After receiving the phone call, Wen Zhiyu hurried to the police station. According to the officer who had contacted him, they had found relevant information about the suspect and needed him to come in for identification.
Helping the police with their work was, of course, his duty.
As he walked into the station, a young officer with a clean-cut face approached him, looking somewhat shy. “Um… has your condition gotten any better?”
Wen Zhiyu had some recollection of him, when the statement was being taken at the hospital, this young officer had been standing nearby. “I found a very professional doctor to treat me. Much better now,” he replied.
“Is that Dr. Li from the War Chain Department Affiliated Hospital?” the young officer pressed.
“That’s him. How did you know?” Wen Zhiyu was a bit surprised.
The young officer smiled. “We live in the same neighborhood. You probably don’t remember clearly, but once when you had an episode, I saw him take you away.”
As the two were talking, an older officer walked over and asked with equal concern, “How’s your condition?”
“Much better.” Wen Zhiyu remained composed as always. In front of Li Qingchi, he’d throw around phrases like “I’m about to die” and “I won’t survive,” but in front of others, he was as steady as a mountain.
“Glad to hear it. Come on, let’s take another statement, give us the details of when the suspect drugged you.” the older officer said, gesturing for him to follow.
The older officer led Wen Zhiyu into an office, pulled out a chair across from the desk, and motioned for him to sit. Then the questioning began, all routine questions, with the young officer recording everything on a computer at another desk.
Police: “What time did you get into the suspect’s car that day?”
Wen Zhiyu thought for a moment. “A little past one in the morning. I don’t remember exactly.”
Older officer: “Do you remember what he looked like?”
Wen Zhiyu shook his head. “He was wearing a mask. But I remember his eyes, somewhat narrow, not big. As for what happened after that, I don’t know.” He paused, then added, “However, I think the suspect must have had an accomplice.”
“Oh? What makes you say that?” the officer pressed.
“Because the person who drugged me and the person who later… got handsy with me were clearly not the same. Their scent, their voice, their tone, all completely different.”
The officer nodded, indicating he’d noted that down. After finishing the routine questions, he moved his mouse and said, “We checked the surveillance footage, and we did find something off, but it doesn’t look like there was an accomplice.” With that, he turned the computer screen toward Wen Zhiyu.
The screen played a surveillance recording: Wen Zhiyu walked out of the company building, got into the suspect’s car, and the car drove around before pulling into an underground parking garage.
The officer switched the feed. The new camera angle faced the front of the car, clearly capturing everything that happened inside: the suspect leaned toward Wen Zhiyu, sniffing at him like a wild animal, then raised a hand to rub his cheek, as if toying with a cherished plaything.
Just as the suspect’s hands began to wander, Wen Zhiyu’s eyes snapped open. He kicked hard at the man’s inner thigh, then quickly opened the door and scrambled out, stumbling toward the garage exit while shouting for help.
He ran a few steps, then looked back anxiously. In that moment of turning, he collided with someone. An alpha.
This person… looked somewhat familiar.
Wen Zhiyu squinted, leaning closer to the screen to examine it more carefully. In the footage, the alpha he’d bumped into immediately reached out to pull him away, but Wen Zhiyu at that moment was in the throes of the drug’s effects, his whole body limp, clinging to the other man like a stubborn patch of adhesive.
The alpha tried again, straining to peel him off, you could feel the effort through the screen, but failed.
Then Wen Zhiyu tilted his head up. Under the drug’s influence, tears spilled involuntarily from his eyes, sliding down his cheeks, making him look utterly pitiful. He said something to the alpha, and from the lip movements, it was clearly readable: “Help me, please.”
The older officer paused the frame and pointed at the frozen image with calm analysis: “See here, you’re the one who ran into this person and begged him for help. From the earlier footage, it’s also clear that he and the suspect didn’t know each other.”
He clicked the mouse, and the video resumed. The alpha gripped Wen Zhiyu’s chin, forcing his head up, seemingly checking his condition.
The alpha stared at him for a few seconds, then scooped him up with one arm like a chick, carrying him straight to his own car. In the shadows not far away, the suspect watched helplessly as his prey was snatched away, his face twisted with fury as he slammed his fist hard against the wall.
The officer paused the video again. “This is even clearer, this man is not the suspect’s accomplice.”
The footage continued. The alpha’s car was angled away from the camera, so nothing inside was visible, no one knew what he did to Wen Zhiyu.
