“No need!” She grabbed her bag and hurriedly left Gangfu Seafood, giving up her seat to this strange-looking man.

When Ye Nian mentioned this, Meng Lan suddenly remembered something: “I know this man! Remember the day we were eating, and I said a man brushed against my sleeve? That man’s coat did have a lot of sand on it!”

As Meng Lan said this, everyone recalled the incident.

Li Meng slapped his thigh: “We even discussed that there was something off about him at the time, and it turns out there really was!”

The result was truly chilling!

Sometimes, a police officer’s intuition is really spot on!

Xiao Ze rubbed his chin and thought for a moment: “But here’s the problem, assuming the murderer is indeed this man, why didn’t he leave immediately after committing the crime? Why did he return to the second floor of Gangfu Seafood and choose to sit opposite the victim’s wife?”

Wang Yue: “It’s indeed very strange. Knowing there are surveillance cameras in Gangfu Seafood, why would he risk going to the second floor?”

“Could he have wanted to kill Ye Nian too?” Li Meng glanced at Ye Nian and noticed she was quite frightened.

“I haven’t offended anyone, why would someone want to kill me?”

“This situation seems a bit like silencing a witness. Did you accidentally learn someone else’s secret?” Wang Yue speculated.

“I don’t know any secrets… Am I in danger?”

*

Having been cleared of suspicion, Ye Nian voluntarily requested to stay at the police station. Everyone was busy, so no one paid much attention to her. She found a chair to sit on, looked at her phone when bored, and ordered takeout when hungry.

The police used facial recognition to identify the suspect and also found the man in the surveillance footage from Gangfu Seafood.

“Suspect Qin Wei, 28 years old, graduated from the School of Architecture. After graduation, he co-founded a construction company with friends, but due to poor management, the company went bankrupt a year ago. He is now homeless, has worked as a food delivery driver, courier, and chauffeur, and has been repaying debts for the past year. Two months ago, he interviewed at Wang Zhongming’s logistics company but resigned after two weeks.”

“According to his university teachers, Qin Wei is rather aloof and doesn’t like to interact with others. However, due to his good looks, he was quite popular with girls and had no bad records during school.”

While investigating Qin Wei’s movements, the criminal police discovered that he had already fled. The day after the crime, he bought a ticket to Thailand and is now in Thailand.

So they had to contact Interpol, hoping they could quickly apprehend him.

“This guy definitely has issues, otherwise why would he run?”

Meanwhile, the criminal police found several large swim rings at Tianlong Bay. After the relentless efforts of the trace inspection team, they finally found a fingerprint belonging to Qin Wei on the surface of one of the swim rings!

The case now had a basic outline.

Li Meng reported the progress of the case over the past two days: “We investigated Qin Wei’s financial information and found that his bank account usually had little money, but a week ago, there was a transfer of 60,000 RMB from Wang Zhongming.”

“So the two might have had financial disputes.”

Xiao Ze wrote “financial dispute” in his notebook. He reviewed the images of Qin Wei and Wang Zhongming in his mind and found that the only thing connecting the two was money.

But what did Qin Wei have that was worth Wang Zhongming spending 60,000 RMB on?

This would probably only be clear once they caught him.

On the other side, Ye Nian, knowing Qin Wei had fled the country, felt relieved. After saying goodbye to the police, she hurried to the funeral home to arrange a simple funeral for Wang Zhongming.

After the coffin was placed into the cremation furnace, she stood there dumbfounded. It wasn’t until the body was cremated and turned into a pile of ashes that she finally broke down and cried, becoming more and more heartbroken.

When Wang Zhongming was alive, he restricted her in every way. Now that he’s dead, there’s no one in the world who cares about her.

At that moment, Ye Nian suddenly felt very lonely.

As she cried, she suddenly remembered that there was still a life inside her, silently accompanying her…

She gritted her teeth and pulled through.

Three days later, Qin Wei was brought to justice.

In the interrogation room, under the glaring lights, Qin Wei looked haggard and dazed. He had suffered during his days on the run.

“Why did you kill Wang Zhongming?”

Wang Yue sat across from Qin Wei, with Mo Lin temporarily observing on the side.

“Because Wang Zhongming wanted to kill me. Between him and me, only one could live.”

“Why did he want to kill you?”

“I have his secret, and he wanted to silence me.”

“What secret?”

“I’ve already confessed to the murder. You can close the case now.” Qin Wei changed the subject.

“Alright then, let’s start with your crime process.” Wang Yue didn’t want to waste time with him and wanted to close the case first, then slowly pry open his mouth later.

“At 3 PM that day, I invited Wang Zhongming to drink on the beach behind Tianlong Bay Hotel. I brought alcohol and food. He wasn’t in a good mood that day, so he drank quite a bit… He said Ye Nian wanted to abort the child.”

After several bottles of strong liquor, Qin Wei saw Wang Zhongming passed out on the table. He checked his phone, and it was almost 7 PM, so he used Wang Zhongming’s phone to send Ye Nian a message, inviting her to dinner at Gangfu Seafood.

When Qin Wei exited the messaging app, he accidentally opened the browser and found that Wang Zhongming had searched for terms like ‘lethal poison’, ‘anesthetic’, and ‘destroy evidence’. He also noticed unread logistics messages on the phone, which revealed that Wang Zhongming had purchased gloves, sacks, ropes, air fresheners, and disinfectants.

“He was drunk and lying next to me. He couldn’t kill me, but I could easily kill him,” Qin Wei said.

Sitting on the beach, Qin Wei thought for a moment. Ye Nian happened to call, and the caller ID showed a beautiful woman’s photo. He suddenly had the idea that if Wang Zhongming were dead, such a beautiful woman shouldn’t be trapped at home like a caged bird by a man like him…

A swim ring was washed ashore by the sea, and Qin Wei stared at it for a while before walking over…

“Even the heavens wanted me to kill him. By then, it was already dark, and there was no one around. I dragged him onto the swim ring, pushed him far out to sea, and then deflated the swim ring.”

