Chapter 66: Sixty-Six

Xu Ze swallowed the rice in his mouth with some difficulty. 'I wasn't photographing the flyers.'

'Just kidding.' Lu Heyang didn't press further, as though it really had been only a joke. He said, 'Eat some more.'

After forcing down a few more bites, Xu Ze set down his chopsticks. 'I'm full.'

'Get some sleep. Go back to your room, or stay here?'

Not knowing why the choice had been handed to him, Xu Ze realized he was still more accustomed to following Lu Heyang's instructions.

'Hard to decide?' Seeing that Xu Ze hadn't answered, Lu Heyang asked.

Xu Ze shook his head, took a sip of water, avoided Lu Heyang's gaze, and said, 'Here.'

After washing his face in the bathroom, Xu Ze lay down on the bed. Lu Heyang picked up the remote and closed the curtains, and the room dimmed at once. When Lu Heyang got onto the bed, he found there was still enough space between himself and Xu Ze for about two more people to lie down.

'What are you doing.' Lu Heyang's tone carried a note of helplessness.

Rustling sounds — Xu Ze silently scooted over to his side. Under the covers, Lu Heyang reached his hand over, slipped it inside Xu Ze's T-shirt, and let his palm rest naturally against Xu Ze's warm belly — just resting there, no other movement. Xu Ze held his breath, his body taut, and after a few seconds leaned forward toward Lu Heyang.

Just as he was about to kiss Lu Heyang, Lu Heyang asked, unmoved: 'What time does the afternoon briefing start?'

Xu Ze froze, retreated back to his own pillow, and once more refused to look at him. 'Two o'clock, or two-thirty. I don't remember.'

Lu Heyang withdrew his hand and straightened Xu Ze's shirt hem. 'You wouldn't forget something like this. What time, exactly?'

Having been seen through, Xu Ze could only answer truthfully: 'One-thirty.'

Lu Heyang let out a short laugh with breath behind it, and covered Xu Ze's eyes. 'Sleep.'

His hand seemed to be developing thin calluses — when it had pressed against his belly earlier, Xu Ze had felt a tingling numbness. He took Lu Heyang's hand down, felt the web between his thumb and forefinger, and asked, 'Have you been training with firearms?'

'Mm. I've been practicing a lot these past few days. There might still be a smell of gunpowder. Here, smell.'

Xu Ze held Lu Heyang's thumb with one hand and his index finger with the other, pried his hand open, and pressed his own nose into the web between thumb and forefinger. He sniffed, and smelled only a faint trace of Pheromone. 'No,' Xu Ze said.

'Then what should we do?' Lu Heyang asked him.

The light was too dim; even at this close distance, Xu Ze still couldn't make out Lu Heyang's expression, so he couldn't tell whether he was seriously asking this strange question.

'Nothing.' Realizing, just a little, that Lu Heyang was probably joking again, Xu Ze took his hand, placed it under the covers, and held it properly. He and Lu Heyang had shared a bed before, but they had never shared a bed like this — just lying here, this simply. Xu Ze wasn't quite used to it, so he searched for another topic. 'Why did you come to the briefing?'

Both Lu Heyang and Gu Yunchi had already decided to apply to the Military Academy; there was no real need for them to attend.

'We happened to have a day off, and came back to handle some paperwork.'

'Is it done?'

'No. We came straight from the airport.' Lu Heyang said, 'So I have to leave soon.'

Xu Ze gave a vague 'mm,' and Lu Heyang realized he was already falling asleep holding his hand, having not caught the second half of what he'd said.

He must be exhausted — Lu Heyang knew this, because Xu Ze had been at the auto repair shop until three in the morning, gotten up a little past seven to gather at the gate of the Preparatory Academy, and then sat through the briefing until noon.

The Mobile Phone on the nightstand buzzed. Lu Heyang looked at Xu Ze for a few seconds, then slowly withdrew his hand. Xu Ze hadn't been holding on tightly; feeling Lu Heyang's hand slip away bit by bit, he only gave a very light grab — and then, perhaps knowing he couldn't keep it, gave up the next second. He drew his hand back, curled his whole body up slightly, and buried half his face in the covers.

