Overly Intense [Criminal Investigation] 154

Chapter 154: The Story Ends

“Is it over?”

It was almost ten at night. Shen Yiyi was driving, and she had picked up Qin Luo at a restaurant near her unit. Although she could smell a strong smell of alcohol when she opened the door, after all, Qin Luo was a good drinker, and she had sat down steadily.

“Have you been drinking until now?”

Qin Luo had been called away by the propaganda department after the interrogation. Shen Yiyi was not supposed to work overtime today, and she had only left so late to wait for Qin Luo to have dinner.

Qin Luo lowered her seat and leaned back. “Isn’t it for the production to start work early?”

“Then let’s not go and see Liu Jia today.” Shen Yiyi turned the car around and drove in the direction of Cloud Top. She did not forget to ask about work. “When can the production resume work?”

“In about two months.”

A meal had lasted for five or six hours, and Qin Luo was a little full from drinking. The overly tight shirt was suffocating her, so she reached out and unbuttoned two buttons, saying casually, “I also happened to talk about Logos’s plan to promote your mother’s case.”

“… ”

Qin Luo knew that Shen Yiyi was waiting for a reply. “It just so happens that your unit also has a legal education and propaganda task next year. They also don’t have to find someone to learn how to operate, and it can also be considered as completing the task for them.”

Police-to-police work was sensitive to begin with, and online public opinion would pose a challenge to procedural justice. Shen Yiyi had not expected the leadership to agree to Qin Luo’s plan so generously.

“Are you afraid that a too high-profile police image will be detrimental to your daily official duties?” Seeing that she did not answer, Qin Luo comforted her again, “Don’t think so much. There are many police IPs now. The speed of refuting rumors by a high-credibility IP account is very fast. A press conference is not as fast as a blogger’s video. You can rest assured. Your leaders are eager for us to help them with their accounts.”

Shen Yiyi was skeptical. “You didn’t bet on some performance with our leaders after you got drunk, did you?”

In the midst of their bickering, the car journey was already half over. Qin Luo had not asked about the result of Zhan Luo’s interrogation from beginning to end. Instead, it was Shen Yiyi who took the initiative to inform her:

“After you joined today, the interrogation broke through very quickly. Team Leader Piao asked me to thank you. He said he would treat us to dinner another day.”

“It’s good that there’s a breakthrough.”

Qin Luo turned her head to look out the window. It was still lush in Shanghai in November, but it was already dark now, and she could only see the leaves swaying.

She suddenly asked, “Do you like this job?”

“I do.”

Without any hesitation, Shen Yiyi gave a straightforward answer.

“Have you never hated it?”

“Of course I have.”

“For example?” Qin Luo was curious.

Shen Yiyi held the steering wheel tightly with both hands. “For example, in Shang Yi’s case, the higher-ups were in a hurry to close the case and rushed the report, which caused the lab to compress the toxicology testing cycle, and the mass spectrometry analysis error rate rose by thirty percent, so it was sent back to be redone. The amount of paperwork to be filled out was doubled, and just this paperwork would take up 2 hours of my time, which led to me working overtime every day.”

Qin Luo was even more curious. “Do your married colleagues also work overtime every day?”

“They do.”

Shen Yiyi yawned. “So you can’t marry a forensic pathologist. It’s a widowed, hell-level marriage.”

“… ” Qin Luo comforted her, “It’s fine. I also have to work overtime every day before Liu Jia gets better.”

Shen Yiyi was still wearing her police pants, and the sleeves of her white sweater were rolled up halfway. You could faintly see the muscle lines on her forearm as she held the steering wheel.

At the dinner party tonight, Qin Luo had heard a few leaders talk about Shen Yiyi, saying that it was rare to see a young woman like her who had been promoted exceptionally. Besides being outstanding herself, the most important thing was that she had no intention of getting married.

Qin Luo closed her eyes and said slowly, “Why don’t we buy a house near your police uniform?”

“Why?”

