Chapter Nine
"Wow! Sister Jiji is such a great cook!"
"Jiji's latte art is getting more and more amazing! Do you have any recommendations for coffee beans lately? I'd like to try making latte art at home!"
"Brother-in-law is so lucky! He gets to eat Sister Jiji's cooking every day (drooling). I really want to come over for a meal!"
...
Teng Zhi was anxious and kept going through the comments under each of her past Weibo posts.
She would screenshot every single word a fan with the Weibo ID "放过最美烟花" said, without any regard for the facts.
This person is the girl who just got into Li Tiancheng's car.
Her real name is Liu Ni. Teng Zhi forgot whether she was born in 1995 or 1996, but in any case, she is a recent graduate this year. The girl came to Li Tiancheng's company for an internship in the second semester of her senior year and was directly hired as a full-time employee after graduation.
With a sore throat, Tengzhi could only force herself to produce saliva and swallow it to relieve the discomfort in her throat.
However, the effect was minimal.
The sky was dark, but the streetlights on both sides of the road had not yet been turned on.
The white light from the phone screen reflected on Tengzhi's glasses, flashing across them rapidly like shattered seashells, their sharp edges scraping against Ye Yin's eyes.
The knot between his brows hadn't been untied since they were in the parking lot.
"I was so stupid... Because we were 'friends' I knew in private, I always liked her comments."
Teng Zhi gave a wry smile. "Friend, yes, I still consider her a friend."
She remembered something, opened Liu Ni's WeChat, and swiped.
The other party would occasionally ask her some small questions about cooking or baking. Last month, Liu Ni said she wanted to cook a meal for her boyfriend, but she was not sure about the order of steps for a few dishes, so she asked Teng Zhi for help.
At that time, Tengzhi already knew about her husband's affair, but unfortunately, she focused all her attention on Yang Jiawen, her "clear target," and thus ignored other inconsistencies.
Looking back at the dishes Liu Ni suggested, it turns out they were all dishes that Li Tiancheng liked to eat, which she had mentioned briefly on Weibo and WeChat Moments.
At that time, she also carefully instructed Liu Ni on what to do.
Tengzhi pushed her glasses up, which kept slipping down her nose, and looked up at the familiar street name on the road sign ahead.
She asked Ye Yin, "Do you know where this direction leads?"
Ye Yin paused for two seconds, then replied, "I know, I'll go to your place."
Two soft laughs came from the side, almost the same as the sound of a fallen, decaying petal.
After a long day in the car, Tengzhi was exhausted. Leaning against the car door, she said in a hoarse voice, "No, that place will soon no longer be my home."
The children's smartwatch drained its battery quickly in the afternoon while in "listening" mode. When the battery was down to 10%, the software reminded the user that "LTC has arrived home".
Ye Yin scoffed. This slut really knows how to use her time.
Regardless of his purpose in bringing someone home, bringing other women home is already a complete lapse in judgment, and Li Tiancheng couldn't clear his name even if he jumped into the Pearl River.
Who knows, besides this woman, there might be a fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth mistress...
It was too quiet in the passenger seat. At this moment, Tengzhi turned back into a soft, fluffy bun, and the filling inside seemed to have gone cold.
She didn't suggest what to do next, leaving Ye Yin at a loss.
This was a family matter between Teng Zhi and Li Tiancheng, and he became an "outsider" with no connection to it.
He sighed, circled the neighborhood for a while, and then found a spot to stop.
"What do you plan to do?" Ye Yin first stated his attitude directly, "If you want to go upstairs, I'll go with you."
At this point, he couldn't let Tengzhi go home alone to face the mess. She was outnumbered, and a desperate man was capable of anything.
Teng Zhi remained leaning against the car door, her head against the window, tapping the edge of her phone with her fingers, without saying a word.
But she didn't keep Ye Yin waiting for long. She sat up straight, raised her hand, pointed to a tall building diagonally in front of her, and said, "Could you please drive there?"
Ye Yin looked in the direction of the index finger. The building was very tall, and a huge gold sign hung on the exterior wall at the waist: "Zhenming Apartment".
