CH 117

Yan Suizhi leaned next to the door, leisurely pressing the floor they were headed to, almost casually replying, “Yeah, it’s quite weird.”

Gu Yan eyed the back of the policeman’s head, not adding more. 

These two people were always unflustered, so much that even Young Master Joe hadn’t perceived anything odd.

He mumbled to himself a bit, and the elevator reached their floor.

This officer looked professional and didn’t really converse with them unless it was for official business.

He was the first to enter the elevator and the last to exit, maintaining an austere face of professionalism the whole way through. 

The butler waiting outside the elevator bowed when he saw them, then entered the passcode at the electronic door.

The policeman swept a glance down the corridor, locating the entrances and exits of the floor as well as the security access, then asked the butler, “Are you in charge of this floor?”

“Are you referring to housekeeping or security?”

“Both.”

“Housekeeping is my chief responsibility, but security is under the purview of a dedicated security team. Six to eight people would usually be assigned to deluxe floors like this, but due to the incident, they’re now having an emergency meeting downstairs.”

The policeman nodded and asked, “Where are the security guards usually stationed?”

“At the elevator door, the electronic passcode-protected door, and next to the security access passageway. Primarily these three locations,” the butler said.

“What about you? Are you here around the clock?” 

The butler pointed at a single room at the end of the corridor. “I usually stay in there, so I’m basically on-call at any hour.”

The policeman nodded. “So, someone would always notice if anyone entered or left this floor, right?”

“I’d suppose so.”

“Alright, thank you,” the policeman said. 

The passcode-protected door opened. The butler swept his hand out, bowing slightly, and after escorting Joe and the others through the door, stayed outside himself.

“Do you mind if I start with taking a look at the layout of the suite?” the policeman asked Joe. It was discernible from the conversation just now that this suite was his.

Joe nodded. “Sure, go ahead.”

He settled Ke Jin on the sofa in the living room, his gaze tailing the policeman curiously. “Do we count as suspects? I’ve come across a few cases in the past, but they didn’t seem to take my statements this seriously as I wasn’t on their list of suspects.” 

The policeman opened the work interface on his smart device, making a few simple notes, explaining, “It might be differences in work culture. The demands of different police stations may vary a bit. Our chief expects us to make detailed notes, not because there’s any suspicion on you. I might have to take a few photographs, if you’re amenable to that?”

Joe shrugged. “Help yourself to anything you need to do.”

“Thank you.”

The policeman circled the large room, capturing it with his smart device as he did. 

“I’m done,” the policeman scanned the room. “Is there somewhere convenient for me to take the statement? Will the sofas do?”

“Of course.”

The policeman turned on his recording device and set it on the coffee table. “First, tell me what time you arrived at this hotel.”

Joe, “Yesterday evening; around four or five, thereabout?” 

Gu Yan, “4:50 p.m.”

The policeman was thrown. “You remember it that clearly?”

The young policeman’s occupational disease kicked in. When encountering such an unexpected response, a whiff of suspicion would be stirred.

Yan Suizhi thought back to the day he first entered the law firm, saying with his eyes crinkled into a smile, “My teacher has an ironclad law that he must arrive ten minutes earlier than the appointed time.” 

The policeman, “Oh?”

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“…”

Yan Suizhi’s hand, which had picked up his glass of water, paused. He glanced at Young Master Joe askew, thinking, Nonsense, I never had this nasty habit myself.

The policeman nodded. “Oh, that makes sense. So, the reception last night began at 5 p.m.?”

“Yeah.” 

“About the arrival timing… were all of you together?” the policeman asked.

“We met at the entrance,” Joe spoke without any sense of self-preservation. “To be precise, it was because I knew about Gu’s habit that I made sure to arrive at that time to bump into him.”

“Then, were you always at the reception the entire time afterwards?”

“Yes, in the glass-domed garden we were just at.” 

“Did you separate in the middle of it?”

Joe blinked. “Does going to the washroom count? I made three trips?”

The policeman had probably asked the question out of habit, but since Young Master Joe was being so cooperative, he went along with it, asking, “Did you go alone?”

Joe shook his head. “No, I was with Ke Jin.” 

The policeman, “…”

He moved his electronic pen, making a few empty strokes in the air above the page, perhaps a bit unsure of how to record this.

“Err… then what about you?” The policeman silently shifted his target, asking Yan Suizhi and Gu Yan.

Yan Suizhi very naturally cast a questioning gaze at Gu Yan. “Twice?” 

The policeman, “…” Why do you have to ask others for this…

His pen twitched. He didn’t know what he ought to write.

Very fortunately, Yan Suizhi continued to add, “We didn’t drink much last night. We only went last night because I wanted to wash my hands. It’s a little dull to go alone.”

The policeman, “…” 

That wasn’t the point? How interesting could washing hands get???

“What time did the reception end?” The policeman felt a dire need to jump across the topic of going to the washroom.

“Around ten?” Joe said.

“Then you returned here?” The policeman asked Gu Yan and Yan Suizhi. “In between, did you go to the front mansion? What I mean is, since that was the original arrangement, did you leave your luggage there? Or did you come here directly?” 

“We went by to take a look at the room,” Yan Suizhi said, “but I didn’t leave my luggage there.”

“So, room 406 was actually unoccupied, right?”

“Pretty much.”

The policeman nodded and jotted it down. “Then did you encounter any trouble lately? For example, did you accidentally offend or provoke anyone? Or things of similar nature?” 

