Late at night, orange-red lights from outside the window cast a glow over Cheng Yu’s exhausted figure in his thirty-sixth-floor office in the financial district. As a director, he was fretting over the quarterly report and his wife’s seventh prenatal checkup when his assistant, Su Wen, suddenly walked in, breaking the stifling silence. She wore a white silk blouse and a black pencil skirt, and bent over to hand him a coffee, carrying the scent of citrus. Her slightly open neckline revealed lace trim, completely at odds with the stern office atmosphere. Their fingertips accidentally brushed the back of a hand, and both pulled away as if shocked. The coffee cup wobbled, splashing dark brown liquid onto the cuff of Cheng Yu’s Armani shirt, while a hint of ambiguity and surprise quietly stirred between them.