Teng Zhi's voice remained calm: "I rented a short-term room there."
*
The short-term rental was actually an apartment-style homestay. When they took the elevator to the 18th floor, Ye Yin asked Teng Zhi how much she had paid and for how long.
During the summer peak season, the price of the guesthouse was a bit high, at 450 yuan per night, but because Tengzhi rented it for half a month, the landlord charged her 400 yuan per night.
There are "Guest Notice" and "Guestbook" left by the thoughtful landlord on the shoe cabinet in the entryway.
After changing into navy blue men's slippers, Ye Yin casually flipped through a few pages of the guestbook. Many guests had left comments about their stay; some expressed gratitude, some offered suggestions, and some even took the opportunity to express their love to their travel companions, saying they hoped to return to Guangzhou with their loved ones in the future.
Teng Zhi wore beige slippers. She pulled her carry-on suitcase into the room, and when she came out, she found Ye Yin still standing by the door. She greeted him like a hostess, "Come in and have a seat."
Ye Yin scratched his itchy nose, responded with an "Oh," and stepped into the unfamiliar little space.
The apartment is small, with one bedroom and one living room.
There is a small white square table against the wall near the entrance, facing the kitchen where you can eat. Next to the kitchen is the bathroom, and a couple of steps away is the bedroom.
At the other end of the living room are a fabric sofa and a low table, as well as a mini balcony. The floor-to-ceiling windows are opened by Tengzhi to let in fresh air, and the wind from the high-rise building stirs the white gauze curtains.
A traveler's palm plant sits in the corner, its lush green leaves adding a touch of life to the small space. As Ye Yin sits down on the sofa, he secretly touches it—oh, it's an artificial plant.
The air conditioner was just turned on, but the room was still stuffy.
Ye Yin felt inexplicably hot, especially a few inches below his chest, as if on fire.
Although they had spent the whole day in that car, which was much more cramped than the apartment, Ye Yin felt that the atmosphere was much more intimate and sticky than it was in the car.
Sweat trickled down the back of his neck, so he grabbed a tissue from the coffee table and wiped it off.
Tengzhi went back into her room, and soon came out with a tripod and a DSLR camera. The lens attached to the DSLR was very long, like a cannon.
This setup is far too professional; even celebrity chasers or paparazzi wouldn't use such a long lens. It looks more like something used for bird hunting in the wild.
Ye Yin got up and followed her to the balcony, standing behind her with his hands on his hips.
Watching her set up the tripod with such skill, he chuckled helplessly, "How far in advance did you prepare for this?"
"I rented the house a few days ago, and yesterday I went to rent a telephoto lens because the distance is a bit far. I tried using my phone, but the picture was not clear."
At this point, Tengzhi no longer hid it from him.
This was originally her "little secret".
Ye Yin asked in a low voice, "Is it because Li Tiancheng is unwilling to install electronic peepholes?"
There were pre-made markings on the balcony railing. Tengzhi followed those markings and mounted the camera on the tripod. Without turning around, she said, "Well, but even earlier, I discovered that my things had been moved."
Ye Yin's eyebrow twitched: "What is that?"
He had heard stories, such as husbands who cheated on their wives by bringing their mistresses home while the wives were away on business trips. The mistresses were so audacious that they used the wives' skincare products, carried their wives' bags, and wore their wives' clothes...
They openly declare their "status" and are unwilling to abide by any "etiquette for having an affair."
Teng Zhi: "It was also last weekend, I went to Fengcheng, and didn't get home until quite late..."
Ye Yin replied, "Oh, I remember, a friend of yours opened a coffee shop."
She paused, then finally turned and glanced at him: "How did you know?"
When she first added Ye Yin on WeChat, she didn't know if he was a friend or foe, so she didn't grant him access to her Moments, and she still hasn't.
Ye Yin suddenly stammered, "You...you posted it on Weibo."
"...Oh, you follow me on Weibo?"
Ye Yin looked away: "Hey, keep going. I got home pretty late last weekend, and then what?"
Teng Zhi glanced at him, but didn't use much force.
