6. Chapter 6

Shen Wei is not there to escort him the next morning. Cussing loudly and manfully ignoring his hangover, Zhao Yunlan drives to the Department of Supervision, uncertain of whether he wants to see Shen Wei there or not.

When he enters his father’s office, he realizes that “not” would have been best. Shen Wei is polite and cold and distant in the most precise way to cause maximum heartbreak to Zhao Yunlan. Shen Wei has a very pointed conversation with a very confused and suspicious Zhao Xinci about how vital it is that they do not create any situations that might offend the Black Cloak Envoy, all the while refusing to look at Zhao Yunlan.

Who has now lost count of how many ways the Black Cloak Envoy has ruined his life, when they aren’t even married yet.

He ignores his father’s bitching at him and walks back out. He stays home for the next two days, ignoring the outside world.

Unfortunately, ignoring the outside world means he’s stuck alone, with himself — even Daqing won’t put up with him in this vile a mood — and he has too much time to think about everything that happened, what he said, and what Shen Wei must be thinking.

He decides that being good husband material means owning up to his mistakes, so on the morning of the third day, he finally takes a shower and puts on clean(ish) clothes in an attempt not to look as shitty as he feels.

When he finally troops over to Shen Wei’s office at the university, Shen Wei looks up from whatever ancient tome he’s studying and stares at Zhao Yunlan with devastation in his eyes, like he’s already braced himself for the worst.

It’s too much, and too little, and far too late, but it’s somehow enough. He sits down next to him, earning a set of raised eyebrows in response.

“I’m sorry for pushing you,” Zhao Yunlan says quietly.

“You didn’t! That is—” Shen Wei starts, surprised.

“I did. And I meant what I said about how I feel, okay? But I backed you into a corner and that was not fair.”

Shen Wei stays still and quiet. Zhao Yunlan rubs the back of his neck. “Also, I’m a greedy bastard sometimes but you’re right that I won’t stand by and let the treaty get broken over this. It’s too important. Maybe I’m not meant to be the next Lord Guardian of Haixing—”

“You are ! No one else could be. No one!” Shen Wei words are hurried and earnest. He grabs Zhao Yunlan’s arm. “No one else.”

“It’s...odd that you feel so strongly about my job. I’m flattered! However, my point in apologizing is to show that I respect you. I like you a lot, and yes, I want more, so unless you tell me to stop I’m going to keep fighting for it. But I want to apologize for putting you in a position where you felt like you had to walk away. I never want you to feel alone, Xaio Wei, especially not because of something I said that I shouldn’t have said. Giving you an ultimatum like that was not fair. I am sorry.” He stops there, looking at Shen Wei.

Who is looking back at him with an expression of such intense desire and awe that Zhao Yunlun will forever picture this exact moment when he hears the term “eye fucking.” Because that is what is going on, here: Shen Wei looks like he wants to eat Zhao Yunlan alive in all the best ways.

Zhao Yunlan is helpless to do anything but stare back at him.

Shen Wei tenses and drags his eyes away, focusing on something across the office while taking deep breaths. He squeezes Zhao Yunlan’s arm before letting go then gets up and walks over to his desk.

Zhao Yunlan smiles. That wasn’t a “no” and it was almost a “yes” and he’s going to remember the way Shen Wei looked at him just then until he’s dead and buried.

They need to get this damn Black Cloak Envoy situation ironed out one way or another so he can get back to courting the man he actually wants to marry.

Zhao Yunlan is the model of patience and restraint! He can wait.

For the next few days, things return to the new normal: Shen Wei escorts Zhao Yunlan around like the consort he very much isn’t, the crack teams of nerds pull apart entire libraries looking for answers, and Zhao Xinci turns his glare up to 11. For added spice, his father also throws in some pointed comments about how his son should ‘know his place’ and ‘stop acting the slut around certain people ’ and ‘what you don’t know can kill you.’ That last is new and a little worrisome, but Zhao Yunlan has bigger problems.

They are twenty one days into the crisis when a breakthrough appears from nowhere, or more accurately, from another SID team member that Zhao Yunlan has never met: Chu Shuzhi.

Turns out, he’s Dixingren.

“You’ve had a Dixing warrior on staff this whole time?” Zhao Yunlan is once again reduced to shrieking at his father in the middle of his father’s office. His mother would be proud.

“It was not my choice , Yunlan,” his father says through very tightly clenched teeth. “Your great-grandmother accepted a deal from the Black Cloak Envoy while she served as Guardian. I was not able to break the contract.” Which, translated, means that Zhao Xinci had tried very, very hard to do just that.

By the look on Chu Shuzhi’s face, he knows it too.

“If we had an actual expert around the whole time why are you just now bringing him here?” Zhao Yunlan snarls at his father.

Chu Shuzhi looks shifty eyed, which might be his natural state, but Zhao Yunlan doesn’t think so. “I have been assisting the legal scholars,” he says, voice flat.

“You do not look like a legal scholar .” Zhao Yunlan is trusting no one at this point.

Before the Dixingren can answer, Zhao Xinci lets out a long, frustrated groan. “Yunlan. Scholars do not ‘look like’ anything, they are just people, even Dixingren. How the hell you could be a police officer for so long with such blinkered opinions—”

“According to all reports and documentation, Lord Guardian Zhao Yunlan was one of the top-ranked police officers in Dragon City, and was even called in as an advisor for international cases involving crime syndicates,” Professor Shen Wei snaps the words with a boldness that borders on imperial. Zhao Yunlan fights down his boner. “I do not think his competence at his job is what is on trial here.”

“And? How would you know?” Zhao Xinci snaps right back. “This whole problem is on him . He did something to cause the Black Cloak Envoy to reject him, and here we are! Trying to fix one of his messes! Again!”

“Go to hell!” Zhao Yunlan yells.

“Just like a child, cursing his parent for telling the truth! If you for once would have been obedient we would not be here! You’ve caused a damned international crisis, you selfish brat!”

Zhao Yunlan steps backwards as if slapped. He feels the sensation of someone grabbing his arm, the hand cold and strong as steel. Shen Wei, his mind supplies absently.

He blinks, trying to figure out what he’s seeing, and it takes a moment to realize that his father is being restrained by...glowing strands of light?

“Lao Chu, perhaps you could remove Zhao Xinci for the moment?” Shen Wei asks, ever so politely, his hand still clamped around Zhao Yunlan’s arm like a vice.

As his very shocked father is very literally dragged out of the office by magical threads controlled by Chu Shuzhi, Zhao Yunlan takes a few deep breaths. He shakes off Shen Wei’s hand to step away and center himself.

“Zhao Yunlan—”

“No. You know him, too, don’t you? You’re all buddy buddy with him! Over three weeks now, your team has been sifting through my private life and my blood samples and this whole time, you’ve known a Dixingren!” He points at Shen Wei. He’s not even sure what the accusation is but he’s furious right now, and Shen Wei is here for it.

“Yes, but if Chu Shuzhi had the answer to our problems before this, he would have told us.”

Zhao Yunlan nods, then shakes his head. “He’s here legally, I take it? If my great-grandmother and the Envoy agreed to it?”

“Yes.” Shen Wei pauses, actually takes off his glasses to rub his eyes, and pulls in a deep breath. Putting his glasses back in place, he looks at Zhao Yunlan with an almost frightening level of stern determination. “He’s one of two Dixingren who have permission to live in Haixing.”

“Two? Two ?” Zhao Yunlan snaps the words and throws up his arms. “And who the hell is the other one?”

Shen Wei holds his hands out in a placating manner. “Me.”