The officer dragged the progress bar, and the footage jumped to fifteen minutes later: Wen Zhiyu stumbled out of the car. A few minutes after that, the alpha finally pushed open his door and stepped out, standing in place as he quietly watched Wen Zhiyu’s staggering retreat.
His head appeared to be injured, bright red blood trickled down his face, a shocking sight.
“We analyzed it repeatedly and concluded that after inhaling the drug and being injected with the banned substance, you were disoriented and suffered memory gaps. When you regained a bit of consciousness in the car, you mistook this person for the suspect, got into a conflict with him in the vehicle, injured him, and then fled.” the police officer explained.
Wen Zhiyu, who had gotten everything wrong: “…” Sorry to this scapegoat.
But it didn’t seem like he was entirely a scapegoat… The person who kissed him in his memory should be him, right?
Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation? First aid? That was understandable.
The police officer said earnestly to Wen Zhiyu, “We haven’t caught the real suspect yet, but we have leads. However, your top priority right now is to properly communicate with this alpha who saved you, thank him, and make peace. Otherwise, who in society would dare to act heroically in the future? By the way, I called him earlier, he should be arriving soon…” The old officer glanced toward the door as he spoke.
The moment he finished, Wen Zhiyu locked eyes with this “scapegoat.”
Wen Zhiyu’s expression froze instantly, and his voice changed pitch: “Li… you? How is it you?”
The newcomer was Li Qingchi. Dr. Li, whom he had coerced into treating him.
From Li Qingchi’s expression, it seemed he already knew that Wen Zhiyu was the one who had hit him. Wen Zhiyu suddenly understood, so that’s why when he first came for the consultation at the hospital, the other man had just finished getting bandaged.
Wen Zhiyu also recalled how he had kept pressing Li Qingchi about the injury on his head.
He tried to see it from Li Qingchi’s perspective, the person who injured my head kept asking knowingly about who caused the wound on my head.
He thought his first reaction would be: this person is constantly provoking me.
Thinking about it that way, Li Qingchi was very tolerant.
Li Qingchi gave him a faint glance: “Surprised?”
After work, when he found a Beta who had been injected with an unknown substance in the underground parking garage, he had also been surprised. He hadn’t wanted to get involved, but this Beta clung to him desperately, pleading with tearful eyes, “Please, save me.”
As a doctor, it was hard for him to stand by and do nothing, so he carried the person into his car.
After getting in, Li Qingchi raised his hand, hooking his index finger around the mask strap, intending to take it off, but after glancing at the unconscious person in the passenger seat, he gave up.
The “prey” that had escaped its clutches now breathed long and steady, eyelashes trembling slightly, cheeks flushed with an unnatural redness, like a kitten exposing its belly without any guard, clearly the drug was taking effect.
The “prey” had fallen into a coma due to central nervous system depression from inhaling a high concentration of the drug, compounded by that unknown injection at the back of the neck. Without timely treatment, his life would be in danger.
Li Qingchi lowered the car window and used the back of his hand to check the “prey’s” forehead and cheeks, body temperature was normal, no fever. He then took out a penlight, pried open the other’s eyelid, and shone the light to examine him. For now, his nervous system seemed to be in no immediate danger.
For someone unconscious from drug poisoning, mouth-to-mouth resuscitation was more effective than chest compressions.
Just then, from beside a pillar not far away came the coquettish murmurs of a young couple flirting, the Omega burying his head in the alpha’s chest.
Li Qingchi glanced over, his gaze briefly meeting that alpha’s, who quickly turned his attention back to the omega in his arms. The two made out in the garage as if no one else were there, the smacking sounds of their kisses clearly audible through the car window.
Li Qingchi lowered his eyes to look at the person in the passenger seat and unbuckled his seatbelt. He leaned sideways, pinching the “prey’s” nose with one hand while cupping his cheek with the other, then completely sealed his lips over the other’s mouth and steadily blew air in. Once, twice… He continued mouth-to-mouth resuscitation for several minutes until the “prey” showed signs of waking.
After finishing all this, Li Qingchi sat back in the driver’s seat, pulled out a wet wipe, and vigorously wiped his lips again and again.
But he wasn’t the only one fixated on that “kiss.”
Wen Zhiyu’s tongue seemed to tie itself in knots: “You… that… was that your first kiss?”
