Chapter 102.2

Wife

As the first rays of the dawn light hit the floor, Song Yuhang, who hadn’t slept a wink all night, lifted her head from her arms.

She carefully took out the last remaining lonely ring from the ring box and slowly slid it onto her ring finger.

She whispered to the empty room, “Lin Yan, can you see this? We… got married.”

In that silent space, only the sunlight touched the corners of her eyes and brows, bringing a trace of warmth to her chilled body.

Song Yuhang cracked a small, strained smile, moved her stiff body, clambered up from the ground, and hobbled out the door with an unsteady gait.

She headed straight to a mobile phone store, staring spellbound at the dazzling array of phones on display.

The enthusiastic clerk started the pitch: “Miss, which phone would you like? We’ve got this new model that just came out—”

The clerk went on and on, like a river of words, but her gaze was fixed on an old phone model tucked away at the back of the display, identical to her old one.

Song Yuhang pointed and said with a hoarse voice, “I’ll take that one.”

The clerk’s lips twisted in a slight pout, and she rolled her eyes secretly, thinking she’d landed a big sale first thing in the morning. Turns out, it was just a broke customer pining for an outdated model from years ago.

As Song Yuhang waited for the clerk to pack up the accessories and hand them over, the clerk asked another question, “Miss, do you need a new SIM card for your phone?”

She pondered for a moment, “I lost my old card. Can I report it and get a replacement? I want my old number back.”

Although the phone was lost and most of the photos and chat records were irretrievable, that number carried too many stories and deep sentiments for her.

She still harbored a wild hope—what if there existed parallel universes? What if, just what if, Lin Yan decided one day to call her?

If she changed her number, Lin Yan would never be able to find her.

A look of impatience crept across the clerk’s face, and in response, Song Yuhang silently pulled out a few more red bills from her pocket and laid them on the counter.

The clerk’s demeanor immediately brightened, “Alright, your ID, please.”

Half an hour later, Song Yuhang left with her new phone and headed straight to the city’s Public Security Bureau in a cab.

It was the start of the workday, and as soon as she showed up at the entrance, countless eyes were drawn to her, a whirlpool of gazes encircling her.

“Captain Song, no rush to come back to work before you’re well.”

“Captain Song, you… you’re really okay, right?”

“Captain Song, we’ve all heard… sigh, take care and move on.”

……

Facing the kindness of her colleagues, Song Yuhang had already become numb from the heartache.

She just mechanically curved her lips into a smile, but that smile never reached her eyes.

“I’m fine, I’m fine, you guys go on with your work. Where’s Director Feng?”

“Director Feng went out early for a meeting, hasn’t come back yet.”

Song Yuhang nodded briefly, getting right to the point: “The kidnapper who survived the last abduction of Xiaowei, have we caught him?”

The crowd exchanged puzzled looks, Xue Rui opened his mouth as if to say something, but then hesitated.

“We’ve caught him…”

Song Yuhang cut him off: “Where is he locked up?”

A junior police officer spoke up, somewhat sheepishly: “Director Feng is personally handling the interrogation, we’ve been told not to discuss it.”

Before the words were fully out of his mouth, and without knowing which nerve had been hit, she had already grabbed him by the collar and yanked him up.

Bloodshot eyes betrayed Song Yuhang’s agitation: “What, I haven’t been dismissed yet, and now you’re treating me like a suspect?”

Xue Rui attempted to defuse the tension: “Captain Song, keep your cool, keep your cool. We get where you’re coming from, but Director Feng’s order is clear… Please, don’t make this hard for us.”

Releasing her grip, Song Yuhang shoved the officer aside: “Fine, I won’t make it hard for you, I’ll investigate on my own.”

With that, she strode out with determination.

Xue Rui slapped his forehead: “Crap, we better report to Director Feng, pronto.”

Walking from the office to the entrance of the City Bureau, Song Yuhang recalled the details of her contact with Fatty, as well as the places in Jiangcheng City where people could be detained.

