Chapter 119

Xiao Haiyang's face was full of sincere gravity; Fei Du had to expressionlessly swallow down his words along with a mouthful of wine.

He slowly strolled over and sat down on the other end of the couch, smoothly stretching out his long legs. "There are security cameras around scenic areas. Lu Guosheng's physical characteristics haven't changed much over the last several years. He knew before he acted that he would be filmed, so whether he wore gloves or not didn't make much difference. I think that after hiding for fifteen years, a person may yearn for freedom. Normally he has to wear gloves, has to be careful, because as soon as he's exposed, the public security system will have its eye on him. But the day he committed the murder was different. He knew there would be someone to come to his rescue. He could enjoy the killing, then slip away."

For a wanted criminal like Lu Guosheng, shouldering the burden of quite a few lives, it was a matter of indifference to add one more, as long as the police didn't catch him.

"A wanted criminal with a bad reputation and a clear identity showing up on the surveillance network is undoubtedly a very good shield for the employer behind him."

Faced with proper business, Xiao Haiyang's brain moved fairly quickly. He nodded at once. "I understand that… But there's another contradictory point. He killed the boy and found the girl's phone, but he left her. Why is that? Could he possibly not have known that the police would question Xia Xiaonan? As soon as that happened, wouldn't the employer he'd worked so hard to shield be revealed?"

Fei Du didn't answer at once. While he was quiet, Luo Yiguo cuddled up to him and put its head in his lap. Having found a heat source, it soon fell asleep on him.

There were many possible reasons for Lu Guosheng not killing Xia Xiaonan—it may have been at his employer's request. Perhaps Xia Xiaonan, having betrayed Feng Bin, had been taken by the killer behind the scenes for one of his own people; perhaps, because she was pretty, he'd wanted to preserve her as a "spoil of war" and was unwilling to kill her; perhaps the young and frivolous "employer" had innocently thought that if he only threatened her enough, the girl would keep her mouth shut and the police wouldn't get anything out of her.

It may also have been a reason of Lu Guosheng's. After all, in the heavy debt of blood he carried, not one of his victims had been female. Some psychopathic killers had mental states that were hard to appraise using normal logic. Amidst their cold-bloodedness, owing to some deep-seated psychological reason, they would be tender-hearted towards people possessing certain characteristics. Until they'd taken Lu Guosheng alive, this was all unknown.

The only thing they could be sure of was that if Xia Xiaonan had died in that garbage bin, the bodies of the boy and the girl would have been found together, and with the girl's phone taken away, no one would have known that one of the victims had also been a participant. It would only have looked like a misfortune; at most, the police, unable to catch the wanted criminal, would have been hauled out for a round of condemnation—now, however, all kinds of coincidences had turned this assassination, which should have been watertight, into a bungled performance…not long after the Zhou Clan case.

If it had been so easy for those people to slip up, they would all have been scooped up long ago; they couldn't have survived up to this point.

Luo Wenzhou only came home at twilight, bringing Tao Ran along. They'd taken a taxi and carried in big and small bags of hotpot ingredients, as though they were planning to hold a weekend party in an interval between working overtime.

Staring as Luo Wenzhou got out his keys and opened the door, then familiarly stepped out of his shoes and kicked them towards the shoe cabinet, Xiao Haiyang was at last belatedly confused. Entirely at a loss, he thought, "Whose house is this, anyway?"

Tao Ran, beaming, passed Fei Du an opaque cloth bag. "I see Xiao Xiao is also here to scrounge a meal."

Xiao Haiyang: "…"

He'd wanted to leave a few times that afternoon, but Fei Du had told him to "wait a while longer." Xiao Haiyang had been waiting expectantly for someone to come and arrange some secret investigative work; he hadn't thought that he was waiting for hotpot!

Xiao Haiyang said, "Well…I came to…"

Fei Du opened the cloth bag Tao Ran had given him and looked inside, seeing a small, pitch black instrument—an anti-reconnaissance device!

"He came to hand in his self-examination," Fei Du said knowingly, casually interrupting Xiao Haiyang's words. "And he was planning to apologize to you and say he shouldn't have spoken rudely and contradicted his superior in a public place yesterday. By way of apology, he bought two bags of imported cat food. Isn't that right, little fellow?"

Xiao Haiyang: "…"

Fei Du had bought the cat food at a supermarket outside. Xiao Haiyang was all at sea right now, but due to the blind faith he'd built up towards Fei Du during the day, he shut his mouth and said nothing.

