Chapter 2

If eye contact is the spiritual kiss without emotion, then Lu Shimiao’s kiss… was definitely the kind with a mouthful of garlic.

Four years of deliberately manufacturing happiness every single day turned instantly pathetic and laughable the moment she saw her ex. Officer Lu felt as if her crow-ridden memories had been dug up from the grave by a shovel.

Her heart ached fiercely.

Xue Tong walked briskly, with the other superintendent following closely behind. Once she stopped in front of the chief, she extended her hand and spoke in perfect Mandarin.

“Director Chen, hello. I’m Xue Tong, from the Hong Kong Forensic Science Division.”

The white ID badge swayed in front of her black tube top. Xue Tong’s familiar perfume quickly pervaded the surroundings, as invasive as her personality. The scent was like a gorgeous rose scattered by a night rain, the lingering fragrance seeping into moss and evaporating under the sun, giving Lu Shimiao a terrible headache.

“Welcome, welcome.”

The chief knew Xue Tong was a well-known forensic evidence expert in the police world and was very polite. “Welcome, Superintendent Xue.”

“Hello, sir. An Lin, from the Ordnance Forensics of the Criminal Investigation Department.” An Lin beside her also extended his hand for a polite greeting.

Lu Shimiao had no interest in listening to the polite chatter between the chief and her ex. She kept her head down, fiddling with the welcome sign in her hand, thinking about how to slip away quickly after the reception.

Lili saw her being so quiet and nudged Lu Shimiao’s shoulder, whispering gossip in her ear, “This female superintendent is too beautiful, like she just walked out of a TVB drama.”

Lu Shimiao forced a smile and replied in a low voice, “Are you blind? She looks just like a fox!”

The insidious and cunning kind!

“No way! She’s cold and glamorous, reserved and seductive, a mature white-cut-black boss in real life!” Lili was so enchanted by the Hong Kong beauty that she lost her mind, chattering like a parrot.

Lu Shimiao frowned and nodded, “Mm, although the first part is a bit forced, the second part sums it up well.” White-cut-black suited Xue Tong perfectly.

While they were speaking, Xue Tong cast a glance at the two sneaky figures.

“She’s looking over here!” Lili tightly grabbed Officer Lu’s arm, starry-eyed. “The chief seems to be assigning you the liaison work. I’m so jealous you get to see the beautiful superintendent every day.”

Heh…

If I gave you this envy, would you take it…

“What?” Lu Shimiao suddenly snapped back to reality and couldn’t hold back her voice. “What liaison?”

Lili was startled.

The chief glared at them fiercely.

Even Xue Tong gave her a cold look, scanning her from head to toe.

Lu Shimiao sheepishly nodded an apology to the group, then leaned back to Lili’s ear and whispered, “What did you just say about the work liaison?”

“Before this superintendent came to Shanghai, she specifically requested you for the technical exchange liaison,” Lili murmured.

Officer Lu probed, “The chief agreed?”

Lili nodded. “Yeah, otherwise why would you be here today?”

Lu Shimiao: “…”

Lu Shimiao bit her lip, thinking about the cases she needed to appraise, the unfinished investigation reports, her study notes… If the chief assigned her another liaison job, dealing with Xue Tong coming and going every day—she felt like she had cursed too soon.

After the polite formalities, the chief led the way and brought the four Hong Kong superintendents into the airport parking garage.

The bureau’s official car was ready. The chief said, “Let’s go back to the bureau first. We can have lunch together at noon.” He then waved at Lu Shimiao. “Little Lu, come here.”

Lu Shimiao was shrouded in dark clouds. Hearing the chief call her name, her heart felt like it had been flooded, and she walked over with a wilted head.

“Let me introduce you all. Lu Shimiao, an excellent officer from the Criminal Technology Division of our City Criminal Police Headquarters.”

The chief beamed with pride and clapped Lu Shimiao on the back, shoving her forward. “A top graduate of the Public Security University. I heard she also did an exchange at the Hong Kong Police College. She’ll be in charge of the work liaison from now on.”

Lu Shimiao was pushed forward by the chief and stumbled several steps, braking to a halt before Xue Tong with a face like death.

Fine. Now she had to say it whether she wanted to or not.

With a dim expression, Lu Shimiao stood at attention and gave a duty salute. “Lu Shimiao, forensic technician.”

Xue Tong, not in uniform and unable to return the salute, simply extended a cold hand and waved it in front of Officer Lu. “Hello, Xue Tong.”

Her voice was cold, like a glass of tasteless water.

Lu Shimiao reluctantly reached out and shook her hand. The moment they clasped, the soft touch felt like a strand of black hair winding around her neck and entangling her thoughts. She didn’t understand why Xue Tong gripped her hand so tightly. She didn’t understand why she always felt like a fugitive in front of Xue Tong.

