Smokescreen

Kota was also looking at her when she looked at him.

She pulled away from him nervously.

"What are you looking at?"

"Why do you even care what I'm looking at?" Kota stared at Catherine with interest. "Weren't you very wild when we were in the hotel earlier? Why can you let go of yourself in my territory?"

Catherine choked.

"I... No matter what, I'm a person of status. How could I be in such a place with you, Besides..." her voice softened, "your car is flashy. Ying could easily find out where we are by using his connections. So now is not a good time."

"Miss Catherine, you are worrying too much. Although you are beautiful, it will be mine eventually, and I am not in a hurry." Kota shook his head, beckoning her to relax.

"The reason we are here is simply to stop for a while and let those men following us think you are here."

Kota continued, "We will leave in ten minutes at most."

Before Catherine could reply, the couple next door suddenly stopped what they were doing.

And the woman asked, "What's wrong?"

The man replied, "It's boring."

The woman got angry. "You mean I am boring?"

Piak!

It was the sound of a clicking lighter.

The man took a drag and sighed in disappointment, "Didn't you hear the conversation between the couple next door—Miss Catherine is a person of status, and find out where they are. They are having cosplay. That's exciting, unlike us."

The man took a puff, then continued his ranting. "You only know about Pop Rocks. What else do you know?"

Kota and Catherine heard it clearly.

The two of them didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

It turned out that this couple had heard their conversation and thought that they were also a couple and that they were having a cosplay.

Catherine couldn't hold back her laughter when she heard this.

She was an icy beauty on normal days. But when she laughed, she was bewitching—especially when she was in that sexy sleeping gown.

Kota had finally experienced her charm.

"You look so beautiful when you laugh. You should laugh more."

"Stop flattering me. I'm not your woman yet."

Catherine realized she had lost her composure, and her face became serious again.

Kota stood up and knocked on the wall. "Hey, bro, coax your girlfriend. Pop Rocks aren't bad at all. Good luck. We will leave first."

The man next door knocked on the wall in reply. "Bro, what other role play do you have? Help me think of one."

Catherine laughed. "You might as well continue with what we just did. It's about a rich lady being abducted by a scumbag."

They looked at each other and smiled.

Kota opened the window. Outside the window was a ladder hanging on the wall.

"You mean..." Catherine glanced out at the street outside the window on the second floor of the guest house.

"Shh." Kota gestured with his hand and climbed out of the window first. He stepped on the ladder and then jumped, landing steadily on the ground.

"Come down, I'll catch you."

Catherine could only follow Kota's instruction and do likewise.

She had learned to dance before. So at such a short distance, coupled with Kota below her, the maneuver was easy.

"The guest house is just a smokescreen, which is all in your plan?" After Catherine landed, Kota held her hand and brought her down the street.

There were only a couple of dogs barking in the pitch-black night.

They were near the area around Columbia University, where Kota had been active for the past years.

Back then, when he was free during the day, he would go around the streets and collect protection fees. So he was familiar with the area.

It was only here that Kota was confident of taking Catherine off the radar for 24 hours.

Ten minutes after the two left the hostel, four or five cars stopped on the nearby roadside.

About a dozen men in black suits got off the cars and came in front of a cheap hostel.

Most of New York's urban buildings looked high end.

But no matter how beautiful the office buildings and towering high-rise buildings were, they were only a facade.

No matter which street one walked down in the city, one would inevitably see signs of the poor.

For example, the enormous amount of household garbage on the street near the guest house, as well as bicycles parked on the side of the road, and so on.

Coster looked at the mess around him and chuckled. "Do you think you can get away by coming to such a place, Young Lady?"

He took the lead and walked into the guest house.

When the guest house owner saw so many people, he was intimidated and gave the room number where Kota and Catherine were.

Coster told his men to go silent so not to spook the targets. 

Then they quietly crept up to the first floor.

Coster could hear the conversation between a man and a woman from afar.

"Jerk, stop it. I'm a woman of status. You... They are going to find us."

The woman's voice was intermittent and even a little distorted.

"Miss Catherine, even if your family has found you now, it's already too late."

The man guffawed.

Hearing the conversation, Coster's face collapsed.

"Am I too late?"

He felt as if a rat had eaten his favorite cake on the day before his birthday.

Moreover, he had known the cold-as-ice Catherine for so many years. He would consider it a crime for anyone to steal a glance at Catherine.

It seemed that this man had ruined her.

Coster's eyes reddened. His heart was bleeding.

His men looked at each other and felt awkward as they imagined what was happening.

"Get out of the room!"

Coster could not take it anymore and stormed into the room.

A scream came from inside the room.

In the powerful light of the bodyguards' flashlights, they saw toilet paper and a piece of Pop Rocks candy packaging scattered on the floor.

Shocked, the man on the bed had forgotten to role-play.

He pulled the blanket over to cover himself and his girlfriend when he saw Coster's angry face.

"What are you all doing here? What do you all want?"