Chen Jun was mostly a careful man, which meant that he didn’t let sensitive information get far from him. He didn’t conduct any of the trafficking business from his work computer, nor did he make any calls regarding trafficking through his work phone. No, he did all that business on a laptop and a cell phone that never left his side, and he never let anyone near it that he didn’t absolutely trust. It was the main reason why he only used Xiaokai as a whore, when normally a man like him would be hiring young men left and right; the List only used sex workers that they could control, but anyone could be bought. Not Xiaokai, who had just as much to lose as Chen Jun, or so Sun Yue claimed.

When he was done, he put everything back where it belonged and took a shower. By the time he was clean—or as clean as he would ever get—Chen Jun was up and rubbing his eyes. Xiaokai smiled at him.

“Did you get some rest?”

“Yes, baby. Thank you.” He beckoned Xiaokai closer and pressed a kiss to his mouth. “You’re the only one who can get me to sleep like this.”

“Rest more.” Xiaokai reached up, smoothed down Chen Jun’s sweaty hair. “The room’s booked all night.”

“Can you stay with me? I’ll sleep better if you’re in my arms.”

Xiaokai would rather do almost anything else. “Not tonight. I have some work to do still.”

“This late?”

“You know how it is.”

“Did I interrupt your work?”

Of course you did, Xiaokai wanted to say. I would always choose work over you, Xiaokai wanted to say. But instead he said, with a soft smile and a hand nestled against Chen Jun’s cheek, “Of course not. We missed our appointment last week and didn’t want to make you miss it again. Don’t worry about me. Get some rest.”

AT THE SAME time Xiaokai was lowering himself to his knees in front of the man named Chen Jun, Zhang Weiran was checking into the hotel whose address had been written on the little piece of paper the woman gave him. He had half a mind to just turn around and leave—after all, this was not the most important part of all of this. What really mattered was everything that had happened in the club—what really mattered was the footage Weiran had gotten of the woman at the bar, of the woman in the private room. The meetings that he requested did not matter on their own.

But, as Xingyu had pointed out, not showing up at the meetings he requested would just gain attention—what kind of fu’erdai would go through the trouble of ordering a sex worker and then not show up to meet that sex worker?

His hands were sweating.