"Tick-"
The hour hand makes a full turn, pointing to 11.
In the usually noisy Yong'an Police Station, it was eerily quiet.
As if someone pressed the still button in an instant, everyone froze in place, forgetting what they were supposed to do for a moment.
Ji Mingrui held the hot water cup he had just received, pulled the seat away, and maintained a half-sitting posture: "..."
Ji Mingrui didn't know how to evaluate the two "soaked chickens" who were sitting in their office at the moment.
Both Xie Lin and Chi Qing were wet, as if they had just been fished out of the water. With this scene alone, no one in the office could imagine what they had experienced before they came here.
There are two solid wood chairs in the reception area, and the two just occupy two seats.
These two people are tall and have long legs, and the picture is quite harmonious when they sit there.
It's just that they don't seem to have a harmonious relationship, and the visual effects are all illusions, especially his brother Chi Qing, who was cold-faced the whole time after being dragged in by his arms.
After a long while, the three in the group regained the ability to organize language.
Su Xiaolan: "Ah."
Jiang Yu: "This..."
Ji Mingrui: "You..."
The appearance of these two people in this unexpected state is not the most frightening thing. The most frightening thing is another detail, the hands which are tied with a tie. This tie, they've seen it.
This is what Xie Lin was wearing during the day when he came to deliver meals to Brother Bin.
The issue is...
How did this tie ended up wrapped around their wrists.
"You... what's going on?"
Ji Mingrui has figured out Chi Qing's temperament after so many years.
Let alone tie your hands with someone else with a tie, even if you stand half a meter away, he will dislike you for being too close to him, which even affects his breathing.
"Can anyone tell me what happened?"
Ji Mingrui stared at Chi Qing: "Especially you, Comrade Chi Qing, why did you appear here at this point."
"And you're still drenched like this," Ji Mingrui was puzzled, "...Your germophobia is really cured? Which hospital is so powerful? I'll send them a banner tomorrow, and the inscription will be 'Back to life, Hua Tuo is reborn'."
Chi Qing has been surrounded by people since he entered the door, and his endurance has reached the limit: "Ask him."
Ji Mingrui: "?י
Chi Qing: "He knows what he did."
Xie Lin: "..."
In fact, after Xie Lin said "get off the car", seeing Chi Qing's expression, he vaguely felt that this matter might be a misunderstanding. because he really didn't look like he was "fearing punishment and resisting", on the contrary, he obviously didn't expect the destination, that It will be the police station.
And when he came in, he saw that he knew the person surnamed Ji, which confirmed his guess.
Xie Lin said, "There is some misunderstanding."
After Xie Lin finished speaking, he asked again: "Is there any dry towel?"
There was an unopened package in Su Xiaolan's drawer. After she gave it to Xie Lin, Xie Lin directly put the towel on Chi Qing's head, and before Chi Qing could react, he went to untie the tie on their wrists.
Chi Qing habitually wanted to withdraw his hand, but Xie Lin held it down: "I know you're a clean freak, so you don't have to if you don't want to. I don't mind being tied to you like this all the time."
So Chi Qing's reaction changed from direct resistance to patient resistance.
Because this knot is very tight, the main reason for the tightness is that the two people staged a speed and passion in the car.
Chi Qing: "Can you hurry up?"
Xie Lin rested his fingers on the tie, raised his eyes and said, "Are you getting uncomfortable?"
For cleanliness, encountering others and being encountered by others is a matter of giving and receiving.
Chi Qing was silent for a few seconds, then turned to look at Ji Mingrui: "Give me the scissors."
Xie Lin: "..."
Ji Mingrui thought that, his brother's obsession with cleanliness doesn't look good.
And it seems to be getting worse.
After Xie Lin took off his tie, he was called into the office by Wu Zhibin, when he failed to answer everyone's questions.
The three-person team could only cast their curious eyes on Chi Qing.
Chi Qing was still wiping his hands carefully with a wet tissue.
He hasn't asked about Xie Lin's identity until now, one reason is that he doesn't care, and the other is that it is easy to guess.
The same is true for Xie Lin.
Only Ji Mingrui and the others were puzzled. Ji Mingrui waited for a while before Chi Qing could explain. Thinking of the message he sent to Chi Qing in the evening but did not get a reply, a terrible guess gradually formed in his mind: "You guys, isn't that you both go to the first crime scene, and then meet at the first crime scene?!"
What is even going on between them ???
After wiping his hands, Chi Qing said, "You're not too stupid."
***
Inside the office.
Wu Zhibin didn't care about this happening, he only cared about one thing: "You care about this case very much."
The last time when he was at the same place, he used interrogative sentences when he said this, but this time it became an affirmative sentence.
"You will not go looking for suspects if you don't care."
"Can you tell me why now?" Wu Zhibin looked at Xie Lin across the desk, and out of a certain keen intuition, he asked, "...why do you care so much about this case? When you were at the scene that day, what did you see? What do you think happened?"
The shirt on Xie Lin's body became darker after it got wet, almost to black, and his slightly sharp facial features were only revealed when he was not smiling, making him look far less "friendly" than usual.
Xie Lin turned the ring between his fingers: "He might want to kill someone."
This sentence was like thunder on the ground, Wu Zhibin stood up abruptly: "What did you say?!"
Xie Lin reached out and took out the photos. one by one from the file bag on the side, and arranged them in a row, and the cat corpses appeared in front of their eyes again.
