Distance

In the States....

Early morning, sitting behind a desk in his study was Lu Yi, as he kept navigating through the screen pages on his computer. Having on a casual pink shirt and grey pants, on his right hand was a dark brown leather watch of high quality. He wore on each foot, black loafers. His clean shaven face and well styled dark hair rested on each side of his temple, making him look irresistible.

Lu Yi ran his business from home, but also had a physical location where his employees of almost a hundred worked behind cubicles to create and come up with all sorts of ideas for advertising campaigns and branding for different companies that sought their professional skills, in making their product stand out and make a name for themselves, in the process.

As usual, Lu Yi will sit in his study to communicate with the others in the company through video chat, emails and phone calls. Whichever of three he wanted to go with, depending on the urgency and mood that he might be in. The fax machine and multi-purpose printer was ever running, with stacks of papers ejecting out of them constantly.

Hours after the phone call from a former schoolmate, Lu Yi acted as though he wasn't bothered by what he heard. On different occasion, he tried to shake away the nagging feeling that crept at the back of his mind. Giving in to the urging from within, Lu Yi opened a new tab on his system and began surfing through the net to find out what he could, about his family friend from before.

On getting to the site that was mentioned in the call from before, he clicked on the video clips that was there and read the comments said about the Zhang heiress. The first thought that crossed his mind, was how unbelievable the press acted towards Zhang Mi. He felt very upset by the comments and terrible reception she received. Lu Yi couldn't understand why her circumstance wasn't properly addressed. He checked a major news outlet to read the article they wrote on her, that was when he finally blew up, speaking aloud, "Even if it was all true, that she did what they said! Wasn't she supposed to receive fair treatment?!"

Lu Yi saw how the Zhang heiress looked, noticing that she very much resembled her mother, the late Zhang Jinxia (nee Ji). He couldn't help but admire how beautiful she looked on the clips and webpage. Throwing aside whatever rational thought he had left, as he picked up the phone to dial the office, letting them know of his intention to take an early flight back to his home country. After the call ended, he began his search for the earliest flight from Syracuse to Chaoyang district, which happened to be fourteen hour on a one way trip.

Unknown to Lu Yi, the presiding judge handling the Zhang heiress case, had already given the approval to have the court hearing moved to seventy-two hours from the day he received material evidence and written request from Ding Bohai, regarding the life of his client being endangered at the prison where she was held.

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PaoYin district prison....

After lunch hour, inside the cell belonging to the Zhang heiress and three other inmates. Lying on a upper bunk of low height, where she was assigned to, on her first day as an inmate. The bed had no sheets, as each prisoner was entitled to one sheet and since her's needed to be washed, she had no choice but to delivered it to the laundry room.

Still lost in thought, as an announcement came from the prison public address system, calling for inmate 714 to report to the waiting room, to see her visitors.

On hearing that it was her that was being called, Zhang Mi jumped out from the bed barefoot and feeling happy that it could be the woman from before and her lawyer that had come by to see her. The Zhang heiress couldn't contain her joy that the other woman had kept her promise to visit her again in prison.

A guard came to unlock her cell. Zhang Mi walked out, feeling as though she was flying in the air. Reaching for the door, the guard assigned to watch her pushed it open, as they both walked in.

That was when the smile died on the face of Zhang Mi, for standing in the visitation room was her former aide Yang Lin and another woman that she had never seen before.

The thought that crossed her mind, was that he came to introduce the woman he was now seeing. None could blame the Zhang heiress for thinking that, for the woman in the room was smartly dressed in corporate red gown with a leather office bag on one hand, which had bold red nail polish. Her makeup was applied to perfection, tinkling silver earrings dangled from both ears. With red lips curved in a pleasant smile, as she saw the inmate walk in, closely followed by a female guard.

The guard turned around to stand by the door, leaving the inmate with the other two in the room, to do some catching up.

Zhang Mi felt so much rage from seeing her former driver looking amazing, while she was in prison fighting for her life and innocence. Not knowing what came over her, the Zhang heiress swung at Yang Lin who was standing close to the lawyer that was brought in to represent Zhang Mi.

Zhang Mi held onto the dark coat he had on, pulling him to her, as she began raining blows to his face. Yang Lin just stood there, accepting that he deserved everything that she decided to throw at him. The lawyer was caught off guard by the unexpected turn of event, before jumping in, to stop the inmate that was hitting Yang Lin.

It didn't take long for the guard to intervene, calling into the pager, "All available guards on duty! Report to the visitation room!"

The call was abruptly answered by five more female guards, as they stormed in, pulling the Zhang heiress forcefully from Yang Lin. Even though there was bruises on her arms from their hold and scratches on parts of her fingers. Zhang Mi swallowed the pain, as they dragged her out of the room towards her holding cell.