"Imported?" Luo Wenzhou looked at Xiao Haiyang. "Ours is a native Chinese cat. It doesn't eat imported food. If you feed it the wrong thing, look out for it turning over its bowl…"

Before he could finish speaking, he looked up and saw Luo Yiguo, its butt sticking up, waving its tail as it chewed with its head down. Judging from its body language, its mood was rather cheerful; it had no intention of knocking over pots and throwing around dishes.

Luo Wenzhou: "…"

The ungrateful little beast!

The hotpot ingredients were all ready-made and didn't require any effort to handle. Even a novice like Fei Du could deal with them.

Tao Ran and Xiao Haiyang set up the hotpot to boil the base and sat down beside it to chat and keep Luo Yiguo away. Fei Du meanwhile went into the kitchen to help wash vegetables.

As soon as he set one foot in the kitchen, Luo Wenzhou sniffed gently. "Have you been drinking?"

"…" Fei Du was taken unawares by this question, because he hadn't thought that a man who spent his time in company with a solid air freshener could have such a sensitive sense of smell. He denied it on the spot. "No, it was grape juice."

Luo Wenzhou dodged left and right, checking on Tao Ran and Xiao Haiyang's positions in the dining room. Then, without warning, he pressed Fei Du into a corner out of their line of sight and personally tasted his mouth.

The kitchen door was half open; if they'd only stuck out their heads, Tao Ran and Xiao Haiyang would have seen. Fei Du could even hear their low voices. Luo Wenzhou's sudden surprise attack of a kiss was unusually turbulent, almost fretful, entirely at odds with the "relaxed and cheerful" atmosphere of the weekend hotpot gathering.

Likely anyone faced with a knife to the back would have found it difficult to maintain true calm.

The winter air was dry, and lips were delicate. Fei Du hissed and hurriedly turned his head away slightly, grabbing Luo Wenzhou's hand, almost inaudibly saying into his ear, "Darling, if you bite through and I bleed, you'll have to carry me out of here on your back."

Luo Wenzhou already had the results of his analysis and smacked him indignantly. "I'll carry you out over my shoulder—you weren't drinking? Do you ever tell the truth?"

Fei Du turned his head to cover up his entirely unrepentant smile and gently licked Luo Wenzhou's earlobe. When he gave a start, Fei Du took the opportunity to firmly pick up the washed mushrooms and float out.

The powerful, invasive scent of hotpot was bubbling over out of the pot. All kinds of meat, vegetables, and seafood were laid out on the spacious dining table, looking very sumptuous. Luo Yiguo followed the smell over and cried out urgently, turning around and around under the table. The four people, however, wore grave expressions.

"Who says you aren't sociable? Isn't eating hotpot with us after work sociable? Xiao Xiao, don't resist. All it takes for people to get familiar is eating a couple of meals together. Tomorrow we have to go back to work. Let's eat well today, substituting tea for wine—cheers." Tao Ran's voice seemed to hold a smile, but there was no sign of it on his face. He rather solemnly accepted the anti-reconnaissance device and made a "ready" hand gesture at Luo Wenzhou.

Xiao Haiyang expressionlessly raised two cups and clinked them together.

Bubbles rose from the hotpot. An indicator light blinked faintly, letting out an invisible scanning signal.

Luo Wenzhou took the detector of the anti-reconnaissance device and stood up. "We'll call this business over. Xiao Haiyang, there are all kinds of bosses. After this, pay attention to how you speak when you're outside. Not everyone would put up with you like I do.—I'll go see if the noodles have softened up."

Saying so, he went around the room with the detector, even carefully probing the pairs of shoes next to the shoe cabinet at the door.

"Fei Du, don't play on your phone, all right? How much money do you need to make that you don't even have time to eat a meal properly?"

Tao Ran heard his implication and immediately picked it up. "Everyone turn off your phones—we'll take a tip from the internet and put all the phones together. No one's allowed to touch them. Anyone who can't hold out will cover the cost of today's food."

Fei Du got out a signal-blocking paper bag, collected everyone's phones, and tossed them into the bag.

When Luo Wenzhou was approaching the entrance hall, the red light suddenly lit up.

Luo Wenzhou's expression instantly altered. At once, Tao Ran turned the sound up on the TV, and they all looked at the indicator light on the anti-reconnaissance device—it flashed unsteadily as Luo Wenzhou moved around. After a moment, Luo Wenzhou took Tao Ran's worn-out briefcase down from the clothes rack. Against the background of the deafening music from the TV, he went through Tao Ran's bag—stuck in an inside pocket was a listening device.

