Chapter 10: The First Signs of Understanding

Chapter 10: The Emergence of Tacit Understanding

The invitation and the news of the patrol officer's death arrived simultaneously, as if perfectly timed.

Clearly, something was amiss.

The back of the invitation featured gilded edges, and the main text read: "9:00 PM Sunday, Platinum Club."

The paper was flecked with gold, releasing a faint fragrance when rustled.

Jian Ruochen turned his wrist, tilted the envelope, and a Platinum Club VIP card slipped out.

His expression darkened slightly.

What exactly did the sender mean by "a gift"—the news of the patrol officer’s death, or this VIP card?

Guan Yingjun approached the waiter and asked, "Did you see what the delivery person looked like?"

His gaze was sharp and piercing, almost menacing. The waiter flinched, shrinking his neck as he softly replied, "He was one of our restaurant's delivery staff."

In the 1990s, there were no food delivery apps; takeout was known as phone ordering.

Most mid-to-high-end restaurants offered this service, employing swift and skilled delivery riders to meet customer demands.

Huangji was one such establishment.

"Where is he?" Guan Yingjun flashed his police badge. "West Kowloon CID (Major Crimes Unit) investigating a case. Please cooperate."

The waiter nodded frantically. "I'll go get him right away."

He had encountered police before, but Guan Yingjun's gaze felt almost lethal. His legs turned to jelly; he bumped into the doorframe on his way out, wincing in pain, but dared not stop, stumbling off to find the man.

After the others had left, Jian Ruochen held the invitation up to the light for inspection.

He noticed that beneath each of the four characters forming "一件礼物" (a gift), there was a thin, faint gray horizontal line, and the bold characters themselves stood slightly raised above the paper surface.

The characters on the four square cutouts varied in size but were all perfectly centered. Moreover, each square was identical in dimension, with crisp right angles, as if precisely measured with a ruler.

Yet the character "件" was smaller than the other three.

Yet the character "件" was smaller than the other three.

But this "件" was cleanly and neatly excised.

But this "piece" was cleanly and neatly excised.

He sounded a little uncertain.

After all, his expertise lay in microexpression psychology and interrogation psychology within criminal psychology. In other areas, he lacked the extensive experience of Teacher Li, who had worked for many years.

Li Zhangyu put on his reading glasses, studied it carefully, and then asked encouragingly, "Why do you make that assessment?"

"Most criminals who use newspaper clippings to conceal their handwriting don’t go to the trouble of cutting characters of different sizes into perfectly uniform squares."

Jian Ruochen stated his conclusion directly: "These characters were clearly meticulously cut, stroke by stroke, from a newspaper, pasted onto identically sized squares, and then uniformly affixed to the invitation."

"A normal person wouldn't go through such an elaborate process. Look, this person even drew pencil guidelines underneath to align the characters. This near-obsessive pursuit of neatness makes me suspect they likely suffer from OCD—obsessive-compulsive disorder."

This condition is more commonly known as obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Li Zhangyu looked at Jian Ruochen with approval. "Excellent judgment, broad knowledge, absolutely accurate... Anything else?"

Jian Ruochen felt a sudden jolt, a tingling sensation, as if called upon unexpectedly in class.

Why ask that? Had he missed something?

He thought carefully and replied, "No, nothing else."

Li Zhangyu clapped his hands. "Indeed, nothing else."

Jian Ruochen: ...

Was Teacher Li teasing him?

Jian Ruochen reached up and touched the red mole on his ear, then turned and asked, "Detective Guan, would you like to take a look?"

"Mm." Guan Yingjun stepped closer, bending slightly to examine the invitation, adopting a stance like someone in a horse stance.

As they moved nearer, a peculiar scent drifted into Guan Yingjun’s nose.

It smelled like citrusy pomelo—cool and sweet—interspersed with a cloying, sharp perfume.

He narrowed his eyes, tilting his head slightly, and his nose accidentally brushed against the strands of hair beside Jian Ruochen’s neck, grazing a warm, delicate point.