A flash of memory revealed the needle marks on his arm, and Song Yuhang swung open the door of a taxi.

“Driver, to Jiangcheng City’s Compulsory Drug Rehabilitation Center.”

Upon arrival, she was stopped by the guardhouse, but she didn’t hesitate to shove her ID right in the guard’s face.

That was a move straight out of Lin Yan’s playbook.

“Captain Song Yuhang of the Jiangcheng City Public Security Bureau’s Criminal Investigation Division, open up. I’m here to interrogate a prisoner.”

The steel stamp on that ID wasn’t a forgery, but the catch is you need written approval to interrogate prisoners.

The prison guard protested, “Captain Song, Captain Song, this isn’t how it’s done…”

Before he could finish his sentence, he was pushed aside. Song Yuhang charged straight in, and the guard hurried after her.

She was a boss, after all, and he didn’t want to cross her.

“Captain Song, Captain Song, please tell me which prisoner you want to interrogate. I’ll go call them out for you. We can sort out the paperwork afterwards…”

He was trying to buy some time, hoping the warden would come to handle the situation, but Song Yuhang acted as if she hadn’t heard a thing, barreling straight in, nearly sprinting from cell to cell, peering through the iron bars.

The guard tried to block her way: “Captain Song!”

Song Yuhang ignored him as if he was air, annoyed, she shoved him aside.

Stumbling back a few steps, the guard slammed into the railing and shrieked, “Captain Song, Captain Song, if you keep this up, I’m gonna call for backup!”

Song Yuhang dashed past a metal gate, then doubled back, pulling at the iron bars.

The guard thought she had finally calmed down, but to his shock, she came back, her eyes zeroing in on the keys hanging at his waist.

“Hand over the keys.”

The guard clenched the key ring tightly and backed away: “Captain Song, Captain Song, this isn’t right, it’s against… against the rules.”

Song Yuhang, furious, grabbed his collar and bellowed, “My wife’s already gone, I don’t give a damn about your goddamn rules and regulations!!!”

Seizing the moment while he was still in shock, Song Yuhang threw a punch, and the young guard covered his face. But she feigned another blow and snatched the key ring from his waist, rushed forward, unlocked the door, and before the main forces could arrive, she slammed it shut with a “bang,” blocking the keyhole from inside.

No matter how earth-shattering the knocking from outside grew, she ignored it completely.

This was a narrow single cell, surrounded by high walls, with only an iron window for ventilation. The fat prisoner was asleep but sprang up at the noise, trembling and shrinking back, watching her as she advanced step by step, her towering figure blocking out the sunlight.

“You… what are you doing? Aren’t you… aren’t you a cop?”

His voice was shrill with fear.

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The room was so small that his back was pressed against the solid wall, leaving him with no room to retreat.

Song Yuhang clenched her fists tightly. “How can you still sleep? How the f*ck can you sleep peacefully? Can you actually sleep?”

She gritted her teeth, each word dripping with blood, wishing she could tear him apart alive.

“Help… Help me!” The fat man was wearing handcuffs and had no strength to resist. He cried and howled towards the door, trying to escape.

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Song Yuhang kicked the guy to the ground and reached out, grabbing his neck with such force that the knuckles turned pale.

“Tell me, who sent you to kidnap Xiaowei? Tell me, who led us there?”

During these past few days, she endured the pain and carefully reviewed the timeline.

The habitual criminals involved in child trafficking that appeared before and after the Spring Festival, Lin Yan’s scratched car—someone knew she would change cars, so they tampered with the Audi she acquired, which indirectly caused her to plunge into the sea. Lin Yan risked her life to save her.

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Not to mention Xiaowei’s previous abduction, where she was forced to follow the other party’s rhythm and played around like a puppet. And as Ji Jingxing mentioned, someone set up a bulletproof steel door in the logging workshop with the intention of trapping them, including Lin Yan.

