Soul Patch

Chapter 88 It’s not a coincidence

“I told you to stay away from Jia Nan. He probably said that before, but you didn’t listen,” Yang Shanshan absentmindedly echoed.

The taxi turned a corner, and the Second Precinct building came into view.

Yang Shanshan plugged in her earphones and stuffed her phone into her handbag.

I casually took out my makeup powder, opened it, and looked at myself in the small mirror.

Seeing the blush on her face, she frowned and patted her face with a powder puff.

Hmm...it looks much better. Looking at my bright eyes and white teeth in the mirror, I smiled with satisfaction.

The taxi driver was an old man. When Yang Shanshan was touching up her makeup, she would glance at him through the rearview mirror from time to time, her face full of envy.

Yang Shanshan touched up her makeup and stuffed the small black powder puff box into her handbag.

"Don't talk about me, tell me what happened between you and Wenjie last night?"

Huang Weiwei's voice was loud, and Yang Shanshan glanced guiltily in the direction of the driver.

She noticed the driver was looking at her through the rearview mirror, and her face instantly turned bright red, feeling like it was on fire.

She looked down, pretending to search for her phone in her purse, her eyes darting around nervously, and said in a low voice:

"Um, we'll talk about it later. I've taken a taxi to work. I'll hang up now and pay the fare."

"Wait, you could have just said you couldn't talk. I got it right, you were asking me about that beautiful woman exercising at the bakery?"

Huang Weiwei scratched her head, racking her brains, but couldn't figure out that such a person existed.

"That was the day you said something happened at the store. When I was at your store, I saw a beautiful woman in sportswear running past on the street."

"I don't really remember. I do recall glancing at the intersection from inside the shop this morning and seeing a pretty young woman with a man carrying a backpack..."

Huang Weiwei suddenly stopped talking and didn't dwell on the incident after it happened at the store.

It was so bloody and terrifying that I'm a little scared even if I don't recall it!

I dare not recall it in detail.

"What's wrong? Why did you suddenly stop talking?" Yang Shanshan asked in surprise.

"We've arrived. How would you like to pay?" the driver asked Yang Shanshan, turning his head to her.

Yang Shanshan glanced slightly at the driver and took out her wallet from her handbag.

I opened my wallet and found a pitiful fifty-yuan bill lying inside.

With a heavy heart, I pulled out the cash and handed it over. Watching the driver accept the money with his rough hands, I felt a pang of heartache.

You know, with electronic payments so convenient these days, cash is very scarce.

If I spend this money today, I'll have to make a special trip to the bank ATM just to withdraw some cash.

"Yang Shanshan, I...I..." Huang Weiwei seemed to have thought of something terrible, and stammered, unable to finish her sentence, which made people anxious.

"What's wrong? Don't rush, tell me slowly."

Yang Shanshan paid the fare, took the change from the driver, and got out of the taxi with her bag slung over her shoulder.

"It's...it's the young man who was crushed to death."

"What young man who was crushed to death? You mean Hao Shuai? The one who got crushed to death by the signboard?"

"Yes, it's him! The pants and clothes are very similar, and most importantly, the backpack is very similar too! I think it's him!"

Huang Weiwei was a little incoherent. Yang Shanshan was walking towards the entrance of the Second Branch Bureau when she saw her colleagues going to work. She smiled mechanically and nodded to greet them.

As soon as her colleague walked past, she immediately stopped smiling and said into the headset microphone:

"That's Hao Shuai? You're asking for the obvious, of course it was Hao Shuai who was smashed to death, I saw it on the news. We even saw us on the news."

Yang Shanshan paused here and didn't continue.

Normally, she would probably joke that we've become celebrities and are on the front page of the news...

She sensed that something was off with Huang Weiwei, and since this was not something to joke about, she wisely swallowed the rest of her words.

"I mean, this morning I saw Hao Shuai, who was crushed to death, waiting for a bus with a backpack in the store. Then he bumped into a young lady, and the two seemed to have a few words of argument..."

Huang Weiwei tried hard to recall the situation again. Yes, that was Hao Shuai who was crushed to death.

He wore a crisp white shirt, workwear trousers, and carried a pure leather business laptop bag, looking so sunny and full of energy.

Yang Shanshan was also taken aback upon hearing this; this was truly...

There's nothing more to say.

"Huang Weiwei, don't be scared. I think Hao Shuai lives nearby and takes the bus to and from work there every day."

As you saw in the news, he was tragically killed when he was struck by a bakery sign on his way home from get off work.

"Yes, you're right, that should be it." She sighed softly, "So what did the girl you saw look like?"

"Long hair, well-proportioned, beautiful, and full of vitality."

Yang Shanshan recalled for a moment, then picked out the key points and said, "I didn't really care about this at first, but I saw her again when I was at work just now."

"So what? It's just a coincidence. She runs every morning and evening to exercise. Last time you saw her at night, and this time you saw her in the morning."

Huang Weiwei kept trying to comfort herself, but... seeing Hao Shuai, who had been hit by her shop's signboard,

He went to work every day, full of energy and hope, and then he died in the blink of an eye...

