Chapter 59: Long Night Downtown!

Chapter 59: Long Night Downtown!

Due to it being the start of September, the sun is setting now and darkness is covering Star City. A steady click-click-click echoes through the quiet lot, the sharp sound of Victoria's high heels striking the concrete as we walk together.

Seeing Victoria dressed up in her dark-blue business lady-suit, I glance down at my heavy long coat and decide I can handle downscaling to just a single firearm while going out with her tonight.

I can tell by the subtle shifting in her eyes that she gets pretty nervous around guns, and besides, I still have absolutely no idea where she actually wants to go.

"Miss Long, give me one moment," I say, stopping in my tracks. "I need to drop off some of my extra armaments inside my SUV and take off this heavy jacket."

Our cars are parked right near each other, so it is not a problem at all. The rear storage compartment containing my tactical equipment is heavily bolted down with a secure thumb-lock, meaning I am not worried about anyone breaking into the vehicle while we are gone. To guarantee the SUV cannot be hot-wired by some random thief, I pull out a critical ignition fuse from the engine block and slip it into a hiding spot inside the cabin.

Since my armored ballistics vest is completely ruined thanks to that brutal encounter with the Monk, I reach into my storage and grab my father's Beretta M9A4. I am choosing this specific nine-millimeter pistol because it is the only weapon I currently own that accommodates a suppressor, allowing the light, compact silencer to attach firmly to the threaded barrel with a simple twist. Once that is settled, I am left wearing just my high-quality, solid-black Kung-Fu formal wear, keeping the single pistol completely hidden against my lower back beneath my belt line. I also reach into the cargo bay and grab my emergency medical kit to throw into Victoria's vehicle just in case things go sideways.

Victoria looks down at the small, black fabric pouch in my hand, which is roughly the size of a standard textbook, her brow furrowing with curiosity. "Is that a gun case?"

I pull the zipper back to expose the stainless steel tools inside for her. "No, this is a portable surgical set I keep on me for bad emergencies. You never know when you are going to come across someone severely injured, a woman suddenly giving birth in public, or someone getting stabbed in an alley."

"Wait, you can actually use all of those tools and perform those procedures?" she asks, her voice full of genuine surprise.

I pull the zipper shut, gripping the handle tightly as I gesture with my free hand toward her sleek black BMW 7 series sedan. "One of my wives happens to be the daughter of the SU Dean and a certified genius ER surgeon, so me knowing how to patch a wound is really no big deal. Let's go, Miss Long."

The vehicle gives a sharp chirp-chirp as she hits the unlock button on her key fob. As we slide into the leather seats, Victoria suddenly remembers her eldest sister mumbling a series of frantic warnings about Rick Lee right after she was arrested by the authorities.

She had not been able to hear the exact words clearly at the time, but the expression of pure terror on her sister's face—the absolute desire to never get involved with Rick Lee ever again—had been permanently branded into her soul. Sitting together inside the quiet cabin of her car, she just stares at me for a few long moments like she is deeply judging my character, forcing me to speak up and break her out of her daze.

"Did I say something wrong, Miss Long?" I ask, leaning back against the headrest.

Victoria snaps back to reality, the memories of our past interactions rushing through her head all at once. She thinks about the casual way I completely took over and changed her flat tire on the shoulder of the road, my high-speed racing victories, my lethal martial arts training, the sheer number of guns I carry, the fact that I killed a master assassin from her middle sister's dangerous sect, my advanced business knowledge, the surgical tools, and my sudden, meteoric rise into the direct line of sight of all four major ruling families.

She looks closely at this young man whom she originally thought was just a kind, cute, and exceptionally polite stranger during their very first meeting, and she suddenly realizes a harsh truth. She knows absolutely nothing about the real me, just like I don't truly know her.

"Why did you actually stop to change my tire that day?" she asks suddenly, turning her body to face me.

