Silent Reading - Chapter 64

Chapter 64: Macbeth Five

5.1.2020

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What, can the devil speak true?

— Macbeth

“According to Dong Xiaoqing, Dong Qian often worked long distance shifts. This one was not an exception. Because she lost her mother at a very young age, her father felt guilty about her abnormal childhood and wanted her to marry well. So he had always been working very hard to save up for her dowry. Then the customers who pay well usually are picky on punctuality, and stopping for restroom breaks means more time wasted on the road, not to mention that there may be gas-stealers at the rest areas. That’s why many long distance truck drivers choose to push the hours. Driving for more than 10 hours non-stop is very common. As for why the crash happened there and then, I suspect that it was purely by accident. You see, Dong Qian was hospitalized for an allergy reaction earlier this year and somehow that had since left him with insomnia, aggravating the fatigue…Captain Luo, I also learnt that Dong Qian’s wife died from a car accident, and because of the mental trauma he couldn’t get back behind the wheel for a very long time. Would someone like him really hit another person intentionally?”

Luo Wenzhou listened to Xiao Haiyang’s reporting without interrupting. He held back on his mentoring instincts to avoid little Xiao jumping at any trifling instructions and launching himself into the air again. Instead, he only replied with terse “yes”-es to show that he’s got it, and then suggested Little Glasses not to stay at work too late.

Judging from this additional information, Mr. Zhou Sr.’s death seemed less likely to be a tropy, heritage-battle-induced murder. For a celebrity family like the Zhou’s however, anything could make the news headlines and fuel conspiracy theories. So it made sense that Zhou Huaixin wanted to involve the police early on to sway the public opinion and clear himself out of the mess. Fei Du might have a point on this one.

Fei Du also said…well, that asshole… Luo Wenzhou’s chest tightened as soon as he thought of him.

Heavy chested and empty stomached, He turned to the kitchen to microwave something to eat. Just as he was washing hands, Luo Yiguo waltzed over to him, fat hips swaying.

The Lord Kitty might have just woken from its afternoon nap. Butt up and belly down, it did a big, comfortable stretch and then “Meadow-ed” cheerfully and rubbed its body against Luo Wenzhou’s ankles.

Yiguo almost never fuzzed over Luo Wenzhou like a pet’s supposed to, except when begging for a treat. Flattered by its sudden, nice gesture, he bent down to pet it despite his freshly-cleaned hands.

Yiguo’s large round eyes were fixed on those reaching hands. Then suddenly, its fangs gleamed, and it pounced on them. But Luo Wenzhou was a seasoned ‘poop scooper’ too, so he had suspected that something fishy was going on as soon as the cat smooched. Familiar with the preludes to its attack, he successfully retracted his hands. The stinky booger missed. Then, his hand slapped back at Yiguo’s face and quickly quelled the ‘rebellion’, squishing it on the ground: “I knew it!”

Since the day the ‘poop scooper’s autumn pants became too hard to bite through, Yiguo started incorporating more hunting tactics like this — god knows where it learnt them from — But the enemy was too cunning: he was never home on time and never respected my provocations. Yiguo thought while growling angrily. In the next moment it was picked up again, rear feet dangling in the air.

“What the hell do y’all want from me? Hah?” Luo Wenzhou asked grumpily, “Daddy feeds you, daddy warms you, daddy’s patience from the next life was used up on you…and look what shitty things you did in return? Do you even have a heart? Hah? Unbelievable…”

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Yiguo protested loudly.

Luo Wenzhou yelled back: “Shut up, you little brat!”

Yiguo quickly surrendered. Its tail dangled languorously. Its four limbs sheepishly held onto Luo Wenzhou’s forearm.

Luo Wenzhou glowered at it for a while, but still walked towards the pantry for wet food. The cat never held grudges as long as there was food. It jumped off and rolled onto its feet, then rubbed its head against his palm and committed to a one-sided truce.

Luo Wenzhou: “…”

He was so fed up with these frivolous folks.

Luo Wenzhou sat down on the floor. His right hand was still warm – the one that was harassed by Fei Du. When he closed his eyes he could still see that face with the skin-deep smile, a smile that messed up his heart rhythm. Then he felt cranky about that messed-up rhythm.

That bit of the crankiness peaked when he woke up before dawn from a messy, loaded dream and found that a part of him was, disharmoniously, wide awake.

It was not even five am. Luo Wenzhou sat up, stayed in bed for a while, then finally gave up and got off to ‘unload himself” in the bathroom. Afterwards, he splashed some cold water on his face and stood in front of the bathroom sink-table, hands pressing down. After a couple deep breaths, he thought that if that shameless, spoiled brat Fei Du kept messing with him like this, he would go ahead and get even. Son of a b**ch…why should upholding one’s moral standard be punished? What kind of a world is this?

Suddenly, he heard a muffled “bump”: Yiguo jumped off his bed and walked to the bathroom too.

Luo Wenzhou: “What do YOU want?”

Yiguo turned its head towards the bedroom and wiggled its tail. He could faintly hear the “Anthem of the Five Rings” playing. Luo Wenzhou was confused at first, then was finally fully awake — it was his ring tone. His blanket-buried cell phone was ringing.

