Winter Solstice

Chapter 33

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Jiang Chengyi left after speaking.

After returning to the room, Lu Yan first went to the bathroom to wash up, and then changed into the clothes for going out. After finishing everything, she sat down at the desk to check the information.

Not long after, she heard someone ringing the doorbell, and just after she got up, the phone on the table rang, and when she took a look, it was the police officer Zhou's number that Jiang Chengyi asked her to save yesterday.

She picked it up, and Xiao Zhou said, "Doctor Lu, I'm Xiao Zhou from Team Jiang, and I'm downstairs now."

She said, "Okay, please wait a moment." She walked quickly to the entrance and looked at the display screen. It was the policeman named Xiao Zhou.

After Xiao Zhou came up, she was about to pour water for him, but Tang Jie's phone call came at this time. She checked the time and it was only 8:30, which was an hour earlier than she thought.

"Lu Yan, your Jiang Chengyi's mansion is too luxurious. There are a lot of rules. I'm too lazy to talk to the security guard. My car is parked at the gate. Come down quickly."

Lu Yan hurriedly said, "I'll be right here." She went back to her room to get her bag, and entered the elevator with Xiao Zhou.

Xiao Zhou didn't drive, and when they arrived at the gate, the two got into Tang Jie's car.

After sitting down, Lu Yan introduced them both: "This is Officer Zhou, and this is my friend Tang Jie."

Tang Jie was enthusiastic, and turned to Xiao Zhou with a toothy smile: "Officer Zhou is good. Oh, I said, Jiang Chengyi and the others have to look at their appearance in recruiting people. Why are his colleagues more handsome than each other?"

One sentence made Xiao Zhou laugh.

On the way, Lu Yan asked Tang Jie, "You said a few days ago that you would go to City B to discuss equipment business with your uncle. When do you plan to go?"

Tang Jie seems to have some fixed business partner with City B. In the past two years, she has visited City B several times to discuss business.

"What else are you going to do?" Tang Jie sighed, "Ding Jing and Liu Yujie have an accident, I don't dare to run around, sigh, I said Lu Yan, it's all our classmates who have the accident, I've been thinking about it these days, why do I always feel , this pervert may belong to our school."

Lu Yan showed a thoughtful expression.

Deng Man's family lived in another district in the city center, and the road was blocked again, and it took more than an hour to arrive.

Parking the car downstairs, Lu Yan and Tang Jie bought snacks in the canteen and let Xiao Zhou accompany them upstairs.

Although the Deng family's house is a few years old, it is very tidy and spacious. If you ignore the messy environment next to the community, it is a very comfortable three-bedroom.

It's a pity that because the owner's mood is not good, there is a gray and depressing atmosphere in the house all the year round.

After Deng Man's accident eight years ago, my uncles and aunts were in pain, and the family was miserable, especially Deng's mother, who almost couldn't continue to work. It was not until three years later that Deng's mother gave birth to life again, and this situation improved.

Deng Xiaomei is now four years old, she is very smart and cute, and makes people laugh as soon as she opens her mouth.

She was the first to run to the door when she heard a knock on the door.

As soon as the door opened, Lu Yan's eyes met Xiaomei Deng's big eyes, and her heart softened into a pool of water. She squatted down and kissed the little guy, and gave her some snacks.

Tang Jie was too greedy at the side, and when Lu Yan was rare enough, she grabbed Xiaomei Deng, picked it up and walked into the house.

Deng Man's parents are not very talkative, and Deng's mother is particularly serious. When Deng Man was still there, she was very strict with Deng Man, and now she seems to be less talkative.

Only when her eyes met her little daughter did Mother Deng's expression become unusually soft and warm.

Lu Yan and Tang Jie took turns teasing Deng Xiaomei, and Deng's mother went to the kitchen to pour water for the three of them, sat and smiled and watched.

After a while, she went to the back room, took out two books, rubbed them several times, and then handed them over to Lu Yan: "This thing has been kept in the utility room, Manman seems to have deliberately hidden the book in the corner, and she is reluctant to bear it. I lost it, and I don't want others to find it. If it wasn't for the move, her father and I would probably never have found this book. It stands to reason that this is Manman's relic. Her father and I should not have given it away, but I looked inside. It's all a group photo of the three of you Manman, just... ah, I hope you don't think auntie is abrupt."