When Xie Lin arranged the photos, he seemed to be arranging them according to a certain rule. Wu Zhibin took a few glances and found that Xie Lin was arranged according to the level of the wounds. From left to right, the wounds became rougher and rougher, which also means that the murderer killed the cat.. The method became more and more brutal.
This is a very common phenomenon.
When the murderer uses violence to achieve a cathartic purpose, he will not be able to control himself during the violence, which is why many murderers choose to continue to torture the corpse after committing the crime.
Xie Lin's finger pointed in the opposite direction: "You look from right to left."
Wu Zhibin glanced at it, his pupils dilated unconsciously.
"The death time of these cats is too close, there is no way to judge, but today another cat corpse was found at the first scene. When I went there, the cat's corpse had not yet become rigid. So I confirmed this order," Xie Lin said, and then said, "The thing....is it done?"
When Xie Lin found the corpse, he sent a message to Wu Zhibin. Wu Zhibin said, "yeah, the scene has been sealed off, and the physical evidence has been retrieved. It is being submitted for inspection. You can continue talking."
Xie Lin's hand slowly stroked the knife marks on the photo.
"Compared with other knives, serrated knives have an obvious pulling feeling when cutting, which can make people feel the feeling when the flesh is cut by force - have you cut the meat with the knife? That sense of resistance and progress Feelings can be addictive at times."
Wu Zhibin frowned upon hearing this.
"Sharp knives are generally used for quick kills, but those who have hatred will slowly enjoy this stinging feeling."
"The knife marks on the first cat's body were
very rough, cutting from the throat all the way to the abdomen, and even broke the contact several times in the middle. But look at the last cat corpse, the murderer even began to pursue the flatness of the knife edge, and the speed of the knife was also slow. It's getting slower and slower, he's calm...even seems like, he's probably practicing."
"You are just guessing." Wu Zhibin said.
"And the most important point," Xie Lin pointed to the knife wound on the cat's chest, which was located on the upper side. Every cat has a knife wound like this in a similar position on the chest, "This wound is very special. A cat's heart is usually between the fifth and eighth ribs."
Xie Lin said the most appalling conjecture in a very flat tone: "Only the human heart is located between the second rib and the fifth rib."
"Of course, these may just be coincidences. I can only say that my intuition tells me that the murderer may have another goal."
Wu Zhibin recalled that on the day when the crime happened, he asked Xie Lin to go and have a look. At that time, Xie Lin also checked the knife marks like this, this child was very good in understanding murderer's psychology since he was very young.
He seemed to know how the murderer cut open the flesh, how he take down the blade bit by bit, what the murderer was thinking at this time, and why the murderer chose this serrated knife instead of other more convenient and smoother knives.
The air conditioner was on in the office, he looked at Xie Lin's side face, and vaguely saw the boy in school uniform sitting in the conference room of the General Administration ten years ago.
***
At this time, convenience groceries, which are open until 11:30, are about to close.
Someone pushed open the door of the grocery store.
"Dingling" the doorbell rang.
After the little boy finished his homework, he was actually very sleepy. He was yawning while packing up the pencil case.
There was a lot of sound of rain outside the window.
Almost drowned out the doorbell's sound.
***
11:35 minutes.
Inside Yongan Police Station.
"Put down the things at hand, and go to Haimao tomorrow morning to continue the investigation. The surveillance near the scene of the first crime must not be let go."
Ji Mingrui didn't quite understand why Brother Bin's expression became so serious after he came out of the office: "Okay, Brother Bin."
He was about to make a record for his good brother.
Chi Qing was the one who appeared at the scene of the crime no matter what, so he still had to go through the process.
Ji Mingrui scribbled in his notebook, then raised his head again: "That-" He wanted to call someone but didn't know how to address him for a while, so he paused for two seconds before saying, "Mr. Xie? You come here too."
He pointed to the empty seat next to Chi Qing: "You sit here, you two I just have to finish the report."
Chi Qing glanced at him.
Ji Mingrui immediately knew what he wanted to say: "Brother, I know, these two seats are too close to each other, but I'm taking notes here, you can't sit here and let other people sit by the office door."
Chi Qing: "He sits here, I can go to the door."
Ji Mingrui: "..."
Brother, not at all, this won't work too.
Ji Mingrui decided to skip this topic, and asked directly: "You speak first, why did u went out at this hour tonight?"
Chi Qing: "Because the weather is good."
Xie Lin listened to the sound of rain outside the window: "Do you think the weather is good tonight?"
Chi Qing: "Do you have an opinion?"
Ji Mingrui found that Chi Qing had a particularly bad temper when facing Xie Lin: "Stop, stop, let me take notes, don't quarrel."
Ji Mingrui cleared his throat and continued to ask, "Which one of you did it first?"
Xie Lin: "I did,"
Chi Qing: "He."
Ji Mingrui: " You know, if you have something to say, you can talk about it. Even if you meet at the scene, and there is a misunderstanding, you can still sit down and talk about it calmly."
Xie Lin: "It's my problem. He went to buy a knife...and he just happened to show up at the crime scene. It looks suspicious. Then I got afraid thinking that he might run away."
Chi Qing glanced at him: "You were holding a knife, do you think you look normal?"
Ji Mingrui felt very complicated when he took the notes.
He wants to say that both of you are actually quite abnormal, so don't fight each other here.