Chapter 98
“Marry, Marry…”
“I don’t know. What did you say, what happened to Yan Xie?”
In the early morning, only an incandescent light was on in the interrogation room. Qin Chuan was still wearing his pajamas—a wide short-sleeved T-shirt. After getting out of bed, he didn’t even have time to put on his glasses, and with undisguised suspicion written in his eyes, he stared at the interrogator behind the iron table.
Outside the one-sided glass, Chief Lu, Deputy Chief Wei, Huang Xing, Gao Panqing, and others were crowded in the small dark room. Several eyes with different expressions focused on Qin Chuan’s puzzled face in the interrogation room.
The interrogator did not directly answer Qin Chuan’s question: “Vice-Captain Qin, please recall it again. Yesterday, from 5:00 p.m. until you left the city bureau at night, what did you say, who did you meet, and what details happened during this period?”
They were all insiders of the public security system and were already very familiar with this process. Qin Chuan rubbed his brows, took a deep breath, and managed to restrain his inner anxiety.
“I was on duty, so I didn’t sleep well the night before. I fell asleep at my desk yesterday afternoon and woke up at about 5 o’clock. I caught a cold in my early years during anti-drug ambushes and suppression missions. I’ve been a bit rheumatic in recent years and was feeling very uncomfortable in yesterday’s rainy weather. It just so happened that Captain Fang was in the office; he took the medicinal wine and said he’d help me apply it…”
Medicinal wine.
Gao Panqing’s expression changed instantly, and even Chief Lu and Chief Wei looked at each other.
“Is medicinal wine effective for rheumatism?” the interrogator asked seemingly casually.
Qin Chuan said: “It is. It was recommended to me by Yan Xie in the early years. The Captain massaged my elbows and cervical vertebrae for a while, and I felt much better. Thinking that I might have to work overtime at night, I went to the pantry to make a cup of coffee and happened to meet Yan Xie while boiling the water, who was coming back from outside in the rain.”
The interrogator asked hurriedly: “What did you talk about?”
In fact, the conversation between Qin Chuan and Yan Xie had already been repeated three times in two hours, but the interrogator still had to ask, and Qin Chuan still had to repeat it. Even everyone outside the one-sided glass did not show the slightest impatience.
Because this was the basic technique in interrogation.
Constantly repeating mechanical questions, asking them out of order, picking words and sentences, asking positive and negative questions… As long as people lie, there would inevitably be flaws; as long as there were flaws, they would definitely be revealed in continuous repetition.
Of course, Qin Chuan understood this, and he was now even more certain that he had become the object of suspicion, so he couldn’t help but breathe irritably: “What happened to Yan Xie? I went home directly after I left the city bureau. If you don’t believe me, you can request for my driving and call records…”
“Vice-Captain Qin, I’m really sorry about this.” The interrogator interrupted him coldly, “But please cooperate with our work.”
“……” Qin Chuan sighed and clenched his teeth. He repeated the conversation between himself and Yan Xie in the pantry, word for word. He even imitated Yan Xie’s tone at that time and finally gritted his teeth: “Then I went back to the office, is this okay?”
The interrogator took down the transcript and asked, “Why did you go to the Criminal Investigation Detachment to borrow that bottle of medicinal wine before leaving work?”
This was the key question — Gao Panqing and Huang Xing’s expressions outside the interrogation room tensed at the same time, and their upper bodies unconsciously leaned forward; but Chief Lu and Chief Wei, who were much older than them, only shook their heads slightly, without any other reaction.
Sure enough, Qin Chuan was baffled: “Borrowing medicinal wine? What’s with that bottle of medicinal wine?”
The interrogator said, “You just need to answer my question.”
“?” Qin Chuan spread his hands: “Because the anti-drug detachment has run out of medicinal wine! If I don’t borrow it, will I have to go to the pharmacy to buy it?”
It really made sense, and even the interrogator was startled.
“What did you do after borrowing medicinal wine from the Criminal Investigation Detachment?”
“My elbows and shoulder joints were very uncomfortable, and Captain Fang was out of the office, so I thought he went home. I didn’t want to bother others at that time, so I just rubbed some medicinal wine on my elbow and massaged it for a while. After the massage, there was still a little bit of medicinal wine left in the bottle, and I thought it was only two mouthfuls, so I wanted to drink it.”