"How come." Lu Yan took the photo album seriously, "Auntie, don't say that."

Hearing this, Tang Jie also lost her interest in teasing Deng Xiaomei and stayed silent.

After a while, Deng Man's mother sighed and said, "Speaking of which, it's still my dereliction of duty as a mother. Back then, I only cared about Manman's academic performance and didn't pay any attention to the child's emotions. Now that I think about it, life It is such a trivial matter to fail in the college entrance examination for such a long time, if I had given her more comfort and encouragement at that time, Manman might not have done stupid things at all."

The three of them didn't speak, and the sad atmosphere spread quietly in the room. Tang Jie couldn't take it anymore. She walked to the window and opened the curtains "swipe" to let the sunlight flood in.

Lu Yan asked Deng's mother: "Auntie, can't you remember who Deng Man went out with?"

Mother Deng shook her head: "A police officer came to ask about this issue last year, but Manman is too introverted and can hide everything. Except for the two of you, I really don't know who else she is related to. Come and talk, say puppy love, I can't see any clues, that is, in the third year of high school, this child went out to play a few times, but she said that she was with you, not many times, and every time she came back on time, I didn't think much of it."

"A police officer came to inquire about Deng Man last year?" Lu Yan automatically ignored the following words and looked at Deng's mother in surprise, "Is it the police officer from the Anshan District Bureau?"

Deng Man's mother gently rubbed her temples: "It seems that her surname is Jiang. She is quite young. I always feel that I have seen it before in Manman's school. When I asked the police officer if he was Manman's classmate, he didn't deny it."

"A police officer surnamed Jiang?" Tang Jie was taken aback. "Don't tell me it's Jiang Chengyi. Didn't he transfer back to City S last year?"

After coming out of Deng Man's house, Lu Yan was in a complicated mood, and after a while of silence, she began to look at the album.

Tang Jie's brows knitted tightly, puzzled: "Why do you all pay so much attention to Deng Man's affairs? Didn't she really commit suicide?"

"Also." The more she spoke, the more uneasy she became. "Didn't you call the police immediately after you identified the body with Auntie? I heard that Auntie went to watch the surveillance video later. If there is a problem, you should have noticed it long ago. "

Hearing the word "recognize the corpse", Lu Yan's face turned pale, and she opened the window to let in fresh air.

"And Deng Man's diary, just a few vague sentences, who can understand it? I don't know if she is really in love, or what kind of notes she took from which book. It's weird, that diary. I don't know why she is so precious, she even took it with her when she was thrown into the lake, and when she was picked up, the paper in the diary was soaked, otherwise we might look back and find some clues."

Lu Yan's eyes felt inexplicably tingling.

Not long after the college entrance examination, she and her classmates ushered in the most splendid summer vacation in her life. Every time she came out to play, she no longer had to rack her brains to think of excuses in front of her mother like before.

One day, Jiang Chengyi made an appointment with his teammates to play basketball. She remembered that Deng Man was in a bad mood, so she asked Tang Jie and Deng Man to go to the school library to borrow books. After leaving school, the three of them went to the movies together.

When she got to school, she passed by the basketball hall, thinking that Jiang Chengyi was in it, she couldn't help but go in.

Surprisingly, Deng Man was already inside.

Jiang Chengyi and the others were playing basketball on the court, while Deng Man was arranging their littered clothes. When she picked up one of them, she stared at the clothes silently.

Lu Yan recognized that the clothes were a T-shirt Jiang Chengyi used to change. She bought it for him with the pocket money she had saved. It was white, ordinary style, nothing special, but because in the row of letters on it, With her English name, she saw it when she was shopping. Seeing that the price was not expensive, she bought it and gave it to Jiang Chengyi as a gift.

He saw through her mind at a glance and often wore it on her body.

Deng Man was still staring at the T-shirt, she stared at Deng Man's back, hiding her deeper and deeper doubts, and approached: "Deng Man."

