly, and spending his time hanging around with various young people from outside the school.

One day, by chance, Huang Song introduced a female high school classmate to Lai Zhengtian for a paid escort arrangement.

Lai Zhengtian was very pleased with that transaction, and afterward had someone bring Huang Song to a karaoke venue especially, where he treated him to the most expensive drinks on the menu.

Lai Zhengtian praised Huang Song as a boy with nerve and a good head on his shoulders, and handed him twenty thousand yuan as a finder’s fee.

For a child who had grown up in poverty, twenty thousand yuan was a sum Huang Song had never even dared to dream of — yet Lai Zhengtian had tossed it over without a second thought.

Huang Song was frightened by it, and didn’t dare accept it so easily.

Lai Zhengtian just laughed at him. “What’s this? The bottle of wine you just drank — a single bottle costs a hundred and thirty thousand.”

Looking at Lai Zhengtian, Huang Song finally understood what it was supposed to mean to make something of yourself in the world — at the very least, to be someone like him: respected, with a face people recognized.

Because of him, Huang Song felt, for the first time, that he was a person of worth. From that point on, he threw himself wholeheartedly into Lai Zhengtian’s orbit.

Whatever Lai Zhengtian told him to do, he did — all of it to live up to those words Lai Zhengtian had once said about him: nerve and a good head.

When asked about the Guan Ling case, Huang Song answered honestly. “Guan Ling was one of the girls under Brother Lai. She was the most popular one with the clients. But she got out of line — seemed like she had gotten hold of something on Brother Lai. Brother Lai said she was a hot potato and needed to be dealt with quickly.”

Zhao Ping looked up from taking notes and frowned. “Speak plainly — when you say ‘dealt with quickly,’ does that mean killing Guan Ling?”

Huang Song shook his head urgently. “He didn’t plan to kill her at first. Because — because Jiang Cheng came back. Brother Lai was wary of him, didn’t dare make a move…”

According to Huang Song’s account, Jiang Cheng was capable and shrewd — sharp thinking, clean execution. He Wu admired his talents and methods greatly.

He Wu had kept him close, and even some of the company’s core business dealings were handed to Jiang Cheng to manage.

The trouble was, from the very first time they met, Jiang Cheng and Lai Zhengtian hadn’t gotten along. They had come to blows multiple times over company matters.

He Wu saw that there was simply no way the two of them could coexist in the same place. After weighing the situation carefully, he chose to keep his own blood cousin and transferred Jiang Cheng to a different city, to work at a branch of the Hengyun Logistics company.

It wasn’t until recently that Jiang Cheng had secured a major contract for the company, earning himself the title of Hengyun’s greatest contributor, that He Wu finally transferred him back to Haizhou.

Jiang Cheng’s triumphant return very quickly made Lai Zhengtian restless. He feared that sooner or later Jiang Cheng would seize his position away from him, and he couldn’t afford to make even the smallest misstep in front of He Wu.

And it was precisely at this moment that Guan Ling got hold of something on him.

In the past, acting with his characteristic ruthlessness, Lai Zhengtian wouldn’t have thought twice about eliminating Guan Ling.

But Guan Ling and Jiang Cheng had once been lovers. If Lai Zhengtian actually moved against Guan Ling and Jiang Cheng decided to pursue it, he would certainly use the matter to make trouble.

“Brother Lai told me that Jiang Cheng used to be a — not that — a police officer. That if he really went after you, he could ruin a person without spilling a drop of blood.”

Tan Shiming’s brows pulled together into a sharp frown. “You’re saying the Jiang Cheng from Phoenix Blaze bar — he used to be a police officer?”

Hearing this, he felt a dim sense of familiarity about the name, but couldn’t immediately place where he’d heard it before.

Huang Song nodded. “I heard he violated regulations, got dismissed, and after that started doing business with Boss He.”

Zhao Ping let out an internal snort. “What business? Don’t dress it up. You think I’m three years old? …And a police officer at that — truly, every profession has its scum.”

Huang Song looked up at Zhao Ping. Zhao Ping rapped the table sharply. “What are you looking at! Keep talking!”

The yellow-haired boy hunched his back and curled into the chair, visibly frightened.

He continued. “So Brother Lai made a deal with Guan Ling — told her he’d give her a sum of money, call it years of hard-earned wages, and then had me call a car to take her back to her hometown in Hongyan County. Wanted to put the whole thing to rest as quickly as possible.”

Zhao Ping said, “And then what? Why did Lai San’er shoot her?”

“Because she was stupid! Because she couldn’t keep her mouth shut!”

Huang Song’s eyes went red. Young as he was, the worst thing he’d ever witnessed running with this crowd was a brawl or a beating. He hadn’t imagined that Lai Zhengtian would kill someone just like that.

Huang Song dug his fingers into his hair and gripped hard, using the pain to hold back the panic, as he said in a low, strained voice, “All Brother Lai did was say a few mocking things about Jiang Cheng in front of her. No matter what Brother Lai usually did to her, she never made a sound. But the moment Jiang Cheng’s name came up, Guan Ling went completely out of her mind!”