Jiang Yi returned to the small hotel room and when the door closed behind him with a soft click, the sound seemed strangely loud in the narrow quiet of the room, louder even than the slow, controlled beat of his own heart.
Yet Jiang Yi stood in the middle of that small room as if he had stepped into a place where time itself had paused.
His face carried the same calm expression that had fooled countless people into believing nothing in the world could move him unless he allowed it. But, his gaze lowered to his hand, the hand Bai Meilin had held.
Slowly, he lifted it before his eyes, studying the long fingers, the faint veins beneath the skin, the quiet strength in the wrist.
It was a hand that had blood on it from years of serving Bai Cai. Recently, it signed contracts capable of changing the fate of families, companies, and enemies. It had remained steady while men twice his age trembled, and it had never once hesitated when the world demanded something cruel from him.