“Zhou Huaijin’s flight landed on time, at around 2 am. He texted his family right away, told them not to pick him up and that he’ll just take a tax. At that hour of the day the roads were practically empty, so it shouldn’t take him more than half an hour to get home. However, The Zhous waited for a full 2 hours. When they tried to reach him again, his cell phone was powered off!”

Luo Wenzhou strode across a pool of police cars towards the family home of the Zhou’s — for the second time in 24 hours. He murmured to himself: “Isn’t Zhou Huaijin supposed to be some rich heir to a business empire? Why would he take a taxi cab from the airport in the middle of the night..where’s his chauffeur? His bodyguards?”

Then he heard the annoying voice interjecting, indolently: “This is him. Zhou Huaijin likes to keep a low profile. He is very polite and considerate, and doesn’t like to inconvenience others. He’s got a reputation among his folks — although some say that he is a bit too soft. Landing at this hour and not wanting to disturb his men — That’s very much like him.”

Luo Wenzhou looked ahead and saw Fei Du, fully dressed, waiting at the entrance of the Zhou’s family house. He nodded to Luo Wenzhou and greeted: “Captain Luo.”

Both the nodding and greeting seemed very at ease. It was as if the one that parted with Luo Wenzhou on bad terms last night was someone else entirely.

Zhou Huaixin was already wailing beyond himself. Like a pile of mud he splashed on the sofa and couldn’t manage to get up at all. Before Luo Wenzhou even approached, he could hear him whining: “What did I say! I told you…that my dad died of a murder…but noone listened. Now my brother is missing too! Are you going to wait until everyone of us perishes? Where are the police now? Well…what use do they have…the police are just a bunch of good-for-nothings….”

Luo Wenzhou’s brows knitted together.

Then Zhou Huaixin saw that the one standing next to him was Fei Du, so he added to the moaning: “Sir Fei, I didn’t mean to offend YOU…My brother…what would I do if I lose him? Those wolves are going to swallow me alive…Oh God…No…I can’t…I can’t take it anymore…my heart aches…My medicine…”

The maid hurried over and handed him a bottle covered with foreign words — it was some vitamin pills from god knows which country. Fei Du took the bottle and helped him with the pills, so that the Mr. Zhou Jr.’ brittle heart could be pampered.

Luo Wenzhou glimpsed at them, then realized that Fei Du had already changed out of his pretentious ‘good-student’ outfit. He was now wearing a semi-formal shirt, and the glasses. His shirt was a little wrinkled from wearing, so obviously Fei Du had been up for sometime now.

At that time, the notification for news pushes on people’s phones were going crazy. It looked like every stock that could be remotely tied to the Zhou’s were plummeting. The foreign stock markets became a feast for the big short. Fei Du’s attire hinted at where he had been after he left the bureau last night. This guy still stank of ‘vested interests’, yet here he was, consoling Zhou Huaixin’s lost soul with utter sincerity, like every noble man.

“Have we located the cell-phone? Hurry! Tape off the scene, don’t allow irrelevant parties into the Zhou’s house because now isn’t the time to disclose the information to the public yet. Has Tao Ran arrived at the airport? Let him collect the camera footage of the shuttle and taxi station at the airport.” Luo Wenzhou walked to the vitamin-drugged Zhou Huaixin and asked, “Mr. Zhou Jr.,do you know when your brother decided on his itinerary? Does anyone else know his flight number?”

Zhou Huaixin pressed on his chest with both hands like the beauty Xi-zi frowning for heart-ache (1): “Yesterday after Dad’s accident, I called him…Who else would know his flight? Everyone could know…I…I don’t know. His plane tickets were usually booked by his secretary I think.”

Xi-zi: a famous Chinese beauty in history. She is known for her frailness, and one famous posture of her was frowning because of a heart ache.

Right then, a neatly-dressed, middle-aged man broke into the room while shouting: “Huaixin! Huaixin! I got on the road as soon as I heard. What happened? Why are there so many Police here?”

Hearing his voice, Zhou Huaixin tossed his vitamin bottle and struggled to get up from Fei Du’s arms: “Brother Hu, my brother went missing!”

Fei Du fixed his shirt collar composedly, and nodded to that worried man. Then he turned to Luo Wenzhou on his side and introduced in a low voice: “This is Hu Zhenyu, the man in charge of the Zhou’s mainland businesses. He is Zhou Huaijin’s college friend, clearly an ally of the ‘Princeling’.

Luo Wenzhou’s eyes couldn’t help but notice Fei Du’s collar-fixing hand. They wandered along his neck and landed on his collar bones. Then he forced those eyes away, nodded perfunctorily, and turned to Xiao Haiyang: “Now that we have two related cases on the two generations of the Zhou’s, they are less likely to be accidents any more. I want you to dig deeper into Zhou Junmao’s car crash. Don’t take the girl’s words at face value.”

Xiao Haiyang accepted the order and dashed off.

