Chapter 77 Doubts

When Lin arrived at the scene, the cordon had been set up and the police officers were conducting the investigation and trace inspection in an orderly manner.

Someone came forward to greet him. Lin Yu nodded slightly and asked him, "Tell me about the general situation."

After scanning the room, the officer said, "The death occurred in the bathroom. The first witness and the person who reported the case was the housekeeper, Luo Xia."

He pointed to a middle-aged woman leaning against the wall and said helplessly, "But her mental state is not very stable now..."

Lin Yu looked over there and looked Luo Xia up and down. She was a very plain woman, about fifty years old, wearing a navy blue work suit. After seeing Lin Yu, she hurriedly wiped away her tears, her cuffs were soaked with dark water, and she hunched her shoulders, trying her best to suppress her panic.

Lin Yu retracted his gaze and walked straight to the bathroom. "Find a female colleague to help calm you down. I'll go check on the body."

The strong smell of blood mixed with the stench of water went straight into his nostrils. Lin Yu pulled the strap of his mask and walked to forensic doctor Yang to watch him perform the examination.

The ceiling light cast a large golden glow in the bathroom. The broken glass on the floor tiles reflected messy spots of light. The rusty red blood foam emitted a foul odor. The thick black hair like seaweed entangled Zheng Yunqing's no longer beautiful face. Her eyes were closed tightly, forming a hideous line.

His solemn gaze shifted from the corpse to the forensic doctor's face. "What's the situation?"

"There are no external injuries to the body. The direct cause of death was drowning." The forensic doctor looked up at him and pointed at the body in the bathtub. "There is blood foam in front of the mouth and nose, and the livor mortis is light red. These are all signs of drowning. The internal cause requires further investigation."

"The bathroom heater was on, and the bath was probably hot water. These external factors may cause errors in the time of death, but based on my experience, it is estimated to be no more than four days. The specific details need to be further investigated by the police station."

Lin Yu nodded and reminded him: "Check carefully and don't miss any suspicious points."

Before leaving the bathroom, he glanced at the scene again, sighed silently, and planned to ask Luo Xia for her testimony.

When I passed by the living room, I inadvertently saw a plate of pizza on the dining table. The dry and wrinkled dough and dehydrated vegetable ingredients showed that it was not fresh, and there was no sign of being eaten.

Out of some intuition, Lin Yu walked over, and when he saw the delivery note stuck on the cardboard box, a light flashed in his eyes.

The takeaway order recorded the order time: it was delivered at 9:25 pm three days ago. The delivery person was Li Ying.

After putting the list into the evidence bag, he walked over to Luo Xia, who was wiping her tears. After a moment's hesitation, he asked her, "What time did you arrive here? Was there anyone else in the room at the time? Was there anything unusual?"

Luo Xia shook her head repeatedly. "I arrived at nine o'clock sharp. I didn't see anyone else in the room. What was unusual..." She frowned, trying to recall, "I vaguely sensed an indescribable stench."

The body had been soaked for too long and had a foul smell. After hearing her mention this, Lin Yu nodded in understanding, "Then, how did you find her in the bathroom?"

"I was planning to say hello to Miss Zheng and clean up, but she didn't respond. Plus, she usually gets up late, so I thought she was still asleep." At this point, she looked a little embarrassed, and her tone was much lowered. "My stomach has been feeling bad these past few days, so I planned to go to the bathroom."

The toilet and bathroom in a single-person apartment are usually designed in the same place, separated only by frosted glass.

"So you went into the bathroom." Lin Yu paused for a moment before continuing to ask, "You saw Zheng Yunqing's body, right?"

Luo Xia nodded with lingering fear, and after taking two deep breaths, she continued, "The door was locked at the time, and I thought Miss Zheng was inside. About an hour later, I didn't hear any movement, and no one responded when I called out. I went into the bedroom and saw that no one was there, and the foul smell seemed to be coming from the bathroom. I was a little scared at the time, so I opened the door with the spare key and saw Miss Zheng lying in the bathtub!"

Recalling that horrific scene, her eyelids began to tremble uncontrollably and two lines of hot tears came out.