Guan Yingjun glanced down and saw the striking red mole on the cartilage tip of Jian Ruochen’s ear, now just inches from his face.

He realized they were standing too close, and that familiar discomfort surged again—even stronger than when they had sat together on the sofa.

Guan Yingjun took a step back, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, and spread it open on his palm. "Put the invitation here. Let me take a look."

"Okay." Jian Ruochen placed it on the cloth.

Guan Yingjun used the handkerchief to pinch a corner of the invitation, brought it to his nose—and immediately sneezed, overwhelmed by the fragrance. "Lancôme Trésor perfume."

He sniffed again and sneezed twice more. "Trésor series. This one is called Trésor."

The invitation seemed saturated with perfume, enough to make one lightheaded.

Guan Yingjun recalled the pomelo scent he had noticed earlier.

If the perfume came from the invitation, then the citrusy pomelo fragrance must have come from Jian Ruochen?

"You can identify all that just by smell?" Jian Ruochen was skeptical and leaned in to sniff.

The scent wasn’t strong—it seemed no different from ordinary perfumes. It wasn’t even as potent as the black tea and tobacco lingering on Guan Yingjun.

How could this man be sneezing so much?

He lifted his hand to smell himself—no scent at all.

Did Guan Yingjun have a bloodhound’s nose or something?

Jian Ruochen leaned closer and asked, "Anything else?"

Guan Yingjun glanced sideways, meeting a pair of bright, expectant eyes.

He stiffened momentarily, then pulled several cotton swabs from his pocket and gently dabbed at the printed characters on the invitation.

When wiping the first two characters, only the tip of the cotton swab turned slightly gray. By the time he reached the character "礼" (gift), the swab abruptly turned black.

Wiping the first two characters left only a faint gray tinge on the cotton swab's tip. But as he cleaned the character for "gift," the swab suddenly darkened to pitch black.

Jian Ruochen suddenly realized, "The ink for the word 'gift' is still fresh—it must have been printed from a recent newspaper."

It made his eyes water. "The paper is very thick, with foil stamping and heat embossing techniques. This thing isn’t cheap."

Jian Ruochen nodded and said, "Oh," understanding dawning. "You mean this invitation was bought at a specific high-end gift shop. With so many gift shops in Hong Kong, how do you plan to find it?"

Guan Yingjun held the invitation between his fingers, a peculiar feeling stirring within him.

Jian Ruochen could actually keep up with his train of thought?

No sooner had he spoken, and Jian Ruochen already knew the next line?

The young man had somehow edged closer to him, and that cool, sweet pomelo scent suddenly cut through the cloying perfume, easing the itch in his nose.

Guan Yingjun drew a subtle breath.

Seeing Guan Yingjun not responding, Jian Ruochen grew even more curious. He lifted an elbow and nudged him. "How will you find it?"

In the 1990s, shopping malls had no surveillance. Finding someone based on an invitation was incredibly difficult. Would they have to go shop by shop asking about it?

Guan Yingjun snapped out of his thoughts. "We’ll have informants look. They can handle this kind of small task."

He checked his watch and walked toward the door. Once he was out of range of the pomelo scent, he relaxed his shoulders. "Where did that waiter go to bring someone?"

Li Zhangyu said, "Why are you in such a hurry? You get so worked up whenever a case comes up. You should drink more cooling tea to calm down."

Jian Ruochen felt a headache coming on at the mention of cooling tea.

Before university in his previous life, he had grown up in Guangdong.

The cooks in the military compound’s cafeteria would brew huge vats of cooling tea every summer.

They brewed it in such large quantities that it felt like everyone was turning into cooling tea.

Cooling tea was absolutely the last beverage he ever wanted to see.

Jian Ruochen muttered, "I’d rather drink sugary drinks than cooling tea. When I’m upset, I prefer ice-cold Coke or dessert wine."

Guan Yingjun let out a light, dismissive laugh.

