Ren Yi took two days off and went home first to stock up on food and daily necessities for the house.
While watching a movie with his father, he took the opportunity to calculate how much leave he had left for the year. He discovered that he had already used half of it. In previous years, he had almost never used all his leave, but ever since Gong Yingxian had appeared in his life, he suddenly felt that his vacation days weren’t quite enough.
Fortunately, there were less than two months left in the year.
Just as the movie reached an exciting part, Ren Xiangrong suddenly asked, “Son, why have you been taking leave so often lately?”
“Isn’t it because I want to spend more time with you?”
“How come I don’t feel like you’ve spent any more days with me?” Ren Xiangrong glanced at him. “Why are you taking so much leave? Can you really leave your squad at ease?”
“Oh, come on, Old Ren. I haven’t taken that much.” Ren Yi explained, “I get forty-five days of leave a year, and I’ve only used half of it. There’s Xiao Qu at the squad, along with my deputy captain and platoon leaders. Every one of them can handle things on their own. I’m completely at ease.”
Ren Xiangrong gave a soft snort, clearly unconvinced.
“Besides, I’m not taking leave to go have fun. I’m helping the police investigate a case and contributing my personal vacation time. You practically devoted all your personal time to the firefighting profession. You can’t expect me to be exactly the same as you, right? Mom used to argue with you about that all the time.”
Ren Xiangrong widened his eyes. “At least I had a wife. What about you? If you were taking leave to date someone, I wouldn’t say anything. You’re already thirty. Hmph.”
Ren Yi rubbed his nose and fell silent.
Ren Xiangrong looked at him for a while before asking hopefully, “You’re not actually dating someone, are you?”
Ren Yi immediately denied it. “I already told you, it’s for investigating a case.”
Gong Yingxian’s face surfaced in his mind, and his chest grew slightly warm.
Ren Xiangrong turned away in disappointment and continued watching the movie. “It’s not that I don’t want you to take leave. I really regret that I didn’t spend more time with your mother back then.”
Ren Yi let out a soft sigh.
“I won’t be able to keep you company for many more years. You should find someone to keep you company. Don’t be alone, understand?”
“Don’t say things like that.” Ren Yi’s heart began to ache.
Watching the person closest to you gradually lose their vitality to illness while you could do nothing about it was perhaps the most helpless and heartbreaking thing in the world.
The next morning, after getting out of bed, Ren Yi immediately got busy. He installed surveillance cameras inside and outside the house, with the live feed accessible from his phone. At the same time, he reminded the housekeeper to pay more attention to any suspicious people nearby.
His home address had been exposed on Archangel, which had left him somewhat uneasy. No matter what, it never hurt to be careful.
After finishing everything, he ate lunch, took Gong Yingxian’s pillow, and drove to another house he owned.
This house wasn’t far from where he currently lived. When they had originally bought it, his father’s first requirement had been that it couldn’t be outside his jurisdiction. While his mother was still alive, the family had moved there and lived for several years. Only after his father became ill did they move back to the old house.
When Ren Yi entered the house, he was startled and almost failed to recognize it as his own home.
The floor tiles had been polished until they gleamed, and every place was spotlessly clean. Fresh flowers had been placed on the dining table and coffee table, and even the sofa covers had clearly been washed.
Ren Yi put down the pillow and walked into the kitchen. On the counter was a velvet-covered box. When he opened it, he found a very high-end set of tableware inside.
He then opened the refrigerator. The huge 500-liter side-by-side refrigerator was stuffed full of all kinds of ingredients.
He no longer wanted to bother checking the bedroom and bathroom. They had probably been completely renovated as well, with plenty of things he had never seen before.
He shook his head with a smile and thought to himself:
What a weirdo.
He found the note Uncle Sheng had left on the dining table. It not only listed Gong Yingxian’s dietary restrictions and the foods he normally liked, but even included detailed instructions on how to prepare them.
Ren Yi memorized all the things Gong Yingxian couldn’t eat, then put the note away. Since Gong Yingxian was coming to his home as a guest, of course he would do the cooking himself.