The interrogator recorded his actions: “You wanted to drink it?”
Qin Chuan nodded.
“It’s common knowledge among the public security officers that some medicinal wines cannot be taken orally, so why do you dare to drink it without hesitation?”
“Because Yan Xie often drinks it, we all know it.” Qin Chuan seemed to feel ridiculous, “But in the end, I didn’t, because as soon as I poured it into the cup, Captain Feng entered the office and immediately stopped me—”
The interrogator looked stern: “Captain Feng stopped you?”
This time, the expressions of everyone outside the interrogation room changed.
Raw aconite wine was highly toxic, and Yan Xie did not cause irreversible consequences because the intake was extremely small. But if Qin Chuan had drunk the whole two mouthfuls at that time, he would have been dead by now!
What made Fang Zhenghong stop Qin Chuan at the last minute?
“Yes.” Qin Chuan nodded affirmatively and said, “Captain Fang saw that I was going to drink medicinal wine and suddenly got a little anxious, then he came up and took the cup from my hand…”
The time went back ten hours to the office of the anti-drug detachment.
…
Splash!
The Chinese medicinal wine was thrown on the ground unexpectedly, and Qin Chuan jumped in shock. But when he turned around, he saw Fang Zhenghong’s stern expression, who scolded him face to face: “Don’t you know that medicinal wine can’t be drunk casually?”
“But this is…”
“What? Do you know what the consequences are of drinking medicinal wine indiscriminately? What if it becomes poisonous?”
“No way, this is from Yan Xie…”
“Don’t mess around with that Yan Xie. He’s not a decent person in his bones!” Fang Zhenghong seemed to want to say something, but he held back abruptly and reprimanded: “You can know people, can know their faces, but you can’t know their hearts. How do you know whether he is only friendly with you to your face, but won’t hurt you if you turn your head?!”
Qin Chuan was stunned after hearing him, and it took him a long time to react, only to feel angry and funny. But before he could persuade Fang Zhenghong, he was interrupted unreasonably by the latter: “Send it back to the Criminal Investigation Detachment! Don’t touch their things in the future!”
“This, Old Fang,” Qin Chuan held the empty medicine bottle in embarrassment: “Look at what you said, our medicinal wine is already finished; can’t I still use it a little? Or I…”
Fang Zhenghong turned a deaf ear to him, muttering about something, and turned back to the detachment commander’s office. Qin Chuan shook his head helplessly, put the empty medicine bottle on his desk, and packed his things to get off work.
But at this time, Fang Zhenghong also came out of the office with his bag, probably planning to go home, when he saw the eye-catching bottle of medicinal wine on Qin Chuan’s table, he immediately became angry again: “Why haven’t you—— “
Qin Chuan immediately surrendered with both hands. Fang Zhenghong glared at him, then simply stepped forward to pick up the empty medicinal wine bottle and strode out of the office door.
…
“Then I got off work. I don’t know where he threw the empty wine bottle.”
There was a dead silence inside and outside the interrogation room, with shock, anger, disbelief, and other emotions flashing in everyone’s eyes. Only Qin Chuan didn’t know why, so he finally asked the question cautiously and vigilantly:
“So… is there really something wrong with the medicinal wine? How is Old Yan?”
Chief Lu raised his hand and made a slight gesture to Deputy Chief Wei and said hoarsely: “Tell Fang Zhenghong to come over for questioning.”
Just then the door was opened, and Gao Panqing, who was standing beside the door, turned his head and stood at attention reflexively: “Captain Yu!”
Yu Zhu didn’t answer or look at anyone in the room. Her cheek muscles were tense, and she walked straight to Chief Lu’s side and whispered, “The questioning of the colleagues on duty is over. Someone saw Fang Zhenghong leaving the Municipal Bureau. He threw an empty glass bottle into the trash can downstairs.”
Chief Lu suddenly raised his head: “Threw it away?”
………
Hospital
“Cough cough cough…”
Jiang Ting woke from his sleep with a sudden cough. The next moment, his head was held up, and the warm water was swallowed down his throat, calming the spasmodic trachea quickly.
Jiang Ting opened his eyes slightly. The lights in the ward were turned off, and the heavy rain that had lasted all night had stopped at some point. Through the moonlight slanting in from the glass window, he saw someone, then frowned and asked softly, “Yan Xie?”
