Chapter 4

I was so furious I could barely see straight. Every part of me wanted to go out there right now, throw that animal to the ground, and beat him senseless.

"Aaah!!!"

A woman's shrill scream tore through the night, and it startled me.

"Help me!!! Leo, please, save me!!!"

She kept screaming while she pounded on the door like a lunatic.

I stepped up to the door and looked through the peephole.

The hallway light that had been on a moment ago was dead now.

Outside was pitch black. Except for the woman's screaming, I couldn't see a thing.

I whipped my head around to look at the computer. The stream chat was scrolling so fast my eyes couldn't keep up.

I still had the knife in my hand, but my mind was made up. I was absolutely not opening that door.

Whatever was happening out there, even if the sky fell in, I was not going out.

While the woman screamed and the man roared and the chat went wild, the elevator indicator light in the dim hallway suddenly started moving.

1… 2… 3…

Someone was coming up.

The elevator stopped on our floor fast, and a group of uniformed officers charged out first, their flashlight beams flooding the dark hallway with light.

There she was, sitting on a little folding stool, wailing at the top of her lungs, while the man stood at my door with a weapon in his hand.

My heart shot straight into my throat. Thank God I hadn't gone out.

If I had, the second I opened the door, a blade would have come down across my face.

"Nobody move!"

The lead officer barked the order and pinned the man, whose eyes were still full of murder, to the ground.

The woman froze for a second, then shut her mouth.

Seeing that, I put the knife back in the kitchen.

I wanted to hop on the stream and explain, but when I checked, the stream had gotten so hot it had already been shut down.

Just as well. Saved me from stirring up more misunderstandings.

The officers outside had the scene under control, so I finally opened the door and stepped out.

"You the one who called it in?" the lead officer asked, looking at me.

I nodded and pointed at the man pinned to the floor.

"He's abusing her. His wife was out here begging me for help just now, so I called the police."

The officer nodded, scanned the scene, then walked over to the woman.

A building security guard had come up with the officers and gone to check the electrical box. He pulled a fresh bulb out of the toolkit he carried and screwed it in, and the hallway lit up again.

The officer in charge had dark, weathered skin, with a sharp tan line at the cuff of his short sleeves. Clearly a veteran who'd spent years on the street.

He looked the woman over a few times, then gave a small nod to the policewoman beside him.

The policewoman was young, but she knew what she was doing. She took a single-wrapped makeup wipe out of her breast pocket and swiped it straight across the woman's face.

The woman didn't even have time to react before the policewoman scrubbed her face several times, good and hard.

When the wipe came away, it revealed a face that looked a little sickly but was actually fair and clear.

I was speechless.

So all that misery I'd seen through the peephole had been makeup the whole time.

"Take them both in!" the veteran officer said, seeing this, and waved the order.

Just like that, both husband and wife were in custody.

"Leo! This isn't over! You know what I mean!" the man snarled, still pinned, his eyes locked on me.

I said nothing and looked at the veteran officer.

His tone toward me softened a little.

"Come back to the station with us. There are a few things we need to verify with you."