It's just an inexplicable awkwardness.

"Weiwei, are you stupid? Your home is in the North District, and mine is in the East District, which is even further east. Who would exercise by walking diagonally across M City? It's not like we're running a marathon!"

As they were talking, Yang Shanshan arrived at her workplace, turned on her computer, and searched for the news article "Hao Shuai accidentally killed after being hit by a signboard" in her browser.

"That makes sense, but are you sure it's the same person? Maybe they just look alike. There are so many girls getting plastic surgery these days, and even internet celebrities have those snake-like faces."

As the news popped up, Yang Shanshan dragged the scroll bar down to the illustration in the news article.

Click Save.

When placed in Photoshop and the resolution is increased, many blurry backgrounds become clearer as the image quality improves.

Zoom in, zoom in, zoom in again...

Haha!

This photographer is really awesome.

After multiplying by 1000px, in the corner of the entire image, there is a blurry, light gray figure.

When this photo was taken, it was already quite dark.

The girl's light gray workout clothes blended almost perfectly with the surrounding background.

Yes, this is the girl in the gym clothes; the knot in her ponytail is the same light pink color.

A large crowd had gathered at the crime scene, packed tightly together in a dark mass.

At normal size, a girl exercising will appear as a gray-black dot in a photo because of the distance.

And who would notice a tiny, inconspicuous pixel in the corner of a photo?

Yang Shanshan saw that she ran past the floor-to-ceiling glass shop window without even glancing at the crowd gathered around her.

This is puzzling, since someone's death is a major event no matter what.

Normally, she would have stopped to see what was going on, but she didn't.

Yang Shanshan's attention was focused on the sudden incident, or on Hao Shuai, Wen Jie, and Huang Weiwei who were killed, or on Jia Nan, Huang Dongheng, or even on the crowd of onlookers...

Sigh, the scene was so chaotic that she couldn't remember where she was focusing her attention at the time.

In short, those who didn't pay attention to the girl exercising only had a vague impression of her slender figure.

And today, when this girl reappeared downstairs, almost instantly, all the vague impressions I had of her became clear.

"Wait a moment, I'll send you a picture of that girl." Yang Shanshan said, and hung up the phone before Huang Weiwei could react.

She quickly took a picture of it and sent it to Huang Weiwei via WeChat.

Huang Weiwei received the picture and examined it repeatedly. After hesitating, she typed a line:

"This girl looks a bit like the young lady I saw in the store, the one who had the conflict with Hao Shuai..."

Hmm...it doesn't seem like it.

"Sigh, it's too far to confirm, but the height, build, and hairstyle are very similar."

After Yang Shanshan sent the picture, she saw a message from Wenjie on WeChat.

"Shanshan, have you arrived at the company yet?"

Yang Shanshan stared at the message for a second or two, then her face suddenly turned red.

The image of Wenjie's intoxicated face and the infatuation in his eyes from last night flashed through her mind.

Last night, seeing Wenjie's infatuation with her, she almost instantly fell for him.

Seeing Wenjie's message now fills my heart with excitement.

When she saw Huang Weiwei's reply, her expression changed several times.

From embarrassment to astonishment, and then to horror...

She hurriedly opened her chat window with Wenjie and frantically typed a message:

"Wenjie, are you... are you alright? I have a very bad feeling..."

Wenjie was mopping the floor at Yang Shanshan's house. Last night, after entering the house, the two of them bumped and stumbled along the way.

He didn't even have time to change into slippers; his footprints were left on the floors of the living room, dining room, and bedroom.

Is this...is this evidence of wrongdoing on Caihua Avenue?

Wipe it off, wipe it off, wipe it all off!

Hearing his phone ring, he threw down the mop, wiped his hands on his clothes, and took his phone out of his pocket.

He paused slightly upon seeing Yang Shanshan's question.

I tried hard to recall what I said last night, and I don't think I said anything I shouldn't have.

He kept his mouth shut about the kidnapping and Jia Nan's revenge!

Even when he was confused and infatuated, he never spoke carelessly.

"That's great! What's wrong?"

Wenjie stared at his phone in surprise, waiting for Yang Shanshan's message.

Yang Shanshan directly made a voice call.

Seeing the woman in red standing ethereal amidst the endless yellow sand, her WeChat profile picture spinning incessantly, followed by Huang Weiwei's slightly anxious voice:

"Wenjie, do you remember the day Huang Weiwei had an accident at her shop, and I went to the shop to be with her?"

The man who was killed by the falling sign was named Hao Shuai. He was taking the bus to work at the intersection in the morning, and was killed when the sign fell on him on his way home from get off work.

I was at the crime scene when I saw a girl in workout clothes running past there, and this morning I saw the same girl running past my building again.

What I want to say is that when I first saw Hao Shuai, who had been crushed to death, I had a strange feeling, I thought it was you.

"I?"

Yang Shanshan's words were somewhat rambling, but Wenjie understood them.

(End of this chapter)