Yan Xie leaned against the hospital bed, his eyes shining brightly in the dark. He lowered his head and kissed the gauze that smelled of blood at the corner of Jiang Ting’s forehead.
“Why are you here?”
Yan Xie didn’t answer immediately. His arms crossed the back of his neck and hooked Jiang Ting’s shoulders, squeezing himself into the single bed. This action brought the two closer together, and he whispered next to Jiang Ting’s ear: “Just finished having an IV drip. I heard from the nurse that you have a fever, so I came here to see you.”
Jiang Ting’s expression could not be seen clearly at night, but under the close proximity of snuggling together, Yan Xie could still feel a brief smile on his lips.
“You saved me…”
“No,” Jiang Ting said, “I hurt you.”
Probably because his tone was too calm and determined, Yan Xie couldn’t think of anything to refute for a while. After a while, he pretended to be relaxed and snorted: “How did you hurt me? I’m the one who wanted to drink the medicinal wine. Was it you who forced me to drink it?”
“You just said that…”
“Of course, if one day you take a fancy to other little white faces, want to murder your husband, and bring me a glass of poisoned wine with your own hands, maybe I’ll just drink it all because there’s no grief greater than when the heart dies, and sacrifice myself so that you and the adulterer later… ouch! How can you hit people!”
Jiang Ting moved his shoulder: “Who did it? Do you have any guesses in your own mind?”
Yan Xie thought for a moment, then shook his head: “It’s hard to say. I brought that bottle of medicinal wine from my house to the city bureau. It is usually placed in the storage cabinet in the hall. No one uses it except me. The last time I used it was probably at the beginning of this year, and it was unclear whether anyone else had touched it. Of course, I know that if you drink raw aconite wine, you will die. But I’m sure that that bottle of medicinal wine is made of processed aconite, so there should be no problem with taking it orally.”
Jiang Ting asked, “What does the bottle look like? Is there a possibility that someone mixed raw aconite into it?”
Yan Xie, who was nearly 1.9 meters tall, felt a little hard to curl up on half of the hospital bed, so he bent one leg and put it on Jiang Ting’s leg, hugged him warmly in his arms, and said, “If it is raw aconite, It is quite laborious to stuff it into the narrow mouth of the wine bottle. Not only is it difficult to hide, but it is also easy to leave medicinal residues around the glass bottle, which will become evidence for future investigations. So it’s more likely that the person sneaked into the Criminal Investigation Detachment’s office and replaced my original bottle with a bottle of medicinal wine mixed with raw aconite. Anyway, it looks dark from the outside.”
While saying that, he twisted his two sword-like eyebrows and rubbed the stubble on his chin with one hand, making a rustling sound:
“If we could check the monitoring of this matter, then we would have been able to get to the bottom of it. But the problem is that the city bureau’s monitoring camera only looks at corridors, stairs, and meeting rooms. The detachment’s offices are of confidential nature, so it belongs in the dark and not necessarily within the surveillance range…”
“Hiss,” Jiang Ting gasped suddenly.
“What’s wrong with you?”
Jiang Ting was so absorbed in his thoughts that he tilted his head inadvertently, and the injured part of his forehead rubbed against Yan Xie’s chin, causing him to be speechless with pain for a while. Seeing this, Yan Xie immediately propped up his upper body, pushed aside his hair to reveal the gauze, and felt his heart ache as if two small claws were scratching his heart. He started asking a series of questions, “Does it still hurt? Should I call a nurse to see? Will there be any scars? Ah?”
Jiang Ting said impatiently, “Don’t move.”
Yan Xie only wore a short-sleeved T-shirt; he lowered his head and kissed the gauze again, his hot body restlessly clinging to him: “It’ll leave scars on our police flower’s face, what should I do…”
Then he thought about it for a while, and he suddenly realized something, his tone filled with subtle satisfaction: “…If there are scars, then let them be. Scars are not bad.”
Jiang Ting had nothing to say, thinking that he was a normal person, and he really couldn’t comprehend the inner world of the Golden Horse Film Emperor in the public security system.
Yan Xie asked, “Can you marry me if you are out of shape?”
“……” Jiang Ting asked back, “Why do you talk about marriage so much all the time?”
The two, one on top and the other on bottom, looked at each other for a long time. The night in the ward was quiet and silent. After a while, Yan Xie finally couldn’t hold back his laughter. His laughter was low and joyful: “Even if I told you, you wouldn’t understand.”