“It’s close.” Qin Luo said, “That way, if there’s an emergency at night, you won’t have to drive for more than an hour. My work hours are very flexible anyway, and my commute is more flexible than yours.”

Shen Yiyi was very sincere. “I can’t afford it.”

Qin Luo burst out laughing. “I can’t afford it for the time being either.”

Logos had lost a lot of money this year. After Shang Yi’s death, many of the accounts were frozen for review. The live stream room had stopped working, and although the business was gradually recovering, many customers had been lost. The breach of contract also required money for compensation, not to mention that the final payment for the production had not yet been paid. It was almost the end of the year, and the administration had even canceled the venue that had been booked for the previous year to save expenses.

But Qin Luo did not feel that life was hard. Compared to Liu Jia’s health, these were not pressures.

“We’ll work hard to make money next year.” Qin Luo smiled and slowly closed her eyes.

The days came to the end of December.

Liu Jia’s bodily functions had recovered well. Although her language system was still recovering, her fingers were flexible enough to send messages. She would occasionally audit a meeting, and after the meeting, she would bombard Qin Luo with messages.

Liang Wei had been to Logos a few times, but Qin Luo had been busy on a business trip to Beijing and had missed her every time. She had asked You Ning to make an appointment with Qin Luo a few times, but Qin Luo had been too busy to reply to You Ning’s messages.

This had forced Liang Wei to go and see Liu Jia, and it was only then that she had run into the busy person outside the ward.

Qin Luo did not want Liu Jia to see Liang Wei. Before the person could even enter the door to visit, she had directly persuaded her to go to a teahouse to talk about business, leaving You Ning and Shen Yiyi to accompany Liu Jia.

Liu Jia was lying on the bed, looking at You Ning on the left and Shen Yiyi on the right. The three of them had not said a few words in an hour.

The patient couldn’t take it anymore and quickly sent a message to Qin Luo. Shen Yiyi was about to finish watching the news, and only then did Qin Luo reply to Liu Jia: [Wait a little longer.]

Just as the news was about to end, You Ning warmed up the atmosphere. “I’ve seen your account.”

Seeing the account meant that You Ning knew her story. Shen Yiyi nodded awkwardly and said thank you.

“It’s very moving.” You Ning said sincerely, “It made me cry.”

Shen Yiyi was even more embarrassed. “It’s not that serious.”

You Ning gently shook her head, but she couldn’t say any comforting words. She had been on a production about child trafficking before and understood the pain of a family looking for their child. It was a long and torturous process, and there was no room for anything but hatred in their lives. The difficulty of Shen Yiyi looking for a murderer was even greater than that of a parent looking for their child, so she couldn’t imagine how the other had persisted all these years.

She had not expected that Qin Luo would help Shen Yiyi with her account. In just half a month, the number of followers had grown rapidly, and every piece of content was a hit. Whether it was the team’s operation, the choice of persona and theme, or the meaning of the content, Shen Yiyi had a very strong plasticity, especially the faint resilience in her, which would inspire people with her strength after listening.

“If you need my help, just say so.”

You Ning could now calmly accept the fact that Qin Luo had chosen Shen Yiyi. If she were Qin Luo, she would also not hesitate to choose such a white moonlight.

She said sincerely again, “Whether it’s a filming problem, or if you want to try more content in the future.”

Shen Yiyi waved her hand. “I have no plans for the future. I don’t want to be an internet celebrity.”

“You already have almost a hundred thousand followers. Even if you don’t want to, you’re already an internet celebrity.” You Ning smiled. “Next time, have Qin Luo film more autopsy-themed content. I love to watch this kind of sensational stuff.”

Shen Yiyi shook her head at the thought. “Isn’t it a bit scary to film an autopsy? Who would watch something so bloody and gory?”

“It’s precisely because it’s bloody and gory that it’s appetizing.”

“…So crazy.”

Liu Jia looked at the two people who were chatting happily in the living room and sent another message to Qin Luo. [You can talk about your business with peace of mind. The old flame and the lover are getting along very well.]