I offer her a genuine smile as I recall pulling off the freeway ramp and spotting her stranded vehicle, but if I am being completely honest with myself, it really came down to her incredible looks and the sheer elegance of how she carried herself. "I noticed your broken-down car first, obviously. But when I saw how incredibly frustrated you looked standing out there, my hands just steered the wheel and pulled over like I had absolutely no control over my own actions. Of course, the absolute biggest reason was that I had never seen a woman as beautiful as you in my entire life."

I give a casual shrug to the open-mouthed Victoria and reach over to click my seatbelt into place. Why should I bother lying about it? It would be completely stupid to claim her looks were not the exact reason I pulled over to help her. If she had been less attractive or just some random dude standing by a flat tire, I definitely would have kept driving without a second thought.

"Mr. Lee, you are a bit too honest, are you not?" she asks, recovering her composure as she starts the ignition. "But back then, you never even bothered to learn my name or stay behind to receive a monetary reward. You just fixed it and left immediately. Did you already know exactly who I was?"

I shake my head, looking straight back into her striking purple eyes. "Not a clue. I just figured you were some incredibly important, high-profile corporate business woman based on the car and the suit. The look of utter helplessness on your face in that moment was what caught my eye, and who honestly needs to demand a reward for a simple tire change?"

I lean in slightly, keeping my gaze locked onto hers as I continue. "Why didn't I ask for your name? Probably because I had never felt that sudden, intense kind of physical attraction before in my life, so I figured it was better to just walk away and ignore it. I had massive, life-changing events going on at the time, and trying to hit on a wealthy woman in distress was definitely not on my immediate to-do list. So, are we just going to sit here in the parking lot all night, or are we going to get that food?"

Victoria then hits the engine start button, her thoughts clearly focused elsewhere as she smoothly pulls out of the university parking lot and into the main street.

As Victoria drives northbound directly into the bustling Downtown area, classical piano music begins to play softly through her car's high-end sound system. What she is listening to shares a striking resemblance to the song Sadness and Sorrow, a deeply pleasant and calming instrumental piece.

Based on the selection, it seems she has a strong personal preference for relaxing instrumental music.

I glance out the passenger window and spot a familiar structure looming on the right side of the street—a place I have visited a couple of times already for my own weddings, the Life Statistics Building. Victoria notices me warmly smiling at the sight of the exterior, turning her head slightly toward me as we cruise past.

"What made you look so happy all of a sudden?" she asks, adjusting her grip on the steering wheel. "I have rarely ever seen you crack a genuine smile."

I point a finger out the glass toward the massive facade of the civic building to explain. "Mary, Hana, and I had our weddings right there, so I always get a warm feeling whenever I pass by this area. I actually married Hana the morning of the Hospital Ball."

Victoria looks completely surprised by that last bit of information, but as she takes a moment to look back on it, it makes total sense. The hospital Dean had been absolutely thrilled that afternoon, which perfectly explains why the two of them had been wearing matching white and black attire at the event.

Victoria then points across the wide street toward a towering forty-story skyscraper standing directly opposite the Life Statistics Building. "This structure right here is the Velvet Tower. It serves as my personal corporate office and my primary home. The lower floors are entirely filled with various businesses that I have started myself, including the Velvet Lounge, which is the specific business I named the tower after."

She signals a turn, guiding the luxury sedan left to enter an underground parking structure that descends a full seven levels beneath the skyscraper.

Four alert security guards standing post at the reinforced entrance immediately recognize the owner's vehicle, waving her through the gate with absolutely no issues.

"The security design of this building is exceptionally high due to the wealthy clientele who come to shop and dine here, and also because of my position as CEO," she explains as she steers down the ramp. "This entire first upper parking floor is strictly reserved for me, a few select VIPs, and the personal staff of my companies. The remaining lower floors are designated for standard guests and shoppers."

The two of us step out of the vehicle after she parks in a massive, brightly lit spot marked with her name painted on the wall.