After asking about the general situation, Lin Yu secretly breathed a sigh of relief, speculating on Luo Xia's eyewitness testimony. The forensic doctor came over and reported the situation: "There are no external injuries on the body, and there are no signs of intrusion in the bathroom. It is a closed secret room, so the possibility of suicide cannot be ruled out."

"Drown yourself in the bathtub?" Lin Yu raised an eyebrow, thinking this was nonsense. He said solemnly, "As long as we have the key, we can create the illusion of a secret room and do a thorough trace inspection."

The medical examiner nodded and said, "I understand. Fingerprint collection and DNA sampling have been processed. Once we return to the bureau, a detailed autopsy investigation should reveal new clues."

"Thank you for your hard work, Forensic Doctor Yang."

"It's all what we should do." Yang Li waved his hand. "I'll go take care of the transfer of the bodies."

After Yang Li left, Lin Yu stood there in thought for a while, then looked at the pizza again. Thinking of the name Li Ying, he felt that this would be a breakthrough. After a while, he walked into the bedroom to check the situation.

The furnishings in the bedroom were neatly arranged, and it could be seen that Zheng Yunqing was a careful and rigorous person. After Lin Yu saw a row of medicines on the bedside table, he leaned over and took a quick look at the names of the medicines and recognized metoprolol and paroxetine, which were two commonly used antidepressants.

"Captain Lin, are there any problems with these medicines?" Seeing him pause for a long time, the officer from the Technical Investigation Division came over, took a look at the medicine bottles, and asked him, "Do you need to pack them up and take them back for inspection?"

Lin Yu nodded, "Take photos first, then put them into the evidence bag according to the original arrangement order."

"Okay." The officer carefully sorted the medicines, but couldn't help but say, "This person must have obsessive-compulsive disorder."

Medicine bottles of different sizes were neatly arranged, each with a label indicating the dosage and time of administration.

Lin Yu's scrutinizing eyes scanned the labels. After a moment, he leaned over and checked the date sequence on the labels again. Then, he picked out a bottle of medicine and said, "Put this in a separate bag."

After the investigation and evidence collection were completed, the forensic doctor also dealt with the situation of the body. The broken glass shards on the bathroom floor were put into an evidence bag for fingerprint checking. Lin Yu took the police officers back to the Criminal Investigation Bureau.

After Qin Zhenyang saw Lin Yu walk into the department, he stepped forward to ask about the situation, "How did he die?"

Lin Yu walked to the water dispenser and filled a half-cup of cold water. After drinking it, he became more lucid and said, "The forensic doctor's initial diagnosis was drowning, but I think it's definitely not that simple."

He taped photos of the scene to a whiteboard, pointed to the one in the bathroom, and stated his opinion, "Although the scene was a secret room, the housekeeper or property management had the key. They could have reconstructed a closed space after the murder. Medical Examiner Yang mentioned the possibility of suicide, but I don't agree."

"Suicide?" Qin Zhenyang also shook his head, agreeing with Lin Yu's opinion. "Zheng Yunqing's background was already complicated, and her death at this particular time must be suspicious. Have you checked the surveillance video? Is there anything suspicious at the scene? Have you communicated with the person who reported the crime?"

Lin Yu shook his head. "The surveillance footage cannot be reviewed because it's overwritten for seven days."

"Then there's no way to know who she came into contact with before she died?" Qin Zhenyang knocked on the table and sighed. "You mentioned that the housekeeper had the key. Do you suspect her?"

Lin Yu couldn't deny her words. He took out two photos from the evidence bag and posted them on the whiteboard. He pointed at Luo Xia's and said, "The eyewitness is Luo Xia, the housekeeper. She has the room key, which means she can enter the scene at any time."

Under Qin Zhenyang's gaze, he pointed to the photo of the takeout order and said, "Forensic Doctor Yang said the time of death should not have been more than four days. This delivery driver, Li Ying, may have come into contact with Zheng Yunqing herself three days ago."

Qin Zhenyang nodded. "So the most suspicious ones right now are Luo Xia and Li Ying, right?"