He began preparing everything. He was busy until a little after three in the afternoon when Gong Yingxian suddenly called.
Ren Yi held the phone between his shoulder and ear while both hands kneaded dough.
“Hello? What time are you coming?”
“I might not be able to make it today.”
Ren Yi frowned, and his hands stopped moving. “What happened?”
“My colleagues and I are staking out a suspect. The hooded man.”
“You found him?”
“Mm. He has accomplices too. This is a very densely populated residential area. We don’t want to cause a disturbance, so we’re waiting for the right opportunity.” Gong Yingxian’s voice sounded somewhat subdued. “I just don’t know when we’ll be finished.”
Ren Yi had been looking forward to having Gong Yingxian come over today, so this news was especially disappointing.
After thinking for a moment, he asked, “Where are you? I’ll come over and take a look. Maybe I can help.”
No matter what, he still wanted to see Gong Yingxian.
Gong Yingxian hesitated for a moment. “I’ll send you my location.”
Ren Yi put the ingredients he had prepared halfway back into the refrigerator, changed his clothes, and left.
The place where Gong Yingxian was staking out the suspect was only two or three kilometers from the scene of the car-burning case. It was an old part of the city, filled with low-rise buildings and damaged roads. Compared with the modern commercial district that had recently been built not far away, it looked like two completely different dimensions.
Perhaps the demolition crews hadn’t reached this area yet.
From a distance, Ren Yi spotted Gong Yingxian’s car and parked behind it.
He walked over and knocked on the window. He then heard the doors unlock. He opened the rear door and got in because there was someone in the passenger seat.
Gong Yingxian looked back at Ren Yi. “Are you hungry? I have some food in the car.”
“No, it’s fine. I already had lunch.”
“Hello, you’re Captain Ren, right?” The young man in the passenger seat turned around and shook his hand. “We should have run into each other at the precinct. My name is Cai Qiang.”
“Hello.” Ren Yi shook his hand. “How long have you two been staking them out here?”
“Almost an hour.” Gong Yingxian rolled up his sleeve and looked at his watch. “My colleagues have been going door-to-door around this area for several days before finally narrowing down the suspect.”
Cai Qiang said, “This suspect has a previous record for getting into fights and seriously injuring someone. He spent several years in prison. We confirmed with the landlord that he has accomplices staying in his apartment. According to information provided by the food delivery company, he frequently orders enough food for three or four people.”
“If there are that many people, are the two of you the only ones staking them out?”
Gong Yingxian pointed toward an inconspicuous van in the distance. “Those are our people too.”
Ren Yi asked in confusion, “Then why don’t you just go in and arrest them?”
“We’re worried the suspects might resist and cause a major disturbance. There are too many people living in this area, and we’re afraid civilians could get hurt,” Cai Qiang explained. “We want to wait for them to come out. Ideally, we’ll catch one of the suspects alone.”
Ren Yi sighed inwardly.
Looks like there really was no chance of going home today.
As though they were thinking the same thing, Gong Yingxian turned his head and said, “If we don’t have time today, we’ll go tomorrow.”
Ren Yi smiled at him. “No problem.”
“There’s something else.” Gong Yingxian said, “This morning, I had Zhou Chuan meet Peng Fei.”
Ren Yi was surprised. “That fast? How did it go?”
One look at Gong Yingxian’s expression told him it hadn’t gone well.
“When Peng Fei saw Zhou Chuan, he had no reaction at all. He said he didn’t know Zhou Chuan. From his expression to his movements to his tone of voice, he didn’t look like he was lying.”
“Maybe he’s just particularly good at pretending.”
Gong Yingxian shook his head. “Someone who can maintain completely flawless facial expressions and body language even under unexpected circumstances must have undergone special training. For example, a special forces soldier or a psychology expert. People like that are extremely rare. Peng Fei has no such background. He’s just an ordinary person. I think he genuinely doesn’t know Zhou Chuan.”
