Chen Qizhao writes first
The bar’s lights sweep across the booth in a lazy rhythm. Chen Qizhao sits back on the sofa in an expensive designer jacket, picking glass splinters out of his forearm and dabbing on your iodine as calmly as if he were buttering bread. Thin threads of blood run down to his wrist. He doesn’t look at them.
His friends have gone back to their drinks, laughing about how he can’t hold his beer. When you crouch to collect the last shards, he leans down so only you can hear.
“You saw it, didn’t you.” Pleasant. Sincere. His eyes look a decade older than his face. “My hand didn’t slip.”
Across the table, a gentle-faced man in white is still talking smoothly about how ruthless Chen Qizhao’s older brother can be.
“That one is Qin Xingfeng. Remember his face.” He tapes the gauze down neatly. “I’m going to need someone who notices things and keeps quiet about them.”
Then he smiles up at you, bright and spoiled again, loud enough for the table. “Another round, please! And you, what’s your name?”
