The shouting outside the door was like boiling water, almost scalding through the thin wooden panel.
“I know she’s inside! I can even smell that slutty scent!”
Zhao Guihua’s shrill voice pierced the air, mixed with the neighbors’ gossip.
“Captain Lu usually looks so upright — could he really be hiding a woman?”
“Who knows? You can’t judge a person by appearance. Not opening the door so late at night — definitely something fishy.”
“If it’s true, that’s a serious misconduct issue. He could lose his uniform!”
Every sentence hung over Su Man’s head like a knife.
Inside the room
The atmosphere was suffocating.
Lu Zhan still held the doorknob, his back facing Su Man.
The muscles on his bare back were tense, every line filled with restrained fury.
Su Man knew this man was like a living volcano — ready to erupt at any second, burning both the shrew outside and herself inside to ashes.
She had to save herself.
And quickly.
Enduring the stabbing pain in her ankle, Su Man took a deep breath and forced herself to calm down.
In her previous life, decades of hardship had taught her one crucial lesson:
In desperation, tears are useless.Only利益 —利益? Wait -> Only benefits and leverage can move people.
Especially a decisive, high-ranking man like Lu Zhan.
“Commander.”
Su Man released his leg.
She pushed herself up, tried to stand, but her legs gave way and she fell back down.
So she simply stayed kneeling on the cold cement floor, looking up at his tall back.
Her voice no longer trembled — instead, it carried an unusual calm.
“The woman outside is my stepmother.”
“She wants to sell me to a village idiot next door for three hundred yuan, to marry off her son.”
“I ran away.”
Lu Zhan did not turn around or speak.
But the hand gripping the doorknob loosened slightly.
He was listening.
Su Man knew she had gambled correctly.
She continued, speaking fast but clearly:
“If you open the door now, I’ll be dragged back, beaten to death, or driven insane.”
“And you—”
She paused, eyes on his broad shoulders.
“You’ll be accused of ‘improper conduct’ and ‘harboring a fugitive.’”
“Even if the truth comes out later, can you wash away the stain?”
“Your promotion, your future, your reputation in this compound — all of it will be tarnished by tonight’s farce.”
Lu Zhan finally turned around.
He narrowed his eyes, examining the disheveled woman on the floor.
Was this still the pitiful girl begging for help just moments ago?
In seconds, she seemed like a different person.
Still soaked and trembling like a drenched chick —but her eyes held sharpness and calculation.
She was negotiating.
Threatening him.
“You’re telling me how to do my job?”
Lu Zhan stepped closer. His military boots thudded on the floor beside her.
He crouched down so their eyes were level.
His stern face came close; his hot breath brushed her cold cheek.
Dangerously intimate.
“You think I care about rumors?”
His rough fingers wiped the mud from her cheek — gentle in motion, but warning in force.
“I, Lu Zhan, stand upright and honest. Once this door opens, I have plenty of ways to shut that shrew up.”
“And you—”
He sneered. His hand slid from her cheek to her slender neck.
“Breaking into a military residence — I could shoot you right now.”
Su Man’s heart clenched.
She felt the calluses on his fingers — marks of years holding a gun.
One squeeze could snap her neck.
But she didn’t retreat.
Instead, she leaned slightly closer.
Their distance shrank further.
The faint cool scent of rain and earth from her clothes drifted into his nose, while the soaked fabric clung tightly to her figure.
Lu Zhan’s gaze flickered uncontrollably — then quickly moved away.
His Adam’s apple bobbed.
Damn.
Was this woman some kind of fox spirit?
Su Man caught that fleeting reaction.
She gained confidence.
This man wasn’t truly heartless.
Nor without weakness.
“You can shoot me,” she said softly, gambler’s madness in her tone.
“But I bet you won’t.”
“Because you’re injured.”
Her trembling finger pointed beneath his left rib.
There was a tiny wound — scabbed, but the surrounding skin showed an unnatural bluish-purple.
A sign of poisoning.
In her previous life, Su Man had read about Lu Zhan in a newspaper.
Winter, 1976 — during a border mission, he was bitten by a rare venomous snake.The untreated toxin entered his bones, tormenting him for years and affecting his shooting hand.It eventually forced his transfer out of the military.
And now — the poison had just begun acting.
Lu Zhan’s pupils contracted.
His killing intent exploded like a beast whose tail had been stepped on.
He grabbed her wrist hard enough to nearly crush it.
“Who are you?”
“Who sent you?”
Even the military doctor didn’t know about this wound.
He had only just noticed something wrong himself.
How could a random village girl see through it at a glance?
Unless she was a spy.
Su Man sweated in pain but made no sound.
This was the critical moment.
If she failed to explain, she would die here.
“I’m Su Man — daughter of Su Laosan from Qianshan Village.”
“I know some herbal medicine. My grandfather taught me.”
“There’s a red line around your wound, right? At night your bones itch, and you alternate between chills and heat?”
All lies.
Her grandfather was a carpenter, not a healer.
She only knew these symptoms from the newspaper in her previous life.
But right now, it was her lifeline.
Lu Zhan stared at her, judging truth from lies.
His grip loosened slightly.
She was completely correct.
The wound was strange — painless at first, but recently unbearable, keeping him awake every night.
“You can treat it?”
“I can.”
Su Man lied without blinking.
She barely knew folk remedies — success uncertain.
First survive. Worry later.
“Protect me tonight, and I’ll remove the poison.”
“It’s a deal, Commander.”
Outside, the pounding intensified — someone even began ramming the door.
“Captain Lu! If you don’t open up, we’re coming in!”
The Security Section Chief’s voice.
Things had escalated.
Lu Zhan released her wrist.
He stood, looking down at her, eyes unreadable.
After a few seconds, he walked to the wardrobe and threw out a large military coat.
“Cover yourself.”
“Hide under the bed.”
“If you make a sound, I’ll kill you before that shrew does.”
Su Man felt pardoned from death.
She grabbed the coat, wrapped herself tightly, and painfully crawled beneath the hard wooden bed.
Narrow. Dark. Dusty.
But to her — the safest place in the world.
Curled up, she watched through the sheet’s gap as the black military boots walked to the door.
Click.
The lock turned.
Su Man held her breath.
The real confrontation had begun.