And then there was the sniper who appeared later, taking out the skinny man among the kidnappers ahead of time because he was about to reveal the truth to her.

Stepping back to consider all possibilities, even if that sniper hadn’t managed to take them out, chasing with a tampered car would have been a certain death sentence. With such treacherous road conditions, freshly laden with snow and slick with ice—

Then, the only goal must be—

Song Yuhang shivered, not from the cold but with realization. This was a death trap set for her, yet Lin Yan, with her wit and ingenuity, had diffused it—a dust explosion.

But if time could rewind, she’d rather she wasn’t that clever, preferring they’d just stayed put in the workshop, never venturing out.

Grinding her teeth in frustrated anger, Song Yuhang knew that this puppet master, hell-bent on her demise, didn’t hesitate to drag countless innocents into their deadly game.

Her mom, her sister-in-law, her niece, her… Lin Yan.

Heat welled up in Song Yuhang’s eyes as she gripped his hand tighter, her voice tearing through the air as she bellowed, “Speak! Who made you do this?!”

The fat man struggled, his sizeable hands futilely clawing at the floor, his face ashen, eyes rolling back as he gasped, “I… I don’t know… cough… cough cough… save… save me…”

His gaze clung to the door, holding onto a sliver of hope.

Song Yuhang was a cop, after all. She wouldn’t kill him in his cell.

“Do you think that I won’t really kill you?” She stood in the shadows, her lips curved into a cold smirk.

The fat man looked into her eyes, filled with ruthlessness, despair, and resentment, which eventually transformed into a chilling desire for murder.

Before he could scream in horror, she covered his mouth with a crumpled paper ball. She tore apart the books that prisoners usually used to learn writing in the prison, shredded them into pieces, and plastered them on his face, then poured water over them.

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“Do you think that I won’t really kill you?” Song Yuhang repeated in a low voice, tearing another piece of paper, wetting it with water, and slapping it on his face.

“Do you know why? Because I want…”

“To slowly torture you.”

“Know what this is called?” she numbly tore off a piece of paper to cover his face, watching as the dampened paper contoured to his features. The fat man was gasping for air, unable to speak a word.

“This is called ‘Water Cell Suffocation’, a brutal torture that’s been around for three thousand years. In ancient times, it was known as ‘The Official Post Ascension’; add a layer, and you rise nine ranks—an immediate promotion and fortune. Isn’t that what you wanted, money?”

Song Yuhang murmured, a slow smile spreading across her face as she added another sheet: “Here, take it, all for you!”

Suddenly, her teeth gritted, she slapped all the sheets of paper onto his face in one go and doused it with a whole cup of water.

The quality of the paper was good, airtight, intensifying the loss of oxygen.

The fat man was shaking violently, the paper thin as cicada wings fluttering with each of his breaths.

He quickly became short of breath due to lack of oxygen, his breathing as labored as if he was hauling on bellows, a mix of terror and the physiological reactions of one facing death. Soon enough, a large wet patch spread on his pants, a foul odor filling the air.

Song Yuhang started tearing books again, the ripping sound prickling her ears.

The fat man fell to his knees, struggling to lift a finger.

Song Yuhang kicked him over, yanking the paper off his face: “Talk!”

As the paper was lifted, the fat man’s face was a river of tears, crying for mercy: “Ma’am, I’ll talk, I’ll talk, just don’t kill me, please!”

Song Yuhang grabbed him by the collar and hauled him up: “Out with it, who sent you to kidnap the kid?!”

“I don’t know him, I didn’t recognize him, just doing a job for money…doing it for the cash!”

“What did he look like?”

“A guy, about 1.7 meters tall, skinny and tall, dressed sharp, sporting a watch that looked expensive, and a birthmark the size of a fingernail on his right wrist!”

Panting heavily, the fat man spat it all out in one breath, even more cleanly than when he spilled the beans in front of Director Feng.