Lu Heyang got out of bed, took the phone and walked out of the bedroom, then went to the sofa in the living room to fetch his bag, and finally left the suite.

That evening, after landing, Lu Qingmo attended a Municipal Government meeting, after which the Wei Clan sent a car to take her to a family dinner.

'An Omega must, after all, put family first. Set your career aside for now. It's time to have a child.'

'We brought this up with the Director last time as well — the younger you are when you start preparing for pregnancy, the better the quality of the offspring.'

'You and Lingzhou certainly can't have just one, which is why you need to have your first child as early as possible, recover quickly, and then have younger siblings — it's for the good of your body, too.'

Through the entire meal, the Wei Clan parents kept pressing these ideas on Lu Qingmo through their words. As usual, Lu Qingmo showed no emotion, only offering an occasional formulaic smile so as not to seem rude.

When the meal ended, the two elders left first, leaving Lu Qingmo and Wei Lingzhou alone in the Mansion. Wei Lingzhou had drunk a little, and was lounging lazily in his chair, watching Lu Qingmo with a half-smile that wasn't quite a smile. 'You used to leave right after dinner. What made you willing to stay today?'

'Why did you have someone beat him up.' Lu Qingmo began, her tone flat.

'Who?' Wei Lingzhou pretended to think, then suddenly laughed. 'Oh, that one surnamed Han.'

'I stayed just to ask you about this.' He lit a cigarette. 'I heard he was harassing you, so I gave him a little warning.'

Lu Qingmo looked at him. 'When did he ever harass me?'

'How could you forget even this? Last time you went to give a speech at the Diplomatic Academy, didn't that one surnamed Han come over and pester you with conversation afterward? I figured it couldn't possibly be that Mrs. Wei had taken the initiative to chat up a Beta out there — of course I had to find someone to teach him a lesson.'

She had not forgotten. Because that was one of only two conversations the two of them had had in several years, apart from their chance encounters at the hotel — so Lu Qingmo remembered it clearly. She and Han Inspector had stood face to face, more than a meter apart, and had not exchanged more than ten sentences.

'He didn't harass me. We had a normal conversation.' Lu Qingmo said. 'I hope you won't interfere in matters like this again.'

If she wanted to, Lu Qingmo could slap countless photographs of Wei Lingzhou dallying with other Omegas right in his face — but she wouldn't, because she didn't love Wei Lingzhou, and so she didn't care about his private life. Alphas were different, though: even without feelings, they still despotically forced the other party to yield, to submit, to become their exclusive possession.

'That won't do at all.' Wei Lingzhou straightened up, leaning slightly toward Lu Qingmo. 'Someone like that has to be beaten. He nearly lost a leg, and still dares to bother you. This time I was being merciful not to cripple him — next time he won't be so lucky.'

Lu Qingmo turned her head aside with a slight frown, avoiding the smell of smoke and alcohol, then stood up. Wei Lingzhou bit down on his cigarette and watched her with a faint smile.

The dining room light was very bright. Lu Qingmo raised her hand and, clean and decisive, slapped Wei Lingzhou across the face.

The slap rang out sharply. Wei Lingzhou's head was knocked to one side, and the cigarette in his mouth flew into his wine glass and went out with a hiss. Ringing filled his brain; half his face quickly swelled and reddened. After a good while, Wei Lingzhou turned back around in disbelief, his eyes bloodshot as he glared at Lu Qingmo.

Lu Qingmo looked at him calmly, and with a backhanded motion, slapped him again.

Having been slapped twice in quick succession without warning, Wei Lingzhou didn't dare make any rash moves. The Omega before him was not only Mrs. Wei, but the Director's eldest daughter. That year, when he had taken it upon himself to have someone drive a car into Han Inspector, he hadn't actually consulted Lu Chengyu about it; Lu Chengyu had only tacitly approved of it out of a desire to make Lu Qingmo compromise — which didn't mean Lu Chengyu would show him any consideration now.