As we walk together toward the large elevator bank, which houses two polished lifts, she continues her tour. "The bottom ten floors are each uniquely set up to accommodate a premium variety of retail stores and upscale restaurants. The second floor right above the main lobby is home to my Velvet Lounge, which is a dedicated space for entertainers of all types to perform, acting as a private club for the rich. It regularly supports professional singers, small bands, comedy acts, and other popular personal entertainment. When we don't have a specific show booked, our house staff includes full-time piano players who also handle live vocals."

Ding~

The crisp electronic tone echoes through the lobby as the doors slide open to reveal a plush, spacious elevator car waiting to take us up to the corporate levels. Unlike most modern buildings, this property employs a dedicated operator specifically tasked with running the lift, proving that no expense was spared when it came to passenger comfort. The sharp-looking operator greets her warmly with a slight bow.

"Welcome back, Miss Long. Where can I take you this evening?"

"Hello, Benz. For now, take me up to my office for a little bit," she says, stepping onto the carpeted floor of the car before turning her attention to me.

"And Rick, don't be deceived by the uniform. Our elevator operators are actually highly trained security personnel."

I had already taken note of his physical posture and the way he sized me up the moment we stepped inside to ensure his boss was safe. "Yes, I noticed right away. Judging by your stance, it should be about ten years of dedicated Kung-Fu training, supplemented by one of the modern Western styles."

The operator looks completely surprised by my sudden breakdown, his eyes widening slightly as he admits the truth. "Azure Dragon Style. You're pretty good, kid."

Victoria gives a small nod of confirmation, realizing that I possess incredibly sharp observation skills. Although the vast majority of the Long family's security force practices that specific discipline, being able to accurately gauge the exact length of a man's training at a glance is not something an ordinary person can do. Her purple eyes gleam with a mixture of curiosity and fascination as she watches me during the long ride up to the thirty-ninth floor.

Ding~

The doors glide open to reveal a perfectly lit, expansive office space styled entirely in clean, professional white.

"Here we go, thirty-ninth floor, Victoria Long Incorporated!" she announces, leading the way out.

The pair of us step directly into the beating heart of her main corporate floor, walking down a central corridor that spans about twenty feet wide with massive, open-concept rooms flanking the left and right sides. Instead of standard solid walls, the rooms are separated by large panes of clear, heavy, soundproof glass.

Looking to the left side of the high-tech office, I see a massive command room filled with rows of sleek desks and high-end computers utilizing software for security monitoring, cyber defense, and a substantial server bank. The layout looks exactly like a corporate intelligence network, or at least the ones I have seen depicted in movies.

On the right side of the corridor is another massive workspace packed with desks and modern cubicles where a large number of office employees are still working late into the evening. I can spot a line of individual manager offices positioned along the outer windows of the perimeter, allowing the executives to remain separate from the massive open area of drone workers while enjoying high-rise views of Star City.

The two massive departments take up almost half of the entire floor space each. After walking about one hundred feet down the main hallway, we step into a quiet reception lobby that serves as the gateway to the executive office area tucked in the back.

The long receptionist desk is built to comfortably accommodate four separate secretarial stations, though only two are currently manned at this hour. Both black-haired women look up from their screens and speak in perfect unison the moment they see her enter.

""Good evening, Miss Long.""

She offers them a polite nod and a warm smile, heading straight to the left of the main desk toward a set of heavy double doors that lead into her private office.

The outer glass doors open into a twenty-foot-long interior corridor that ends at a second set of thick wooden doors, creating a mini-hallway that functions like an acoustic airlock to completely block out any sound from the reception areas.

Victoria steps up to the security panel, punching in her private passcode and pressing her thumb against the scanner before the lock clicks open, demonstrating that she only permits a select few individuals into the main office.