Lin Yu propped his hands on the workstation railing to maintain some balance and nodded in agreement. "I'm still waiting for the autopsy report and the fingerprint comparison results from the Technical Investigation Department."

"But the fact that Zheng Yunqing died didn't surprise me." Qin Zhenyang looked at the pale yet beautiful face in the photo and shook his head with some regret. "The last time I saw her, although I couldn't say I liked her, I didn't expect that our next meeting would be like this."

"Her death was within your expectations..." Lin Yu raised his eyebrows slightly, his eyes suddenly becoming sharp, "Is there a problem with Mayor Feng?"

Feng Yan was Zheng Yunqing's backer. Now that she is dead, Feng Yan is definitely not immune from the blame.

"Yes." Qin Zhenyang walked over to his workstation and lowered his voice. "Do you remember the last time we had dinner together, we discussed Director Zhang, who was reported for taking bribes? He's been arrested and has even provided a list of people who accepted bribes. The Discipline Inspection Commission is investigating officials who had contact with him."

Lin Yu thought for a few seconds and asked, "Didn't we agree to settle the accounts at the year-end meeting?"

"People like that shouldn't be allowed to linger on." Qin Zhenyang didn't hide his anger and snorted coldly, "A landslide occurred during the mining operation, and more than a dozen miners were buried underground. The two who were finally rescued died in the hospital the day before yesterday. These are all living lives!"

Lin Yu's heart sank when he heard this. He took the glass of water and handed it to Qin Zhenyang. After a moment of hesitation, he said, "I understand how you feel. In fact, when I took over this case today, I knew that some things were out of control."

As the sky brightened, the people hiding in the dark became anxious and wanted to burn everything to ashes in order to continue covering up the truth.

Zheng Yunqing's death was not an accident, but an inevitable outcome that was beyond her control.

Qin Zhenyang drank some water and calmed down a lot. His eyes fell on the bag of medicine bottles. He picked up the one that was placed alone and asked curiously: "What are these medicines used for?"

My Little Nonsense Column: I don’t know how the character of Zheng was shaped since he appeared on the stage. This is my first time writing a mystery, and my ability is not enough. Shirt mentioned before that if this case is solved, it will be the end. It is indeed the case. In fact, when I wrote it later, I was always confused about why I wrote these. It was not well written. Maybe no one will remember it at all. Later I thought about it, maybe it was because no one would remember me that I wrote it. After some artistic processing, I wrote down all the things that touched me. Some things may be fleeting in the news, but if forgetting becomes the norm, some sacrifices will be meaningless.

I checked a lot of official information, in order to write it in an obscure and reasonable way. Thank you all for watching and recommending me. I put too many chapters at once before. If you have time, I hope you can make up for it for me. It is about to be finished, but this data is really a bit disappointing. Although it is definitely my problem, this work may be my last work.

I know that some people are looking forward to my subsequent works, including "Happy to Meet You", but the fact that there are more than 500 collections but only more than 40 readings is still a big blow to me.

I am very grateful to Li Ge for saying that my work makes people feel comfortable, Youran has always told me that she likes it, Mingmingyue will even rewatch it and write serious annotations for me, 103 tells me his thoughts every time after reading it, and urges me to update and praises my Weiyang. I am very grateful for all these and remember them very clearly, including the very touching comments I received on Jinjiang, I read every one of them very carefully.

As I write, I am saying goodbye to the character and also to myself. This work is a goal I set for myself at the age of 20, to write a long novel. I used to write short stories, and this is my attempt. I agreed from the beginning that this would be to practice my writing skills, but I don’t really know how good my writing is. I also know that I am always criticized for being lengthy, and that my writing skills are not good enough, so I use words to make up for it, which is useless.

I shouldn't have been so depressed this morning. I've stopped mumbling for the first time in a long time. I've already written the detailed outline of the finale, and this ordinary and slightly boring story is coming to an end. I will finish it, and I hope you will all read it with me.

I would rather not have it than force others to do it, so when I see the disparity between the collection and reading data, I feel useless. I give people expectations but fail to make them want to read my work. I'm a newcomer and this is my first long novel. I care about it very much, so if you like it too, please give me a little feedback.