Chapter One: Everyone in the Rain Is Acting

Within ten seconds, eight phones pointed at them. A curly-haired woman in front held her livestream perfectly steady. Its title already read: RICH MAN WATCHES HELPLESS GIRL SUFFER. There was no luxury car in sight, but traffic had never required facts. Chenzhou could have walked away. Then a bus passed, and its headlights illuminated worn silver markings around the umbrella handle. Seven drops of rain encircling a crane with closed eyes. His breath caught. Fifteen years ago, on the last rainy night before his mother vanished, she had carried an umbrella like this. She hid him in a wardrobe and whispered through the door, “Chenzhou, never take it, no matter who offers. The Lu family umbrella doesn't shelter people from rain. It shelters names.”