Tidal Engagement - Chapter 11

Over the next month, Pei Tinglan and I maintained a partnership that was anything but romantic.

I dug into the Old Anchor Archives, while he supplied blood samples, scales, and internal Pei Family materials.

I liaised with the research institute, and he took care of delivering anyone who tried to shut me up to the doorstep of the police station.

His methods were polite.

Most of the time.

Once, someone tried to run me over with a car. The front bumper barely grazed the guardrail when in the next second, the entire vehicle was flipped over by a wall of seawater surging up from the roadside.

When the driver was rescued, he was physically fine-just so terrified he started reciting traffic laws on the spot.

I asked Pei Tinglan if he was responsible.

He sat across from me in the café, unhurriedly stirring a cup of black coffee.

“No evidence.”

“I’m not a cop.”

“It was me.”

“Could you not admit to illegal acts so smoothly?”

He lifted his gaze.

“I held back from biting.”

For a moment, I honestly didn’t know whether I should praise him.

He noticed, the corner of his mouth curving just slightly.

“Miss Lin, don’t force yourself.”

“What?”

“You don’t have to praise me.”

I really felt that this man was a master at pushing his luck.

The research progressed slowly.

The patterns on the Old Ring were not common metal, but a bio-osseous material that responded to tides and blood.

After my advisor examined the sample, he was silent for three full minutes.

“Xiao Lin, this fiancé of yours-is he legal?”

I said, “At present, it’s difficult to define.”

The look my advisor gave me was complicated.

“Be careful.”

I nodded.

“I know.”

But I later discovered that I still knew far too little.

My mother’s old medical records-Pei Tinglan was the one who found them.

That day he came to the institute in a black trench coat, the cuffs buttoned up tight.

A junior colleague passing by glanced at him three times, then came back and asked me, “Is that your dangerous fiancé?”

I said, “Don’t go around describing him like that.”

She said, “Then how would you describe him?”

I thought about it.

“A very dangerous collaborator.”

She gave me a thumbs-up.

“That’s even worse.”

When Pei Tinglan came in, he was holding a sealed bag in his hand.

“Your mother didn’t die from illness.”

The pen in my hand stopped.

He placed the sealed bag on the table.

Inside were several yellowed sheets of test reports.

Wen Bloodline. Anchor Depletion.

I stared at those words, my fingertips gradually turning cold.

Pei Tinglan didn’t say any words of comfort.

He just set a cup of warm water by my hand, then stepped back to the window.

That was more useful than a hug.

I didn’t need to deal with his closeness at a time like this.

When I finished going through the report, I discovered my father’s signature on the last page.

Consent to terminate treatment.

Below it was Pei Zongyue’s signature.

Collaborator.

I suddenly recalled that after my mother passed away, my father moved us away from Nangang and never let me touch the sea again.

It wasn’t just that he feared something would happen to me.

He knew the Wen blood would pull me back into the Pei Family’s tides.

Yet six years later, he still sent me back.

I closed the report.

Pei Tinglan looked over at me.

“Feel like crying?”

“No.”

“Feel like killing someone?”

“More or less.”

He nodded.

“I can provide a plan.”

I lifted my eyes to him.

Pei Tinglan paused, then added: “Within the gray edges of the law.”

“Not even the gray edges.”

“Then I’ll reconsider.”

Watching his utterly serious expression, the hard, cold lump in my chest loosened a little.

“Pei Tinglan.”

“Mm.”

“Are you coaxing me?”

He lowered his gaze.

“Isn’t it obvious?”