Chapter 84 Chapter 84 Long time no see, it's you again! ...

"I don't think the police can find this." The cabin door opened, and Dong Sihai's plump figure rushed in with the sea breeze. "It's exactly as you expected... They went to Che Xiaozhen's house and must have discovered the basement."

Wu Sijia lay on a folding chair, eyes closed, not surprised at all. "Well, how many police cars are here?"

"About seven or eight. I didn't dare get too close for fear of being discovered." Dong Sihai bent down, picked up a peach, washed it under the faucet, and handed it over. "So what are you going to do?"

Wu Sijia did not answer, but took out a folding knife, cut off a piece of peach flesh, and threw it to Xu Yanhong who was tied at her feet like feeding a dog.

"Eat." She raised her eyebrows. "Aren't you hungry?"

Xu Yanhong slowly raised her face, staring with bloodshot eyes.

"Oh, sorry, I forgot. Your mouth is stuffed with a rag." Wu Sijia said cheerfully, "Never mind. It would be terrible if your loud voice as a teacher attracts the police."

In the dim light, she leisurely nibbled on a peach and picked up the half-read Gu Long novel in her hand.

"Sijia, when do we set sail?" Dong Sihai stood by the door, looking out. "Which way?"

"Tomorrow, after the police leave, we'll go to Shenzhen." Wu Sijia turned a page. "Then we can sneak across to Hong Kong before the handover."

Dong Sihai became excited. His eyes swept over Xu Yanhong who was leaning against the table leg. His smile froze and he said with a bit of guilt, "...What about her?"

"I leave it to you." Wu Sijia said without hesitation, "Throw it into the sea."

“…”Xu Yanhong began to struggle and sob.

Dong Sihai sat down next to him, scratching his hair in distress.

After a while, Xu Yanhong gradually stopped crying.

In the quiet cabin, the only sounds were Wu Sijia turning pages of a book and eating peaches.

"I'll go see the police." Dong Sihai moved to the door restlessly.

Across the embankment, you can see that the police flashlights are all focused on the burned house.

"They should all be in the basement," Dong Sihai reported in a low voice. "I leaned over a tree and listened. The people sent by the provincial department this time are criminal police from their crackdown team, composed of elite officers from various cities in Handong. It is said that the leading female police officer is very powerful. She has made great achievements at such a young age. She is called the Jiangtan Little Detective..."

Wu Sijia suddenly stopped moving.

When she was a flight attendant, she often distributed newspapers to first-class passengers, and she had seen that familiar name in the Handong Daily and Evening Paper.

It also comes with the prefix - "Little Detective of Jiangtan".

Wu Sijia put down the book, stood up, walked to the cabin door, and looked up at the dock through the gray glass.

...Is Ji Yinhe actually the investigating police officer of this case?

How would this young detective from Jiangtan feel when he found out the real murderer?

The light in the dilapidated house burned brightly in Wu Sijia's eyes.

She suddenly smiled thoughtfully.

"Si Hai." The woman turned around, a strange smile on her calm and beautiful face. "We may have to change our plans."

*

"Teacher Lu, could you come over and take a look at these physical evidences?"

Officer Yan squatted beside the cage on the ground, holding up a dead rat. "This is too disgusting. The murderer is really torturous..."

Lu Zheng turned away from Ji Yinhe who was checking the camp bed, picked up the gloves from the tool box, put them on as he strode over.

The cage was littered with cut hemp ropes, food scraps, and in the corner there was a pile of excrement that gave off a disgusting smell.

However, Lu Zheng just put them all into the evidence bag and told Xiao Yan to take them back for inspection, but his eyes remained on the empty ground.

"What are you looking at?" asked Officer Yan.

"Dust." Lu Zheng took out a magnifying glass from the toolbox and slowly moved it towards the dark and light mottled ash on the ground.

"...Wu Sijia must have been hiding here for some time." Ji Yinhe walked over, holding a long hair. "Teacher Xu has short hair that reaches her ears, not this long... What's new here?"

Lu Zheng pointed at the marks on the ground. "They weren't gone for long. If Xu Yanhong was locked in this cage, we could tell her posture by the marks on the dust and the shape of the scattered food—"

He sat down on the ground next to her, imitating Xu Yanhong's movements as she slumped in the cage, and then narrowed his eyes.

"Her right hand was constantly moving." Lu Zheng pointed to a patch of dust in the corner of the wall. "Look, this should be where her elbow touched the ground. Almost all the soot has been wiped away."

Officer Yan murmured, "What is she doing? Trying to break free from the ropes?"

"No, she is carving." Ji Yinhe's eyes had moved up a few inches and landed on the dark wall.

The flashlight swept over, and two small inscriptions with strokes as thin as a hair appeared in front of everyone.

On the left is "Deng Qianxiu", which is covered with a layer of transparent paste. You can see that it has been rubbed many times and has traces of time.

"I know, it's left over from the two years Deng Qianxiu was imprisoned here!" Officer Yan exclaimed happily.

However, the two pairs of beautiful eyes next to it were fixed on the crooked word on the right.

When Xu Yanhong carved this word, she must have put her right hand, which was holding the sharp object, behind her back and tried her best to hide the range of movement, making it really difficult to recognize.