Jiang Ting: “…….”
“In the animal world, two males competing for females often experience very cruel fights and slaughter, sometimes even ending in life and death. This is an instinct engraved in our bones because of natural development and biological evolution, and it is still written in human DNA. Of course, we humans are relatively advanced primates, and in addition to same-sex fights, we often pay more attention to pleasing the contested object, and winning the approval of the contested object is the final victory.”
Yan Xie leaned his upper body low and almost pressed Jiang Ting under him, looking at him playfully: “So if you don’t win the approval, even if you kill your competitor, it can’t count as a victory. This is the highest law of heterosexual communication in our modern society…”
Jiang Ting raised the hand that was not in the infusion and covered his eyes with a smile.
Yan Xie forcibly took his hand off: “Are you listening to me? What do you think?”
“You are just…”
“What do you think? Marry or not?”
Jiang Ting smiled and said nothing.
“Marry or not? Huh? Speak?”
Jiang Ting wanted to cover his eyes and ignore it, but Yan Xie pressed his hand, and the two struggled and shook so much that the hospital bed let out a creaking sound. The sound was both embarrassing and heart-pounding. After arguing for a long time, Jiang Ting couldn’t do anything and gave up: “… Marry, marry. If I were a woman, I would definitely marry you!”
Yan Xie did not hesitate, and his hand groped down: “What if you weren’t?”
“Let go!”
“What if you weren’t a woman?”
Jiang Ting was helpless, and after a while, he could only say, “If I’m not a woman, only you can marry me, is that okay?”
Yan Xie agreed immediately, for fear that he would go back on his words: “Okay, I’ll marry!”
Jiang Ting couldn’t hold back and scolded with a smile, “Get the hell off of me.”
Yan Xie was a little reluctant to let go, but Jiang Ting forcibly pushed him off. He could only curl up his two long legs regretfully. Lying at the head of the hospital bed, he was still muttering indistinctly: “How much dowry do you want, give the number…”
Jiang Ting kicked him unceremoniously: “Hey.”
“Domestic violence started before you even got married—how can you?”
“What happened to the bullet fired from the Type-92 pistol at the scene of the assault on the police in Jiangyang County?”
Yan Xie’s muscles stiffened, and it took him a few seconds to relax. He clenched his teeth to squeeze out a few words, “I knew it must be Ma Xiang who betrayed the team!”
Jiang Ting said coldly: “If Ma Xiang can get past me with those few tricks, he will be able to give lectures at the Public Security University. What’s going on?”
Yan Xie couldn’t hide it anymore and could only tell him the information he got from Chief Lu, including the suspect suspected of being the shooter who died miraculously on the national highway and that they still could not find a gun matching the bullets. He picked up his mobile phone from the bedside table and opened the photo album in front of Jiang Ting: “That’s the bullet, here. Fortunately, the bullet was stuck in the back seat of the car. It’s a bit of God’s will.”
Jiang Ting glanced at it, then suddenly sat up and took the phone.
“What happened?”
Jiang Ting turned on the light as soon as the voice fell, and a deep, fine line appeared between his eyebrows.
Yan Xie noticed the difference and couldn’t help sitting up straight. He saw Jiang Ting staring at a picture in the photo album. Following his gaze, he saw that the picture was very clear. It was the metal carvings on the bottom of the cartridge case and the silver primer cup.
Yan Xie’s tone changed a bit: “What’s wrong, Jiang Ting?”
“……” Jiang Ting’s eyes flashed, not knowing what he was observing. After a while, he returned the phone to Yan Xie and said solemnly, “I went to Gongzhou this time to…”
Yan Xie’s temple jumped immediately.
“It can be said to sweep graves, but it was actually to confirm some of my speculations about that package of new fentanyl compound in Hu Weisheng’s drug production case — if you have an impression, after we found this package of drugs from Hu Weisheng’s rooftop, it was stolen by A-Jie. I came to find you after coming back from Gongzhou because I successfully confirmed these speculations, so I wanted to tell you all the clues.”
Jiang Ting reached out and pinched the root of his nose. The calm profile of his face was reflected by the lamp as if he was considering his words
After a while, he pointed to the phone in Yan Xie’s arms and said solemnly, “I’ve seen this bullet before.”