After putting on his clothes, Qin Wei stood on the shore watching Wang Zhongming until he slowly sank into the water…

Qin Wei suddenly laughed: “It’s a pity the clothes inside got wet, and the coat got dirty. The outfit I carefully coordinated didn’t make a good impression on Ye Nian… She probably despises me…”

Wang Yue was a bit puzzled: “Just because you found out he might want to kill you, you killed him. Why not communicate properly and resolve the issue?”

Qin Wei: “This matter couldn’t be resolved.”

“Alright.” Wang Yue sighed: “Why did Wang Zhongming invite you to his house at 1 AM?”

“Does it matter? I’ve already confessed to the crime.”

Since Qin Wei refused to explain why he went to see Wang Zhongming at night, Wang Yue had no better options and had to seek help from Mo Lin, who was observing on the side.

Mo Lin shrugged, indicating he had no solution, and the interrogation ended.

*

Wang Yue hoped Ye Nian could personally ask about the reason, but Ye Nian, upon learning about it, expressed her unwillingness to get involved.

“Aren’t you curious about the secret between Qin Wei and Wang Zhongming?”

“The person is dead,” Ye Nian said, “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“How do you know it doesn’t matter? What if it has something to do with you…”

Before Wang Yue could finish, the call was hung up.

The more this happened, the more he wanted to uncover the truth.

He wrote down all the clues on a piece of paper: Qin Wei visited Wang Zhongming at 1 AM from the 2nd to the 8th of last month, and on the 10th of this month, Qin Wei received a 60,000 RMB transfer from Wang Zhongming…

The 10th, is this a special day?

Thinking of this, he flipped through Ye Nian’s records and found that the 10th was the day Ye Nian went to the hospital for a check-up and discovered she was pregnant.

Pregnancy, transfer…

Is there a connection?

The more Wang Yue thought, the more his head hurt.

He went to Mo Lin’s office, knocked twice, found no response, and pushed the door open to find no one inside. Just as he was about to leave, he saw Mo Lin coming out of Gu Yuan’s office, smiling brightly: “Looking for me?”

“Yeah.” Wang Yue caught up: “Teacher Mo, what do you think the secret between Qin Wei and the deceased is?”

“Can’t you see?” Mo Lin said, “Qin Wei is protecting Ye Nian, and judging by Ye Nian’s reaction, she probably already knows the secret.”

Mo Lin glanced at Wang Yue’s notebook, where “10th” was circled in red.

He smiled: “Seems like you’re not that dumb.”

Wang Yue scratched his head, thinking: What on earth is going on?

Wang Yue went to find Xiao Ze, who was busy reviewing case files and had no time to listen to his analysis.

He then went to find Li Meng, who thought he was overthinking.

Then he went to find Meng Lan, who patted his shoulder: “Don’t think about it. If even Teacher Mo can’t guess, do you think you can?”

Wang Yue felt very frustrated. Just then, Gu Yuan came out of his office to get coffee. Wang Yue was a bit afraid of Gu Yuan, but he desperately needed someone to support him, so he went up to say hello.

“Gu Yuan… why do you think Wang Zhongming transferred money to Qin Wei on the day Ye Nian got pregnant?”

Gu Yuan glanced at him: “Maybe… the child is Qin Wei’s.”

Gu Yuan’s words shocked Wang Yue: “No… no way! Didn’t they meet for the first time at Gangfu Seafood? They don’t know each other, how could the child be Qin Wei’s?!”

“Do they have to know each other?” Gu Yuan said, “Sperm can survive outside the body for a while.”

Gu Yuan’s words suddenly enlightened Wang Yue: “You mean… Wang Zhongming bought Qin Wei’s sperm?!”

“Didn’t want to go to the hospital for IVF, so came up with this method.” Gu Yuan sipped his coffee: “That’s just my guess.”

Wang Yue was still in a daze, but with this analysis, everything seemed to make sense. Why Qin Wei said Wang Zhongming had to kill him, and why Qin Wei had to keep the secret…

Wang Zhongming, with his strong possessiveness, wouldn’t want the child’s biological father alive!

Qin Wei keeping the secret and protecting his offspring was also reasonable.

As for why he risked going to Gangfu Seafood to meet Ye Nian… did he fall for Ye Nian during this process?

Or did he simply want to see the child’s mother?

Wang Yue tried to think about the whole case from Qin Wei’s perspective…

The reason he killed Wang Zhongming wasn’t just self-preservation, but also jealousy… Jealous of Wang Zhongming’s successful career and beautiful wife. Even though Wang Zhongming made such a shameless request, Qin Wei had to compromise for money to survive…

All these complex emotions drove him to crime!

Gu Yuan left with his coffee, leaving Wang Yue standing there in chaos.

After composing himself, Wang Yue called Ye Nian: “Do you still want the child?”

Ye Nian: “I want to keep it. After all, it’s my child, and my only attachment in this world.”

If the investigation continued, Ye Nian might not be able to bear the public’s scorn and would have to abort the child.

“What if the child isn’t Wang Zhongming’s, would you still keep it?”

There was a long silence on the other end before Ye Nian slowly exhaled: “No matter whose child it is… I will keep it. Please don’t disturb me anymore, and don’t defame Wang Zhongming. I’ve accepted this outcome…”

Wang Yue finally understood why Teacher Mo remained silent, and what he meant by “seems like you’re not that dumb”…

If the truth brings pain, then what’s the point of pursuing it…

Author’s Note: ~This chapter seeks comments (poor author)