I See Murders Before They Happen

Chapter 23: Chapter 21: Being Targeted

Night fell.

A small riverside courtyard in the suburbs of Jinghai.

A man dressed all in black stood by the river, watching the gentle ripples on the water’s surface.

After a moment, a woman, also dressed in black and wearing a baseball cap, walked over. ”They’ve tracked down Tang Qiang and are moving to arrest him. Shen Yanzhou has already left the police station. They’ve also checked the license plate number.”

The man tossed a handful of fish food into the river. ”So soon? They’re much more efficient than I imagined.”

The woman looked at him.

”If you have something to say, just say it,” the man said.

The woman took an envelope from her pocket. ”These are the photos taken on Qingyang Road.”

The man glanced down at the envelope in her hand but didn’t take it.

”There’s a girl... she looks a lot like her. I checked. She’s twenty-five, named Su Miaoyi.” The woman continued, ”It looks like she’s very close with Zhuang Yanzheng.”

”Su Miaoyi?” The man took the envelope and looked at the photos inside. ”The real Su Miaoyi?”

The woman said nothing.

The man stared at the photos for a moment, then let out a soft laugh. ”How long do you think it’ll take them to find Tang Qiang?”

The woman still said nothing.

The man started to laugh. He walked over to the woman, draped an arm around her neck, and guided her into the small courtyard. ”We’ll stay one more night. Tomorrow, we’ll go see this... Su... Miao... yi.”

「...」

「Municipal Bureau.」

That night, everyone was working overtime again.

The medical examiner’s office had already confirmed it.

The head found at Huating Imperial Garden and the other body parts found at the abandoned amusement park belonged to the same person: He Kai.

Tang Qiang was still in the process of being apprehended.

The car with fake plates had also been tracked via surveillance footage. It had appeared on Qingyang Road at around three in the morning the previous night.

There were no surveillance cameras at the amusement park.

The cameras on Qingyang Road only caught the car turning onto the street leading to the amusement park. It came back out about ten minutes later and then vanished.

The footage showed two people in the car, appearing to be a man and a woman.

However, they were both wearing masks and hats, so their faces weren’t captured.

The vehicle was also currently being traced.

The surveillance footage from around the bar He Kai frequented was also reviewed, and the same car with fake plates was spotted near the bar ten days prior. Again, no faces were captured.

The camera behind the bar could only see the entrance to the back alley.

It had captured Tang Qiang in profile and the back of He Kai.

This was all tied to an incident from a year ago.

The higher-ups were taking this very seriously.

Everyone was under immense pressure.

They worked frantically through another night.

Finally, at just after seven the next morning, they caught Tang Qiang.

He was brought back to the station and immediately interrogated.

Zhuang Yanzheng, having gone another night without sleep, looked even more ferocious, his temper on the verge of exploding.

Dealing with a punk like Tang Qiang, it took him less than ten minutes to get a full confession.

After getting out of the drug rehabilitation center, Tang Qiang had been idling his time away.

He hadn’t held a proper job in years.

Whenever he earned a few hundred, he’d spend it all on alcohol.

A little over three months ago, a woman suddenly approached him.

She gave him a case full of cash.

Tang Qiang had never seen that much money in his entire life.

He took the money, so naturally, he had to do what she asked.

The woman gave him a few bags of meth.

Tang Qiang, of course, knew what it was.

He also knew how much harm it could do.

It was because of that stuff that he had become a shell of his former self, suffering immensely before he finally managed to quit.

Tang Qiang didn’t dare to take it.

But he couldn’t resist the temptation of the money, so he accepted it in the end.

”That woman, she also gave me a few cigarettes laced with marijuana and told me to go to a bar and get close to a guy named He Kai,” Tang Qiang said. ”He Kai was a loner, but at the bar, he was friendly with everyone. I got to know him pretty quickly.”

”After a couple of days, I offered him a cigarette. He didn’t suspect anything and smoked it. Then he got hooked. After that, I switched him over to meth,” Tang Qiang continued. ”And then he quit his job and started coming to me for more every so often.”

”Then, about a dozen days ago, the woman found me again. She said that the next time He Kai came to me for a fix, she would be waiting for us in the alley behind the bar, and I was to get He Kai into her car. We always did our deals in the back alley. There are no cameras there, and nobody ever goes back there,” Tang Qiang said. ”About ten days ago, I guess, He Kai came for a score, and I made up an excuse and got him into the car.”

Zhuang Yanzheng listened to him speak.

His story matched what Su Miaoyi had seen and what the surveillance footage had captured.

”But as soon as we got in the car, He Kai took a blow to the head, and then I got hit on the neck and passed out,” Tang Qiang said. ”By the time I woke up, it was noon the next day.”

”Where did you wake up?” Zhuang Yanzheng asked.

”In a courtyard by Shallow River in the suburbs,” Tang Qiang said. ”I was just lying on the floor inside the house. There was no one there. I don’t know where the woman went, or the man who was driving, and He Kai was nowhere to be seen. But I saw bloodstains on the ground in the courtyard. I didn’t know whose blood it was, so I got scared and ran.”

”You didn’t know He Kai was dead?” Zhuang Yanzheng asked.

”I had a feeling,” Tang Qiang said. ”That’s why I went into hiding, isn’t it? But I really didn’t kill him. I was just doing a job for the money. I don’t know anything. If I’d known someone was going to die, I never would have taken that money.”

”The courtyard by Shallow River. Exact location,” Zhuang Yanzheng said.

Tang Qiang gave him the exact location.

Zhuang Yanzheng walked straight out of the interrogation room, gathered his team, grabbed guns and other gear, and headed for the suburbs.

The suspects had intentionally revealed their location through Tang Qiang.

They didn’t know if it would lead to a direct confrontation, so it was best to be cautious.

The drive took nearly two hours.

They arrived at the destination.

After a detailed deployment, they slowly moved in.

But the courtyard and the house were already empty.

A car was parked in the courtyard—the same one from the surveillance footage.

The river was surrounded by a forest.

This was the only courtyard in the area.

They secured the perimeter of the courtyard.

Zhuang Yanzheng led a few men to search the house and yard.

Qi Feng opened a wooden box. ”Captain Zhuang, I’ve got something.”

Zhuang Yanzheng walked over.

It was another wooden bead.

There were still three characters carved on it.

Beneath the wooden bead was an envelope.

Zhuang Yanzheng opened it.

Inside, he found it was full of photos of Su Miaoyi.

Photos taken at the abandoned amusement park.

His heart sank.

He turned a photo over.

On the back of one, a line of text was written: [You’re here? A shame. I’m in a hurry to find the girl in the photos, so I won’t be seeing you just yet.]

「...」

After leaving the police station yesterday afternoon, Su Miaoyi had gone to the old district, returned home, and had a talk with her aunt and uncle.

Then, she had come back this morning.

She had sent her resume to a few companies over the weekend, planning to find a job.

She had an interview this morning, which is why she had hurried back.

She had taken a car from the old district directly to the company for her interview.

After the interview, she left the company and went to a bus stop to check the routes.

As she was looking, she suddenly felt that someone was staring at her.

She turned and scanned the area, her gaze finally landing on a woman with long hair.

The woman was dressed in black and wore a mask.

Even from a distance, she could feel the woman’s intense gaze fixed on her.

Su Miaoyi felt a little uneasy. Just as she was about to leave, her phone suddenly rang, making her jump...