Corporate-Level Simp
As captain of the Ditan City Criminal Police Team, Li Weiguo was far from stupid.
With Wen Yiqian’s explanation laid out that clearly, every question that had been nagging at him found an answer.
“So An Zhi went into hiding because she was certain we would launch a thorough investigation into you.”
“And if you really were a concealed criminal, that kind of pressure would be very likely to make you slip up.”
Wen Yiqian nodded.
“But there’s one thing I still can’t account for.” Li Weiguo kept his gaze steady. “If this was all a setup, then coming back to the station with me from the start would have cost you nothing.”
His eyes sharpened. “So why go through the performance? Why insist on investigating yourself?”
He let the pause sit. “Unless you really have done something you don’t want us finding.”
“I already told you: I’m just unlucky. I can be sitting at home doing nothing and still end up a suspect.” Wen Yiqian kept his tone straightforward. “If I’d been hauled in and locked up for a few days, what guarantee did I have that I wouldn’t somehow end up labeled as the actual culprit? Where would I go to appeal that?”
“So you simply don’t trust us to do our jobs,” Li Weiguo said, his voice cooling.
Wen Yiqian gave an awkward laugh and said nothing, thinking privately: Do you have any self-awareness at all? I run into two psychopathic criminals in a single day, and you’re asking why I don’t trust the police?
“Do you have a way to reach An Zhi?” Li Weiguo pressed on. “She’s cut off all contact with the station and her family. If I expose what she’s done directly, dismissal will be the least of her problems.”
“Getting in touch with her is actually straightforward.” Wen Yiqian smiled. “When I went to the Crescent Moon Hotel, I found out she had checked out half an hour before I got there.”
He continued. “That timing struck me as too precise. Not an hour before, not ten minutes before: exactly half an hour before I arrived.”
“Someone tipped her off.” Li Weiguo caught it immediately.
“Before I went to the hotel, I had to ask someone on the street for directions to the Crescent Moon Hotel, since I didn’t know the way.” Wen Yiqian left it at that.
“That person gave her the warning?”
“Do you think it’s really that much of a coincidence?” Wen Yiqian gave him a look. “The answer is right in front of you. You just don’t want to believe it.”
Li Weiguo went still, his expression tightening.
At the time, plainclothes officers had been tailing Wen Yiqian.
After he had asked for directions, those officers had questioned the passerby immediately.
That meant the only people who had known Wen Yiqian was heading to the Crescent Moon Hotel were that passerby, the plainclothes officers, and Li Weiguo himself.
“For someone as attractive as An Zhi, it’s not exactly unusual to have a few devoted admirers willing to do anything for her.” Wen Yiqian said it lightly.
Li Weiguo’s face drained of color. His fists closed.
An Zhi’s recklessness was one thing: she was still green, and she had been bold and headstrong since childhood.
But for someone inside the station to leak information to her, letting her make fools of an entire department…
These people had no idea what it meant to wear that badge.
Li Weiguo drove his fist into the table and stormed out of the interrogation room.
Wen Yiqian sat back, blinking.
The man had been completely unmoved when he learned An Zhi had staged the whole thing.
But the moment a lovesick informant entered the picture, he had erupted.
Simps really do deserve everything coming to them.
…
With Li Weiguo’s standing at the station, getting answers out of people didn’t take long.
Within half an hour, the source of the leak had been identified.
His name was Zeng Wenyu. He had been feeding An Zhi information the whole time, and also, incidentally, sending her his warmest regards.
Armed with An Zhi’s secret contact number, Li Weiguo, his expression glacial, dialed.
The station was quiet. The unanswered ring tone cut through the silence with particular clarity.
Nobody picked up.
He tried again. And again. Each call went unanswered.
“Where is she?” Li Weiguo grabbed Zeng Wenyu by the collar.
“I genuinely don’t know. This has always been the number I use to reach her.” Zeng Wenyu, pale and deflating, answered weakly.
Li Weiguo wanted nothing more than to backhand the man twice, but held himself in check. “Is there any other way to contact her?”
Zeng Wenyu shook his head, then reflexively added, voice laced with worry, “Do you think something’s happened to her? Maybe we should have the tech team trace the number…”
“I hope she’s fine out there,” Li Weiguo said, through something between a laugh and a growl, the sarcasm thick enough to stand on. For the devoted fool standing in front of him, he didn’t even have the energy to be properly angry.
He took a breath, looked at the officers present, and said evenly, “From now on, treat this as if nothing happened. Nobody does anything about An Zhi. When she’s had enough of her little adventure and decides to face the consequences, someone let me know. Clear?”
…
Back in the interrogation room.
“Can I go now?” Wen Yiqian ventured, watching Li Weiguo’s expression.
Li Weiguo said nothing and kept staring at him.
“Um…” Wen Yiqian shifted uncomfortably. “Just so you know, I’m not interested in men. No matter how you feel about me, nothing is going to happen between us.”
Li Weiguo snorted, some of the tension breaking. “I’m not interested in pretty boys.”
“Ah, so it’s the muscular type for you.” Wen Yiqian pulled a face.
“I’m trying to figure out what kind of person you actually are,” Li Weiguo said, his tone returning to something serious.
“A good person,” Wen Yiqian replied, without missing a beat.
He meant it, too. He always had been.
“I hope you’re right.” Li Weiguo found himself thinking back to the look in Wen Yiqian’s eyes that morning.
It had been more unsettling than any genuine criminal he had ever sat across from in that room. So convincing it made the back of his neck prickle.
Could an expression like that really have been manufactured?
The interrogation room door swung open before he could follow that thought any further, and an officer came in at pace. “Captain Li, something’s happened.”
“What is it?” Li Weiguo’s brow drew together.
“It’s An Zhi. Something’s happened to An Zhi.”
Li Weiguo’s expression went cold. He was already on his feet.
Wen Yiqian felt the bottom fall out of his stomach. He put both hands over his head, pressed his face down against the table, and did his best impression of a man who had ceased to exist.
Li Weiguo followed the officer out, then stopped and turned back. “You’re coming too.”
“Please, no.” Wen Yiqian let his forehead drop against the table two or three times.
(End of Chapter)