In his head, the esteemed Professor Yan went, Oh, loads.

But, on the surface, he shook his head with a smile, “Do I look like someone who easily offends others?”

The policeman hastened to say, “That’s not what I mean.”

“Erm… which room did each of you stay in last night?” 

Joe pointed at them. “This one, this one, and that one. These two rooms.”

“There’s four of you but you used three rooms?” the policeman asked. “How were they assigned?”

Joe, “We were drinking together. The intern stayed over there, and Ke Jin in this one. But why do you ask this? It doesn’t have anything to do with the case, no?”

At this, Yan Suizhi glanced at Young Master Joe with considerable surprise. 

He likely said this in consideration of the impact that having excessively close relations between a lawyer and an intern would have on Gu Yan’s image.

This young master was often slapdash in nature, but he expended all of his attentiveness on Ke Jin and Gu Yan.

The policeman didn’t probe further after being questioned by Joe but changed the subject. “According to police records, you were the one who noticed the light in room 406, is that correct?”

“Yeah.” Joe pointed at his bedroom. “Right in front of the window. I noticed it when I walked by. You’ve checked the layout just now too; it’s very easy to look across at the other side.” 

“Then, all of you also went to the surveillance room, am I correct?”

“Yep. I wanted to find out what was going on,” Joe said, “lest I end up losing sleep over it.”

“So you were also the ones who noticed the problem with the surveillance footage?”

“Mn.” 

The policeman asked some more general questions about the time frame and what they knew about the movements of others from last night until now.

He looked particularly serious, asking whatever that he could think of, meticulously taking their statements. Then, approximately two hours later when the butler served lunch, he got up. “Alright, thank you for your cooperation.”

Before leaving, the policeman asked them again, “Did you really not run into any trouble? If you have any guesses, you can tell me. After all, if you hadn’t changed your accommodations last minute, it could have been a different story today. I think that this might be associated with you.”

“I’m baffled as well.” Yan Suizhi said, “But… maybe that person was just trying to find an empty room to crash?” 

The policeman seemed a bit grudging still, but he eventually nodded. “If there’s a need in the coming days, we may need your further cooperation.”

“Sure.”

“Additionally, my colleagues are still taking statements for the other guests. For the time being, don’t leave your floor in the afternoon.”

With experience from Yaba Island, Joe nodded obligingly. “Got it.” 

The policeman left after instructing them on this.

They had lunch in the suite.

As it wasn’t convenient for guests to leave their rooms, the hotel’s many recreational facilities were temporarily unavailable and they were unable to proceed with the scheduled main event.

Joe set Ke Jin down on the most comfortable spot in the sunlit living room, then got on the treadmill in boredom, continuing the exercise that got interrupted in the morning. 

Gu Yan and Yan Suizhi, on the other hand, were sitting on the sofa, reading case files.

Joe adjusted the treadmill to a high speed, his mouth unable to shut up even as he jogged. “That policeman—taking the statements—really had—an unusual amount—of questions.”

As he was running, the rhythm of his speech was broken up, interspersed with his breathing.

“He’s obviously digging for information,” Yan Suizhi said. 

“No wonder—you guys—spoke so little—during the statement,” Joe unconsciously replied.

And after replying, he suddenly perceived something wrong again.

“Digging for information? What information?” Joe was perplexed.

More accurately, most people wouldn’t feel that the other party was digging for information just because they asked more than necessary, no? Unless there really was something to dig. 

All of a sudden, Joe noticed that there, in fact, were many suspicious points about this.

For example, why was an intern’s room the target? Unless there was something special about this intern…

For example, why was the intern so wary of the policeman’s inquisitiveness? What was there to be wary about? Unless there was something being kept under wraps…

Something special? Being kept under wraps? 

Joe thought back carefully…

Hss. The day-to-day incidents didn’t seem like much on an individual basis, but when he linked them all together now, he suddenly realised that this intern was more than just a little bit special. It seemed that ever since he appeared, there was nothing commonplace about him…

He had nothing that an intern should have and everything that an intern shouldn’t.

He frequently spoke up even before Gu Yan did; how did he seem remotely like an intern at all? 

Also, the countless anomalies that Gu Yan showed because of him…

He had always assumed that Gu Yan would only crack when it came to Dean Yan, but who would have known—

Young Master Joe’s brain abruptly froze at this thought.

Could it really be that easy for Gu Yan to shift his attention after fixating on the dean for ten years? 

It was as if that after the intern appeared, Gu Yan had a different attitude towards the explosion case, just as though…

Huh????????

Wait—!

Joe was gobsmacked. 

A shocking conjecture suddenly spawned in his head!

While it was very completely ludicrous, if his guess was right, then everything would make sense…

In that split second, Joe attained enlightenment.

This was Joe’s first time experiencing this. It felt as though someone had dunked a bottle of cold beer over his head. 

With a head full of ice, he looked at the two people on the sofa discussing a case, tentatively calling out in a trance, “…Dean Yan?”

Then, he saw that intern, without even lifting his head, reply, “Speak.”

Joe, “………………………………………………”

Right after giving this response, the intern suddenly came to, lifting his head and softly uttering “ah, my bad.” 

But his apology was pointless now.

Young Master Joe was already struck dumb.

His entire person froze.

Tragedies always struck without warning. 

His entire person had frozen, but the treadmill was still running.

And so, his centre of gravity skewed—with a loud thump, the treadmill sent him staggering to his knees on the ground.

Even then, a look of ‘dafaq?’ was still plastered across his face.