The streets of Beijing hummed with the usual chaos—bicycles weaving between honking cars, steamed bun vendors shouting over the din, the scent of soy sauce and engine exhaust hanging thick in the air. Skyscrapers towered over tiny noodle shops, their glass facades reflecting the smoggy afternoon sun. It was a city of contrasts, where ancient alleys hid behind corporate monoliths, and Zhou Tian had spent his whole life feeling like he belonged to neither.
Inside the sleek but soulless offices of *Golden Peak Investments*, Zhou sat at his desk, staring at a spreadsheet glowing under fluorescent lights. His suit jacket was draped over his chair, his tie slightly loosened after another twelve-hour day of running numbers. His boss, a balding viper in a too-tight dress shirt, rapped knuckles on his cubicle wall.
"Conference room. Now."
Five minutes later, Zhou stood in silence as his boss slid a termination letter across the table. No warning. No reason. Just a cold, "Pack your things." The office eyes flickered toward him—some pitiful, some relieved. His closest coworker wouldn't even meet his gaze. By the time he cleared his desk into a cardboard box, security was already hovering.
---
His apartment smelled like jasmine rice and betrayal.
The door was unlocked. Inside, laughter spilled from his bedroom—her laughter, breathless and unfamiliar in that way. He dropped the box. The floorboard creaked. A half-second of silence, then a scramble.
His girlfriend, Li Na, shot up from tangled sheets, eyes wide. His so-called best friend, Cheng, lurched naked off the bed, hands raised.
"Tian, wait—"
Zhou broke his nose with one punch. Cheng crumpled, blood trickling between his fingers. Li Na screamed.
"Get out," Zhou said, voice eerily calm.
She scrambled for clothes, babbling excuses. He ignored her, yanking his suitcase from the closet and throwing in clothes, his laptop, and the framed photo of them in Hangzhou he'd kept on his desk. The photo glass cracked as he shoved it into the bag.
Cheng groaned on the floor.
"If you ever face me again," Zhou said, "I'll make sure you don't get up."
Li Na grabbed his wrist. "We can—"
He looked at her. Really looked. The smudged mascara, the lips still swollen from Cheng's mouth, the chipped red polish on her nails from where she'd clawed his back last week.
"We're done." He pulled free. "So is he when he wakes up and realizes he downgraded."
The train station was packed, the air thick with sweat and diesel. Zhou bought a one-way ticket to Shanghai with the last of his emergency cash. As the train pulled away, Beijing's skyline shrank behind him—a city of ghosts.
Somewhere ahead, in the neon glow of a place that didn't know his name yet, a reckoning was waiting.
The rhythmic clatter of the train wheels against the tracks provided a steady, hypnotic backdrop to the tension simmering between Zhou Tian and the stranger across from him. She had been eyeing him for the better part of an hour—crossing and uncrossing her legs, rolling the tip of her tongue along her bottom lip, letting her blouse dip just enough to tease the soft swell of her cleavage. He had pretended not to notice, flipping idly through a magazine he wasn't reading, the corner of his mouth twitching when she let out an exaggerated sigh.
Then, he looked up.
Their eyes locked—hers dark, playful, and inviting; his sharp, predatory, and giving nothing away. A silent challenge passed between them, thick and electric. Without a word, she stood, smoothing her skirt with deliberate slowness before swaying down the aisle toward the cramped bathroom at the end of the car. Zhou waited exactly ten seconds before following.
The bathroom light flickered when he shoved the door open. She was already pressed against the tiny sink, her chest rising fast, pupils blown wide. No words, no hesitation. He grabbed the back of her neck and crushed his mouth to hers in a kiss that tasted like mint gum and something sweeter, darker. Her lips parted instantly, letting his tongue invade and devour. She moaned into him, her hands fisting in his shirt, nails scraping the hard planes of his chest through the fabric.
He shoved her blouse up in one rough motion, fingers finding the clasp of her bra, flicking it open with practiced ease. Her breasts spilled into his palms—heavy, warm, the nipples already pebbled tight. The slick noise of their kiss filled the tiny space as he thumbed her stiff peaks, and she arched into his touch with a whimper.
Her hands dropped to his belt, jerking it open with shaking fingers, nails tracing the defined ridges of his abdomen before shoving his pants down just enough. His cock sprang free, thick and heavy between them, veins pulsing visibly under flushed skin. Her breath hitched when she wrapped a hand around him, barely able to close her fingers, her thumb tracing the leaking slit.
"Jesus," she whispered, looking up at him with blown-wide eyes. "This is so fucking big."
Zhou didn't give her time to adjust. He hooked a hand under her thigh, forcing it high around his hip as he lined himself up, the swollen head of him pressing into her heat. "Tell me you want it," he growled.
"Please." Her voice was wrecked already. He slammed home in one brutal thrust.
Her back hit the mirror with a thud, a broken scream tearing from her throat as he split her open, shoved so deep the breath left her lungs. There was no rhythm to it—just raw, animal pounding, her hips jerking with every snap of his. The train rattled violently around them, metal screeching, but all he heard was the filthy slap of skin on skin and her sobbing moans as he yanked her hips forward to meet each punishing drive.
"Fucking take it," he snarled into the damp skin of her neck, teeth dragging.
She came with a shattered cry, head thrown back, her body clamping down on him like a vise. He didn't slow, chasing his own release with merciless precision, one hand tangled in her hair, the other gripping the sink so hard the plastic groaned under his fingers. When it ripped through him, pleasure white-hot, he buried himself to the hilt and pumped every fucking drop into her, his groan muffled against her open mouth.
For a long moment, the only sound was their ragged breathing, the train's muffled hum. Then, she giggled, breathless. "Shanghai better fucking brace itself."
Zhou smirked against her throat. "It won't know what hit it."