Once we step inside the massive room, she begins to explain the architectural choices of her company's layout. "As you probably noticed on the way in, most of the floor utilizes clear glass walls and large open workspaces. Design choices like this help dramatically reduce the risk of corporate espionage by making covert movements inside the office nearly impossible. It won't stop a professional, but it completely deters the amateurs, like nosey interns."

She points toward a large, seamless door integrated into the right wall of the space. "That door leads to my personal restroom, but whenever you are working here with me, feel free to use it. It features a full walk-in shower and clean towels. I even keep a few extra changes of clothes and business suits stored in there for those nights when I don't have enough time to head upstairs to my apartment."

She gestures over to the opposite left wall, and I notice a full-sized refrigerator and a built-in drinking bar, which includes a soda fountain positioned right next to a premium liquor setup. The entire unit is recessed into the structure so it doesn't stick out into the room, perfectly matching the surrounding wall color so it doesn't immediately draw the eye when you walk through the door.

"I keep it stocked with bottled water, alcohol, sodas, snacks, and a microwave for fixing a quick meal," she notes. "I didn't bother installing a full kitchen inside the office because I have two fantastic restaurants operating on the lower floors of the tower. Help yourself to whatever you want."

Victoria walks out into the center of the vast executive office. The layout features a stylish, lowered floor design in the middle of the room accessible by a couple of wide steps, holding two large, facing couches with a massive ten-by-ten coffee table positioned between them for formal meetings. Placing the furniture in a recessed pit ensures that she can clearly see across the entire room from her main desk without any visual obstructions.

Victoria walks past the seating area over to her primary desk, which is crafted from solid white material with a smooth, light-brown wood top, and sets her designer bag down.

"Rick, please be patient with me for just a brief moment while I file these university documents away in the safe, and then we can get everything ready for our dinner," she says, clicking her pen.

Buzz~

The sharp tone of the intercom sounds from Victoria's desk console. She reaches over to press the receiver button, and the clear voice of one of her secretaries fills the quiet room.

[Miss Long, Technology Manager Shen is outside asking if she can come in to see you?]

"Sure, go ahead and send her right in," Victoria responds, releasing the button.

I remain standing by the massive floor-to-ceiling outer window, staring out at the expansive, dark blanket covering Star City and admiring a high-rise panoramic view that I normally don't get to experience. My Acrobatics Mastery skill is working passively in the background, keeping my balance centered and completely preventing me from feeling woozy or dizzy while looking down at the streets from this extreme height. In reality, I actually used to suffer from a pretty severe fear of heights, a lingering phobia stemming from a traumatic childhood incident.

Knock Knock

Just as the old memory of that ten-year-old trauma threatens to creep into my thoughts, the firm knock and the sound of the heavy wooden door clicking open makes me snap my head away from the glass to see who just walked in.

A woman steps into the private office possessing a remarkably curvy body type that instantly reminds me of Mary, though she sports long, dark-crimson-tinted black hair tied up into a loose, sloppy bun. She wears a pair of stylish red-framed glasses over her sharp blue eyes and looks to be somewhere in her early thirties, dressed in a professional black knee-length skirt and a crisp white button-down office shirt. A simple, elegant gold wedding band rests on her finger.

"Miss Long, the entire main office floor was absolutely buzzing the moment they saw you walk in here accompanied by a young man," the woman says with an energetic smile, turning her gaze toward me. "Hello, sir. I am the Technology Manager for Victoria Long's corporation. It is very nice to meet you, and you can just call me Lucy Shen."

The lively older woman walks straight across the room to offer a firm handshake, so I reach out to meet her grip and introduce myself.

"Hello, Mrs. Shen, I am Rick Lee, and I am actually only her student from Star University, so you can go ahead and calm down the rumor mongers out there," I say with a chuckle, offering a polite greeting.

After she releases her overly friendly handshake, she turns her attention back to Victoria, sliding a thick set of folders across the white desk. "Security intrusions had been up a month ago when I first started, but the main hacker snooping around in your servers seems to have completely stopped recently. They did not do anything openly nefarious to the network, but they did leave behind some nasty monitoring programs embedded in the code. I am mostly sure I have completely weeded them out by now."