“Where can I find him?”

“At Huange Nightclub, that’s where we always meet up!”

“After you took the children, where’d you sell them?!”

“To Auntie Hong, some lady called Auntie Hong! Where she sells ’em on, I’ve got no clue.”

Song Yuhang forcefully pushed him away, still filled with anger, and turned around to deliver a series of fierce kicks to his face. The combat boots were studded with rivets and had thick soles.

“You f*cking human trafficker!”

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The fat man let out a miserable scream as blood sprayed from his nose, crying for his parents.

“And you have the audacity to still call out for your f*cking parents! Shut the f*ck up!” Song Yuhang was about to make another move when she was tackled to the ground by the prison guards who burst in through the broken door.

With a click, the handcuffs were fastened around her wrists.

Song Yuhang didn’t resist as she was marched out, escorted right into the squad car. But with eyes blazing, she turned back to stare down the fat man, as if she could tear him limb from limb, her gaze unrelenting until he was out of sight.

The fat man shivered, not from cold, curled himself into a ball hugging his head, thinking, “F*ck, even prison isn’t safe.”

The iron door clanged lightly. With a light cough, Feng Jianguo took a seat across from her, observing her as she hung her head in silence.

“Director Feng, she won’t say a word no matter what I ask. What do you think…”

What’s there to think? Surely you can’t resort to torture like she did with the suspect.

With a simmering anger, Director Feng ordered, “Everyone, out.”

This was clearly his cue for a one-on-one interrogation.

The officers exchanged glances, gathered their notebooks, and filed out.

Only when everyone had cleared out did Director Feng speak up: “Tell me, why did you run off to the rehab center?”

Song Yuhang lazily lifted her eyelids, her gaze drifting to the camera on the wall, and a mocking smile twisted her lips.

Normally she would never wear such a smile; it was the kind of expression Lin Yan was notorious for.

Director Feng felt a jolt of alarm but kept his composure as he went over to switch off the camera, plunging the surveillance feed into darkness.

“Now can we talk?”

Leaning forward, Song Yuhang said, “I’ve got nothing to say. I hit him to vent for Lin Yan. Today, Director Feng, by detaining me, you’ve snagged yourself a mere prisoner. Release me, and I’m willing to be your pawn at the front lines, to crack a case so big it’ll make history—achievements big enough to land you the promotion you’re after.”

Director Feng watched her silently, his light brown pupils filled with something unreadable.

She was never the type to speak like this ordinarily, and she wouldn’t even allow herself to contemplate such questions.

All her focus was on cracking the case, she was simple and pure-hearted.

It was Lin Yan’s presence that brought warmth to her, made her seem like a living, breathing “person,” and it was Lin Yan’s death that complicated her, made her less “human.”

Director Feng quietly sighed to himself, uncertain whether he had made the right move or not.

“How do you know what I want? What if I really just aspire to uphold justice and righteousness? Even if you are the protégé of Director Zhao and the face of our Jiangcheng City Bureau, mistakes must be met with punishment.”

Song Yuhang cracked a smile, “It was only when I landed the position of Criminal Investigation Captain that I understood everyone craves power and money; the only difference is the means they use to get it.”

“I aided your promotion; you provided me the chance to solve cases – it’s a fair trade.”

It was as if he heard some private joke, lifting his teacup with a snort of laughter, then setting it down, his hands clasped together as he quietly watched her.

“I could help you—”

Song Yuhang paused, taken aback.

He continued, “But not because I’m looking to climb the ranks. I haven’t stooped so low as to ride on others’ coattails for a promotion. There’s only one reason I’d help you.”

“And that’s to see criminals brought to justice, to have fairness and justice prevail.”

A twinge hit Song Yuhang’s nose, and tears quickly welled up in her eyes: “Why? Haven’t you always hated Lin Yan?”

The old man puffed his beard and glared, retorting, “Who said I hated her?”