Lu Shimiao forced a smile, then pulled back her hand. She turned and walked back to the chief’s side. “Chief, I have to go to the Procuratorate this afternoon, so I won’t go back to the bureau. I’ll coordinate the work with Lili tonight.”

“Okay.”

Hearing the chief readily let her go, Lu Shimiao didn’t look back and was about to bolt.

The Hong Kong superintendent saw she was leaving and spoke with icy coldness. “Wait.”

…

Lu Shimiao didn’t intend to stop. But who knew her body would be so honest that she instinctively halted.

“Director Chen, may I exchange contact information with Officer Lu?” Xue Tong said, pulling out her phone. “It would be more convenient for work.”

“Of course, no problem.” The chief immediately agreed.

Lu Shimiao gritted her teeth. Thanks a lot, dear chief. Couldn’t we just use the office phone for work calls? This old fox Xue Tong really blocked all paths with just one sentence.

“Officer Lu, this is my WeChat QR code.” Xue Tong walked up behind her and proactively handed over her phone.

“Okay.” Lu Shimiao could only politely take out her phone, open WeChat, and aim at the QR code.

Beep—

The contact card popped up, and right below it was a red exclamation mark.

“You have added this user to your block list and will not receive their messages.”

Fuck…

She had totally forgotten that she had blocked Xue Tong four years ago.

“Is it done?” the chief urged from the side.

“Yes, yes.” How could Lu Shimiao dare let the chief know the hidden truth? She fumbled through the settings with her fingers, hastily removing Xue Tong from the block list.

Xue Tong held her phone and tapped into her pinned conversation. Once-rejected messages were now full of red exclamation marks, covering the entire screen.

Expressionless, she typed a line at the bottom and sent it: “Thank you, Officer Lu.”

“Then I’ll be off?” Having completed her task, Lu Shimiao pointed to her car, wanting to slip away immediately.

But the moment she finished speaking, her phone vibrated. She looked down at the screen—it was from Xue Tong, who was standing right beside her. What the hell? Pulling the old underground affair right in front of the chief?

“Hurry back and take a shower. I have no idea how you got covered in blood,” the chief said, looking at the disheveled Little Lu.

Lu Shimiao didn’t say goodbye to Xue Tong; she turned her back and fled swiftly.

Only when she turned and could no longer see Xue Tong did her heart, which had been pounding frantically for nearly half an hour, gradually calm down.

Lu Shimiao leaned on the car window and took out her phone to look at the chat. Heh. Blocking was truly the biggest failure in social media!!! The chat history had automatically restored as soon as the other person was released from “prison.”

Just above the “Thank you, Officer Lu” message, starkly lay the message Lu Shimiao had sent Xue Tong many years ago: “I’m about to take off.”

Scrolling up one more: “Xue Tong, I waited for you all night.”

…

Lu Shimiao was struck by the words like lightning and abruptly threw her phone far away; it landed on the car hood.

Shameful! Those painful words looked so embarrassing today!

Flushed with shame and anger, Lu Shimiao painedly picked up her phone, exited the chat, found Xue Tong’s profile picture, and slid left to delete the chat history. Out of sight, out of mind!

Lu Shimiao started the car in a fury and sped all the way out of the airport.

The stench of blood still hadn’t dissipated; the tactical uniform clung stiffly to her skin. Thinking of her ex made her lose focus and get cut off in traffic. Just as she stopped at a red light, a phone call came in.

Lu Shimiao gripped the steering wheel with both hands. In the rearview mirror she saw a very long face.

“Little Lu, I have a stabbing case here. The procuratorate sent it back for supplemental investigation…” The colleague’s voice was chaotic over the speaker, then cut off midway.

Lu Shimiao was annoyed. “And then?”

“It’s about the signature in that case file from last time; the injury assessment—did you sign it, or was it…” The voice on the other end trailed off again.

A whole sentence was spoken and she still couldn’t grasp what the other meant. Lu Shimiao frowned and gripped the steering wheel tighter. “What’s the case number?”

Ten seconds later, the voice continued, “Oh right, Little Lu, about that signature in the case file, was it the first supplemental investigation or the second?”

Listening to the colleague’s nonsense literature, Lu Shimiao’s face completely fell.

She really couldn’t understand why these middle-aged colleagues, when calling, were exactly like her father—never getting to the point without talking for ten minutes!

Suppressing her anger, Officer Lu deepened her voice and said, “What signature? Stabbing? Brother Chen, I recognize every word you say, but together I don’t understand.”

The person detected Officer Lu’s irritation and grudgingly said, “When are you coming back to the bureau?”

“This afternoon.” Lu Shimiao got distracted and almost ran a red light. She slammed the accelerator, making the tissue box on the center console fly into the passenger seat.

“Then we’ll talk this afternoon.” The caller hung up.

So was the colleague’s phone call just to add insult to injury? For some reason, the image of Xue Tong’s cold look at the airport resurfaced in Lu Shimiao’s mind.

