Donghae frowned at the end of the letter, scrunching his eyebrows together until his forehead started to hurt. He reread the whole document again, sighed, and walked out of his private office to the main quarters.

“What’s with the long face, baby?”

“I just got a headache letter from HQ, and – what did you just call me?”

Hyukjae brushed it off with a sheepish smile. Sometimes he simply honestly forgot not to call the inspector by his favourite pet name at work. “Sir. I said ‘sir’, sir.”

“Anyway,” Donghae shot the officer a side glare before he continued, addressing everyone in the office. “It seems like we’re in for some more company this week.”

“What do you mean?” Sungmin asked. “Is someone new coming to our division?”

“Not just someone, but two someones,” the chief sighed, waving the letter in his hands. “We’re expecting them on Friday.”

“But today’s Friday,” Hyukjae pointed out, tilting his head in confusion. “Are you saying they’re coming in today?”

Donghae was stunned for a little while, looking at the officer with wide eyes before re-scanning the letter from top to bottom. “Apparently so,” he said with a frown, mouth pulled slightly down. “They’ll be reporting here around noon, so send them in when they come. I’ll be in my office. Kyuhyun, please come with me for a while.”

“Yes, sir.”

* * *

“Update me.”

“Right.”

Kyuhyun took over the inspector’s desktop, clicking on several files and delving into several databases and archive folders. Donghae peered at the information on the screen and let out a slow whistle.

“You solved the case.”

“No, I didn’t,” the technical officer said. “I only traced the dots back to a gang and compared them with what we had in our database.”

“You half-solved it, then,” Donghae insisted with a small smile on his face. “A car-theft gang, eh?”

“The dot tattoos were traced back to a car-theft ring that used to be pretty active since a couple of years ago. The police have never made any arrests because they never knew who the members or leaders were. They have had a few leads, including having caught wind of the belly tattoos, but they weren’t able to catch a single person. The police however have unearthed a few places believed to be their former chop shops, probably empty and abandoned due to a tip-off. This gang is known for stealing only expensive and lavish cars from all over the country and then selling them off again as spare parts. The police have literally given up on this operation.”

“So we’re dealing with car thieves now, eh?” the inspector said with a furrow of his brows. “Interesting. Is this all the information we have on hand right now?”

“Yep.”

“Come on, Kyu. I know you can do better than this,” Donghae smiled, with a nudge to the shoulder. “Think you can dig up more dirt than those useless police officers last time?”

Kyuhyun smirked. “You know I love a challenge. This will be a piece of cake.”

A sudden commotion outside caused the two men to break their eye-contact. Donghae even thought he heard some of his female staff squealing and he mentally sighed, not wanting to know exactly what prank Hyukjae probably pulled on them to cause the ruckus outside.

Before he could even think of getting out of his office to see the damage, his intercom sounded and Henry’s nervous voice could be heard. “B-boss, the new g-guys – I mean officers are h-here… Should I s-show them in?”

“Ah, yes. Tell them to come in.”

“Yes sir.”

“By the way, what just happened?” Donghae asked, seeing Kyuhyun’s grim face, probably scheming about a million ways to kill Hyukjae for scaring the clerk. “What did Hyukjae do this time?”

“Uhh… there was a bat in the office. I-I think it’s gone now… OH MY GOSH NO IT’S COMING BACK AHHH—”

The intercom disconnected and the chief could only pray for the safety of Hyukjae’s skin after his technical officer literally leapt off the chair and ran towards the main office with a murderous face. Instead, he leaned back against his leather chair and waited for the two officers to enter, wondering since when did he become in charge of a freaking circus.

* * *

Donghae eyed the two new officers with caution as he received the personal files over from them. One was shorter than the other, who was frowning and had a rather untouchable aura surrounding him. In contrast, next to the mysterious guy stood the shorter officer, with a face full of smiles and looking absolutely eager.

“So, Kim Heechul-ssi and Kim Ryeowook-ssi, am I right?” the inspector asked, skimming through the files before placing them back on the table. “Are you two siblings?”

The sulky officer crossed his arms before scoffing in disgust. On the other hand, the shorter—and less sulkier officer shook his head with a grin. “No, sir. I’m Ryeowook, but you can call me Wook for short. And I’m not exactly related to Heechul-ssi, although we both share the same family name, but surely inspector you would know that there must be hundreds and thousands of Kim’s throughout Korea and you can’t expect all of us to be related to each other somehow, in fact, did you know that if you threw a rock randomly you’d probably hit a Kim, a Lee, or a Park, oh but surely you would know since you’re a Lee yourself—”

“Yes, Ryeowook-ssi, thank you but a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ would suffice,” Donghae interrupted, before his head would burst. Ryeowook grew red in the face and shut up effectively, while Heechul let out another mocking scoff.

“Weirdo,” the taller officer commented, inflicting a small embarrassed look from Ryeowook. Before he could burst into tears, Donghae quickly interjected.

“Alright, I’ll just need you guys to sign here along with your initials and I’ll have someone show you the ropes around here,” the inspector said, pointing to a line at the bottom of a document. “Make sure you check your details carefully before you sign.”

“Inspector, you got my address wrong,” Ryeowook pointed out.

“Just correct it and I’ll see that it gets changed.”<