Don’t Cry, Tai Lake

material, as she explained it all in detail.
    She then sat up, drawing one foot under her in a casual pose. But then she immediately thought of something else and leaned over the table again. As she bent over the folder, her robe parted slightly. He thought he caught a flash of her breasts. If she was aware of his glance, she said nothing.
    A spell of silence fell over the room when she finished going over all the material in the folder.
    “I really appreciate your coming over tonight,” she finally said, her eyes lambent in the flickering fluorescent light.
    He glanced at his watch. It was past nine. She didn’t say anything about it’s being late, so he could choose to stay, perhaps, for a bit longer.
    It wasn’t comfortable to sit in the same unchanging position for long, particularly in the cramped space between the desk and the bed. He was reminded of a so-called lovers’ room in a restaurant on the Bund in Shanghai. The tiny size lent itself to intimacy. He had been there with another woman—though not his lover—who was murdered shortly afterward. He shivered at the sudden, inexplicable premonition. He shifted on the chair, which warbled with a screeching sound.
    She sat further back, her back touching the bare wall, her arms no longer clasping her knees, and her legs parted. She patted the bed, an invitation for him to sit alongside.
    As his glance fell to the bed, he noticed a sauce stain from the noodles she had made earlier in the evening on the fleshy spot below her big toe. In the soft light, her toe looked rounded and snowy like a creamy scallop in a chef’s special. The absurd association only made her look appealingly vulnerable. As a Jin dynasty poet said, she’s so beautiful that she could be devoured. He thought he could read a message rippling in her eyes, reflecting back what he fantasized.
    Instead he rose to leave.
    They looked into each other’s eyes.
    “It’s late, Shanshan. I think I have to leave. The center locks the entrance around twelve.”
    It would be out of the question at this stage, Chief Inspector Chen knew, for him to do anything unacceptable for a cop, particularly for an incognito cop on vacation.
    If he was going to help, he had to stick to his role as a policeman. There could be no conflict of interest, even if he kept his identity a secret from her.

ELEVEN
    FRIDAY MORNING, SERGEANT HUANG parked his car in the shade near the center’s entrance, rolled down the window, and waited. According to the plan Chen had discussed with him, the first interviewee of the day would be Mi, Liu’s secretary at the chemical company.
    It wasn’t exactly a surprising move to Huang, who’d already talked to Mi before Chen involved himself in the case. Huang lit a cigarette, trying to guess which approach the chief inspector would use.
    At the appointed time, Chen showed up at the gate, where an elderly security guard hastened to salute him obsequiously. Huang stepped out of his Shanghai Dazhong, which, as Chen specified, didn’t look anything like a police car.
    “Thank you, Huang,” Chen said, sliding in to the front passenger seat. “Before we go to see Mi, I want to take a look at Liu’s home office.”
    Huang jumped at the suggestion. His team had hardly finished working at the crime scene, with several reports still waiting to be processed by the lab, when Internal Security intervened and pushed them straight to a conclusion that left little for them to do. Being the youngest member of the team, Huang knew better than to protest when the other team members, older and far more experienced, chose to keep their mouths shut.
    But it wouldn’t be difficult for him to show Chen Liu’s apartment, which wasn’t being watched at the moment. They had talked about the photos of the crime scene, but Chen’s going over the scene in person could make a difference. In Sherlock Holmes stories, the detective never failed to find something important yet previously unnoticed by others who examined the crime scene.
    “No problem,” Huang said. “We’ve gone over it closely, but you should definitely take a look.”
    Less than ten minutes later, they arrived at the apartment complex, which was located near the back of the chemical company plant. Sure enough, there wasn’t any sign of police stationed near the complex, and no residents were out walking in the area.
    “It’s a relatively new complex and it’s not fully occupied yet,” Huang remarked. He showed his badge to the