As his most intimate partner, Wei Zhi knew the side of Ji Qikun that belonged to the night better than anyone else.
By day, he was a model colleague, a perfect boss, a loyal friend, a kind neighbor, and a helpful stranger. He woke up at six every morning like clockwork, exercised on an empty stomach, and ate healthily. He was always in his office working before any other employee arrived. In the two years Wei Zhi had worked at the gallery, she had never seen him assign tasks outside of working hours. During holidays, supermarket gift cards were never missing, and even the temporary workers at the gallery received a festive gift. If he encountered someone in need on the street, he would lend a helping hand without hesitation.
He possessed a handsome face that rivaled any celebrity and a tall, commanding stature. He was gentle, witty, and considerate; no one could utter a single word against him.
That was the Ji Qikun of the daylight.
But on the other side of that radiant brilliance lay the murky, chaotic darkness of night.
In that darkness, he was the sole master.
The monitoring software on her phone was merely one of his methods, and certainly not the only one.
The finance office was as mundane as ever. The clatter of keyboards rose and fell. A new batch of works from newly signed artists had arrived at the warehouse today, and the inventory accountant was buried in work. Beside her, Xiao Cai hid behind a partition, adjusting her false eyelashes in a small mirror. The only male in the room sat inside a glass-walled office, leisurely playing on his phone.
Wei Zhi’s gaze swept casually across the three walls before her, noting every suspicious spot.
What concerned her most was the wall behind her.
To monitor her while she worked, no position was more convenient than the one at her back.
A knock at the door pulled her from her thoughts, and everyone in the office looked up in unison.
Xiao Lin from the Administration Department walked in with a beaming smile, carrying a six-inch birthday cake. A blooming yellow carnation was tied to the ribbon on top.
“Xiao Cai, happy birthday! This is a gift from the company.”
Though she said "the company," everyone in the finance department knew the money came from Ji Qikun’s private account as a perk for employees on their birthdays. In her two-plus years at the gallery, Wei Zhi had received such a cake twice.
Manager Li stepped out of his glass cubicle, cheerfully telling everyone to take a break and celebrate Xiao Cai’s birthday together.
“Wait, let me go thank President Ji first—”
Xiao Cai’s face flushed as she hurried out. The cashier accountant shot Wei Zhi a meaningful look, whether intentional or not.
“Eating just cake will be too cloying. I’ll go grab some Starbucks that Xiao Cai likes,” Wei Zhi said, standing up with a smile. “What would you all like to drink?”
“I’ll treat everyone to the coffee. Sorry to make you run the errand, Xiao Wei,” Manager Li chuckled.
“It’s no trouble. It’s my treat to her as well,” Wei Zhi replied.
The Starbucks was about three hundred meters outside the gallery. Although it was close to the office, Wei Zhi had never come here alone.
“Hello.” The barista in the apron smiled at Wei Zhi from behind the counter. Even as she stared silently at the menu on the wall, the barista didn’t rush her.
The heavy aroma of coffee drifted through the air. In a shop where a single cup cost thirty or forty yuan, the seats were always full whenever Wei Zhi passed by. She had never understood what those people—the ones who could sit leisurely in a Starbucks and order an expensive coffee on a whim—had done to make their lives so different from hers.
As she grew up, the things Wei Zhi liked became fewer, while the things she hated grew in number. After resigning from her previous company, she had added one more thing to her list of dislikes: coffee.
At her previous job, which had no cafeteria, bringing her own lunch would either increase Wang Lin’s workload or interfere with the extra part-time jobs Wei Zhi worked every day after hours. If she went home for lunch, the round-trip subway fare would add up.
Money, money, money—
Wei Zhi was a dizzy, spinning top, and money was the whip cracking in the air.
The company had a tiny pantry, but it was ignored by everyone because it only contained cheap biscuits and instant coffee of a brand no one recognized. Every day at noon, when other colleagues went home or out for lunch, Wei Zhi would open the pantry door and brew cup after cup of coffee.
Sweet, cloying, and filled with additives, the coffee liquid clung to her throat like grime, mirroring the poverty that stuck to her like a cancer.
The calories from the instant coffee and the limited daily supply of biscuits were what sustained her as she ran up flights of stairs, drenched in sweat, delivering takeout for customers.
Wang Lin was dead now.
Without the monthly medical expenses of over forty thousand yuan, she could eventually pay off her online loans just by selling the gifts Ji Qikun gave her.
Wei Zhi no longer had to make the sacrifices that had become an unbearable burden on both their lives, but she didn't feel any lighter for it.
She had to find a new goal in life; otherwise, she wouldn't be able to convince herself to keep living in this hellish world.
Ji Qikun was the straw she had grasped, her only hope of changing her life.
No matter what, she had to marry him.
Carrying four coffees and one Frappuccino, Wei Zhi walked back to the finance office. Xiao Cai’s desk was still empty. It wasn't until five minutes after Wei Zhi returned that Xiao Cai walked back in, her face slightly flushed.
“The birthday girl is back!” Manager Li was the first to speak.
“Come on, let’s put in the candles!” the inventory accountant said.
Wei Zhi handed over the bag of candles. Xiao Cai was in a great mood and didn't give Wei Zhi any attitude, taking out two candles and poking them into the cake.
