Chapter 64: Chengnan Bookstore 11
…
Zhuang Ningyu had been single-mindedly waiting for his meal. Hearing this, he only then remembered that Wenying Road was indeed right next to Guanxing Tower. Standing at the office window, he could probably see the top-floor apartment where Yi Ke lived. But close as it was, he had no other thoughts at the moment besides wanting to eat, leaving Yi Ke to furiously wag his invisible tail in the air like a propeller beside him. His heart itching with impatience, he served his wife until he had finished the fish and shrimp, then pulled the man into his arms and asked gleefully, “Move in with me?”
Zhuang Ningyu flatly refused, but Yi Ke would not give up. The commute from Wenying Road to District 15 crossed half the city, and rush hour traffic was a standstill. Did he really want to waste his time on a meaningless commute?
While traffic jams were certainly a headache, Zhuang Ningyu was genuinely not mentally prepared to live with him. It took a great deal of effort to finally push away the head buried in the side of his neck. “Sit properly!”
Yi Ke sat up very properly, while mentally planning the ownership of all the rooms. The living room, dining room, study, gym, and master bedroom would belong to his wife and him. The kitchen would belong to him, but it would belong to his wife when she needed to get snacks from the fridge. The guest room would belong to him after he angered his wife.
Before meeting Yi Ke, Zhuang Ningyu had already read thousands of pages about love in literary works. He typically enjoyed appreciating the extreme suffering intertwined with religion and philosophy, and would occasionally put himself in the shoes of a character to analyze forbidden morals and desires. But after meeting Yi Ke, his view of love couldn’t be distorted in the slightest. He often marveled at his healthiness, in every sense of the word—except for being a bit overly clingy.
Yi Ke held one of his hands and refused to let go. After a while, he leaned his head over again. The warm sunlight shone into the hospital room, so Zhuang Ningyu temporarily gave up on discussing work matters with him. The two of them squeezed onto a small sofa, each looking at their own phone. It was inconvenient, to be sure, but that’s just how love is.
…
Because of this mental contamination incident, Zhuang Ningyu was granted a nominal two-week vacation. In reality, he had rested for less than two days before he was back in the research group for a meeting. All the data from the Zeus Grand Hotel was consistent with the “replicated rule zone” hypothesis. A member of the research team from the capital said, “Currently, only the Invisible Giant should have this capability.”
“If a replicated rule zone must be at the original address to succeed, then they must have conducted many replication experiments of the Zeus Grand Hotel before this book club meeting, right?” Zhuang Ningyu said. “After all, replicating a rule zone is not easy. They would surely want to extract as much data as possible before letting it be discovered by the Order Maintenance Department, to make the most of it.”
“If that’s the case, then the suspicion on Zhang Nan, the owner of Chengnan Bookstore, is even greater,” a colleague from the investigation team projected a page of names onto the screen. From Zeus Group to White Bird Bookstore, to the Fu Group, Tang Xiaoyuan, and also adding Ni Ruiling and Hou Junye behind her, he spread his hands helplessly. “To be honest, they are all tough nuts to crack. None of them are willing to cooperate. Please understand, we really need more time.”
Zhuang Ningyu asked, “Then what about Dou Dekai’s kidnapping case?”
“There’s been progress on that,” the investigator said. “The police re-examined the physical evidence from that year and just found a tiny, burnt remnant of a data SIM card stuck to the inner wall of a destroyed camera.”
When the Zeus Grand Hotel was first being built, many cameras were installed on the construction site for anti-theft security. The investigator continued, “Because the construction site already had cameras, the police missed this clue back then, allowing the culprit to get away with it.” An old-fashioned camera becomes a mere decoration without a network or power cable. It has to be modified to continue working, and this data card is evidence that it was modified and likely operational at the time.
“If the fire back then had been just a little bigger, it really would have all been burned away. The fact that a piece of the card’s core was left, I suppose you could call it fate. Also, thank you, Captain Zhuang, for your sharp insight.”
“I only proposed a hypothesis. Solving the case still depends on all of you,” Zhuang Ningyu was very polite. He sat by the window, and his peripheral vision happened to catch a Bentley parked by the roadside, and a flashy, dazzlingly handsome guy leaning against the car.
Zhuang Ningyu: [The meeting isn’t over yet. You should go home first. Don’t stand in the cold wind.]
Yi Ke: [No, they said Team Leader Ren wants to steal you for the capital. I have to stand guard here! [Angry][Angry][Angry]]
Team Leader Ren was the head of the investigation team from the capital this time. He did indeed seem very interested in Zhuang Ningyu. After the meeting, he took the initiative to invite him, “Captain Zhuang, would you like to stay for a meal? I heard there’s a famous local restaurant nearby.”
“I’m sorry, I have plans,” Zhuang Ningyu packed up his notebook and smiled apologetically. “I have to go.”
Team Leader Ren raised an eyebrow slightly. “Alright, then some other time.”
Whether he would be free some other time was also hard to say. Zhuang Ningyu jogged into the elevator. Yi Ke had successfully waited for his sweet-smelling wife, who had not been stolen away! He happily opened his arms for a hug, but Zhuang Ningyu tapped him lightly on the head. “Let’s go, quickly!”
A large group of colleagues was coming downstairs. This was not a place to linger. Yi Ke got the message, fastened his seatbelt, and floored the accelerator. Home!
Home to Guanxing Tower.
Zhuang Ningyu hadn’t even officially reported to the research group yet. In the time it took to have a meeting, he was practically kidnapped and taken to the parking garage. It couldn’t be helped; the distance was just too close, just a turn around the corner. Yi Ke parked the car, then opened the passenger door to give him a princess carry. Zhuang Ningyu dodged backward and asked warily, “Wait a minute, what are you doing?”