Nineteen years old—still so young.

He didn’t know that for a man to cool down, all it took was lighting a couple of cigarettes or taking some alone time under the covers.

Guan Yingjun pulled out a cigarette and held it in his mouth. He had just lit it and taken a puff when the waiter from earlier arrived, sweating profusely and pulling someone along behind him.

The newcomer wore a royal blue padded windbreaker, his nose and cheeks red from the cold.

He clutched at his pocket, wary. "I was just hired to deliver the letter. The person who asked me to deliver it said the money is mine. Officer, you’re not going to ask for the money back, are you?"

"That depends on how cooperative you are." Guan Yingjun held the cigarette in his mouth and flashed his badge at the man again. "Did he pay you in cash? What did he look like?"

The delivery man, afraid his money would be taken, obediently dug into his pocket and pulled out the cash to show. "It looks like this."

Jian Ruochen was both amused and exasperated. "He’s asking what the person who gave you the money looked like."

"Oh... oh, oh." The man scratched his head sheepishly and hastily stuffed the money back into his pocket. "I didn’t get a clear look at his face, but..."

The man gestured with his hands. "He was about my height, not wearing any brand names. His clothes were a bit worn, seemed moderately wealthy, and relatively young."

He thought carefully again, making sure he hadn’t missed anything, then said, "I don’t know anything else."

Guan Yingjun took out the notebook he carried on him, swiftly writing down the man’s statement. He hurriedly put the notebook away and reached out to the man. "Hand over the cash."

The man immediately covered his pocket. "No way, officer! Haven’t I been cooperative enough? You can’t go back on your word!"

"I’m not taking it from you." Guan Yingjun urged, "Hurry up."

Reluctantly, the man pulled out the money, still muttering under his breath. When he saw Guan Yingjun put the stack of cash into an evidence bag, his face went sheet-white.

Jian Ruochen opened his mouth to speak.

But out of the corner of his eye, he saw Guan Yingjun take out a worn leather wallet, count out the same amount and number of bills, and place them in the man’s hand. "There might be clues on your money. I need to keep it, but I won’t take it for nothing. I’m exchanging it for new money."

The man immediately broke into a wide grin, licked his thumb and counted the cash with a brisk riffle. "Thank you, officer! It’s even new money with consecutive serial numbers. You’re generous, officer!"

He raised his hand to his temple and gave Guan Yingjun a mock salute. "If you need me again, just call!"

Jian Ruochen pensively touched his earlobe, stroking the red mole there.

So Detective Guan wasn’t incapable of handling people; he just didn’t see the need.

When he wanted to win people over, he wasn’t bad at it either.

Guan Yingjun checked his watch again, then picked up the bill placed by the dining table. He pulled out 100 dollars from his wallet and stuffed it into Li Zhangyu’s hand. "Time is tight. I need to return to the West Kowloon headquarters immediately. Uncle Li, you and Jian Ruochen take a taxi back to school."

Jian Ruochen said, "Detective Guan, don’t drive if you’ve been drinking."

Guan Yingjun paused mid-step, his gaze shifting to the empty wine bottle on the table that the three of them had finished.

Jian Ruochen took the 100 dollars Guan Yingjun had placed in Li Zhangyu’s hand, quickly ran out, and called back the delivery man in the windbreaker who hadn’t gone far. "100 dollars to drive for us."

He wrapped an arm around the delivery guy’s back and brought him back to the private room, speaking like old pals. "Never driven an officer before? Detective Guan has a case right now and is in a hurry. Can you drive fast?"

The delivery guy’s eyes lit up.

Was he finally going to experience one of those car chase scenes from TV?

Rubbing his hands together eagerly, he said, "I’m great at it!"

Guan Yingjun took out his car keys and tossed them to the money-loving delivery guy, then turned to Jian Ruochen. "In that case, you come with me to the West Kowloon headquarters."

He asked Li Zhangyu, "Uncle Li, what about you?"