Chapter 186: The Cemetery Search (1/2)

I broke into cold sweat when I saw the dagger in Xu Gang’s hand. It was a critical moment, and it was absolutely crucial that I keep my head cool. I told him, “You gain nothing from killing me, Xu Gang! You’ll just be committing one more crime!”

Xu Gang smirked. I was sure that he was going to stab me. Thankfully, Xiaotao and Yuanchao kicked the door down and entered right at that moment. They aimed their guns at Xu Gang and shouted, “Drop your weapon now!”

“You misunderstand me,” Xu Gang stated calmly. “I have no intention of hurting anyone.”

At that point, Xu Gang stood between me and Xiaotao and Yuanchao. It would be extremely easy for Yuanchao to shoot him at that distance.

“Drop your weapon and raise your hands!” shouted Xiaotao again.

Xu Gang ignored her and told me, “I’ve heard of your reputation, Detective Song. You’re supposed to be a master detective who can solve any murder case no matter how difficult. So, do you think I’d be stupid enough to let myself be arrested and tell you where that vile woman is? You’re gravely mistaken…”

I suddenly realized that his plan was to commit suicide all along. I lunged forward and desperately tried to snatch the dagger away from him. But as soon as I made a move, Xu Gang impaled the dagger into his throat with swift accuracy and collapsed lifelessly to the floor.

Xiaotao was stunned. I quickly turned Xu Gang’s body over, only to see the arrogant smirk frozen on his dead face. His body was still convulsing, but the knife had plunged too far into his throat that it cut off the major veins in his trachea.

“I’ll call 120 now!” shouted Xiaotao in panic.

“No,” I shook my head. “It’s too late…”

At that moment, Dali entered the room panting. He was shocked by the scene and yelled, “Holy shit!”

I closed Xu Gang’s eyes. Although he was a criminal, I still recited the Reincarnation Mantra for him. Xiaotao made a call and ordered a group of officers to come and clean up the scene. In order to prevent the neighbors from seeing the dead body, we closed the door. Dali had never seen anyone commit suicide before, so he was trembling with fear. He dared not take a look at the dead body, so he just stood there facing the wall the whole time like an idiot.

We searched the room, but found nothing consequential. I recalled what Xu Gang said before he died—he said that the person injected with the hibernation drug would survive two years in an environment with limited oxygen. This might be a hint that the rich lady was trapped in a closed space.

Apart from that, he also mentioned his desire to see the woman losing everything she had. This gave me an idea.

“Let’s go search the rich lady’s house!” I told Xiaotao.

We did not wait for the police to arrive before leaving. The rich lady’s house was a small mansion situated in a prominent high-end residential area. I picked the lock open with my iron wires and we barged into the house with haste. As soon as we entered, my nose was hit with a heavy stench of blood.

When we got to the second floor, we were greeted with a macabre scene. There was a man lying face down in a pool of blood. He was still wearing silk pajamas. The furniture around him was in disarray. Judging from the degree of solidification of the blood, the murder must’ve occurred about forty-eight hours ago.

I looked around and remarked, “There are signs of struggle here. Look, there are fragments of a vase on the floor.”

Xiaotao picked one of those fragments up and examined it closely.

“There’s blood on it!” she exclaimed.

There were no obvious signs of injury on the deceased despite the pool of blood he was lying in. I turned the body over and was stunned. There was a huge gash on his chest. The murder weapon was nearby too—an ice pick. It also took no effort to identify the victim at all, because right above him on the wall hung a portrait. It was the rich lady and a man who looked very much like the deceased. He was obviously her husband.

There was a mobile phone in the victim’s pocket. I checked it, and found that he’d sent a text message to his maid two days ago. It read, “We’re going on vacation. You don’t need to come here for the time being.”

“Do you think Xu Gang killed him, Song Yang?” asked Xiaotao.

“No,” I responded. “It’s the rich lady!”

The victim’s position in the room proved that the murderer was sitting on the sofa when he was killed. The fact that he was only wearing pajamas hinted that the murderer couldn’t have been a stranger. There was also a woman’s cigarette holder near the ashtray on the coffee table. It was likely that the murderer was smoking a cigarette while sitting on the sofa, then they grabbed the ice pick and stabbed the victim’s chest with it.

There were shoe prints on the carpet. The size seemed larger than the victim’s feet, so it was probably Xu Gang who came in wearing shoes after the murder. He probably forced the rich lady to kill her husband. There was probably an altercation between the two after that, and Xu Gang probably hit the rich lady in her head with the vase.