After a turn, Lu Shimiao drove cold-faced into an old standalone villa district in downtown Shanghai.

Although this location was prime—worth 160,000 per square meter—she still couldn’t find a parking spot, and the property management was a total mess. Lu Shimiao circled the neighborhood a few times, taking thirty minutes before she finally managed to squeeze her car into a roadside spot.

Lu Shimiao dragged her tired body to the front door, entered the code, and pushed it open. As usual, there was no one home. Officer Lu was used to it.

She took off her tactical uniform in the living room and tossed the dirty clothes into a basin. Her mother had said that her clothes were too dirty and smelly to deserve the washing machine.

She turned on the air conditioner, quickly showered, and couldn’t be bothered to climb the stairs back to her bedroom. Lu Shimiao, wearing a loose tank top, simply lay down on the sofa.

As soon as her body sank into the sofa, she couldn’t keep her eyes open, although before she closed them her mind was completely filled with the way Xue Tong had looked at her…

In her sleep, Lu Shimiao frowned, and those hazy memories repeated themselves over and over again in her dreams.

…

As the top student of criminal investigation at the Public Security University, when Lu Shimiao received the list for the government-sponsored exchange program, she didn’t feel much of a stir inside.

Even that dusty application form was only remembered by Lu Shimiao when her mother went through her suitcase at the end of summer vacation.

“Why not take such a good opportunity?” Qiu Wen nagged her daughter the whole day at home.

“Why does a child like you always make people worry?”

“If I hadn’t found it, were you planning to give the opportunity to someone else?”

“Why are you just like your father? Always taking things as they come.”

Lu Shimiao, reading her book in silence, finally got annoyed by her mother. “If you want me to go, I’ll go. Satisfied?”

Lu Shimiao’s first twenty-three years of life were like a piece of driftwood; saying she went with the flow was an understatement. More precisely, she was a whale kept in a glass tank, swimming stereotypically in a confined space, a constant struggle within her mother’s rules.

Attending the police academy was forced upon her by her business-oriented parents. The reason was that no one in the Lu family pursued a career in government.

Qiu Wen always thought that the end of the universe was becoming a civil servant, but teaching didn’t suit Lu Shimiao’s silent nature, so in the end she chose the police profession for her.

To her mother, the ultimate purpose of a career was to find a good spouse in the future. So after Lu Shimiao’s college entrance exam results came out, Qiu Wen immediately used her daughter’s city-top score to fill in the police academy as her choice.

After Lu Shimiao submitted her choice to the school, the school was greatly shocked. Such a smart brain not going to Tsinghua or Peking University for research but becoming a police officer… such a waste of talent.

Her homeroom teacher called Lu Shimiao many times, asking if she had a school or major she wanted. On the other end of the phone, Lu Shimiao was silent, and eventually Qiu Wen snatched the phone and rebuffed the teacher.

Later, after her exchange year in Hong Kong, Lu Shimiao seriously came to a truth: Qiu Wen was the whetstone of her life. Sharpening her until she was extraordinarily sharp, yet also incredibly blunt, until it seemed there was no expectation left in her life.

So when Qiu Wen started going crazy at home again over the public-funded application, Lu Shimiao’s first reaction was to compromise. She wanted to escape. Might as well escape to Hong Kong.

Before the September semester started, Lu Shimiao came to Hong Kong ahead of time with her father.

In Hong Kong where land is gold, universities don’t provide on-campus accommodation, and the police college was the same. So when Lu Yuan heard his daughter hadn’t secured a dorm, he immediately couldn’t sit still. He had often seen reports about the poor living conditions in Hong Kong. How could his pampered precious daughter squeeze into some dump? What if she mixed with unsavory people and went astray?

Lu Yuan unprecedentedly put aside his work, got a travel permit, and dragged his luggage to accompany his daughter to pick a dorm in Hong Kong in advance. But they were still a step too late; the cost-effective dorms near the police college had been snatched up the previous semester.

Left with no choice, the two turned to an agent to find a rental. The sales guy was a mainlander. Seeing Father Lu dressed sharply, his daughter covered in designer brands, and hearing their Shanghai-accented speech, the sound of renminbi rang in his ears.

What kind of sucker was easiest to fleece? A doting father, especially a rich one.

The agent blatantly screened out cost-effective single apartments and recommended a high-end complex two subway stops from the police college to the inexperienced father and daughter. The sales guy hyped it up, claiming the neighborhood had a great environment, good security, convenient for school, and that this was the last high-end shared apartment available.

He blew away all of Father Lu’s worries and concerns. Without even looking at the apartment, they decided on the spot and signed the contract. One hundred thousand a year in rent, and Father Lu didn’t even furrow his brow. He patted Lu Shimiao on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, darling, as long as you live safely, Daddy is relieved.”

Only Lu Yuan didn’t know that this decision he made for his daughter would cause Lu Shimiao immense suffering for a long time, dragging her into an abyss.