Deng Man seemed to be very flustered when he heard her voice, and his face returned to normal in an instant.

Thinking of Deng Man's strange behavior earlier, Lu Yan had a guess in her heart. After the two sat down in the stands, she quietly observed Deng Man and noticed that Deng Man's eyes had been following Jiang Chengyi, and she knew that Deng Man was a gentleman. People who know how to hide their emotions are always gazing in front of her recently, which is very strange.

She thought for a while and tried to make her voice sound calm: "Deng Man, we are good friends, you know, I cherish our friendship very much."

After a while, Deng Man turned his head and looked over, his face seemed to have been splashed with a layer of gray powder, and instantly became dull.

She stared at Deng Man: "Jiang Chengyi and I have already made an appointment to fill in the same university. I like him, especially."

Every word of her was tense, and her eyes were cautiously groping on Deng Man's face. With Deng Man's keenness, she could fully understand her suggestion. There was a voice in her heart that kept whispering: Deny it, Tell me it's not what I thought it was at all.

But Deng Man only smiled miserably, and in the end he didn't say anything, turned around and left the basketball hall.

Lu Yan looked at her thin back, an ominous premonition flashed in her heart, and she chased out.

She ran to the library, but Deng Man was not there. She ran back to the teaching building and found Class 6 classrooms on the first floor. Looking inside, Deng Man was standing by the window and was throwing a bunch of things out of the window. .

She quietly watched Deng Man's back at the door. After an unknown amount of time, she walked in and gently pulled the corner of Deng Man's shirt and said, "Deng Man—"

Deng Man turned back fiercely, tears in his eyes, big ones rolling down.

She had never seen such a painful expression on a person's face before. She was completely stunned and opened her mouth, but she didn't know how to speak. After a while, she hurriedly took out a tissue from her pocket, wanting to help Deng Man. Wiping tears.

"I'm fine." Deng Man pushed her away, trying to appear as if nothing had happened, but his voice was choked, "I'm going home first, you and Tang Jie go to the library."

After Deng Man left, Lu Yan's mind was in a mess.

A few days ago, she just turned eighteen years old, graduated from high school, the university is beckoning to her, her life will soon open a new chapter, but she is far from transformed to have enough experience, she is not mature enough, Not all problems encountered can be solved. Faced with such a difficult situation, she felt unprecedented frustration and confusion.

She stared out the window blankly, and was stunned for a long time, until Tang Jie called her, and she came out of the classroom blankly.

The library was behind the teaching building, and when she passed downstairs, she thought of Deng Man's act of throwing the paper ball just now, hesitated for a moment, and walked to the rose bushes downstairs to search carefully.

After searching for a while, I finally found a paper ball in a haystack.

Her heart was pounding, and she crouched down to open the ball of paper.

I saw a sentence written on it: "I hate her! I hate her! I won't let her go even if I'm a ghost!"

Every word was written so heavily that it felt like the back of the paper.

She felt like she had been stabbed 10,000 times, and her heart suddenly cooled.

Later, Tang Jie found that she was not looking right, and insisted on sending her home.

After staying at home for a long time, thinking of what happened just now, she still felt cold, trying to calm herself down, and decided to call Deng Man again, or at least ask her out to have a good talk, but after calling, Deng Man He didn't answer at all, just hung up her phone.

She was bored at home for two whole days.

Jiang Chengyi was not in the city, and was dragged by his mother to the suburban villa to celebrate his grandfather's birthday. When he realized that something was wrong with her, he called her countless times, promising to come back the next day, and then take her to relax. She was a little uncomfortable. She was refreshed, but because she wanted to see him too much, she agreed to come out to meet him. After the phone call, her mood improved somewhat.

After packing up her things to go out the next day, she hesitated whether to call Deng Man again or go straight to Deng Man's house to find her. After thinking for a while, she decided to choose the latter option.

But at this moment, she received a call from Tang Jie and was told: Deng Man committed suicide.

After hanging up the phone, she felt like she had fallen into an ice hole, and her memory was blank for the next few hours.

