Turbid Light

At five in the morning, a rainstorm began. Xun Muke took off his glasses and placed the photo upside down on the table, letting the rain soak the wood. His computer played the reporter's interrogation of Xu Jiaming on a loop, rewinding to forty-eight hours earlier.

The forged will bought him time, and Xu Jiaming quickly took up residence at Mingzhu Fashion, plotting how to subdue dissidents. However, trouble was like a sensible sparrow, only visiting at the most crucial moment. A swarm of reporters gathered downstairs at the company, and Li Qiuqi's parents also added fuel to the fire. Public opinion shifted from Xu Mingwei's death to the disappearance of the girlfriend of Xu Jiaming, the current head of Mingzhu Fashion.

Her parents were back, using the reporters to complain bitterly, determined to force Xu Jiaming to return their daughter to them. He thought he could hear the commotion from the eighteenth floor below. An assistant came in to ask if any action should be taken. After much hesitation, Xu Jiaming finally asked Li Qiuqi's parents to come up.

Li Qiuqi's parents are both workers. Their sad faces are full of harshness, and they speak lines that are familiar to him.

"Give us the money, and Li Qiuqi will be yours."

They didn't care about Li Qiuqi's whereabouts at all, they just treated their "daughter" as a commodity and wanted to sell her for a good price.

Xu Jiaming was almost laughing out of anger. They had used this trick many times and said the same thing every time, but no matter how much money he gave them, they would still come after a while.

He knew about Li Qiuqi's family situation before they were together. At that time, he only regarded Li Qiuqi's original family as a shortcut to pursue her emotions, but he didn't expect that this family was so difficult to deal with.

"I said I won't give you any more money." Xu Jiaming supported his head, looking very tired.

"Then don't blame us for talking nonsense. You lost our Qiu Qi. We are going to call the police."

Xu Jiaming smiled contemptuously, indicating that it was casual.

Li Qiuqi's parents were furious and immediately slammed the table, "Aren't you afraid we'll sue you for human trafficking?"

"Oh, but did I sell her?" Xu Jiaming was not intimidated by his uneducated parents. "I didn't. You sold her to me. Do you need me to show you the documents?"

From the second time he gave them money, Xu Jiaming realized that he could not keep giving them money to appease them, so he drafted an agreement and asked them to sign it. After signing, they would get 200,000 yuan, and Li Qiuqi would no longer have anything to do with them.

He saved Li Qiuqi and rescued her from her cannibalistic home.

"You!" The woman glared, "After all, I'm Qiuqi's mother. Do you really want to watch your mother-in-law kneel down and beg you?"

"Just help us one more time. It's just a hundred thousand. Just a hundred thousand. You have such a big company, a hundred thousand is not a problem."

Their attitude softened.

Xu Jiaming was already fed up. He scratched his ears and said nonchalantly, "Who said I'm going to marry Li Qiuqi?"

The woman's pupils shrank, and she rushed forward to strangle him with anger. "You bastard! You're playing with my daughter's feelings! I will never let you go!"

Soon, the security guard at the door dragged the two out. Xu Jiaming grabbed his collar and coughed. Before he could catch his breath, he heard footsteps at the door again. "Didn't I tell them to get out?"

But the person who came was not a familiar face to him.

The assistant brought over the brewed Pu'er tea. The man in front of him had an overpowering aura, and looking into his eyes made him feel guilty.

"Any clues about my father's case?" Xu Jiaming broke the deadlock first.

Chen An took out three photos and asked, "Do you recognize these three people?"

A month ago, Xu Mingwei decided to set up an ice sculpture hall in Changjie Department Store for publicity. After that, the department outsourced the carving work to the Fuyi Ice Sculpture Team. They then investigated the ice sculpture team and learned that there were three main people who carved this ice sculpture, Chen Mu, Feng Zou and Wei Qiang.

Xu Jiaming looked at these photos carefully. In his eyes, there was no difference between these people. They all looked like poor people like Li Qiuqi's parents.

He shook his head. "I don't know him."

Chen An put away the photo and changed the subject, "I just heard you arguing with someone."

Xu Jiaming didn't really want to bring up the matter, so he vaguely brushed it off, "Ah... a couple I helped."

"You know, a little kindness can turn into a grudge. Once they tasted the sweetness, they started to spread rumors outside and forced me to continue to help them. I had no choice." Xu Jiaming pretended to be helpless.

It was difficult for a 20-year-old college student to pretend to be mature in front of the police. Even though Chen An had seen through his poor acting skills and was sure that he was hiding something, he was not in a hurry to expose him.

The long silence forced Xu Jiaming to repeatedly wonder whether the other party had seen through his lies. It didn't take long before Xu Jiaming wanted to escape.

"If nothing else..."

"Don't you want to ask your father?" Chen An interrupted him at the right time.

"It's been so long, and you don't care about the real cause of your father's death?"

Xu Jiaming's face looked very ugly. He seemed to be back in that alley, and in front of him, a large area of ​​white covered the ground like a stiff corpse.

"How...did he die?" He raised his head, but his gaze subconsciously fell below Chen An's eyes.

He didn't dare to look at her.

Chen An said: "He was electrocuted."

"Really?" Xu Jiaming's face remained stiff. "The electric current lasts only a moment, so it shouldn't be too painful."

Chen An thought his attitude was strange.

"You and your father don't seem to have a very good relationship."

Xu Jiaming said: "Indeed, he has not fulfilled his duties as a father. I have nothing to say to him."