Officer Yan even held his breath, afraid of disturbing their identification.

"Is it... Zhen?" Lu Zheng looked at it carefully for a moment and asked softly, "It looks like it's next to a skein of wire."

"...No." Ji Yinhe gestured with his hands twice and said calmly, "Maybe it's the sea."

"Hai?" Lu Zheng nodded gently. "I see. It's not the twisted wire, it's three water drops. It's just that it was difficult to control the distance when carving the characters, so I can only connect them into one piece."

"Yes." Ji Yinhe tilted her head, a little confused. "What does she want to remind us?"

Officer Yan, who was squatting nearby, said, "Is there any need to ask this? Dong Sihai!"

"It's not that simple," Lu Zheng said. "Xu Yanhong must know. If we can find this out, there's no way we can't find Dong Sihai."

"What does that mean?" Officer Yan looked bewildered. "By sea?"

"Well, there's only one main road leading to the dock. Wu Sijia, Dong Sihai and Xu Yanhong must have driven at least one car. Since we didn't see them all the way here, they must be planning to leave by boat." Ji Yinhe blinked. "Could this 'sea' represent the name of the ship?"

"It's possible." Lu Zheng nodded. "It's dark now. Sailing would make too much noise and we would definitely discover them. They are probably hiding on a boat outside, waiting for the storm to die down before leaving."

Officer Yan was dumbfounded. "There are hundreds of them parked on the shore. It will take forever to search them one by one!"

Ji Yinhe thought for a few seconds and said, "Maybe the word 'sea' has more than one meaning."

"You mean, maybe it's Dong Sihai's ship?" Lu Zheng said sharply.

Without waiting for Ji Yinhe to answer, he took out his cell phone from his bag and dialed Shi Youhua's number.

The phone rang twice before it was picked up by a strong woman who always stayed up late.

Lu Zheng briefly explained the situation and then asked directly, "How many ships does Baihualou have at the Jinghai County dock? Are there any with the word 'Hai' in their name?"

However, Shi Youhua said confidently, "There are twelve ships docked in Jinghai County. They haven't moved in a long time, and none of them have the word 'hai' in their name."

"...Okay." Lu Zheng exchanged glances with Ji Yinhe helplessly, but still said politely, "Could you please tell me the ship number?"

Shi Youhua reported the twelve names without hesitation.

Ji Yinhe immediately called Tan Li and asked her to contact the maritime department and ask them to send a list of ships registered at the Jinghai County Port.

Fortunately, last year, the country introduced a policy requiring all ships to be registered. Hearing that it was related to a major murder case, the Maritime Safety Administration officer was very diligent and drove over in less than half an hour to personally deliver the list.

While the detectives were collecting the remaining physical evidence, Ji Yinhe and Lu Zheng got into the Grand Cherokee and patiently compared them one by one.

"None of the ships under the name of Baihua Tower contain the word 'sea'." Lu Zheng tapped the notebook lightly.

Ji Yinhe was not discouraged, but looked through the list of the Maritime Administration again.

A ship called "Anemone" caught her attention.

Coincidentally, the owner's name had not yet been registered on the back of the ship.

"Anemone, anemone..." she murmured softly several times.

Lu Zheng took over the conversation, "What's wrong? Anemone is a marine creature, also known as sea flower."

Comrade Xiao Ji's eyes lit up and he snapped his fingers. "This flower is..."

Two voices rang out in the carriage at the same time: "Shi Youhua's flower!"

*

After cracking the message left by Xu Yanhong, Ji Yinhe and Lu Zheng divided all the criminal police into groups and asked them to search for the Anemone separately.

Twenty minutes later.

The walkie-talkie in Ji Yinhe's hand rang, and a criminal police officer reported that he had found the location of the Anemone, and there were lights faintly on in the cabin.

"Okay, stay there and don't move." Ji Yinhe took a deep breath, "I'll take people over there now."

"You have to hurry," the detective muttered anxiously to himself. "I see the hatch is open. Are they planning to escape now? ... No, why is there a woman coming out? Is she Wu Sijia?"

Ji Yinhe's heart suddenly skipped a beat, and without even having time to call out to anyone, he immediately ran in that direction.

The calm sea water sparkled in the night, but the surging waves made the ships on the shore sway continuously.

Not far ahead, a woman in a white shirt and dress stood on the deck. The strong sea breeze made her slender and tall figure sway.

Perhaps because she saw her childhood playmate in a military green uniform, the woman suddenly laughed.

Intermittent and unclear sounds were blown into Ji Yinhe's ears.

"Ji! Yin! He!" The woman raised one arm, waved it in the moonlight, and said with a smile, "Long time no see, it's you again!"

Ji Yinhe paused, not knowing what to say for a moment.

As she got closer, she suddenly noticed two tied-up figures at the woman's feet, like two bundles thrown there, with cloth strips stuffed in their mouths, constantly making cries for help.

——It’s Dong Sihai and Xu Yanhong!

Ji Yinhe took a deep breath, stared at the crumbling figure, and said in a deep voice -

"Wusijia, you are suspected of murder, kidnapping, abuse of corpses and other illegal crimes."

"Now you are required to stop all actions immediately, otherwise we will take coercive measures!"

She pursed her lips and whispered the last words:

"My former friend... I'm here to catch you."