CH 121

The police were still nervously investigating the death of the control room’s duty officer, Barry Johnson.

Every guest that stayed in Hanjin Garden Hotel was a somebody. Fa Wang District Police didn’t dare to take it lightly, practically utilising their entire force for this investigation whilst looking into the intruder who broke into room 406. 

The progress of their investigation was kept under wraps. The police didn’t allow any word of it to be divulged to the public, lest they ended up spooking the perpetrator.

Many paparazzi and reporters continued to camp outside throughout it all, but the police officers in the hotel had their guards drawn high, each keeping their mouths sealed.

Hanjin Garden Hotel was particularly lively and particularly silent the entire afternoon.

There were more people than usual, yet the atmosphere was even more dead than usual. 

It was only when dinner came around that this atmosphere finally let up a bit.

The police seemed to have narrowed their list of suspects, and many guests were allowed back their freedom of movement.

A small number among them was very squeamish about incidents involving the loss of human lives and weren’t willing to dally in the hotel for a second more. They kicked up a fuss in hopes of departing the venue, yet were blocked off at the courtyard by Chief Xiao.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we certainly don’t wish to detain you,” Chief Xiao said. “But the fact is that there are some eccentricities about this case. In view of your personal safeties, please refrain from leaving at night. If you must, it’d be best for you to choose to leave tomorrow.”

Those guests, dissatisfied, gave him hell in the courtyard.

With a face as dead as a coffin, Chief Xiao said, “I thank every one of you for your well-wishes on the behalf of my ancestors, but I still have to advise you to extend your stay for a night. The people under the most pressure are actually us from the police department, because this implies that we have the responsibility to ensure your safety on this night to hold accountable to my words. There’s no point in bringing trouble on myself for nothing; it’s really only out of consideration for you that I’m doing this.”

His words convinced most of them, and only three guests insisted on leaving in the end. The rest chose to leave the next morning instead.

But those whose backgrounds held more sway, perhaps inured to these disturbances, each remained exceptionally calm, dining and conversing over drinks as per usual. 

Joe slumped over the railing from the second floor, watching the laughing and chatting crowd downstairs, and snorted. “Look at this. You wouldn’t be able to tell at all from their faces that someone had just died in the morning.”

Gu Yan stood next to him with his gaze cast down, indifferently sweeping the crowd. “That’s normal.”

It wasn’t their first time dealing with these people; they knew their temperaments like the back of their hand.

“Vfglberis veii,” Tbecu Zjrafg Abf tjv cfnfg yffc jyif ab wlz lc klat atfw. “Po sbe ajxf tewjc ilof rb ilutais, atfc sbeg ilof lr wfjclcuifrr. Ktja Jtlfo Wljb lr qgbyjyis raeqlv lc atf tfjv. Oewqlcu atlr vfc bo kbinfr obg j vjs wbgf kbeiv bcis rqfii agbeyif; kts vbc’a atfs pera vlrqfgrf fnfgsbcf jrjq?” 

Gu Yan slid him a sidelong glance.

This stupid dolt actually still enjoyed ridiculing others.

“Some of them haven’t been cleared of suspicion,” Gu Yan said.

It wasn’t convenient for the police to say this outright lest anyone took offence to it. As such, they used the lack of safety as an excuse to have more people stay behind. 

First, this wouldn’t easily startle the other party, and secondly, if they were ultimately cleared of suspicion, the police wouldn’t have to worry about them making a scene.

“Is that how it is?” Joe asked.

He was chatting with someone on his smart device during this, occasionally moving his fingers to send a response.

“I’m speaking from experience,” Gu Yan said. 

At a sofa booth a short distance behind them, Yan Suizhi was unhurriedly eating his dinner.

Ke Jin was quietly seated next to him, appearing to be in fairly good condition.

