Futong.
After the post mortem analysis had been completed and necessary information was gathered, Mingshen released Dai Yaling's body to the next of kin of the Dai family. There was a small funeral held in the evening, which Jia and Huojin had attended too. The atmosphere at the Dai family's home was somber and laced with silence when they returned from the funeral.
Dai Fengge had locked himself in the room while Dai Meihui cooked dinner, lost deep in her thoughts. A small fluff of ball hugged her legs from the back with the purest smile on his lips. "Mama, I am hungry!"
She smiled and patted his head. "Yes, yes. Dinner is ready. Will you help me set the spoons on the table, dear?"
"Yes!" He flailed his arms up in excitement and ran to take the spoons from the kitchen drawer.
"Be careful around the forks. Don't touch them, okay?"
"Yes, Mama."
Dai Meihui glanced at the bedroom where Dai Fengge had cooped himself inside ever since they had returned. With an unpleasant gaze, she walked inside and plainly said without much emotion, "Dinner is ready."
"G-go away!" Dai Fengge was slightly drunk with an empty bottle lying on the bed.
The scene before her immediately irked her. "What is wrong with you? Yun is here, yet you are drunk like crazy! Do you even bother how it will affect him if he sees this?"
He gritted his teeth, his eyes bloodshot. "I…I have lost my Mom here and you are worried about what Yun sees? You are calling me for dinner? How can you even think of having an appetite when we have lost Mom…Do you have any heart?"
A mocking laughter escaped with a glint of mistiness in her eyes. "Heart, huh? Should I really have a heart for a husband and mother-in-law who ignored my existence and openly…" she trembled, "openly supported another woman to replace me?"
That agitated him further because he knew he had no justification for his affair. He couldn't meet her accusatory gaze and looked away. "Xiaoling is gone anyway."
"And? Soon, you will find another woman because clearly, you aren't happy with me."
"Just leave me alone…" He drunkenly threw a pillow in her direction only to miss it. "Mom is not here with us anymore and all you can think about is your own injustice! What about the injustice that happened to Mom? That old hag killed my Mom!"
"Talk quietly!" She angrily urged. "Yun will hear you! And have some shame. Don't curse Miss. Ma when it was all an accident."
Dai Fengge shot a gaze at her, blazed with fury. "Don't call it an accident when…!" He bit his lip, tears staining his shirt wet as he held his fierce words back, "You don't care, do you? But I do and I won't spare that old hag! I will make her suffer too!"
Dai Meihui pressed her forehead. "Enough, Fengge. Even though you acted so rudely to her and gave her a panic attack, she was kind enough not to blame you. Have a little decency."
"Decency for the woman who killed Mom? She doesn't deserve pity, only my punishment! And I will give it to her!"
Frustrated by him, she walked out and said as she closed the door, "Don't he stupid! You have lost it, Fengge. I wanted to talk to you about our marriage and Yun but clearly, you aren't in your right mind at the moment. Sleep and get in your senses by tomorrow so that we can have a responsible conversation."
He heard her closing the door and left him alone. He leaned his head back on the bed, staring at the broken watch on his wrist. It had slipped off his hand during the funeral that brought cracks to the glass.
He caressed it gently with a swirl of guilt and regret flickering in his eyes. "I am sorry Mom…I am sorry I couldn't protect you…"
Outside, Dai Meihui released an exhausted sigh. She turned and was taken aback by seeing Yun standing behind her. "Yu-Yun…"
Nervousness gripped her, her heart pounding in her chest.
He must have definitely heard all his shouting…
"Mama, why Dada shout? Why Dada scold you? I don't want Mama sad," his beautiful black irises were wet with big drops of tears.
Dai Meihui felt the urge to cry and immediately kneeled to his level. He hugged him close to her chest and patted his back as she tried to control her tears from falling. "I am sorry you had to hear that, Yun. Mama is not sad, okay?"
"Mama is crying."
She laughed and quickly wiped her tears. "Oh this? These are happy tears, silly. Look, Yun did such a great job in arranging the spoons on the table all by himself. Mama is really happy and proud and that's why I am crying. People cry when they are happy too."
She kissed his cheek and grinned. "You are hungry, right? Let's eat!"
Yun peeked at the room behind her with a hesitant look.
"Oh don't worry about Dada. He is a little tired. You know that Grandma…is at a far place now, right?"
He nodded.
"Hm. He is missing her a lot. It will take some time. But he will be fine soon, no worries."
"Okay…"
She pecked his forehead and smiled. "Let's go eat."
She glanced at the door before leaving with a worried gaze.
I hope he comes into his senses tomorrow and doesn't do anything reckless…
—
The next day, two parallel sets of investigations were underway simultaneously. One was to bust the drug supply chain and the other was to find out the place where Yin Xiaoling and Wu Yue met to plan Dai Yaling's murder.
Xiyang gave Jia his report. "Mam, I have found something."
"Tell me," Jia put aside the other files and focused all her attention to his report.
"I looked into all the places where Wu Yue has gone in the past six months. Usually, she travels between two places which are her university and part-time job. She lives in Xidan. Renmin University, where she studies, is near Haidian district. Her part-time job is also nearby, Caishikou, which is just the next station to Xidan.
However, what I found is that she has gone to places which have nothing to do with her university and work. All these places are scattered across different directions in Beijing and are random places she visits."
"Any place where she might have met Yin Xiaoling?"
"Not found that yet. Though I don't understand what she is doing by visiting so many places?"
Jia took the report from him and studied the list of places.
"Drug deal? The random places might be because such deals from just one location are risky to be caught. So they keep changing locations. And…" she raised her brow, mapping out the locations in her head, "How does she travel to these places?"
"She takes the subway."
"Ding, ding!" Mingshen arrived with a flamboyant vigor in his demeanor. He took a seat opposite Jia and grinned. "The subway lines are getting used for these naughty drug deals, which is what my men have discovered too. Ah, I am so happy. I will soon get my hands on some fresh research subjects. I can hardly wait~"
Jia paid no heed to his twisted enthusiasm. "There are 23 lines in the Beijing subway and approximately 430 stations in total. It won't be a walk in the park to find them. We need to know how they decide the place for the deal."
Mingshen rubbed his palms together. "We don't need to crack our heads for that because we have the perfect bait for it. That girl herself."
"No way," she disagreed, "I cannot alert her and possibly ruin our chances for-"
Just then a junior officer arrived at her desk and hurriedly said, "Sorry for the interruption, Superintendent Song. There has been an attack. Dai Fengge tried to kill Ma Zhilan a few minutes ago."