1982 Started from Hong Kong

Chapter 46: The Swindler Again
"How's your brother's theater business going?"

At 7pm, Inspector Shi Binghui of the Sau Mau Ping Divisional Police Station returned home and just happened to see his wife Tang Lok Ling about to go out.

Deng Leling is 32 years old this year. After marrying Shi Binghui, she has nothing to do every day.

Apart from doing some housework, most of the time he spends his time playing mahjong with other ladies from similar family backgrounds.

She has taken good care of herself. Although she is in her thirties, she has a baby face of someone in her early twenties. However, her figure is too plump and hot from front to back, which makes people want to pin her to the ground and whip her at first sight.

"It's called a video hall, not a theater."

Deng Leling corrected Shi Binghui, while changing clothes, saying: "He has two video halls, and now has a daily income of over a thousand yuan. He also bought two public housing units. I think Zecheng has found something suitable for himself this time."

As she spoke, she took off her silk pajamas, walked to the clothes rack with her long, plump legs bare, took off a pair of denim shorts, and put them on her legs with one hand against the wall.

Shi Binghui couldn't help swallowing when he saw her arching her waist and raising her hips, with the flesh between her waist and hips trembling.

He smiled, showing his buck teeth, and stepped forward to hold Deng Leling's flat belly, rubbing it a few times through his suit: "Then let him do something with some scheming. I have organized four or five drinking parties for his two video studios recently, and we drank until we were drunk. Do you want to compensate me? Here's the rebate!"

"Don't bother. I'm in a hurry to help his video parlor collect money. I may not be back tonight."

Deng Leling turned around and rolled her eyes at him: "You haven't even taken your medicine, and you're making me feel so uncomfortable. Be careful that I might cheat on you tonight."

When Shi Binghui heard this, he immediately lost interest. He slapped Deng Leling's buttocks and sat back on the sofa amid her screams.

When he reached middle age, his wife disliked him.

Inspector Shi was in his early forties and was already a regular customer of the Chinese and Western Pharmacy.

"Let Ah Cheng hire two more assistants. Do you need to help him every day in the future?"

Sitting on the sofa and lighting a cigarette, Shi Binghui said with an unhappy expression.

Deng Leling put on a pair of slim-fitting denim shorts, pulled up the waistband of her pants and jumped twice barefoot, creating a perfect curve in her lower body.

As she put on her shoes, she said, "Let's talk about it later. Besides, I don't feel comfortable leaving all the thousands of dollars of income to outsiders to keep accounts."

"What is he doing now?"

"Let's make a movie. Even though he is a member of the Directors Guild, he still has to buy the copyright to show the movie. It's better for him to make it and show it himself."

"What can he produce with his limited talent? He thinks he is a director just because he drives a camera. If I hadn't been a consultant to the Directors Guild, would the Guild accept him as a member?"

"I know you have the ability~"

Deng Leling changed into casual clothes, and from behind the sofa, she put her arms around Shi Binghui's neck, her chest resting against the back of his head: "I'm going to go out first, you should finish work early tomorrow night, and I'll make you some Dragon and Tiger Soup, okay?"

After a brief and tender moment, Deng Leling walked out of the house in her high heels.

Shi Binghui glanced at his old friend who seemed to be showing no signs of improvement and sighed.

We walked in silence until we arrived at the Sau Mau Ping Housing Estate.

Carrying a brand-name bag, Deng Leling walked arrogantly through the housing estate buildings, with a look of disdain on her face from time to time.

She also came from a housing estate, but married Shi Binghui and moved out early. When she revisited the place, she felt a sense of superiority as if she understood the people's sentiments.

When I arrived at the video room, the guy at the door had been sitting there all day and had already started dozing off.

Deng Leling walked to the table with a frown on her face and slammed her shoulder bag onto the table, scaring the waiter so much that he staggered and almost fell to the ground.

"Sister Ling, you're here." The waiter rubbed his eyes and gave a flattering smile.

"I want you to come and sleep here for a thousand dollars?"

Deng Leling's voice was caustic, but she certainly knew that sleeping between screenings had no impact on business.

But if you have a little power, you don't have to show that you are of the same class as these poor people.

