It was nine that evening.
Zhang Rong and I were keeping watch near a bar.
We had identified the three girls mentioned in the love letters. They attended the same school as Bai Qinian.
One of them was the female corpse we had found in Bai Qinian's room.
Another was called Yu Xiaoxiao. As it happened, she had also been born in the Year of the Dragon.
We had also discovered that the car seen near Wang Meilan's home last night had appeared near Bai Qinian's school today.
So Zhang Rong and I had waited outside the school until Yu Xiaoxiao came out, then followed her to this bar.
I firmly believed Hu Shide's gang would target Yu Xiaoxiao, so we kept watch near the bar.
"What if they don't come today?" Zhang Rong asked me.
I said that if they didn't come today, we would wait until tomorrow, and if they didn't come tomorrow, we would wait until the day after.
They were definitely going to target Yu Xiaoxiao.
"If Hu Shide is after Wang Meilan's fortune and never intended to bring Bai Qinian back to life, then there's no need to kill so many more people, is there?"
Zhang Rong was puzzled. "Killing this many people carries such a huge risk."
I sighed. "Maybe he wanted to gain Wang Meilan's trust first. Or maybe it was for the money-take whatever he could get first. But that's not certain either. After all, we still haven't confirmed whether Hu Shide or Wang Zhenhui was responsible for Bai Qinian's death."
"Let's just keep watching for now."
If we were wrong, we would take the investigation in another direction. If we were right, we might save someone.
As it turned out, we were indeed right.
About forty minutes later, a black Mercedes-Benz