Mother had been home all along. Her body was under the bed in the bedroom. When the door was open earlier, when I came home and sat at my desk to do my homework, when I secretly checked my phone, her body was watching me.
No, maybe she was still alive then, staring at me with pleading eyes. Or maybe she was suffering but didn't dare make a sound. Could the killer have been right beside her, holding a knife to her throat, hurting her while threatening to run out and kill me if she made a sound?
Tang Hanlu's head felt ready to burst. Countless thoughts flooded her mind, every one of them terrifying.
"But if the killer was under the bed, what about the police officer outside?" She clutched her phone so tightly that only the pain in her fingertips brought her back to her senses a little. "The bad guy pretending to be a police officer is outside. The man I saw when I came home from school was outside too. There shouldn't be a killer in here, unless there's more than one. But he has no reason to take Mother hostage and hide under the bed."
Tang Hanlu looked toward the Master Bedroom, two thoughts clashing in her mind. She felt the killer should be outside, yet feared he was a psychopath who liked murdering schoolgirls and had hidden under the bed specifically to wait for her to come home.
"When I was doing my homework, I wasn't paying any attention to what was behind me. If the killer was in here, he would've had plenty of chances to attack me, so... it should be safe inside!"
Tang Hanlu tried to bolster her courage. She grabbed the mop and, worried her slippers would make noise, went