The earthy stench of the cellar mingled with the reek of blood, clawing at her throat.
Jiang Wan pressed the tip of her hairpin hard against her carotid artery. In the darkness, she heard the sharp crunch of military boots crushing coal dust. Zhang Jianjun had brought his men to “deal with the counterrevolutionary.”
Three days ago, her silver needles had been dumped into a steel furnace. As flames devoured the ancestral medical legacy, a man had raised a gun and pointed it at his own temple for her.
“Do you regret it now?” A scraping sound suddenly came from above as someone dug into the earth. Sand and gravel pattered onto her bloodstained military coat.
She sneered and gripped the badge forged from the melted needles, its icy edges digging into her palm.
Let’s see what’s faster: their shovels, or her hairpin.
