“If he only uses it for business, at most we’re invading on the clients’ privacy, not Xiaokai’s. Although I would like to know about his personal email.” He checked, just in case, to see if any other email accounts were signed in, but the business one was the only thing coming up. It was worth a try, but he hadn’t really expected much—Xiaokai didn’t seem the type to browse his personal email on a work computer, even if he was the head honcho. “Do you know his personal email? I might be able to—” He stopped at Xingyu’s expression.

“That’s a no.”

Xiaokai really was an asshole. “Maybe his phone—”

“Director Liu! I didn’t expect you back tonight.”

Weiran froze. Xingyu froze too. Then Xiaokai’s voice drifted in from the hallway, warm but tinged with exhaustion:

“I’m just dropping by to pick something up.”

Zhang Weiran swore silently. He looked at Xingyu with wide eyes, but Xingyu was still frozen, hunched toward the computer, just staring at the doorway.

“Director—”

“…Yes?”

“You aren’t overworking yourself, are you?”

Another pause, then Xiaokai’s voice, more gentle than Weiran had heard it so far: “Meimei,12 I’m fine. Don’t worry about me. Are you heading home soon?”

“Ah—yes. One more thing, Director.”

Weiran very slowly reached over and turned off the monitor. Please don’t say anything. Please don’t say anything.

“Mr. Liu Xingyu stopped by with a friend. He said that he forgot his phone.”

Damn it!

Xiaokai, strangely: “Did he?”

“I didn’t see them leave, but I stepped away for a moment—they might have left then. I can’t imagine they would still be there. But if they are—I didn’t want you to be caught by surprise.”

Damn it all to hell. Weiran frantically gestured at Xingyu, who just shook his head at him with those wide eyes. Come on, understand!—Get under the desk!

Understanding lit behind Xingyu’s eyes. He nodded hard, crouched, eased himself into the leg space beneath them. And then Weiran followed suit, squeezing in next to him, keeping his breath as steady as possible so Xiaokai wouldn’t hear him out of breath. They were screwed. They were really screwed. They should’ve downloaded the emails right away and gotten the hell out of there, not sifted through them for all those minutes—damn it!