It happened too suddenly. Deng Man's father was in a meeting outside and was on the way back. After Deng Man's mother got the news, she refused to accept the fact. She fainted several times and was rescued again. collapse.

She was the first to arrive there, and was dragged by the lost mother Deng Man to identify the body. When going through the formalities, she remembered the words on the note, and her grief was mixed with a trace of fear.

The corpse was pulled out of the freezer, and she saw Deng Man's swollen face with strong hatred at a glance, only to feel that the back was hit hard, and the pain was close to numbness. Beside her ear, there seemed to be a huge glass wall crashing to the ground, making a deafening sound. The moment the fragments fell to the ground, she was dizzy and swaying, and it took all her strength to keep from falling.

In the past eighteen years, she has lived a magnanimous and happy life, facing death for the first time, but she did not expect it to be in such a cruel way.

In just a few minutes, she was tossed from the inside to the outside as if by an invisible knife, and even her soul was shattered into scum. When she came home, she stood in the empty living room and found that she was still risking Cold sweat and soaked clothes wrapped tightly around her body like plastic wrap, making it extremely difficult for her to even breathe.

She fell ill, and every time she closed her eyes, she could see Deng Man's eyes full of hatred, and the almost cursed words from a good friend on the note were like maggots attached to bones, constantly in her ears The echoes eat away at her willpower bit by bit.

She burst into tears and was drowsy and burned to 39 degrees. Her whole body seemed to be thrown into a brazier, and her consciousness was almost blurred. Her mother was so worried that she sent her to the hospital overnight. After admission, she was diagnosed with acute glomerulonephritis. Live for half a month.

Tang Jie's voice was clearly in her ears, but it was like a thick membrane, which meant a distant and empty space.

She was immersed in her own world, fascinated by herself, until her body was shaken forcibly several times before she suddenly raised her head.

"What are you thinking?" Seeing Lu Yan finally reacting, Tang Jie rolled her eyes, "We're home."

She said casually, "Oh."

The moment she opened her mouth, she realized that she had a strong nasal voice.

Afraid that Tang Jie would see it, she hurriedly lowered her head and unfastened her seat belt.

"Da Zhong came to pick me up." Tang Jie watched her and Xiao Zhou get off the bus, "I won't go up."

She regained her calm and instructed Tang Jie, "Be careful on the road and call me when you get home."

When she got home, she asked Xiao Zhou to sit down on the sofa, adjust her mood, and start flipping through the album.

As Deng Man's mother said, the photo album is full of group photos of the three of them. In almost every photo, the three of them are smiling. The smiles are as bright as a sunny day in May, and there is no haze in sight.

She searched carefully one by one, paying attention to every detail in the photo. Every time she turned over, she tried her best to observe Deng Man's expression, not even letting go of a small black spot on her eyebrows.

When she turned to one of the pages, she stopped.

The corners of the page are a bit frayed, apparently having been rubbed regularly by the owner.

She moved her gaze slowly upwards, looking at the person in the photo, her heart jumping without warning.

It was the three of them, smiling and taking pictures in front of the school's flowers. At first glance, it was nothing special.

But in the upper right corner of the photo, that is, behind the three people, in a far place, two people were standing. The two were talking in the sun, and neither of them looked towards this side. It was obvious that the light was inadvertently in.

In this photo, Deng Man's smile is particularly bright.

Lu Yan's mind was buzzing, and she stared at the faces of the two people and looked at them. After a long time, her eyes gradually became cold.

Dr. Yu did go back to S City in the afternoon, but on the way to the Anshan Branch, he was temporarily called to S University to go through a mandatory procedure. For this, he specially called Jiang Chengyi and apologized again and again.

Jiang Chengyi made another appointment with Dr. Yu on the phone, put several cases together, and discussed the case with the people below.

Just talking about Ding Jing's case, a colleague came in from outside and handed Jiang Chengyi several pages of phone numbers: "Ding Jing has received some harassing calls in the past few days. Although they are all harassing calls, the strange thing is that these The source IP of the phone call is different, I checked it, and the first page and the second page are from the same source, and I don’t care about the bits and pieces that follow.”