Chapter 98
“Marry, Marry…”
“I don’t know. What did you say, what happened to Yan Xie?”
In the early morning, only an incandescent light was on in the interrogation room. Qin Chuan was still wearing his pajamas—a wide short-sleeved T-shirt. After getting out of bed, he didn’t even have time to put on his glasses, and with undisguised suspicion written in his eyes, he stared at the interrogator behind the iron table.
Outside the one-sided glass, Chief Lu, Deputy Chief Wei, Huang Xing, Gao Panqing, and others were crowded in the small dark room. Several eyes with different expressions focused on Qin Chuan’s puzzled face in the interrogation room.
The interrogator did not directly answer Qin Chuan’s question: “Vice-Captain Qin, please recall it again. Yesterday, from 5:00 p.m. until you left the city bureau at night, what did you say, who did you meet, and what details happened during this period?”
They were all insiders of the public security system and were already very familiar with this process. Qin Chuan rubbed his brows, took a deep breath, and managed to restrain his inner anxiety.
“I was on duty, so I didn’t sleep well the night before. I fell asleep at my desk yesterday afternoon and woke up at about 5 o’clock. I caught a cold in my early years during anti-drug ambushes and suppression missions. I’ve been a bit rheumatic in recent years and was feeling very uncomfortable in yesterday’s rainy weather. It just so happened that Captain Fang was in the office; he took the medicinal wine and said he’d help me apply it…”
Medicinal wine.
Gao Panqing’s expression changed instantly, and even Chief Lu and Chief Wei looked at each other.
“Is medicinal wine effective for rheumatism?” the interrogator asked seemingly casually.
Qin Chuan said: “It is. It was recommended to me by Yan Xie in the early years. The Captain massaged my elbows and cervical vertebrae for a while, and I felt much better. Thinking that I might have to work overtime at night, I went to the pantry to make a cup of coffee and happened to meet Yan Xie while boiling the water, who was coming back from outside in the rain.”
The interrogator asked hurriedly: “What did you talk about?”
In fact, the conversation between Qin Chuan and Yan Xie had already been repeated three times in two hours, but the interrogator still had to ask, and Qin Chuan still had to repeat it. Even everyone outside the one-sided glass did not show the slightest impatience.
Because this was the basic technique in interrogation.
Constantly repeating mechanical questions, asking them out of order, picking words and sentences, asking positive and negative questions… As long as people lie, there would inevitably be flaws; as long as there were flaws, they would definitely be revealed in continuous repetition.
Of course, Qin Chuan understood this, and he was now even more certain that he had become the object of suspicion, so he couldn’t help but breathe irritably: “What happened to Yan Xie? I went home directly after I left the city bureau. If you don’t believe me, you can request for my driving and call records…”
“Vice-Captain Qin, I’m really sorry about this.” The interrogator interrupted him coldly, “But please cooperate with our work.”
“……” Qin Chuan sighed and clenched his teeth. He repeated the conversation between himself and Yan Xie in the pantry, word for word. He even imitated Yan Xie’s tone at that time and finally gritted his teeth: “Then I went back to the office, is this okay?”
The interrogator took down the transcript and asked, “Why did you go to the Criminal Investigation Detachment to borrow that bottle of medicinal wine before leaving work?”
This was the key question — Gao Panqing and Huang Xing’s expressions outside the interrogation room tensed at the same time, and their upper bodies unconsciously leaned forward; but Chief Lu and Chief Wei, who were much older than them, only shook their heads slightly, without any other reaction.
Sure enough, Qin Chuan was baffled: “Borrowing medicinal wine? What’s with that bottle of medicinal wine?”
The interrogator said, “You just need to answer my question.”
“?” Qin Chuan spread his hands: “Because the anti-drug detachment has run out of medicinal wine! If I don’t borrow it, will I have to go to the pharmacy to buy it?”
It really made sense, and even the interrogator was startled.
“What did you do after borrowing medicinal wine from the Criminal Investigation Detachment?”
“My elbows and shoulder joints were very uncomfortable, and Captain Fang was out of the office, so I thought he went home. I didn’t want to bother others at that time, so I just rubbed some medicinal wine on my elbow and massaged it for a while. After the massage, there was still a little bit of medicinal wine left in the bottle, and I thought it was only two mouthfuls, so I wanted to drink it.”
