Zhou Jin gave a small nod.
Once A’Juan had gone, Zhou Jin looked at him with puzzlement. “How did you know I don’t eat fish?”
Jiang Hansheng simply smiled.
Zhou Jin didn’t dwell too much on that small moment — her thoughts were still tangled up in the Guan Ling case.
“Where were we?”
Out of habit, she served Jiang Hansheng a chopstick-full of food first, then continued. “Lai San’er using a gun really was an unwise choice — but does that alone establish that it was a crime of passion?”
“Look at it from another angle,” Jiang Hansheng said. “Lai Zhengtian summoned Guan Ling to the Tonghe riverbank late at night — why would she go?”
Zhou Jin’s brow furrowed.
“According to Hongyun’s testimony,” Jiang Hansheng said, “Lai Zhengtian had sexually assaulted Guan Ling, and had used violent means to coerce her into selling herself over a prolonged period. For Guan Ling, I believe Lai Zhengtian represented terror itself.”
Going to a dangerous location, at a dangerous hour, to meet a dangerous person — how could Guan Ling have dared to go alone?
“She had a reason she couldn’t refuse?” Zhou Jin offered. “Lai San’er could have been threatening her.”
Jiang Hansheng shook his head. “Guan Ling went of her own free will.”
At the very least, the security footage from the Shangyue Hotel showed no signs of tension or anxiety in her as she waited for the taxi.
“Of her own free will?” Zhou Jin said.
Jiang Hansheng nodded. “Do you remember — the manager of the Shangyue Hotel mentioned that Guan Ling had told him she was done with this line of work, and wanted to go back to her hometown in the countryside.”
At that moment, Zhou Jin’s phone rang. It was Xiao Yang calling.
He launched straight in, his voice bright with excitement. “Is Professor Jiang with you?”
“Yes,” said Zhou Jin.
“He’s absolutely incredible!” Xiao Yang was barely containing himself, his pitch rising. “Tell Professor Jiang — we did exactly what he asked. We pulled every single private vehicle that passed along the Tonghe riverbank during the window around the time of the incident, every one that headed straight to the Haiji Expressway, and checked them all.”
The Haiji Expressway?
“There’s a van,” Xiao Yang continued. “The driver runs private fares, going back and forth between Haizhou City and Hongyan County on a regular basis.”
Hongyan County was Guan Ling’s hometown. To get from Haizhou City back to Hongyan County, the Haiji Expressway was the only route.
Because the incident occurred in the dead of night, traffic had been light; and along the stretch near the scene — the Tonghe riverbank — heading straight north would take you directly to the Haiji Expressway entrance, with no forks or turnoffs along the way.
This drastically narrowed the scope of reviewing the traffic surveillance footage, and new leads emerged quickly.
“If what Professor Jiang said is right,” Xiao Yang said, “and Guan Ling had been planning to go back to her hometown that night, then this driver was most likely the one coming to pick her up.”
After hearing all of this, Zhou Jin finally understood.
Based on Jiang Hansheng’s assessment, Lai San’er’s actions had not been premeditated — it had been a crime of passion. Which meant that from the very beginning, Lai San’er had never intended to kill Guan Ling.
Guan Ling held something over him — leverage that was perhaps lethal. Lai San’er had only wanted to put the matter to rest as quickly as possible. To that end, he had even offered Guan Ling terms she was willing to accept — perhaps that he would let her go, and arrange transport to take her home.
This was also consistent with what the manager of the Shangyue Hotel had said in his testimony.
That night, Guan Ling had taken a taxi out to the outskirts of the city alone — not because she was going to meet Lai San’er, but because she wanted to go home.
“The driver is still in the city right now. Brother Zhao and the others have already gone to find him,” Xiao Yang wailed. “Damn it, I’ve been running checks until I’m half out of my mind. All I want to do is go home and sleep for three days and three nights straight!”
Zhou Jin laughed, exhaling a long breath that carried all the lightness of clouds parting to let the sun through.
She ended the call and relayed what Xiao Yang had said to Jiang Hansheng, then asked, “How did you work it out?”
Jiang Hansheng was about to explain.
He had not been present at the scene, and could only draw preliminary inferences from the testimonies and physical evidence gathered by various parties. Before these inferences were verified, even he himself could not guarantee they were entirely correct.
As a consultant, Jiang Hansheng had only provided the direction of the investigation. The rest would require a great volume of repetitive, painstaking work to either confirm or disprove his reasoning.
Now that the police had found, through the traffic surveillance footage, the driver who had come to collect Guan Ling that night, his inference could finally be confirmed.
But just as Jiang Hansheng was about to speak, a sharp rush of chili hit the back of his throat. He turned aside reflexively, coughing against his hand for a long while, and then hurriedly drank several mouthfuls of tea before the fit gradually subsided.
His ears had gone completely red, and a faint flush had spread across his cheeks. His dark eyes shimmered with a watery gleam.
Zhou Jin finally noticed his distress. “?”
Jiang Hansheng’s throat ached, his voice coming out hoarse. “I’m sorry, Zhou Jin. It’s a bit too spicy for me.”
Zhou Jin: “…………”