"Show me this week's account book."

After another round of checking the accounts, Deng Leling, who had been playing cards for many years, was sensitive to numbers and quickly spotted the problems in the account books.

"What's going on these days? Why is your income getting less and less? Are you cooking the books?"

The waiter had stretched his neck to look into her collar while she was checking the bill. When he saw her looking up, he quickly put on a bitter face and said, "No, Sister Ling, there have indeed been fewer customers recently, and the seats are often not full, so the turnover will naturally become bad."

Deng Leling was full of disbelief and asked, "Nonsense! I come here every two days, so why haven't I seen fewer customers?"

The guy curled his lips and glanced at the half of her thigh exposed outside her denim shorts.

I thought to myself, when you were here, did those people come to watch a movie? Aren’t they here to see the thighs?
But he didn't dare tell the truth. He just pointed inside and let her see for herself.

Deng Leling lifted the heavy door curtain and looked into the video room. Just as the waiter said, there were more than a dozen steel-frame beds inside, and at least half of them were empty.

"How could this happen?" Although he was asking a question, his voice was still aggressive.

The accountant scratched his head in embarrassment: "The boss recently asked us to show two of his new movies. The customers were not satisfied after watching them, but he also ordered that we must show four shows a day. So every time we show his two movies, the customers refuse to come."

This touched upon Deng Leling's blind spot in knowledge. She thought that Category III films were nothing more than those with some obscene content to attract customers, but she didn't expect that these obscene people had their own pursuits.

"Then change other belts quickly and fill up the empty seats first."

"The boss won't allow..."

"Who has the final say now, him or me? He doesn't know what he's doing. He can't even make a pornographic movie as good as others. No wonder Ah Hui called him a loser."

Deng Leling also became angry. Besides feeling that her brother was not living up to her expectations, another reason was that she owned half of the shares in the video hall.

It doesn’t matter if Deng Zecheng pursues his dream of making movies, but it absolutely cannot affect his money-making ability.

I am still waiting for my share of profits from the video hall so that I can buy new jewelry to show off in front of my poker friends' wives.

"Sister Ling, which play do you want to play?" asked the waiter.

Deng Leling flipped through the cardboard box containing videotapes on the table. There were only a few dozen videotapes in it, most of which were movies that had been shown for many rounds.

Deng Zecheng used procedural justice to destroy Zhai Yuan's business. For a period of time afterwards, the guy named Chen Jiale came to his door every day.

And every time he would bring the staff from the Film and Television Department and ask them to check whether he was illegally playing pirated movies.

After all this, Deng Zecheng became frustrated and had to put away those pirated videotapes, and through personal connections, he half bought and half begged for a batch of copyrights to various types of local and Taiwanese movies.

Although this is safe, the cost also increases.

Deng Leling searched for it and asked: "Is there no new movie to show?"

The guy replied: “It’s all here.”

Deng Leling rolled her eyes and said impatiently, "First, just find two good ones and replace Ah Cheng's movie. I'll discuss it with him tomorrow."

The guy picked up a video tape that had been shown the least number of times and walked into the video room.

Deng Leling looked at the account book for a few more times, feeling increasingly annoyed.

If you continue like this, you will earn less and less.

He won't lose money, after all, the venue and equipment are all Deng Zecheng's own, so it's just the electricity bill.

But she had seen the video hall making huge profits in the early days, so she naturally felt very disappointed at this time.

"Excuse me, is Boss Deng here?"

Just when she was thinking about how to turn losses into profits, a man's voice sounded in Deng Leling's ears.

Deng Leling looked up and saw the man in front of her with neatly combed hair, a pair of gold-rimmed glasses on his nose, and a smile that revealed his snow-white teeth.

"you are?"

"I'm a distributor for an Australian film company, my last name is Zhuang."

Shen Wei smiled politely and took out his business card and handed it to Deng Leling while speaking. The name card was all in English.

While Deng Leling was looking at the business card, Shen Wei's eyes swept over her and he couldn't help but sigh in his heart.

What a sin! If my boss hadn't forced me to be a cheater again, I would never have been willing to cheat such a beautiful woman.

(End of this chapter)