My wife won’t get out of the car. He must be waiting for me to carry him! Yi Ke felt his logic was perfectly sound, so without another word, he climbed into the car. Zhuang Ningyu looked through the car window at the high-end parking garage, full of cameras everywhere, and couldn’t imagine what the security guards in the monitoring room were seeing at this moment. He decisively lifted his foot and kicked the man out. “I’ll walk myself!”
Not only did he walk himself, but he walked at lightning speed, afraid of being harassed in public. The files in his arms clattered to the ground. Yi Ke followed behind, picking them up along the way. “Slow down, don’t rush, don’t rush.”
As he picked up the files, he was frantically selecting music on his phone. But because Zhuang Ningyu had his back to him, he didn’t notice this in time and lost his due vigilance.
There was only one apartment on the top floor. Yi Ke wrapped his arms around him from behind, rested his chin on his shoulder, and said affectionately, “The password is the date we first met.”
Zhuang Ningyu: “…Use your own fingerprint to open it.”
Yi Ke was devastated. “Why do I have to open it myself? Don’t tell me you forgot!”
Zhuang Ningyu: “I didn’t forget.”
Yi Ke insisted, “Then you open it.”
Zhuang Ningyu really hadn’t forgotten, but this method of opening the door always reminded him of the phrase “eloping to a love nest,” which made his scalp tingle. He absolutely couldn’t bring himself to do it, standing there frozen like a statue. So in the end, it was Yi Ke who opened the door. With a “beep—,” the security door unlocked. Zhuang Ningyu finally breathed a sigh of relief, but not completely, because he then heard the romantic BGM from who-knows-which of their encounters, and laid eyes on a hallway full of Ecuadorian red roses.
“I have something else to do, I’m leaving.”
“Come back.” Yi Ke grabbed the back of his collar, pulled him back into his arms, and slammed the door shut with a “bang.”
Zhuang Ningyu was carried and tossed onto the sofa. The living room’s decorations were even more extravagant than the entryway, as if he had moved all the red roses in Jincheng into the room. The light from the crystal chandelier hanging from the high ceiling was dazzling. He turned his head slightly to the side, but after waiting for a long time, Yi Ke’s next move never came.
“…”
But Yi Ke also needed a moment. He looked at Zhuang Ningyu lying in a sea of roses, completely overwhelmed by a huge sense of happiness. Besides the sound of his own heartbeat, it felt as if the whole world had stood still. After a very long time, he finally reached out to hug him, burying his head in that familiar, soft fragrance.
Zhuang Ningyu patted his back. “Don’t you have anything to say?”
Yi Ke held him even tighter. He wanted to speak, but he didn’t know what else he could say. In the end, he hugged him so hard he started to cry. Zhuang Ningyu was at a loss, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. He ran his fingers through that soft, clean hair, rested his chin on the other’s shoulder, and also closed his eyes in relaxation.
The scent of roses filled the air. The music looped again and again until it finally stopped. Zhuang Ningyu asked softly, “Have you cried enough?”
Yi Ke let out a nasal “mhm.” His ears and neck were burning red. He held on to him and refused to let go.
Zhuang Ningyu had no choice but to say, “I’m hungry.”
Yi Ke shot up. “I’ll go cook!”
He “whooshed” into the kitchen and even locked the door from the inside. Through the frosted glass, Zhuang Ningyu in the living room could clearly see his clumsy figure by the stove. He went up and knocked on the door. “Do you need my help?”
“Crash!”
The crisp sound of breaking bowls and plates came from the kitchen.
Due to the interference of love, Yi Ke’s cooking skills were not at their best today. But fortunately, both of them were in a state where “love is enough to live on,” their spiritual needs far outweighing their material ones, so what they ate wasn’t very important. Zhuang Ningyu did not stay the night at Guanxing Tower. In fact, Yi Ke himself felt he wasn’t quite ready and needed to calm down. So he obediently drove his wife back home.
The car window was open, and the wind from the road finally cleared his hot-headed brain. Yi Ke sat in the driver’s seat, watching until Zhuang Ningyu entered the unit door of Fuxing Court before backing out and driving away. The further he drove, the more he felt something was wrong—
He didn’t say he loved him!
There was no kiss?
Tonight, besides cooking, it seemed like he hadn’t done anything at all!
He slammed on the brakes at a red light, utterly shocked that he could have missed such a crucial step!
So he immediately turned on his left signal to make a U-turn.
His phone, tossed on the passenger seat, showed a new message—
Zhuang Ningyu: [Drive safely. Be safe. Get some sleep early.]
Yi Ke slammed his head hard against the steering wheel.
The man in the car next to him looked panicked. “Are you alright, young man?”
He was not alright.
It was a very big problem.
…
Zhuang Ningyu’s transfer procedures were approved quickly. He would report to the research group after the New Year. On his last day at the Dispute Resolution Department, Qian Yue helped him pack his things into a cardboard box, crying like a fire hydrant. Wu Tao had wanted to comfort Comrade Xiao Qian, but ended up getting quite sentimental herself. Zhuang Ningyu coaxed one, then the other. “How about I just stay here then.”
“No,” Wu Tao refused seriously. “We can’t hold back our leader’s bright future!”
Zhuang Ningyu patted her shoulder, then lifted Qian Yue, who was wailing on his shoulder, and slapped an envelope into his hand. “Four VIP cruise tickets for each of you. Take your families out to play during the New Year. When you get back, work hard. Be good, stop crying.”
The sponsor of the cruise tickets was at that moment leaning against the office door, waiting to help his wife move offices.
And decided to confess for the second time.
