38: Chapter 38 Only Us

Wednesday night, a French restaurant a thirty-minute drive north of the South District.

When Chen Feng parked his used Porsche 911 and walked into the restaurant, Sarah had already arrived, sitting by the window.

She had changed out of her police uniform into a simple dark red dress, which made her skin look very fair. A thin silver chain around her neck shimmered faintly under the lights, highlighting the beautiful lines of her collarbone.

"Sorry, the traffic was a bit heavy." Chen Feng sat down opposite her and naturally beckoned the waiter over.

"It's fine, I just arrived too." Sarah placed her hands on the table, her fingers unconsciously interlaced. She didn't look as aggressive as she did at the police station.

The food they ordered arrived quickly. The atmosphere was a bit stiff at first, with small talk about the food and the red wine.

"That car of yours... is quite nice." Sarah mentioned casually while cutting the steak on her plate.

"It's used," Chen Feng took a sip of water. "Tony helped me find it. He said a boss needs a decent car, otherwise there's no presence when negotiating business."

Sarah couldn't help but curl the corners of her lips. "He certainly looks out for you."

After a brief silence, Sarah spoke first. She put down her knife and fork and looked up at Chen Feng, her blue eyes appearing very serious under the soft restaurant lighting.

"Chen Feng, I've always wanted to ask you something."

"Hmm?"

"Back then... after you finished tutoring Amy on that paper, why did you just disappear? Your phone wouldn't connect, and you didn't reply to emails. I... my mom thought something had happened to you."

This question made Chen Feng's hand, holding the glass, pause in mid-air.

He looked at Sarah; there was no reproach in her eyes, only pure confusion.

He thought for a moment and finally decided to tell the truth, or at least part of it.

"At that time, the company was about to go under." Chen Feng's voice was very calm. "There was no money in the account, and I couldn't even pay next month's wages. Every day, I was thinking about how to get investment, how to keep the company alive. I really... didn't want you and your family to see me in that state."

He smiled self-deprecatingly: "A man who can barely support himself shouldn't be freeloading at someone else's house, right?"

Sarah listened quietly without speaking. The steak on her plate had gone cold, and she didn't touch it again.

After a while, she whispered: "You know, after my dad's accident, things were a mess at home. You were the only... outsider who came to our house."

Chen Feng was stunned.

"You fixed the screen door in the backyard for us back then, and my mom still keeps it. She said that was the first time the house had any life in it since Daniel left." Sarah's eyes were a little red, but she quickly blinked, suppressing her emotions. "So, we never felt like you were just freeloading."

Chen Feng's heart felt like it had been gently bumped by something.

He hadn't expected that a casual act of his back then would be remembered by them for so long.

The second half of the meal was much more relaxed and natural. The two chatted about Amy's school anecdotes and the bizarre cases Sarah encountered at work, just like old friends who had known each other for a long time.

After the meal, Chen Feng paid the bill, and the two walked out of the restaurant side by side.

The evening breeze was a bit chilly, and Sarah subconsciously hugged her arms. Chen Feng naturally took off his suit jacket and draped it over her shoulders.

Sarah's body stiffened for a moment, but she didn't refuse. The jacket still retained his body heat.

The two walked slowly along the quiet street.

The streetlights stretched their shadows long.

After walking for about a few minutes, Sarah suddenly stopped, turned around, and faced Chen Feng.

"Chen Feng." She looked up at him, her expression very serious. "I'm a police officer, you know that. There are many things you're doing now... that I can't pretend not to see."

She mentioned the missing mercenary case of the Maida Group and the Ministry of Defense's order to forcibly stop the FBI investigation. Each item seemed to be a reminder to him that there was an insurmountable line between them.

Chen Feng did not back down. He looked into her eyes and asked in return: "Then why did you come tonight?"

This question was like a key, stabbing directly into the most contradictory part of Sarah's heart.

Why did she come? She had asked herself that too.

Was it curiosity? Or was it that long-buried flutter of the heart that she didn't even want to admit to herself?

Sarah bit her lip, seemingly making a difficult decision. Finally, she seemed to give up the struggle and lowered her gaze.