All the wealth in the world couldn't stand against a single finger from those in power. For Lu Chengyu to bring down the Wei Clan would be an easy thing indeed. If Lu Qingmo, who had always been cooperative, were truly angered and this arranged marriage were to go wrong, the Wei Clan would be the first to suffer.

'Go ahead and try.' Lu Qingmo's voice was calm. She took a napkin to wipe her hands, then picked up her bag and walked out of the dining room.

It wasn't until the evening briefing ended that Xu Ze was still full of regret — regretting why he had fallen asleep so quickly at noon that he hadn't even known Lu Heyang had left, when normally, no matter how tired he was, it would take him a while before he could fall asleep.

'I left first. The room will be checked out tomorrow. Sleep there tonight. If He Wei asks you to keep him company, ignore him. Get some rest.' — Xu Ze read Lu Heyang's message to him over and over, and regretted it even more. If he hadn't fallen asleep, he could have heard Lu Heyang tell him all this in person.

Sure enough, He Wei had slept enough during the day and was full of energy at night, and invited Xu Ze to go to a bar. Xu Ze, keeping Lu Heyang's order firmly in mind, refused, and went back to the suite.

After a shower, and after finishing a test paper, Xu Ze washed up and went to bed. The bed was large, but Xu Ze lay only on the right side — the side where Lu Heyang had slept at noon. Xu Ze pressed his nose close to the pillow and sniffed carefully over it, like an animal, until at last he caught a very, very faint trace of Lu Heyang's Pheromone.

The Mobile Phone buzzed. Xu Ze immediately picked it up — a message, from an unknown number. But an unknown number could also be Lu Heyang's, because Lu Heyang seemed to have many domestic and international numbers; every time a new one appeared, Xu Ze would save it into his contacts. The labels had started from Number 1, and had now accumulated to over a dozen, even though many of them might never be used again.

If he didn't know Lu Heyang's family background, Xu Ze would have thought he was a street hawker of Mobile Phone SIM cards.

He opened the message. Several images. He tapped the first one, and in the instant he realized what it was, Xu Ze sat bolt upright, holding his breath.

It was part of the case files and documents relating to a certain case from ten years ago.

Xu Ze had never doubted the circumstances of Xu Ming's death. His mother Qiao Yuan had, on account of it, credulously believed someone else's lies, been fleeced of all her savings and death benefits, and finally slit her wrists; his grandmother had also been traumatized by it — even so, Xu Ze had felt no resentment, no sense of injustice, because he knew his father had died in the line of duty.

So even upon learning from the files that Xu Ming had perished in a drug case, Xu Ze's thinking remained the same — until he saw, in a screenshot from a surveillance recording, a face that looked somewhat familiar.

Xu Ze quickly recalled: it was an Alpha who had been very close to Tang Feiyi, named Shao Ping, who had once been a trusted subordinate of Tang Feiyi's father. The materials clearly identified Shao Ping as the principal offender in the drug case, who had shot and killed three police officers while fleeing.

But Xu Ze remembered that Shao Ping was the Boss of the Casino, and had appeared many times at the Underground Club, coming and going with Tang Feiyi — otherwise he wouldn't have had any impression of him.

Turning to the last page, Shao Ping's name did not appear on the list of criminals killed on the spot or arrested and sentenced — which meant he had indeed escaped at the time, and was still working for Tang Feiyi now, alive and well.

More importantly, the documents made no mention of anyone accidentally falling off a mountain — only the three officers who had been shot.

After looking through all the images again and organizing the information in his head, Xu Ze began to wonder who had sent them. He tried to call the number back, but it was presumably a virtual number, and the call didn't go through.

It couldn't be Lu Heyang. Xu Ze didn't think Lu Heyang would have the leisure to look into something like this; and even if he did, he wouldn't send it to him in such an ambiguous way without any other explanation.