Joe glanced back. “Truth be told, I was rather envious a while back, wondering, how could an intern be so likeable? Even Ke Jin showed special interest in him. But I get it now… it makes me happy, actually. Because it says that Ke Jin is sharper than me in some areas, and maybe one day he’ll suddenly get better.”

His smart device vibrated again. Joe bit his tongue and glanced down, exasperated. 

He pithily responded to it, obviously fobbing the other off. Then, he asked Gu Yan, “By the way, I’ve been curious—when exactly did you find out that he’s the dean? You couldn’t have recognised him at first sight, did you? Which was why you took him on as your intern?”

Gu Yan, “No.”

No matter how obsessed he was, it wouldn’t be to the point where he would suspect the other party was Yan Suizhi just by very slight similarities in appearance.

Gu Yan thought back to what happened that day. “I really disliked him the first time I met him at the law firm.” 

He disliked anyone who resembled Yan Suizhi, because no matter how similar they looked, those people weren’t Yan Suizhi, yet would always make him recall Yan Suizhi.

It felt too agonising. No one would like that.

“Are you being serious?” Joe said.

“Yeah, I am.” Gu Yan leaned against a pillar, glancing at Yan Suizhi, then said evenly, “I was very opposed to it when Fitz first arranged for him to be under me. I was set on finding a reason to send him out of my sight, as far away from me as possible.” 

Seized by such thoughts and emotions, he behaved more erratically that day, in a manner that was rather unlike him.

“Then why did you decide to make an exception and keep him?” Joe was curious.

“Because I saw his miserable asset balance,” Gu Yan said.

“Oh, I should have known,” Joe said. “You’ve always been soft-hearted.” 

Gu Yan didn’t speak.

Soft-hearted?

Maybe.

It was just that when he saw that asset balance, he couldn’t help but imagine if Yan Suizhi had really encountered such a situation, not a penny on him and being rebuffed everywhere… and suddenly he found it hard to bear. 

“So it actually took you a while before you recognised him, right?” Joe spoke, then nodded, satisfied. “I feel better now. My powers of observation are still passable in view of that.”

“Not quite. I already began to have doubts later that day. A similarity in temperament alone could be passed off as coincidence, but on the occasions that he slipped up, his speech mannerisms were too similar. It was uncanny.”

Joe, “…Fine. After going around in circles, I’m still the dumbest.”

Gu Yan shot him a sidelong glance. 

Joe craned his neck back and quickly averted his gaze again, then went back to fiddling with his smart device.

They continued to chat idly.

When Gu Yan leisurely finished the glass of wine in his hand, he suddenly spoke, “You’ve been holding it in the whole afternoon already. What do you want to ask him?”

“What?” Exposed all of a sudden, Joe rebutted by reflex, but then sighed. “Alright. How did you know I’ve got questions for him?” 

“…During the five minutes that we stood here, you glanced over no less than ten times, during which you went into a daze and bit your fingernails once, also that you never stopped using your smart device,” Gu Yan couldn’t keep himself from snapping back. “Fortunately, I have eyes.”

In other words, anyone would be able to tell, as long as they weren’t blind.

“Geez… it’s my sis, Ms Eunice! She might have been stimulated from the call in the afternoon and has now latched onto me to discuss the stuff Old Fox used to be involved in,” Joe said. “As for the dean… I do have questions to ask.”

As Joe spoke, he turned back to glance at the booth again, coincidentally meeting Yan Suizhi’s eyes right then. 

Yan Suizhi. “?”

Joe immediately chickened out, averting his gaze. With his back facing the booth, he bumped his shoulder against Gu Yan. “Actually, asking you is more or less the same. Do you know what medical cases the dean has handled? From long ago.”

“As far as I know, there was only one case.” Gu Yan said.

Joe clutched his head, looking frustrated. “So it’s the case that you wrote an analysis about? Say, do you think he’ll be unhappy if I went up to him and asked him for details?” 

After all, that case had sparked a lot of criticism against Yan Suizhi at that time. Under such circumstances, very rarely would people be happy to be reminded of the past.