Chapter 82: A Woman Called A (1/2)

Killer Nights

Chapter 82: A Woman Called A-Ping

“Are you ok?” asked Lu Xiaoqiang as he ran over and squatted next to the woman who had just fallen, “Are you hurt?”

“No…” the woman shook her head.  She used her arms to prop herself up into a half-p.r.o.ne position, cowering in fear and said, “Don’t… don’t kill me please… I don’t know anything…”

“Hehe!  So I look like a killer to you, eh?” Lu Xiaoqiang shook his head and laughed in response to the woman’s statement, “So tell me what I want to know about A-Di, and I won’t kill you!”

“Heh!”  Once she heard Lu Xiaoqiang’s tone of voice, an awkward smile appeared on her face as she grumpily shouted at Lu Xiaoqiang, “You’re not a killer, so why I should I tell you?  Come help me up.  This floor’s freezing!”  Clearly, the woman’s fear of Lu Xiaoqiang had decreased significantly.  Deep down inside, she felt that Lu Xiaoqiang wasn’t someone who would do her harm.

“Alright!” acknowledged Lu Xiaoqiang as he helped the woman up.  She used Lu Xiaoqiang’s strength to pull herself up and then leaned her body over in Lu Xiaoqiang’s direction.  She batted her eyelashes and curiously asked Lu Xiaoqiang, “So, big boy, who was A-Di to you anyway?  Was she your old lover, or did she owe you money?”

“Old lover?  Owe me money?” Lu Xiaoqiang asked in surprise.

“What, neither of those?” asked the woman as she glanced at Lu Xiaoqiang, “If it’s neither, then why do you want to find her?  Am I not good enough?”

“You?”  Hearing what the woman said, he somehwat understood but was also somewhat confused.  As a 25-year-old young man, he has had some interaction with women of his age, but his profession and regimented life at the academy meant he had a below-average understanding of women and relations.h.i.+ps.

“That’s right,” the woman nodded earnestly, “Whatever she can do, I can do, too, and I don’t do it any worse than her!”

“Oh!”  Even if Lu Xiaoqiang were full-blown stupid, he would’ve understood what the woman was getting at after that last bit.  This woman must’ve thought he was one of A-Di’s regulars, which is why she was trying so hard to sell herself.  But there was something more.  Lu Xiaoqiang also felt that this woman had just the slightest romantic interest in him.  Prost.i.tutes were human, too, and it was not unusual for them to develop feelings for their regular customers.  Finding a long-term boyfriend was something that these women in the alley longed for as well.  After a few years walking the streets, what they needed wasn’t money but rather affection.

“How would you reward me if I told you what I knew about A-Di?” asked the woman as she leaned even closer to Lu Xiaoqiang.  She was practically on top of him at this point.

“I…” Lu Xiaoqiang hesitated.  He then pulled out his police badge from his pocket and said, “Sorry, I’m a cop.”  He didn’t want to reveal his ident.i.ty, but he knew that if he didn’t tell the woman about his real ident.i.ty now, then things were going to get a whole lot more complicated tonight.

“A cop?”  The woman looked at the badge in Lu Xiaoqiang’s hand and sure enough stopped dead in her tracks.  She stood there blankly for a bit.  Lu Xiaoqiang was clearly a cop, something she hadn’t foreseen.  “Are you… aer you going to arrest me?” asked the woman as she raised her head and looked at Lu Xiaoqiang with a certain amount of terror in her eyes.  Before Lu Xiaoqiang could answer, however, she laughed, “No, you won’t arrest me!  But you’re a cop, and I’m a hooker, so why should I help you?”

“So… you don’t want to avenge your fallen sisters?”  Lu Xiaoqiang had originally wanted to ask, “Don’t you want to have a stable job?” but that would have clearly been a nonsensical thing to ask.  What did cracking this case have to do with getting these women legal and stable jobs?

“Ai!  Sit down.”  The woman walked back from Lu Xiaoqiang’s face and sat down on the bed.  When she walked past Lu Xiaoqiang, she didn’t so much as glance at him, as if to say she had no real interest in him from the start.  When Lu Xiaoqiang saw the woman sitting down, he decided to sit down right next to her.

“If I told you about A-Di, will you really give me that money?” asked the woman as she picked up the 200 yuan that Lu Xiaoqiang had thrown onto the bed and played with it in her hands.

“Yes,” Lu Xiaoqiang resolutely answered.

“This truly is the Information Age,” the woman laughed at her self-deprecating joke, “It looks like selling information is a lot more lucrative than selling s.e.x these days!”

“Hehe,” Lu Xiaoqiang chuckled before sighing.  He didn’t know how to respond to what the woman just said.  After all, he had just graduated from the police academy, which meant he didn’t have a lot of experience dealing with women.  However, if he weren’t a rookie cop, he wouldn’t have come to the alley and done this crazy thing either.

“Alright, my name is A-Ping,” declared the woman as she glanced at Lu Xiaoqiang, almost as if to tell him that he needed to remember her name.  She then continued, “Well, I’d say you found the right person.  I came with A-Di from the provincial capital.  They’ve been cracking down on prost.i.tution there as well, and it was getting too hard to make a living there, which is why we came over here.”