The interrogator recorded his actions: “You wanted to drink it?”
Qin Chuan nodded.
“It’s common knowledge among the public security officers that some medicinal wines cannot be taken orally, so why do you dare to drink it without hesitation?”
“Because Yan Xie often drinks it, we all know it.” Qin Chuan seemed to feel ridiculous, “But in the end, I didn’t, because as soon as I poured it into the cup, Captain Feng entered the office and immediately stopped me—”
The interrogator looked stern: “Captain Feng stopped you?”
This time, the expressions of everyone outside the interrogation room changed.
Raw aconite wine was highly toxic, and Yan Xie did not cause irreversible consequences because the intake was extremely small. But if Qin Chuan had drunk the whole two mouthfuls at that time, he would have been dead by now!
What made Fang Zhenghong stop Qin Chuan at the last minute?
“Yes.” Qin Chuan nodded affirmatively and said, “Captain Fang saw that I was going to drink medicinal wine and suddenly got a little anxious, then he came up and took the cup from my hand…”
The time went back ten hours to the office of the anti-drug detachment.
…
Splash!
The Chinese medicinal wine was thrown on the ground unexpectedly, and Qin Chuan jumped in shock. But when he turned around, he saw Fang Zhenghong’s stern expression, who scolded him face to face: “Don’t you know that medicinal wine can’t be drunk casually?”
“But this is…”
“What? Do you know what the consequences are of drinking medicinal wine indiscriminately? What if it becomes poisonous?”
“No way, this is from Yan Xie…”
“Don’t mess around with that Yan Xie. He’s not a decent person in his bones!” Fang Zhenghong seemed to want to say something, but he held back abruptly and reprimanded: “You can know people, can know their faces, but you can’t know their hearts. How do you know whether he is only friendly with you to your face, but won’t hurt you if you turn your head?!”
Qin Chuan was stunned after hearing him, and it took him a long time to react, only to feel angry and funny. But before he could persuade Fang Zhenghong, he was interrupted unreasonably by the latter: “Send it back to the Criminal Investigation Detachment! Don’t touch their things in the future!”
“This, Old Fang,” Qin Chuan held the empty medicine bottle in embarrassment: “Look at what you said, our medicinal wine is already finished; can’t I still use it a little? Or I…”
Fang Zhenghong turned a deaf ear to him, muttering about something, and turned back to the detachment commander’s office. Qin Chuan shook his head helplessly, put the empty medicine bottle on his desk, and packed his things to get off work.
But at this time, Fang Zhenghong also came out of the office with his bag, probably planning to go home, when he saw the eye-catching bottle of medicinal wine on Qin Chuan’s table, he immediately became angry again: “Why haven’t you—— “
Qin Chuan immediately surrendered with both hands. Fang Zhenghong glared at him, then simply stepped forward to pick up the empty medicinal wine bottle and strode out of the office door.
…
“Then I got off work. I don’t know where he threw the empty wine bottle.”
There was a dead silence inside and outside the interrogation room, with shock, anger, disbelief, and other emotions flashing in everyone’s eyes. Only Qin Chuan didn’t know why, so he finally asked the question cautiously and vigilantly:
“So… is there really something wrong with the medicinal wine? How is Old Yan?”
Chief Lu raised his hand and made a slight gesture to Deputy Chief Wei and said hoarsely: “Tell Fang Zhenghong to come over for questioning.”
Just then the door was opened, and Gao Panqing, who was standing beside the door, turned his head and stood at attention reflexively: “Captain Yu!”
Yu Zhu didn’t answer or look at anyone in the room. Her cheek muscles were tense, and she walked straight to Chief Lu’s side and whispered, “The questioning of the colleagues on duty is over. Someone saw Fang Zhenghong leaving the Municipal Bureau. He threw an empty glass bottle into the trash can downstairs.”
Chief Lu suddenly raised his head: “Threw it away?”
………
Hospital
“Cough cough cough…”
Jiang Ting woke from his sleep with a sudden cough. The next moment, his head was held up, and the warm water was swallowed down his throat, calming the spasmodic trachea quickly.
Jiang Ting opened his eyes slightly. The lights in the ward were turned off, and the heavy rain that had lasted all night had stopped at some point. Through the moonlight slanting in from the glass window, he saw someone, then frowned and asked softly, “Yan Xie?”