"Because... I can distinguish between Sarah in uniform and the Sarah of tonight." Her voice was very soft, with a trace of imperceptible trembling. "Tonight, I am not Sheriff Mitchell."

Just as she finished speaking, a gust of wind blew by, messing up a few strands of blonde hair on her forehead.

Chen Feng reached out and tucked that strand of hair behind her ear.

His fingertips inevitably brushed against her warm earlobe.

Sarah's breathing clearly hitched, her shoulders trembled slightly, but she didn't pull away.

In that instant, everything around them seemed to quiet down. Only the light of the streetlights and the sound of their breathing, which was drawing closer, remained.

Chen Feng took Sarah to her doorstep.

After the car stopped, Sarah unbuckled her seatbelt and returned the jacket to him.

"Thanks for your jacket."

"You're welcome."

She paused at the car door, looked back at him with complex eyes, seemingly wanting to say something, but finally just curled the corners of her mouth.

"Good night, jerk."

After saying that, she slammed the car door shut with a "bang."

Chen Feng watched her back disappear at the door, sat in the car for a full thirty seconds, and then restarted the engine. He touched his heart; it was beating a little fast.

...

Meanwhile, during the day at Umbrella Corporation.

Amy Mitchell had officially been working as an intern for a week.

She was assigned to the quality control laboratory on the ground floor. Her work was very simple: assisting Professor Zhou and the others in conducting routine sampling tests on the finished products of "ruisu" and "healing factor" and recording the data.

The work was relaxed, the pay was generous, and Amy was very satisfied with this internship.

What made her happiest was the lunch break every day.

She would bring the dog biscuits she made at home in the morning, which had beef and carrots added, to find Dahei in the corner of the first-floor lobby.

"Dahei, time to eat!"

That modified creature, which looked like a hellhound in the eyes of others, would immediately lift its head from a doze upon hearing Amy's voice. Its huge tail would slap against the floor with a "thwack-thwack" sound, and it would trot over happily, rubbing its massive head against Amy's calves.

Its level of closeness to Amy had continued to deepen in just one week.

Now, Amy didn't even need to go find it. Every day at 11:50, Dahei would be waiting punctually at the door leading from the first floor to the laboratory, waiting for Amy to get off work like a devoted wife waiting for her husband.

It would lie down beside Amy, letting her lean against it to read, making a deep, satisfied purring sound in its throat. This behavior had never occurred when it treated anyone else, including Chen Feng.

Underground third floor, in the main monitoring room.

Dr. Samantha Lee pushed up her glasses and watched the scene on the surveillance screen, which was warm yet somewhat eerie, with a blank expression.

She called up the real-time physiological data monitoring of the B-01 type "Hound."

When Amy approached, Dahei's heart rate steadily dropped, and its cortisol and adrenaline levels—commonly known as stress hormone levels—also dropped to a very low value.

Samantha pulled up historical data to compare and discovered a phenomenon that even surprised her.

Dahei's stress hormone levels with Amy were not only far lower than its baseline when facing strangers, but even... 12% lower than its baseline when it was with its master, Chen Feng.

This meant that in the judgment of Dahei's nervous system, Amy, this young girl, was a presence that made it feel even more at ease and safe than the "master" who gave it new life.

This completely contradicted the design logic of biological weapons.

Samantha created a new document on her electronic notebook, typed a line, and highlighted it with a red circle.

[Research on the extraordinary affinity phenomenon of B-01 type towards specific individuals — Preliminary guess: Resonance at the genetic level? Or an unknown directional mutation in the emotional circuitry after T-Virus modification?]

[Note: Need samples for comparative analysis.]

She looked up and looked at the surveillance screen again.

In the footage, Amy was lying on Dahei's furry back, completely unguarded, reading a book while breaking half of the biscuit in her hand and stuffing it into Dahei's mouth, smiling innocently.

Samantha's gaze lingered on the girl's bright smiling face for a few seconds, and her eyes became deep.

She thought for a moment, and finally closed the document, deciding not to report this matter to Chen Feng.