“If he isn’t a suspect, then who exactly was that man in black?”
“He’s not completely free of suspicion either,” Gong Yingxian added.
Ren Yi was confused. “What do you mean?”
Cai Qiang said, “After we brought him to meet Zhou Chuan and got absolutely nothing out of it, we were really unwilling to give up. Dr. Gong suddenly had an idea and asked me to bring the garbage we’d collected from the scene out of the evidence room for Peng Fei to look at. That’s when Peng Fei reacted. But he refused to admit that he had anything to do with those pieces of evidence.”
“You mean there might be something belonging to Peng Fei among them?”
Gong Yingxian nodded. “Either there’s something of his, or he knows something. I could tell from his expression. I’ve already sent the evidence to the forensic department for fingerprint comparison. However, with everything burned so badly, we don’t know whether we’ll be able to find anything.”
“Fire-damaged evidence is very difficult to examine. I think we should focus on the hooded man for now. There’s probably a better chance there.”
“Exactly. That’s why as soon as we received the message from our colleagues, we came straight here to stake them out,” Cai Qiang said with a cold snort. “Once we catch one, we won’t have to worry about catching the other.”
The three of them chatted intermittently as the sky gradually darkened.
Ren Yi worriedly asked, “What if they don’t leave the house all day?”
“Then we’ll go arrest them while they’re sleeping in the middle of the night. The landlord gave us a key.” Cai Qiang glanced at Ren Yi. “Captain Ren, you really don’t need to stay with us. It’s taking up too much of your time.”
“It’s fine. I’m on vacation.”
Ren Yi glanced at the back of Gong Yingxian’s head and thought to himself that this guy’s bladder was pretty impressive. He’d been sitting there for so long without even going to the bathroom.
Unexpectedly, Cai Qiang immediately said, “Ah, I need to use the bathroom.”
He opened the door and got out.
Once there were only the two of them left in the car, Gong Yingxian immediately turned his body around as far as he could and blinked at Ren Yi.
“You really aren’t going home? Staking someone out is boring.”
“It’s fine. Even if I go home, I’ll just play on my phone. I’d rather stay here and see how the police catch criminals.”
Naturally, Ren Yi wasn’t going to admit that he simply wanted to stay here with him.
“Oh, do you know what delicious food I prepared for you today?”
“What?”
“I’m not telling you.” Ren Yi gave a cheeky grin. “You’ll find out when you see it yourself.”
Gong Yingxian raised an eyebrow. “Is your cooking good? You’re pretty confident.”
“It’s decent. If I follow a recipe, I shouldn’t be able to mess up too badly. By the way, do you play video games? What kind of movies do you like?”
“Why?”
“You have to have some entertainment after dinner, right?”
Gong Yingxian curled his lips into a smile. “I like horror movies.”
Ren Yi rolled his eyes. “Are you making fun of me? Forget the movies. I’ll teach you how to play games.”
“What game?”
“I’ll decide when the time comes.” Ren Yi lifted his chin. “Depends on how quick you are to learn.”
Gong Yingxian gave a soft snort. “As long as I want to learn something, there’s nothing I can’t learn.”
Ren Yi clicked his tongue twice. “Pretty confident, aren’t you?”
Gong Yingxian said without the slightest bit of embarrassment, “I’m telling the truth.”
“All right, I know you’re smart. I can’t wait for you to learn so you can carry me up the ranks.”
“Up to where?”
Ren Yi casually explained, “Somewhere really impressive.”
Gong Yingxian said seriously, “Wherever you want to go, I can take you there.”
Ren Yi froze.
In the next instant, his heart beat so fast it seemed ready to leap out of his chest.
He cursed inwardly.
Damn it, could he say something like that to just anyone?
The things Gong Yingxian casually did and said could easily make him read too much into them. But he really didn’t want to overinterpret a straight man’s words and actions, afraid that it was all just his own wishful thinking.
Gong Yingxian was about to say something else when his radio suddenly crackled to life.
“Dr. Gong, did you see that? The suspect is coming out.”