Yan Xie leaned against the hospital bed, his eyes shining brightly in the dark. He lowered his head and kissed the gauze that smelled of blood at the corner of Jiang Ting’s forehead.
“Why are you here?”
Yan Xie didn’t answer immediately. His arms crossed the back of his neck and hooked Jiang Ting’s shoulders, squeezing himself into the single bed. This action brought the two closer together, and he whispered next to Jiang Ting’s ear: “Just finished having an IV drip. I heard from the nurse that you have a fever, so I came here to see you.”
Jiang Ting’s expression could not be seen clearly at night, but under the close proximity of snuggling together, Yan Xie could still feel a brief smile on his lips.
“You saved me…”
“No,” Jiang Ting said, “I hurt you.”
Probably because his tone was too calm and determined, Yan Xie couldn’t think of anything to refute for a while. After a while, he pretended to be relaxed and snorted: “How did you hurt me? I’m the one who wanted to drink the medicinal wine. Was it you who forced me to drink it?”
“You just said that…”
“Of course, if one day you take a fancy to other little white faces, want to murder your husband, and bring me a glass of poisoned wine with your own hands, maybe I’ll just drink it all because there’s no grief greater than when the heart dies, and sacrifice myself so that you and the adulterer later… ouch! How can you hit people!”
Jiang Ting moved his shoulder: “Who did it? Do you have any guesses in your own mind?”
Yan Xie thought for a moment, then shook his head: “It’s hard to say. I brought that bottle of medicinal wine from my house to the city bureau. It is usually placed in the storage cabinet in the hall. No one uses it except me. The last time I used it was probably at the beginning of this year, and it was unclear whether anyone else had touched it. Of course, I know that if you drink raw aconite wine, you will die. But I’m sure that that bottle of medicinal wine is made of processed aconite, so there should be no problem with taking it orally.”
Jiang Ting asked, “What does the bottle look like? Is there a possibility that someone mixed raw aconite into it?”
Yan Xie, who was nearly 1.9 meters tall, felt a little hard to curl up on half of the hospital bed, so he bent one leg and put it on Jiang Ting’s leg, hugged him warmly in his arms, and said, “If it is raw aconite, It is quite laborious to stuff it into the narrow mouth of the wine bottle. Not only is it difficult to hide, but it is also easy to leave medicinal residues around the glass bottle, which will become evidence for future investigations. So it’s more likely that the person sneaked into the Criminal Investigation Detachment’s office and replaced my original bottle with a bottle of medicinal wine mixed with raw aconite. Anyway, it looks dark from the outside.”
While saying that, he twisted his two sword-like eyebrows and rubbed the stubble on his chin with one hand, making a rustling sound:
“If we could check the monitoring of this matter, then we would have been able to get to the bottom of it. But the problem is that the city bureau’s monitoring camera only looks at corridors, stairs, and meeting rooms. The detachment’s offices are of confidential nature, so it belongs in the dark and not necessarily within the surveillance range…”
“Hiss,” Jiang Ting gasped suddenly.
“What’s wrong with you?”
Jiang Ting was so absorbed in his thoughts that he tilted his head inadvertently, and the injured part of his forehead rubbed against Yan Xie’s chin, causing him to be speechless with pain for a while. Seeing this, Yan Xie immediately propped up his upper body, pushed aside his hair to reveal the gauze, and felt his heart ache as if two small claws were scratching his heart. He started asking a series of questions, “Does it still hurt? Should I call a nurse to see? Will there be any scars? Ah?”
Jiang Ting said impatiently, “Don’t move.”
Yan Xie only wore a short-sleeved T-shirt; he lowered his head and kissed the gauze again, his hot body restlessly clinging to him: “It’ll leave scars on our police flower’s face, what should I do…”
Then he thought about it for a while, and he suddenly realized something, his tone filled with subtle satisfaction: “…If there are scars, then let them be. Scars are not bad.”
Jiang Ting had nothing to say, thinking that he was a normal person, and he really couldn’t comprehend the inner world of the Golden Horse Film Emperor in the public security system.
Yan Xie asked, “Can you marry me if you are out of shape?”
“……” Jiang Ting asked back, “Why do you talk about marriage so much all the time?”
The two, one on top and the other on bottom, looked at each other for a long time. The night in the ward was quiet and silent. After a while, Yan Xie finally couldn’t hold back his laughter. His laughter was low and joyful: “Even if I told you, you wouldn’t understand.”