The four of them silently concentrated their gazes on this little thing. Only Luo Yiguo's attention was still on the food. Seeing no one was paying attention to it, it let out a displeased howl.

Luo Wenzhou's gaze moved. He walked over, carrying the bag, and picked Luo Yiguo up with one hand. Luo Yiguo's legs dangled in the air; it didn't know what the litter box attendant's problem was and gave a thin cry.

Against the background of the cat's cry, Luo Wenzhou scooped out a cup of boiling water and poured it over the listening device. There was a crackling sound, and the old leather of the briefcase let out a strange smell. The flickering red light on the anti-reconnaissance device calmed.

No one spoke for a good while. Luo Wenzhou released the scapegoated knight Luo Yiguo and spoke first to break the silence. "Taotao, you've been carrying this crappy bag for ten years. There's two gaps in one zipper. It must be about time to change it. I have some new ones here, you can go and pick out whichever one you like later."

Tao Ran forced a smile. "Fine. Give me the most expensive one."

Xiao Haiyang said, "Who is it?"

Tao Ran had calmed down from his initial shock. He drank a mouthful of herbal tea. "It could be anyone. There's nothing in my bag that's worth any money. I don't normally pay attention to it, just toss it somewhere.—When it's crowded on the subway, any place you hand your bag in to be checked, all the acquaintances I've seen recently, informers, witnesses I've gone to see, victims… Anyone could have had an opportunity. It doesn't necessarily have to be one of our people."

"Sure." Fei Du unhurriedly put a few pieces of meat into the hotpot. "If it had been me, I'd have put a listening device on Lao Luo. At least one for each of the two of you."

Luo Wenzhou's office was basically a public space, and his things were thrown casually around the City Bureau. Any colleague who was short on spending money to buy cigarettes could give a shout and just take the money from his bag.

If it was someone from the Criminal Investigation Team, the difficulty involved in planting something on either of them was about the same—there weren't any obstacles.

Luo Wenzhou let out a long breath, his voice so low it was almost drowned among the steam. "Lao Yang's testament mentioned the 327 case and Gu Zhao, so this person must be a contemporary of theirs…or even older. It's likely to be some old leader of good standing and reputation. Perhaps that's the reason why they established their headquarters here."

Xiao Haiyang stared stupidly at one and then another. "Wh-which Lao Yang? What are you all talking about?"

Tao Ran gave Luo Wenzhou a questioning look.

Luo Wenzhou patted Xiao Haiyang on the shoulder and briefly explained, "This dumbass was raised by Gu Zhao. He counts as a relative of an elder and a victim."

Fei Du shrugged. "And I'm a relative of a criminal who betrayed the 'organization' and a victim."

"Tao Ran and I have been investigating the truth behind Lao Yang's death three years ago," Luo Wenzhou said. "Recently, shiniang gave us Lao Yang's testament.—We all have different information now. Let's get each other up to date as we eat."

They were like a group of people groping around in the darkness who, whether from private motives or public duty, had by coincidence set foot on the path to seek the same abyss and had staggered along, moving forward with their eyes closed for this long. Now all their roads with their different starting places and different endings had finally met at the same point. There was a fragmentary flame flickering in the mists, faintly revealing the shape of the abyss.

"We can temporarily detain Wei Wenchuan and his father," Luo Wenzhou said, "but we can't hold them for long, because we don't have any evidence, and Wei Wenchuan is a minor. The two of them know it, so they feel very secure. Time is tight. What should our next step be? It's not very convenient to simply investigate this Beiyuan's Longyun Center of yours. I looked it up. That building was built by Wei Zhanhong, it's their own property. We could obtain the security camera records from around there, but investigating surveillance footage requires an application and proper grounds. I can't just make it happen by saying so. There are many eyes on the team. Even if the bug in Tao Ran's bag wasn't put there by one of our people, it'll still make it hard to keep a secret. Until we can make a definitive strike, we can't disclose this information."

Tao Ran said, "What about informers?"

"Can informers be trusted?" Xiao Haiyang asked. "They come from all over the place, and you don't know what kind of people they normally come into contact with or who they get favors from. I always suspected that what happened to Uncle Gu was related to a mole among his informers."

Just then, Fei Du, who hadn't spoken all this time, suddenly said, "We can use my people."