Manager Li took out a lighter and lit the pink and blue candles.
Small flames flickered atop the thin wax.
Wei Zhi smiled. “Let’s pull the curtains; it’ll have more atmosphere. Xiao Cai, your makeup looks so beautiful today, it would be a shame not to take some photos. I saw a set of birthday photos online yesterday—want me to take a few similar ones for you?”
She pulled her phone from her pocket. After swiping to unlock it, she showed the screen, which displayed the set of photos.
Xiao Cai had intended to refuse, but seeing the photos, she was immediately tempted.
“Well... alright then. Take a few and let me see.”
Wei Zhi asked Manager Li and the accountant to close the door and pull the curtains. The finance office quickly became dim and dark, with only the two candles on the cake emitting a faint glow.
“Come on, strike a pose—” Wei Zhi raised her phone, the camera aimed at Xiao Cai.
*Click, click, click.* Wei Zhi pressed the shutter repeatedly.
“Let me see.”
Xiao Cai took the phone from Wei Zhi. As she scrolled through the photos, her expression shifted from skepticism to surprise.
“Your photography skills are actually pretty good!”
“Yeah, let me take a few more for you,” Wei Zhi said with a smile.
Xiao Cai forgot their past grievances and threw herself into the photoshoot.
Wei Zhi kept shooting from different angles, even inviting the accountant and Manager Li to join in for a few group photos.
“What about you?” Manager Li asked.
“I don't like having my picture taken. You guys go ahead,” Wei Zhi said.
Just like the coffee earlier, it was a question asked only for the sake of asking. Afterward, no one invited Wei Zhi to join again.
After taking a few more shots, she switched the camera to video mode while no one was looking and quickly recorded a sweep of the office.
“All done,” she said with a smile. “I’ll send the photos to you privately in a bit.”
“Send me the originals; I’ll edit them myself,” Xiao Cai emphasized.
Surrounded by the others, Xiao Cai finally blew out her candles.
Manager Li pulled the curtains open again, and light dispelled the darkness in the office.
The group shared the birthday cake, and Xiao Cai carefully placed the yellow carnation into a Starbucks cup.
Wei Zhi made an excuse to go to the restroom. Once inside a stall, she pulled out her phone to check the photos and video she had just taken.
She swiped through the photos one by one, occasionally stopping to zoom in on a specific spot.
In the thirty-six-second video, her finance colleagues were gathered harmoniously. At the moment the accountant’s hand touched Xiao Cai’s shoulder, Wei Zhi pressed pause.
She kept zooming in on the image until only a single, faint red dot remained on the screen.
That pinprick-sized red light came from the potted plant behind her workstation. It was pointed directly at her back and her computer screen.
If that really was the infrared fill light of a surveillance camera, when had it been installed?
Was it before she had falsified the accounts, or after?
This had moved beyond the question of who installed it; it had become a thorn in her side that she needed to resolve immediately.
Back at the office, Wei Zhi picked up her phone and sent a message to Ji Qikun.
*What do you want for dinner? I’ll go buy the ingredients early.*
A few minutes later, Ji Qikun’s reply arrived: *I have a dinner appointment with a newly signed artist tonight. Do you want to come along?*
Ji Qikun’s suggestions were usually a polite form of rejection. If he truly wanted her to do something, he would never use a question. This was a lesson Wei Zhi had learned after a year of dating him.
*I don’t want to go,* she typed. *I’ll wait for you at home, okay?*
After a moment, Ji Qikun replied: *Okay.*
After work, Wei Zhi had already looked up the address of the shop she needed to visit. She took a taxi to the farmers' market near Ji Qikun’s home. At the spice shop she frequently visited, she pretended to accidentally leave her phone behind.
Then she hailed another taxi, urging the driver to get to the nearest surveillance equipment store as fast as possible.
A blue sign read "Eagle Eye Security." Wei Zhi walked into the empty shop without hesitation.
She looked around. The counters on all four sides were filled with boxes she didn't recognize.
“Is the owner here?” she called out.
A young man with messy, curly hair sat up from behind the counter, where a folding bed was tucked away. He was playing a game on his phone and asked without looking up, “What do you want?”
“I’d like you to help me check something. Is this an infrared fill light for a camera?” Wei Zhi asked.
“What is it?”
Wei Zhi took out a pre-prepared USB drive, opened the video, paused at that specific second, and asked the curly-haired owner to look at the magnified red dot.
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m in the business, wouldn't I know? It’s obvious at a glance!” the owner said confidently. Then, remembering something, he glanced at Wei Zhi. “You being secretly filmed? Want to buy a detector? Pinhole cameras are advanced these days; some don't even need infrared lights, but a detector will find them one hundred percent! As the saying goes, when you find one cockroach, there are already hundreds in the house! How can you feel safe without a detector?”
“Are detectors expensive?”
The owner, sensing a sale, immediately turned off his phone and excitedly pulled a palm-sized sample from the glass counter.
“This is an RF detector, not expensive at all! This model is four hundred and twenty. Since you’re a young lady, I’ll round it down for you—how about four hundred?”
“I need something else too,” Wei Zhi said.
“What else? Changing your door locks? We’re pros at that too!”
“I want a pinhole camera.”
***
