CH 23

The hotel arranged by Qingshan was quite satisfactory. It was a newly opened hotel with complete facilities and no musty smell of old wood in the rooms.

Pei You dragged his suitcase into the room, closed the door with a sigh of relief, and then loosened his shoulders, taking a deep breath to relax.

After a whole night of flying and driving, even someone like him who was used to traveling long distances felt a little overwhelmed. He reached behind his neck and massaged the sore muscles before taking out his computer bag from the side pocket, casually placing it on the sofa in the suite’s living room.

The rain was still pouring outside, and Pei You’s face finally showed a hint of exhaustion. He sat down on the sofa, pinched the bridge of his nose, and took a short financial report out from the outer pocket of his computer bag.

Pei You was the type of kid who would finish his homework during the first week of summer vacation. He was used to getting his work done before resting, so even if he felt tired, he still wanted to go through the preparatory materials before going to sleep.

The financial report of Dongjiang was a mess, with inconsistent data throughout, and even some figures from several years that did not match at all. It looked like it was written carelessly at the last minute.

Before the business trip, Pei You’s auditing team had urgently sorted through Dongjiang’s financial reports from the past few years and compiled a centralized presentation for him, consisting of four or five pages, with the important sections highlighted.

Pei You opened the small fridge next to the TV cabinet, took out a bottle of sparkling water, and while twisting it open, he walked back to the sofa.

Dongjiang Company was not like Qingshan; it lacked a formal operating model and resembled the typical family-owned businesses of the last century. Internal management was chaotic, and the business scope was not well-defined.

Similar to most companies that prospered in that era, Dongjiang was a construction company whose main business involved undertaking various small projects, including residential buildings and some less important municipal planning. They preferred handling their own projects rather than outsourcing and had a complete construction system within the company.

Before coming to Weinan, Pei You went through their information and discovered that apart from their core business, Dongjiang also leased equipment to external parties and undertook small projects derived from their main projects.

For a big company like Qingshan, those minor endeavors might not have made much of an impact. However, having seen numerous financial reports and businesses, Pei You understood that such business volume would be sufficient for Dongjiang, a local enterprise in an ordinary prefecture-level city, to sustain itself comfortably.

However, the financial reports submitted by Dongjiang were a mess each year, not to mention the pitiful profits. When Zhou Cangshan had inquired about this, the feedback from this end stated that the physical business hadn’t been doing well in recent years, construction costs had risen, leading to a decline in profits.

Nonsense, Pei You thought.

Dongjiang had its own equipment, stored materials, and its project engineering team was all in-house. With so much investment going in and very little revenue coming out, it was hard to believe that all the funds were spent on operational expenses.

Pei You quickly went through the presentation and found that the major losses reported by Dongjiang were almost all related to cost control. It was either materials or equipment wastage, a wide array of issues.

Having worked in that field for many years, Pei You had seen countless fraudulent accounts. He could even guess that Dongjiang might not have a systematic finance department, and even the accountants were possibly relatives or friends who weren’t professionally trained. Otherwise, even if they were faking the accounts, they wouldn’t make such obvious mistakes in that category.

—Experienced auditors could easily spot the discrepancies after checking a few times.

After spending twenty minutes reviewing the presentation, Pei You took out a pen from the side pocket of his backpack and marked two crucial items for inventory check, adding some notes.

Having done all that, the outside had turned into a grayish hue. Pei You raised his head to look out of the window, then closed the documents, got up, and went to freshen up.

He took out a change of clothes from his suitcase and quickly took a shower.

When he came out, he instinctively wanted to hang his coat in the wardrobe. However, as he reached into the outer pocket, he unexpectedly found a hard card.

He was momentarily stunned, then belatedly remembered what it was. An annoyed expression appeared on his face.

Oh no, Pei You thought, I forgot to return Zhou Qingbai’s ID.

It was apparent that there was no time to go next door now. Based on his knowledge of Zhou Qingbai’s sleeping habits, he knew that half an hour was enough for him to fall into deep slumber. So, he rubbed the ID card for a moment and placed it on his own bedside table.

I’ll deal with it when he wakes up, Pei You decided. After all, Zhou Qingbai had gone through a long journey last night, and it wouldn’t be considerate to disturb his peaceful sleep now.

Pei You tidied himself up and then took out his phone to leave a WeChat message for Zhou Qingbai, explaining the situation and informing him about the overtime arrangements.

The message box remained calm , without any response. Pei You knew that Zhou Qingbai had already fallen asleep, so he didn’t say anything further. He exited the WeChat interface and set an alarm.

Normally, he would set an alarm for five hours later, according to his schedule. However, considering Zhou Qingbai next door, he pushed the alarm time two hours later.

Based on the weather forecast, that late-season rain would last for an entire day and night.

Comfortably resting amidst the regular sound of rain, Pei You fell into a deep sleep, a dreamless one. He even woke up twenty minutes earlier than his set alarm.

Outside, the sky was gloomy, and through the heavy curtains, the room was dim. Pei You rubbed his temples, sat up on the bed, and then reached for his phone. Out of habit, he first opened WeChat to check if Zhou Qingbai had responded.

He couldn’t tell if  Zhou Qingbai  hadn’t woken up yet or for some other reason, as the last message in their conversation was still the one he had sent before going to sleep, and there were no new replies.

It wasn’t strange for Zhou Qingbai not to reply, but what surprised Pei You was that just below Zhou Qingbai’s pinned conversation, there were several new messages from Ge Xing.

Pei You knew Ge Xing, but they weren’t particularly close. They were merely acquaintances, and the only common factor was that Ge Xing had introduced Zhou Qingbai to him.

They rarely contacted each other, which made Pei You wonder for a moment before clicking into the conversation.

“Good morning, General Pei,” Ge Xing’s chat window displayed, “Did the business trip go well? Is Zhou Qingbai difficult to handle?”

That message was followed by a white dog smoking a cigarette expression, causing Pei You to furrow his brows, unsure why Ge Xing would randomly text him that.

Out of politeness and because Ge Xing mentioned Zhou Qingbai, Pei You still replied politely.

“It went well, and he’s not difficult to handle,” Pei You said, “How did you know about the business trip?”

Ge Xing seemed like an automatic reply expert, always online and ready to reply. The chat window immediately displayed “typing” and within a few seconds, a new message popped up.

“He said it himself,” Ge Xing said, “In his Moments.”

Pei You was momentarily stunned, and he exited the chat, clicking into Zhou Qingbai’s Moments. It turned out that a few hours ago, Zhou Qingbai had posted a photo of two overlapping flight tickets.

His own ticket was underneath Zhou Qingbai’s, but still visible enough to show his name.

“Let’s commemorate my first business trip.” This is what Zhou Qingbai wrote as the caption.