At that time, the dawning daylight had already colored the skyline. The quiet city was about to wake up and delve into a new day of hustle-and-bustle.

Tao Ran’s call came through: “The taxi’s been found. The plate number is YBXXXX. The driver was knocked unconscious and left at the side of the road. When he woke up he managed to get to the hospital, and five minutes ago he reported to the local police station with the help of the hospital. We’ve just located the car, it’s at…”

A staff on the technology team raised his head at the same time and said, “Captain Luo, we’ve located Zhou Huaijin’s cell-phone!”

Luo Wenzhou looked up. The voices in and out of the cell phone mingled together:

“On the bank of the Baisha River —”

“Near the Baisha water banks!”

Zhou Huaixin almost fainted at the news. Hu Zhenyu managed to catch him before he fell. With the help from many others, he carried him to the sofa. When Zhou Huaixin finally regained consciousness he broke into loud tears again: “Brother Hu, my brother…will they sink him into the river? I will kill that bastard Yang Bo! Where the hell did Zheng Kaifeng go? Why isn’t he back yet after Dad’s accident?”

Hu Zhenyu’s face paled. He tried to signal Zhou Huaixin to shut up, but it was impossible to control this eccentric psycho. With sweat running down his cheeks, he still managed to squeeze out a polite smile at the officers: “Huaixin is too young. With this sudden calamity his mental state is a bit unstable. Please don’t mind his nonsense.”

Hearing this, the red-eyed Zhou Huaixin suddenly sat up straight like a resurrected zombie: “But it wasn’t nonsense! He IS a bastard. Don’t think that you guys can keep me in the dark on this! That son of a b**ch has had his eyes on us for a long time. Now that he’s schemed to take out my dad and my brother, he must think he can have his way with me now right? Cuz’ I am a know-nothing outsider? Even Uncle Zheng is on his side!”

Hu Zhenyu suddenly raised his voice: “Huaixin!”

“Send a team to Baisha River.” Luo Wenzhou ordered quietly, then turned to Hu Zhenyu and asked, “Mr. Hu, because of the abduction and the suspected murder, this has turned to a criminal case. Your family business is no longer a private matter now. There could be important evidence in the details, and there are grave consequences for hiding them. I hope that you are aware of the seriousness of the situation here.”

Hu Zhenyu was quite an experienced crisis handler. Even under the pressure of a serious Luo Wenzhou, he didn’t falter much, only wiped away some sweat on his forehead and said, “Yes, yes, of course. I completely understand. Many of you here might have already heard of Mr. Zheng. He has been the hand of our President Zhou Sr. since they were both young. Now despite his age, he is still the pillar of the Zhou Enterprise.”

“As for Mr.Yang…Mr. Yang Bo, he is Mr. Zhou Sr. ‘s secretary, a bright, capable young man. He has achieved a lot, and maybe that has attracted him some unfriendly rumors. Some of the rumors that Huaixin heard, well…you know…Mr. Yang is the kind of young man who’s ‘the kid next door’ — like how you young people put it — who does everything better than you in your parents’ eyes. So the late Mr. Zhou Sr. often scolded Huaixin in comparison to him. It’s not surprising that the two didn’t quite see eye to eye. But if you accuse him of harming Mr. Zhou Sr. and Mr. Zhou Huaijin, I’ll be the first one to disagree.” As Hu Zhenyu explained, he gingerly assessed Zhou Huaixin’s expression, worried that he would run amok again. Hu continued, “Plus, those two are both abroad. I contacted them as soon as yesterday’s incident. Now they should be on the flight back. Let me give their flight number to you. Please, may I trouble the officers at the airport to offer them special protection? We cannot afford to have a third victim!”

Yang Bo, the bright rising star who was only Zhou Huaixin’s age but already occupying an important managerial position in the Zhou’s empire…Judging from this, he does indeed sound like a stereotypical ‘bastard son’.

Luo Wenzhou peeked at Fei Du and saw him nodding back silently, approving his hypothesis.

At that time, Lang Qiao rushed into the room while calling out: “Oh no oh no…Boss, it’s going down!”

Luo Wenzhou noticed all the Zhous pricking up their ears, so he gestured at Lang Qiao and took her outside, then asked: “What’s wrong?”

“Look.” Lang Qiao took out her phone.

The “Zhou Huaijin, successor of the Zhou’s Empire, Kidnapped” news headline took over the internet in no time. There was a hyperlink underneath, but was deactivated.

“I asked the Net Surveillance team to delete the linked video.” Lang Qiao said, “It’s this one.”

Following her finger point, a video popped up on the screen. The shaky camera was facing an unconscious man tied up on a chair. The camera closed in on his face, then slowly panned around it, showing his face from all different angles. The well-groomed man looked in his thirties. Even under such extreme circumstances, one could still easily tell that he was good-looking and gentlemanlike.

“It’s Zhou Huaijin.” Fei Du recognized him in one glance.

Luo Wenzhou’s scalp almost went numb.

The abductor did not ask for money or for life. Nor did he contact the victim’s family. Instead he uploaded the video online. What the heck did he want?

Did they watch too many British TV shows or what?!