With the camera in place, she bent down and looked through the viewfinder to find her bearings: "When I got home that night, I found that the frying pan and the Yukihira pan had been switched."
"What? What pot?" Ye Yin didn't understand and was completely confused.
“It’s just two pots.” Teng Zhi slowly panned the camera and explained to him simply, “Since you follow my Weibo, you should know that I have a lot of cookware, which I store according to my own usage habits. That day I was out all day, and when I came back I found that the positions of two of the pots had changed... The bowls and chopsticks were also a little different, but the cookware was the most obvious difference, I could tell at a glance.”
She licked her lips and continued, "Li Tiancheng doesn't cook. That night he said he was going out for a business dinner and wouldn't eat at home. Before this evening, I thought it was Miss Yang who went into my kitchen, but I was wrong."
Ye Yin understood. He chuckled softly, "She's the kind of person who can mix up sugar and salt, unlike you who's so capable."
The straightforward praise made Tengzhi's earlobes burn slightly, just as she found her "target" in the viewfinder.
She kept the camera still, slowly straightened her back, and lightly pressed a button, which lit up the viewfinder screen.
People and things that are invisible to the naked eye can be made visible through certain means.
The long-range telephoto lens was aimed at one of the apartments in a high-rise residential building several lanes away.
The apartment building was about the same height as the building opposite, or rather, their apartment was slightly taller. Through the camera screen, you could see two square, transparent windows framing a bright yellow area. There were no security bars or blackout curtains, and a woman was busy doing something by the window.
In today's world, everyone's secrets are nothing more than paper lanterns, easily exposed with a single poke.
The only difference is whether your lantern breaks first or mine breaks first, that's all.
Teng Zhi quickly set up the wireless remote control, and she became inexplicably excited again, like a well-behaved student eager to prove her ability to her teacher. She demonstrated it in front of Ye Yin, took several photos in a row, and said in a smug tone: "I was able to think of this method, isn't it brilliant?"
The expensively rented telephoto lens was indeed quite good; even in the dark, it captured six or seven parts of Liu Ni's face.
Ye Yin felt a tickle in his throat, as if ants were crawling over it, and his voice grew darker with the night: "How did you know... that this apartment has a view of your kitchen?"
“I spend all my time in the kitchen. Standing by the sink, all I can see is this apartment building.”
Teng Zhi casually remarked, "Sometimes while waiting for the soup to boil, for the ribs to cook, or for the bread to bake... I would move a chair and sit there to clear my mind. Then I discovered that many of the apartments here are actually guesthouses, and the guests who go out onto the balcony often change every few days."
“I didn’t have a source to buy pinhole cameras, and I almost fell for a scam because of them. You know what? I even considered using a drone, and I went to DJI to test fly it, but it was too loud. I bought a few home security cameras, but they were too difficult to disguise perfectly and were too easy to be discovered, so I gave up on that too. In the end, I came up with this solution…”
The excitement that was just moments ago was suddenly doused with ice water, and with a "splat," it all came to a standstill.
Teng Zhi's voice gradually lowered: "I know, it's actually not sharp at all, it's stupid to death."
It's only because they're incredibly stupid that Li Tiancheng kept them in the dark for so long.
It takes absolute stupidity to fail to notice Liu Ni's sarcastic remarks.
It's incredibly stupid that the initial target was actually Yang Jiawen—Teng Zhi's original plan was for her to throw the photos at Ye Yin and say to him, "Mr. Ye, this is solid evidence."
Suddenly, a large hand reached out from beside her.
The body instinctively tried to dodge, but it was too late; the vines couldn't escape.
The hand gently landed, like soothing a baby, and slowly swept across the top of her head twice.
The man's voice, warm and moist like a summer evening breeze, carrying an ambiguous emotion, crept into her ears.
"No, Jiji is super sharp."
————Author's ramblings————
These chapters are all over 3500 words long! Have I written too much? (thinking)
Tomorrow's post is up to fate. I can only write during my spare time these days. I'll post it as soon as I'm done, no need to rush me.
Friendly reminder: This story took place in 2018.
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