Jiang Ting: “…….”
“In the animal world, two males competing for females often experience very cruel fights and slaughter, sometimes even ending in life and death. This is an instinct engraved in our bones because of natural development and biological evolution, and it is still written in human DNA. Of course, we humans are relatively advanced primates, and in addition to same-sex fights, we often pay more attention to pleasing the contested object, and winning the approval of the contested object is the final victory.”
Yan Xie leaned his upper body low and almost pressed Jiang Ting under him, looking at him playfully: “So if you don’t win the approval, even if you kill your competitor, it can’t count as a victory. This is the highest law of heterosexual communication in our modern society…”
Jiang Ting raised the hand that was not in the infusion and covered his eyes with a smile.
Yan Xie forcibly took his hand off: “Are you listening to me? What do you think?”
“You are just…”
“What do you think? Marry or not?”
Jiang Ting smiled and said nothing.
“Marry or not? Huh? Speak?”
Jiang Ting wanted to cover his eyes and ignore it, but Yan Xie pressed his hand, and the two struggled and shook so much that the hospital bed let out a creaking sound. The sound was both embarrassing and heart-pounding. After arguing for a long time, Jiang Ting couldn’t do anything and gave up: “… Marry, marry. If I were a woman, I would definitely marry you!”
Yan Xie did not hesitate, and his hand groped down: “What if you weren’t?”
“Let go!”
“What if you weren’t a woman?”
Jiang Ting was helpless, and after a while, he could only say, “If I’m not a woman, only you can marry me, is that okay?”
Yan Xie agreed immediately, for fear that he would go back on his words: “Okay, I’ll marry!”
Jiang Ting couldn’t hold back and scolded with a smile, “Get the hell off of me.”
Yan Xie was a little reluctant to let go, but Jiang Ting forcibly pushed him off. He could only curl up his two long legs regretfully. Lying at the head of the hospital bed, he was still muttering indistinctly: “How much dowry do you want, give the number…”
Jiang Ting kicked him unceremoniously: “Hey.”
“Domestic violence started before you even got married—how can you?”
“What happened to the bullet fired from the Type-92 pistol at the scene of the assault on the police in Jiangyang County?”
Yan Xie’s muscles stiffened, and it took him a few seconds to relax. He clenched his teeth to squeeze out a few words, “I knew it must be Ma Xiang who betrayed the team!”
Jiang Ting said coldly: “If Ma Xiang can get past me with those few tricks, he will be able to give lectures at the Public Security University. What’s going on?”
Yan Xie couldn’t hide it anymore and could only tell him the information he got from Chief Lu, including the suspect suspected of being the shooter who died miraculously on the national highway and that they still could not find a gun matching the bullets. He picked up his mobile phone from the bedside table and opened the photo album in front of Jiang Ting: “That’s the bullet, here. Fortunately, the bullet was stuck in the back seat of the car. It’s a bit of God’s will.”
Jiang Ting glanced at it, then suddenly sat up and took the phone.
“What happened?”
Jiang Ting turned on the light as soon as the voice fell, and a deep, fine line appeared between his eyebrows.
Yan Xie noticed the difference and couldn’t help sitting up straight. He saw Jiang Ting staring at a picture in the photo album. Following his gaze, he saw that the picture was very clear. It was the metal carvings on the bottom of the cartridge case and the silver primer cup.
Yan Xie’s tone changed a bit: “What’s wrong, Jiang Ting?”
“……” Jiang Ting’s eyes flashed, not knowing what he was observing. After a while, he returned the phone to Yan Xie and said solemnly, “I went to Gongzhou this time to…”
Yan Xie’s temple jumped immediately.
“It can be said to sweep graves, but it was actually to confirm some of my speculations about that package of new fentanyl compound in Hu Weisheng’s drug production case — if you have an impression, after we found this package of drugs from Hu Weisheng’s rooftop, it was stolen by A-Jie. I came to find you after coming back from Gongzhou because I successfully confirmed these speculations, so I wanted to tell you all the clues.”
Jiang Ting reached out and pinched the root of his nose. The calm profile of his face was reflected by the lamp as if he was considering his words
After a while, he pointed to the phone in Yan Xie’s arms and said solemnly, “I’ve seen this bullet before.”
