A Good-for-Nothing

217. A Net (I)

Translator: Dragon Rider

Zhao Fei was tired, but not so tired that he would drift off to sleep or let his guard down in a car. In fact, technically speaking, the likes of him didn’t need sleep at all.

However, he didn’t open his eyes when he was gently picked up from the passenger seat by Zhou Yize.

Zhou Yize also enjoyed doing this very much and was willing to do it.

Both of them had a strange feeling as though they had nothing to worry about and could fully relax whenever they were by each other’s side, as though they had been tightly against each other like this tens of thousands of years ago.

Carrying Zhao Fei in his arms, Zhou Yize returned to the house he usually lived in. A son of a property developer, he owned more than one houses, but this was the only one that he stayed in often.

Zhao Fei opened his eyes in Zhou Yize’s arms before the latter unlocked the door. His eyes were very clear and totally free of sleepiness. No sooner had he opened his eyes than Zhou Yize lowered his head to look at him.

“Put me down.”

Zhou Yize did what he was asked to.

Zhao Fei stood there, briefly kneaded his forehead and then looked at Zhou Yize with a shadow of a smile. “Hey, were you really going to carry me into your house like that had I not ‘woken up’? Don’t you think that’d be a little weird?”

“I don’t see anything weird about that,” replied Zhou Yize in the tone of someone explaining that one and one made two.

Zhao Fei still had a weak and weary smile at the corners of his mouth. He suddenly leaned over and patted Zhou Yize’s face. “But I don’t quite like going to someone else’s place.”

“There’s something I need to attend to. I’ve got to go.” Zhao Fei gave Zhou Yize a wave and then walked off with panache.

Standing bolt upright in the doorway, Zhou Yize quietly watched as Zhao Fei’s face gradually disappeared behind the elevator door, his mouth which had been a thin line slightly curving into a relaxed smile, as though Zhao Fei could do nothing he wouldn’t tolerate.

And then his cellphone rang.

The affection on his face quickly vanishing, he fished out his phone, the look in his eyes hardening somewhat. “You caught him? Okay, I got this.”

…

Zhao Fei had just walked out of the elevator when he received a phone call from Li Zong, who didn’t ask him where he had been exactly and just reminded him to pay a visit to the headquarter. Zhao Fei en passant asked Li Zong some questions.

When approaching the front gates of the residential district, he gradually slowed down, looking up in the direction of a certain floor of a certain building.

“Zeyi?” These two words issued from his graceful lips and with that he dissolved into chuckle. He wasn’t sure whether this was that man’s real name or not, but he didn’t really care, for it was unnecessary for friends with benefits to know about each other’s identity or family background.

He clapped a hand to his forehead. “I’m being foolish.”

He couldn’t understand why he did such a pointless thing.

“Fortunately I controlled myself eventually.” Zhao Fei shook his head with a self-deprecating smile. Then he hailed a taxi and headed straight in the direction of the police station in the Eastern District.

At this time, in the police station, Chen Xi was sitting limply leaning against the back of the chair, his countenance a shade twisted, muttering repeatedly, “That’s impossible. How could Shuanglin have died? I remember so well he returned home.”

Everybody present had a somewhat grave look on his face, especially Zu Zhichong, who could hardly believe that he was so unfortunate as to have encountered yet another thorny case.

Chen Qianlin asked calmly, “Where did they find Jiang Shuanglin’s body?”

Luo Zhou’s eyes swept across their faces and then he gave them an unexpected answer in a deep voice. “In Feng Ma’s house.”

Everybody else’s pupils contracted drastically, amazement washing over their faces.

How had Jiang Shuanglin come to die in Feng Ma’s house?

“Ho–How come Shuanglin was in Feng Ma’s house?” Chen Xi was unable to believe what he’d just heard, open-mouthed, his eyes bloodshot.

“What’s the cause of Jiang Shuanglin’s death?”

“According to the message my colleague sent to me from the scene, the circumstances of his death were very similar to those of Feng Ma’s. There’s no wound on him, and nothing out of the ordinary could be seen, but all his organs failed, and the possibility of poisoning has been ruled out.”

Chen Qianlin, Zu Zhichong and He Zheng exchanged glances, all of them seeing suspicion of another possibility in each other’s eyes.

It was Demon’s Attendants that had killed Feng Ma. If the circumstances of Jiang Shuanglin’s death were the same as those of Feng Ma’s death, then Jiang Shuanglin should have been killed by Demon’s Attendants as well, but why had those people killed Jiang Shuanglin?

“Let’s go to the scene to check. These words are not enough for us to confirm whether or not it was the same killer,” said Zu Zhichong.

Luo Zhou knew that they worked for a special department, that there were many things they wouldn’t tell him just because he asked, so Luo Zhou asked no questions. He just picked up the papers on the table and said, “Okay. I’ll tell my colleagues and then go there with you.”

Luo Zhou looked at Wang Jian and Chen Xi who had a flurried look on his face, as though pondering what he should do with the two of them.

Chen Xi noticed the expression in Luo Zhou’s eyes and erupted nervously, “No! No! I’m staying! I’m not leaving! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die!”

“Take it easy, Xiao Xi. Why are you so scared?”

Chen Xi’s eyes and nose were both runny, his cheeks covered with the mixture of the two liquids. “It must be the ghost of Feng Ma! He killed Shuanglin, and now he’s going to kill me, too! Because we both know his secrets!”

Luo Zhou instantly began to have headaches. It was unmistakable that Jiang Shuanglin had died before Feng Ma, so his killer definitely wasn’t the ghost of the latter. Besides, the cause of Feng Ma’s death was not as simple as it seemed. Luo Zhou had a hunch that it wasn’t Feng Ma who’d killed Jiang Shuanglin.

“Chill, Chen Xi.”

Zu Zhichong was not capable of strengthening the vital flames on people’s shoulders as Li Zong had once done, so he took a Composing Fu (Fu is a piece of rectangular paper on which magical figures are drawn by Chinese Taoist priests to invoke or expel spirits and bring good or ill fortune) from his pocket and handed it to Chen Xi. “Don’t be afraid. Take this Fu.”