SFTD -Chapter 157 Ghosts Beneath the Bridge (Part 12)

Wang Xuchao slapped his thigh hard.

“Great! Help me properly thank Director Sun for this. That level of professionalism is impressive. I’ll add your WeChat now and send you the exact location. I’ll be waiting downstairs.”

“Alright, see you in a bit!”

Half an hour later, Zhang Xiaotian was brought into the interrogation room.

Even though he was strapped to the interrogation chair, he still looked arrogant, his legs shaking constantly under the table. Wang Xuchao and a deputy sat across from him, tapping the table with a pen.

“Name.”

“Zhang Xiaotian!”

“Age?”

“Eighteen! What reason do you have to arrest me?”

Wang Xuchao raised a small ziplock bag. Inside were several white round tablets.

“You’re a frequent visitor to the police station. I don’t even need a lab test to know what this is just by smell. With this alone, I can put you away for years.”

“To make you fully convinced, let’s weigh it.”

His assistant immediately brought out a high-precision electronic scale and placed the bag on it. Numbers appeared: 7.127 grams.

Wang Xuchao clapped with a smile.

“Ha, over seven grams. Congratulations.”

“I assume people in your line of work know the sentencing standards by heart: under seven grams—up to three years; seven to ten grams—three to seven years. Heh.”

At this moment, Zhang Xiaotian stopped shaking his legs and gripped the edge of the table.

“Damn it! This is fucking framing! I never had that stuff on me! If you want to arrest someone, you don’t need to play dirty like this!”

“Sir, this is a rule-of-law society. We’re law-abiding citizens. Don’t joke around with this kind of setup!”

Wang Xuchao didn’t get angry. Instead, he turned on a bodycam.

“This is Officer Cui’s body camera. The entire arrest process is recorded, including the seizure of this small packet of meth from you. You can’t deny it. As long as you touched it, your fingerprints will be on it.”

Zhang Xiaotian slammed his handcuffs violently.

“Don’t frame me! I never touched that bag! How could there be my fingerprints?”

In the next room, Zhou Hai frowned slightly.

This guy was a tough nut—without solid proof, he wouldn’t talk.

He glanced at Officer Cui.

“You said you found meth on him? Any other personal items?”

Officer Cui thought for a moment.

“I was the one who searched him. I saw the bag of pills and immediately made the arrest. But when I checked his pockets, I think I saw blue latex gloves.”

Zhou Hai leaned over and whispered a few words to Xu Biao, who quickly left the room with a grin.

A knock sounded on the door shortly after. Wang Xuchao paused the interrogation and opened it.

Xu Biao stood outside wearing blue latex gloves and whispered a few words into his ear. Wang Xuchao’s eyes lit up immediately and quickly let him in.

“Let the forensic guy handle this.”

Xu Biao walked up to Zhang Xiaotian with a serious expression.

“Lift your head. Look at me.”

“W-what… what are you doing?”

Without answering, Xu Biao pulled back his eyelids to examine his eyes, then searched his pockets.

Sure enough, inside the inner pocket of his hoodie, he found a pair of blue latex gloves. Near Zhang Xiaotian’s fingernails were traces of white powder.

A smile spread across Xu Biao’s face.

He patted Zhang Xiaotian’s shoulder.

“Pupils aren’t dilated, mucous membranes show no congestion. You didn’t take it yourself. Looks like you’re an experienced dealer.”

“You even wore gloves while repackaging—smart.”

“But the inside of those gloves has talcum powder. Your sweat and skin cells mixed and stuck to the inner surface. Thanks to your ‘frugality,’ you left us evidence. Ten minutes is enough for fingerprints and drug composition analysis.”

He tossed the gloves into an evidence bag, then picked up the meth bag and walked out.

Zhang Xiaotian’s earlier arrogance vanished completely.

“Wait! I’ll talk! I was just delivering goods! I didn’t know what it was! I just separated pills by color and shape and packed them into small bags and delivered them to designated locations!”

“Talk to the Wang team leader first. I’ll wait outside for instructions.”

Xu Biao nodded at Wang Xuchao and left.

Now Wang Xuchao wasn’t in a hurry anymore. He removed his hat and stared at Zhang Xiaotian.

After a long pause, Zhang finally asked: “What do you want to know?”

Wang Xuchao pushed the scale aside.

“Do you know Xu Miaochi?”

The sudden shift in topic made Zhang Xiaotian freeze for a moment.

“…I know her.”

“Then tell me—where were you on June 20th, 2014?”

“This question Officer Zeng already asked me. I didn’t go anywhere. I didn’t go to Yong’an Sports Academy either. That day was my grandmother’s birthday, I went back home.”

“How did you know Xu Miaochi?”

“We were middle school classmates.”

“You had a crush on her?”

“Not really a crush. Everyone on the team knew I was pursuing her. But Xu Miaochi had some opinions about me. That teacher who was chasing her was a real piece of shit though—married and still flirting around. Disgusting.”

Wang Xuchao tapped the table.

“Watch your language!”

“Did you falsely accuse Zeng Zhichang?”

“Falsely accuse? I didn’t falsely accuse him. My arm really was fractured. I had medical proof. The surveillance clearly shows it—he grabbed me, slammed me into a pipe, then dragged me out of the bathroom and threw me out, and that’s how I got injured.”

“Can police just hit people whenever they want?”

Wang Xuchao frowned and slammed the table.

“Whether it happened or not, don’t shout! And don’t forget where you are!”

“Explain this thing you were carrying!”

As he spoke, Wang Xuchao raised a white unmarked plastic bottle. He opened it slowly and poured out several dark green capsules.

Zhou Hai, watching from the observation room, suddenly tensed.

He pressed closer to the glass, nearly knocking his glasses off, then turned to Xu Biao.

“Xu Biao… don’t these capsules look familiar?”

Xu Biao squinted.

“Never paid attention. Looks pretty ordinary.”

Zhou Hai shook his head.

“When I performed the autopsy on Zeng Zhichang, I found half of a capsule like this in his heart. It had already softened from digestion, so I couldn’t identify what was inside.”

He was about to rush out, but Xu Biao grabbed him.

“Don’t rush. Let’s hear what he says first.”

Inside the interrogation room, Zhang Xiaotian didn’t look surprised. He only shrugged.

“This is medicine prescribed by an old Chinese doctor in Yong’an. My father suffers from headaches. It works pretty well.”

Wang Xuchao carefully examined the capsules, clearly noticing the similarity as well, and quickly put them back into the bottle.

“Headaches? Which old Chinese doctor?”

“In a residential area on Changzhou Road. No signboard. Everyone just calls him ‘Doctor Zhang.’ He sees about ten patients every morning, then leaves. Comes back the next day to dispense medicine. He’s supposedly quite miraculous.”

Wang Xuchao narrowed his eyes.

In the observation room, everyone pressed closer to the glass.

“Treating headaches?”

“You’ve been there—did you ever see Zeng Zhichang there?”