Li Qingchi raised an eyebrow, laughing in anger: “I did a good deed, got wrongly blamed for it, and my first kiss was taken from me too. In the end, I’m the one who got hurt the most.” His tone was cold as ice.
From the beginning to the end of this incident, he was indeed the one injured: treated like a pervert, hit on the head, giving up his first kiss to save someone, and finally being coerced into treating a beta he disliked.
Li Qingchi even suspected that he and Wen Zhiyu were bound by some invisible thread, no matter how they struggled, they were just trapped beasts in a cage.
From the young officer watching the scene on the side: Li Qingchi kindly saved Wen Zhiyu, only to be injured by him in return. Instead of holding a grudge, he repaid resentment with kindness by treating him, truly a dedicated doctor who cares for his patients!
Wen Zhiyu coughed lightly, choked by his words, and let his gaze fall on the wound on the other’s head: “Sorry… um, how’s your head? Is it serious? Did you use the medicine I sent you before?”
The injury had been caused by Wen Zhiyu hitting him with a glass ornament from the car.
Li Qingchi replied indifferently, “It’s fine.”
The old policeman beside them saw the atmosphere turning tense again and quickly grabbed both their hands, pulling them together in an eager attempt to broker a handshake and make peace: “Come, come, shake hands, and let’s call this matter closed…”
The moment Wen Zhiyu’s fingers touched the back of the other man’s hand, the latter withdrew it swiftly, his well-defined fingers tracing an arc through the air before slipping into his pocket.
The old policeman didn’t mind; he simply took the brief contact as a sign that they had cleared the air: “Alright, that’s settled then, you two have shaken hands and made up. Once you step out of the police station, don’t go arguing over this again. Acting bravely in the line of duty is a good thing, what’s there to fight about? It was all just a misunderstanding.”
And so, the two were forced to put on a reluctant performance of reconciliation. Satisfied, the policeman let them leave.
As they walked out of the station together, Wen Zhiyu glanced at Li Qingchi’s perpetually icy expression and couldn’t help but speak up: “Dr. Li, still angry? I’ll apologize, this one’s on me.”
Li Qingchi showed no reaction.
“Then how about I sweet-talk you a little?” Wen Zhiyu drawled, stretching out his tone. “Dr. Li is the best, forgive me?”
There he goes again with that smooth talk.
“I don’t want to forgive you.” Li Qingchi stopped in his tracks, his gaze landing on Wen Zhiyu’s face. “In there, you played the harmless innocent, but the moment you stepped out, you switched faces. I didn’t realize you had two personalities, need me to refer you to the psychiatry department?”
Two faces? So that’s the image he had in Li Qingchi’s eyes. Wen Zhiyu thought to himself.
Far from being annoyed, he actually smiled: “Rare to hear Dr. Li say so much in one go. Talking to me helps develop your language system?”
Li Qingchi stared at him for a moment, seemingly deciding that arguing was pointless, and turned to leave, he had a meeting that evening and didn’t want to waste time.
Wen Zhiyu immediately quickened his pace to catch up: “Li Qingchi, don’t act like you’ve been taken advantage of here. You also took my first kiss, you know? That’s not a bad deal for you, is it? And besides,” he deliberately dragged out his words, “your kissing technique is really terrible.”
Li Qingchi frowned in correction: “It wasn’t kissing, it was rescue breathing. I’m professionally trained, and the procedure was by the book.”
“Oh? And what’s your standard for ‘professional’?” Wen Zhiyu challenged. “Don’t tell me you have hands-on experience with anyone besides me?”
“My technique is standard, and the procedure is clear.” Li Qingchi answered stiffly.
Wen Zhiyu: “Oh~ really?” He lifted his upper lip slightly with his finger, revealing a tiny wound with a clear tooth mark still visible on it. “But when you kissed, I mean, gave me rescue breathing, your teeth caught my lip. See, your canine’s handiwork.”
“You bit my lip too.” Li Qingchi pointed out calmly.
Wen Zhiyu looked closely and, sure enough, there was a distinct wound on Li Qingchi’s lower lip.
“Then I guess we’re about even.” Wen Zhiyu concluded, then swiftly changed tack. “But you did save me, so I owe you a thank-you. How about this, tonight, dinner’s on me. It’s settled. The Violet Restaurant on Linhe East Road. Don’t stand me up.” With that, he curved his lips into a smile.