Qin Luo only saw this message when she was downstairs at the hospital, but she did not go up. She just sent a message to Shen Yiyi, asking her to go to the parking lot.

When Shen Yiyi arrived, she saw Qin Luo sitting in the driver’s seat with a tense face.

After she had fastened her seatbelt, she rested her hand on Qin Luo’s arm and gently comforted her. “What’s wrong? Did the chat not go well?”

Qin Luo looked at Shen Yiyi in a daze, then shook her head and drove out of the hospital without a word.

“Did you guys talk about the production?” Qin Luo’s expression was too stiff. Shen Yiyi was worried. “Or…”

Qin Luo shook her head. “It’s nothing.”

No matter how Shen Yiyi asked from the side, Qin Luo insisted that the two had met for business and that it did not involve any illegal transactions.

It wasn’t until the two had gotten home that Qin Luo had entered the door and had not even let Shen Yiyi spray alcohol. She had turned and had gone into the cloakroom. When Shen Yiyi had finished washing her hands and had pushed the door to go in, she had seen Qin Luo holding her pajamas in her hand, not having changed yet.

Shen Yiyi was a little concerned.

To be precise, they had been in a relationship for a month, and she had seen You Ning again tonight. At this moment, Qin Luo clearly had something on her mind but did not want to mention it to her, which made her feel particularly distant. This lack of closeness made Shen Yiyi concerned.

She used to be a person who was afraid of being clingy, who hated being hugged from behind, who hated being bombarded with more than a dozen messages a day, who hated idle chat with no real purpose, and who hated being infiltrated.

Now she was concerned about this distance.

“Are you in a daze in front of the mirror?”

Shen Yiyi gently hugged Qin Luo from behind, her cheek against her narrow back. Recently, Qin Luo had had many dinner parties and did not like to move in the winter. She could even feel a thin layer of fat on her waist. Shen Yiyi liked this feeling very much, so she held her tightly.

“Was I in a daze?” Qin Luo looked down at the pajamas in her hand and only then realized that she had been distracted. “I was thinking about the plot of my new book.”

“Really?” Shen Yiyi clearly did not believe her. “You can tell me.”

She had asked Qin Luo to tell her, and Qin Luo could really tell her.

Qin Luo was not even wearing clothes, just her underwear. “My new book is about a woman.”

Shen Yiyi could not listen to the story at all. Qin Luo’s fantasies would not stop all day long. The stories were not repetitive and could be told every day without end. But it was not that she did not like Qin Luo telling stories. It was just that they had not seen each other for a week, and their original date had been ruined by Liang Wei and You Ning. Now, she had not eaten, had not changed her clothes, and was telling a story.

“Have you heard of meta-literature?”
“No.”

Qin Luo explained, “It’s when the protagonist of a work realizes that they are a work. This kind of work has a very strong self-awareness. It not only tells a story, but also constantly tells the reader and itself that it is all fictional.”

Shen Yiyi’s eyes were on the wiggling scar on Qin Luo’s arm. She could not listen to any meta-literature at all. In her mind, there was only: Qin Luo actually has keloid skin.

Shen Yiyi’s hand had even, without her knowing, traveled up her waistline and had gently stroked that scar. She had even, like a cat, tentatively approached that scar, her breath scorching hot, and had even wanted to take a bite, so…

This time, it was Qin Luo who was concerned. She turned and arrested Shen Yiyi in her arms. “I’m telling you about my inspiration. Can you not bite me?”

Just bite, and don’t want to listen.

Shen Yiyi stood on her tiptoes and used a kiss to block the other’s so-called inspiration.

In December, Qin Luo had seen Shen Yiyi only a few times. They had not kissed in a long time, and a gentle and slow kiss could not cover her scorching thirst. So she held her shoulders in reverse, her fingertips clutching tightly. The two were like a piece of driftwood pulled into the deep sea by the tide, drifting in the kiss. She kissed her lower lip, the tip of her nose, until Shen Yiyi let out a low, satisfied sound. “Alright, you can continue with your story.”

What the hell was there to say?