A Crime Committed By an Acquaintance - Chapter 1
After sending the last email, it was already thirteen minutes past ten o’clock.
Sang Ru shut down her computer without a hint of nostalgia, packed her things, and left. The new proposal had been sent; all that was left now depended on whether the client would have any more “brilliant ideas.”
However, these brilliant ideas arrived unusually fast today. The notification sound for a new email chimed at the same time as the elevator’s “ding.”
Sang Ru opened the message. Good lord—three options, and the other side had rejected all of them in under three minutes.
She didn’t reply. Instead, she turned off the screen and stepped into the elevator.
In a 38-story office building, she wasn’t the only one working this late.
Two men from above the 16th floor were already in the elevator—well-dressed elites. One appeared relaxed, the other rigid and proper.
Sang Ru’s gaze swept over them lightly before she turned to face the front, carefully wording her email reply.
The gist of it was: Please take another look.
This wasn’t the first time Pei Feng had seen Sang Ru. Every time, this woman managed to stir something in him. Her figure was exceptional, her face beautiful, and the scent she carried wasn’t some common fragrance—it drifted around, teasing the senses before slipping unexpectedly into one’s heart.
Pei Feng put away his casual demeanor, took out his phone, and typed a message for Zhou Tingzhao to see.
“My type. Should I go for it?”
Zhou Tingzhao glanced indifferently at the woman’s back and said, “Suit yourself.”
“What?” Sang Ru, having just hit “send” on her email, instinctively responded. Only then did she realize he hadn’t been speaking to her. She smiled, offering an apology without a trace of embarrassment. “Sorry, I misheard.”
“No problem,” Pei Feng seized the opportunity to subtly move closer to her, maintaining a composed expression as he struck up a conversation. “I’ve seen you here quite a few times late at night. 16th floor… an advertising agency?”
“Mm.”
“Must be tough.” Pei Feng looked at her profile as he replied, already calculating how to ask for her contact information in a way that would seem natural.
Some people are too quiet, and the quieter they are, the more they provoke a desire to disrupt that calm.
So Sang Ru smiled imperceptibly and replied, “Same for you in investment banking.”
Pei Feng was taken aback for a moment, then chuckled heartily. “How did you know?”
He was almost convinced this beautiful woman felt the same way about him.
“I just know,” Sang Ru said.
The elevator moved faster than expected. Just before the doors opened, Pei Feng seized the last moment to ask, “Do you need a ride home?”
Sang Ru jingled her keys. “No need.”
The elevator stopped.
“Then can I get your WeChat?”
The woman’s beautiful brow arched slightly, and Pei Feng’s heart inexplicably lifted with anticipation.
The doors opened, and Zhou Tingzhao stepped out first, walking past them.
“Sure,” he heard her say.
Zhou Tingzhao sat in the driver’s seat, not starting the car for a long time.
He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to relax his nerves. In the quiet moment, he thought about the difficult opponents he’d encountered in business today and began reviewing where he might have made missteps while dealing with them.
But he soon realized he couldn’t focus enough to reach any conclusions.
Unusually, he found it hard to concentrate.
A message from Pei Feng popped up just then, “Why did you leave so fast? You vanished in the blink of an eye.”
“I got her WeChat! Haha! She’s even more interesting than I thought! I’m going all in this time, bro—I’m finally leaving the ranks of the lonely singles.”
“You broke up less than a week ago,” Zhou Tingzhao replied. “Send me the files for the merger case again later.”
“…You’re going to spend your whole life married to work, aren’t you?”
Zhou Tingzhao closed the chat window, rolled down the car window, and lit a cigarette.
He soon received the files from Pei Feng, and not long after, Pei Feng’s flashy red sports car roared past him.
The sound of the sports car’s engine faded into the distance, and the parking lot suddenly fell into an odd, heavy silence.
Even though there was still one more person here.
Zhou Tingzhao, as if he had rested enough, finally started the car. The headlights flashed on, and the parking lot grew noisy again.
He opened another chat window and tapped a few times with his finger.
“Come here.”
A few seconds later, Zhou Tingzhao finally heard another sound.
Beyond the engine, beyond his own breathing inside the car—another sound.
His focus, which had wandered when he tried to think about business, now sharpened in this moment.
The sound of high heels clicked closer, step by step. Zhou Tingzhao stubbed out his cigarette and rolled up the window.
Then, the owner of the high heels knocked on his car window.
Someone deliberately repeated the same action, just to make her bend down and rap on his window.
A wave of stifling smoke rushed out at her. Sang Ru stepped back, frowning. “You’ve been smoking.”
“Get in.”
“Next time,” Sang Ru said.
The smoky smell was a major mood-killer for sex. She did want something to happen with Zhou Tingzhao, but definitely not today.
Sang Ru said goodbye, but suddenly her left wrist was grabbed, and the next moment she was pulled abruptly back toward the car window. She barely managed to steady herself by grabbing the window ledge with her right hand.
It hurt, and she felt humiliated. She was angry. Sang Ru glared at the man in the car through the dim light. “What the hell are you…”
What the hell are you doing?
That was what she meant to say, but she never got the chance.
Zhou Tingzhao seemed to have truly taken leave of his senses. He cupped the back of her head and kissed her with what felt like full force. The taste of tobacco suddenly surrounded her, pouring through her lips and tongue into her heart and lungs.
An excessively fervent kiss—all her half-formed anger was swallowed up in an instant.