Chen An said, "We found undigested fluoxetine in his stomach. Do you understand your father's physical condition?"

"What?" Xu Jiaming found it amusing. "I'm not familiar with him. Other than the fact that he was ill and hospitalized last year, I know nothing else. You should ask Huo Iris and her two bastards about that. They have a much better relationship with Xu Mingwei than I do."

Chen An nodded and then left.

Xu Mingwei's death is extremely suspicious. His medical records show no history of depression, nor any prescriptions for medications like fluoxetine, the origin of which is unknown. The original crime scene has not been found, nor have the three ice sculptors. Citywide surveillance footage reveals scant traces of Xu Mingwei since his release from the hospital. Aside from Xu Jiaming's somewhat strange reaction, nothing else has been discovered.

In the afternoon, he met Huo Iris and her two sons as he had said. Unlike Xu Jiaming's domineering personality, the other two sons of the Xu family were much more timid. Huo Iris knew this, so no matter what Chen An asked, she would be the first to answer.

During the conversation, Chen An mentioned Xu Mingwei's first wife. Xu Jiahe, who had been silent for a long time, said: "Muqiu's death was not an accident."

Huo Iris became nervous and pinched his arm. Xu Jiahe lowered his head and said nothing.

"Just kid, you're talking nonsense. We didn't have these two children when his ex-wife died." Huo Iris tried to make amends in a panic.

She didn't want the police to dwell on this point, so she gave another piece of information, "Lao Xu has a few rivals in the business world, and their relationship has deteriorated in recent years. Lao Xu held a banquet to ease the tension, and several of them met. Maybe..."

Her hint couldn't be more obvious.

"when?"

Huo Iris knew very little about business, so she called her secretary when she couldn't recall anything. According to the secretary, the banquet was held a few days after Xu Mingwei was discharged from the hospital.

"Do you know where he has been since he was released from the hospital?"

"Uh... I'm not taking care of him." Huo Iris said with some shame. Now she followed Xu Mingwei mainly because of the money. She and Xu Mingwei no longer had the same feelings as before. "He has a caregiver to take care of him. Usually he only goes between home and the company. Oh, he also goes to Changtang Courtyard. If you can't find him, you can go there to look for him."

"Longtang Courtyard?"

"Changtang Courtyard was built by his ex-wife, and the last banquet was also held in Changtang Courtyard. It's considered his secret base, very secluded."

Chen An took the banquet list back with him and just left the building, he received a call from Cheng Xiaoxiang. Li Qiuqi's parents had gone to the Municipal Bureau, crying and begging the police to help them find their daughter. Cheng Xiaoxiang looked up the records and found that the couple had reported the case two months ago. The report was registered at Li Qiuqi's school, and the matter was also resolved by the school's police station.

However, the parents' attitude changed too quickly. Sometimes they said they had found their daughter, and sometimes they said they hadn't found her yet. They begged the police station to continue looking for their daughter. The police station was fed up with their trouble, so they called the Municipal Bureau and exposed the relationship between Li Qiuqi and the deceased's son.

From the parents' mouths, Cheng Xiaoxiang roughly pieced together the story of Li Qiuqi and Xu Jiaming.

Li Qiuqi is the eldest daughter in the family and has two younger brothers. Living in a family that favors boys over girls, Li Qiuqi's only remaining value is to create wealth for her two younger brothers. For this reason, Li Qiuqi's parents often criticize their daughter. On the one hand, they hope that she will be admitted to a prestigious university and receive a generous scholarship, and on the other hand, they instill in her the idea that it is more useful to be with a rich man than to be admitted to a university.

They knew very well that their daughter was pretty. After realizing that Li Qiuqi's grades were not good enough to get her into top universities like Peking University and Tsinghua University, they focused on finding a rich husband for her.

After the college entrance examination, Li Qiuqi did not get into Peking University or Tsinghua University, and only got into a bottom-ranked 211 university. Her parents decided not to support her schooling anymore, so strange men would visit her home every now and then, and she was forced to sit on the other side and accept the man's picky demands.

Even though he was fat and had no merits, and he only had the money to marry her thanks to his family's support, he kept criticizing her appearance and personality, and even arbitrarily judging her ability to have a son. Finally, she couldn't stand it anymore and begged Xu Jiaming to take her away, and this boyfriend really did take her away.

Li Qiuqi left a sum of money to her parents and decided not to have any more contact with them.

She gave up the 211 university and followed Xu Jiaming's advice to go to the same school as Xu Jiaming.

It was a great shame that their daughter ran away with someone else. Li Qiuqi's parents cursed at the Municipal Bureau without caring about their image, and they just blamed their daughter for not giving them enough money and bringing shame to them.

At the end of last year, they learned of Li Qiuqi's whereabouts from Li Qiuqi's high school classmates. They rushed from the countryside without stopping, but found that Li Qiuqi was missing.

"Then why didn't you insist on looking for her?"

"What's the point of looking for her? We looked for her to ask for money. Her boyfriend ran out of money, so she came home with us. She will naturally have money after she gets married." Li Qiuqi's father accidentally said what was in his heart.

Cheng Xiaoxiang's face looked very bad, and the notebook made a loud noise when it was placed on the table. The two of them immediately changed their words.

"Of course, we're definitely worried about her. A girl like her, not coming home for Chinese New Year, doesn't that just prove she ran off with someone? I can't even hold my head up during Chinese New Year!"