Listening to her report, I keep my face perfectly neutral, but internally I know this lady is definitely not ordinary. My perception shows she possesses an advanced level of Kung-Fu training, and the monitoring program she is currently boasting about clearing is actually mine. What she found was only a dummy program I intentionally left behind as a decoy to hide the primary tracker, which is currently running perfectly fine inside their network.

Lucy catches the slight smile tugging at the edge of my mouth, turning her sharp blue eyes toward me over her red frames. "Mr. Lee, do you happen to know a lot about computers as well?"

"Me? I just mess around with devices a bit in my spare time, but nothing major," I lie smoothly, playing dumb. "I was just listening to your cyber warfare talk and thinking it sounds exactly like something straight out of a spy movie."

She grins at my response, lifting a hand to point back toward the massive glass-walled tech room down the corridor. "Well, if you ever want some actual computer lessons, you can always find me right here, and my office door is always open for someone who wants to learn. If Miss Long brought you all the way up here tonight, she must see some real potential in you, so I will go ahead and get back to my monitoring work. Goodbye, you two."

Victoria watches the interaction with a look of surprise, knowing this normally aloof manager she hired a month ago rarely engages with anyone. Seeing Lucy talking so freely with me makes Victoria realize the tech manager must intuitively sense that I am talented, prompting her to speak up on a sudden whim.

"Lucy, Rick and I are about to head downstairs to the Velvet Lounge for a quick bite to eat," Victoria says, gesturing toward the door. "Would you like to come along and join the two of us?"

I can tell from the sudden spark in her expression that this lively woman desperately wants to tag along, but she lets out a dramatic sigh and shakes her head. "Sigh, my husband specifically wants me home early tonight, so I have to reluctantly pass this time around, but I definitely want to come along for the next one for sure. Plus, if this is your very first official time out together, I would only end up being a total third wheel. Ufufu, bye!"

Victoria and I exchange an incredibly awkward look at her blunt insinuation that this is our first date. Before either of us can even attempt to correct her, the energetic lady vanishes through the exit just as fast as she arrived.

Leaving the executive suite, Lucy Shen maintains a happy smile on her face as she walks back down the wide corridor toward her primary desk inside the technology department.

Sitting down in her ergonomic chair in front of three massive high-resolution monitors, she clicks her mouse to bring up a live security feed showing Rick Lee and Victoria Long getting ready to leave the private office.

"Well, it is very good that you did not recognize me, my nephew," she murmurs to herself, a playful glint appearing in her blue eyes. "This means I can keep an eye on you much more easily from now on. Hmm, it seems Victoria is not holding any negative emotions toward you at all, and in fact, I think she actually likes you, you little brat. Well, you are certainly not ordinary anymore, my little firecracker. You're the only person to ever make father feel completely ashamed, fufu."

Her second monitor is actively parsing through the private phone logs of one Alex Renaldo, mapping out his recent travel history and the specific details of his overseas vacation. At the same time, her fingers begin flying across the keyboard of her third monitor, pulling up a highly secure, restricted read-out detailing the current digital and financial activities of Debby Tang.

"Oh? So you are already draining her hidden assets, and a large block of Tang stock was purchased immediately right after," she notes, her grin widening as she reviews the encrypted transfers. "Suspicious, but at least you are not fully going full bandit on them. Hmm, and those Eurasian charities seem like a nice touch. Rick, you are proving to be incredibly fun to follow."

She taps a command on her console, switching her main monitor over to the internal elevator camera to watch the two of us riding the car back down the tower.

"Velvet Lounge, hmm, let's see exactly who is down there right now," she giggles, pulling up the lounge's VIP guest list on her screen. "Oh my, is this going to turn into a triple-date of bitter foes meeting on a narrow path? Fufu, I best get a bag of popcorn in the office microwave right now!"