Jiang Chengyi turned the pages one by one, his eyes flicking over each string of sources, and when he reached the third page, he stared at one of the IP addresses with a flash of surprise.

But soon, he returned the information to his colleagues: "Just check the first two pages. The third page is estimated to be some retail investors, so there is no need to check."

The colleague gave an "OK" gesture and turned away.

Jiang Chengyi stood at the table for a while, then suddenly raised his head and said to the middle-aged police officer next to Lao Qin: "Lao Zheng, you didn't say last time that a girl committed suicide by jumping into a river a few years ago, and someone wrote anonymous letters to the police station for seven consecutive years. , ask the police to re-investigate the case-"

"Ah, yes." The policeman nodded in confusion, "What's wrong with Team Jiang."

"Where is the file, can you help me find it?"

Jiang Chengyi didn't come back until six o'clock.

Xiao Zhou sat on the sofa watching TV, taking out his mobile phone from time to time to check the time.

Lu Yan was cooking in the kitchen, fearing that Xiao Zhou would be bored, she occasionally came out to chat with Xiao Zhou.

As soon as Jiang Chengyi came back, Xiao Zhou stood up immediately and asked very excitedly, "Team Jiang, what did Dr. Yu say?"

Jiang Chengyi first looked at the restaurant and saw Lu Yan was busy inside, so he looked away, walked to the sofa and sat down: "Dr. Yu won't come over until tomorrow, eat first, I'll take you off later."

Xiao Zhou is obviously a person who is easy to satisfy. Although Lu Yan's cooking skills are average, he still eats with relish.

Jiang Chengyi sent him back and stood at the entrance, looking at Lu Yan who was still busy in the kitchen.

After Lu Yan finished packing, she just met Shang Jiang Chengyi's complicated eyes, with a premonition, she looked at him and said frankly: "When I went to Deng Man's house today, her mother told me that you went to check on Deng Man last year. "

Jiang Chengyi didn't answer this question, but picked up the stack of letters that had been placed in the entrance, walked straight over, pulled out the chair, sat down opposite Lu Yan, and threw the stack on the table: "Let's check Looking at Ding Jing's call records in the past few months, I found that she has received many harassing calls, which means that before I was transferred back to City S, someone was already investigating her."

Lu Yan blinked and pulled her hair behind her ears: "Oh, really?"

"Can you explain why these numbers have your Nanshan Lane IP address?"

She looked aside: "I didn't understand you."

Jiang Chengyi's emotions are still indistinguishable from anger and anger, but his eyes can see through people's hearts: "Oh, then why did we call up the surveillance video near Ding Jing's house last month, and you will appear on the screen."

Lu Yan blushed slightly and looked up at him.

"You're following her," he concluded. "You already suspected her, didn't you?"

"I'm a little tired." She got up suddenly, "I'll go back to my room to rest first."

She was just walking a few steps when Jiang Chengyi grabbed her. Then, something cold and heavy was fastened on her wrist. Looking down, Jiang Chengyi had already handcuffed her and himself.

"What are you doing." She was shocked and argued, "I didn't do anything illegal!"

He pushed her against the wall, pressed against her, raised the letter in his hand, and pressed her in a low voice, "Then can you tell me why you write these anonymous letters year after year."

She heard the suppressed undercurrent in his voice, and anticipating what he was going to do, her heart beat wildly for a while, and then slowly calmed down. Because they were too close, the hot breaths of the two were already entangled, and they couldn't tell the difference. clear each other.

Seeing that she didn't speak, he pinched her chin and said earnestly: "Why did you break up with me back then, you know it well, as early as seven years ago, you found out that you did something wrong, so you After collecting evidence year after year and writing these anonymous letters, now I just want to hear the truth, the reason why you are so eager to know the truth, do you have any other ideas besides finding out the real cause of Deng Man's death?"

These words were like a sharp sword. As soon as it was stabbed, it shattered her strong shell, and she burst into tears unconsciously: "You know the answer."

He stared into her tearful eyes and said slightly, "I want to hear it from you."