The second person he thought of was Tang Feiyi, but Xu Ze couldn't understand what motive he would have for doing this.

It was already very late. Xu Ze saved the photos, turned off his phone, lay down, and pulled the covers over himself.

He had originally thought he could keep his emotions under control — until he lay with his eyes closed for over an hour, unable to fall asleep.

What was the probability that the contents of the materials were fabricated? Very small. Documents stamped by the Capital Bureau, detailed case records, an event from ten years ago on the same day, in the same city, as his father's sacrifice — too many coincidences. The only thing that didn't match was that Xu Ming wasn't a narcotics officer, just an ordinary criminal police officer, but it couldn't be ruled out that he had been assigned to a support mission.

If everything was true, it would prove that the fugitive who had killed police officers was still out there, making money freely, while the family of the officer who had died in the line of duty had continued to crumble over the past ten years — and it would also mean that Xu Ze had brushed past his father's killer many times at the Underground Club, completely unaware.

Xu Ze still remembered the last time he saw his father. That day, Xu Ming and Qiao Yuan had walked him to school. Xu Ze hadn't cried or made a fuss; the teacher on duty at the school gate had patted his head and told him to go on in. Xu Ze, with his backpack on, had walked a few steps, then turned back to see Xu Ming and Qiao Yuan standing by the roadside under a parasol tree bathed in morning light, waving at him through the crowd.

Those two faces had grown blurry in his memory, but the sunlight of that morning and the green parasol leaves were still as clear as yesterday.

No one had warned the child he was then that he was about to lose everything.

The next day, after the briefing ended in the evening, Xu Ze went to the auto repair shop without eating dinner. At ten o'clock at night, Xu Ze crawled out from under a car, washed his hands clean, and secretly ate his already-cold meal in the tool room — because he was afraid the bodyguard would see him, and would certainly offer to order him a fresh one.

Xu Ze ate while calling last night's unknown number — this was the eleventh time he had tried. The virtual number had already expired, and the phone kept prompting that the number was empty.

With his mouth stuffed with rice, Xu Ze's gaze fell unfocused on the ground. He rarely felt such an urgent desire to investigate something, accompanied by confusion — he didn't know what to do, how to resolve it. The text message had come too strangely, too bluntly, pointing all arrows directly at a certain person, as if openly luring him to look into it.

But no matter who had sent the message, or what their purpose was, Xu Ze couldn't not want to verify it. The question that had tormented Qiao Yuan for years — how exactly had Xu Ming died — had now, without warning, fallen onto him. He couldn't leave it alone.

The Mobile Phone rang. Xu Ze drifted out of his thoughts in a daze. Another unknown number on the screen. For some reason, Xu Ze hesitated for a moment, and only answered after a few seconds.

It wasn't a stranger's voice. It was Lu Heyang.

'Are you at the auto repair shop?'

'Mm.'

'What's wrong?'

Xu Ze didn't know how Lu Heyang could be so sharp as to sense something was off from just one 'mm.' He paused before answering, 'Nothing.'

'Alright, I'll hang up then.'

Xu Ze nodded to himself, and gave another 'mm.' His thoughts were too muddled right now; he didn't dare say too much, afraid of letting more slip.

Walking out of the training room, Lu Heyang handed the phone back to Gu Yunchi. Gu Yunchi wiped some sweat with a towel, and seeing that Lu Heyang looked somewhat cold, asked him, 'What?'

Nothing, really. It was just that even through the phone, he could feel Xu Ze's absent-mindedness and caution, as though afraid that saying one more word might cause something bad to happen. He hadn't even found a fifteen-second call strange, hadn't asked a single 'is something the matter?' — that wasn't like Xu Ze.

'Nothing.' Lu Heyang lowered his brow, looking ahead, and said out of nowhere, 'Too hard to teach.'

He insists on hiding everything and solving it himself; unless someone grabs him by the scruff of his neck and pins his tail down, he will never take the initiative to open his mouth and explain. Really, very hard to teach.