The Last Killer

Ten minutes later, bad news came from Sirina: the location of the phone could not be tracked, probably because the phone was completely damaged or the battery was pulled out.

The bad news made Rob's face serious, but Leo was beyond his expectation, showing no frustration or pain, which made him feel like his partner was stretched to the extreme tension, like a piece of heated bowstring. The rocks at the extreme temperature will maintain the MAX state of this critical point until the last pull is applied or a bucket of ice water is poured down—this makes him very worried that when the last moment comes, he will not be able to Will shatter violently due to excessive load.

The rented apartment was empty, and Leo and Rob went straight down the elevator on the 17th floor and headed straight to Portland State University against the clock.

The teacher in the language training class today happened to be Wayne, who was a little nervous when Leo asked him: "Bi Qing? Yes, yes, he came to class today. Although it was a bit late, please ask It's a holiday, I thought he wouldn't come today... Now? I don't know... Ladies and gentlemen, does anyone know where your classmate Li Biqing went?" He turned his head and asked the class, muttering Talk to a dozen students.

After a while, a Chinese boy lazily raised his hand: "I saw him answer the phone before, and then went out with his bag."

"When?" Leo asked.

"Probably... more than an hour ago, I don't remember."

"Did you hear what he said on the phone?"

"Hey, how do I know? Do I look like the kind of person who pries into other people's privacy all day long?" the boy yelled dissatisfied.

"Aren't you, gossip guy?" His deskmate took the opportunity to attack.

There was laughter in the classroom again.

Leo walked away without even leaving Wayne a polite word, leaving behind him the big white man who shook his fingers awkwardly: "...you're welcome."

"What now?" Rob asked after Leo.

Leo forced his throbbing brain to calm down and sort out those chaotic thoughts, "Suppose it was Lei Zhe who called Bi Qing, what would he say? Especially after the identity of his murder suspect has been exposed ? Bi Qing is not a person who does things indiscriminately, he must have a very strong excuse to lure him out instead of calling the police immediately."

"Uh, 'Actually, I'm innocent, the murderer is someone else' or something like that?" Rob thought hard and said, "No, the evidence in the case is convincing, and Bi Qing knows it very well, he won't believe this kind of rhetoric .Then what could it be...could it be a sincere confession before pretending to commit suicide that moved him and made him go to see him for the last time regardless of the danger?"

"Shit, what speculation are you talking about!" Leo swears rarely.

"It's very possible, isn't it? Don't tell me you can't see that that Latin American kid is interested in Bi Qing."

"Nonsense, that's why he made him his target!"

"No, I'm not just referring to that perverted desire, but some kind of hidden...feelings? Perhaps in his view, Bi Qing is the most distinctive one among his chosen targets... ..." Rob expresses his opinion in terms that try not to provoke Leo.

But he still inevitably irritated his black-haired partner, who glared at him fiercely like a vicious prisoner, almost gnashing his teeth: "How is it different? Can you arrange the corpse more delicately! Damn, If you talk like that again, I'll beat you up, I swear!"

"It's my fault!" Rob immediately raised his hands in a gesture of surrender, "Let's get back to the topic, where will he lead Bi Qing?"

Leo gritted his teeth and fell silent, their actions fell into a stalemate.

Hi Leo, guess where I've been?A Chinese boy in home clothes with bare feet, sitting cross-legged on the sofa, holding a thick notebook, and biting the end of the pencil in his right hand playfully.Oh, don't show such a embarrassed look, well, lower the difficulty, I will give you a hint...

Leo closed his eyes, letting the illusory figure laugh and talk in his mind, as real as what he saw.What kind of hint will you give me, where is it, Bi Qing?

He opened his eyes suddenly, turned around and ran towards the classroom, rushed to Li Biqing's seat, checked his desks and chairs up and down, and the classroom that Wayne had managed to organize became a mess again.

found it!His fingers stopped on a handwriting in the drawer, where a line of English was written in black pen: "Big black walnut tree."

Leo rushed out of the classroom again like a gust of wind.Wayne, who was completely ignored, looked at his back speechlessly, with an embarrassing expression: "...you're welcome again."

The West Coast was once rich in black walnut trees, but due to decades of heavy logging, the number has plummeted to the point of needing protection.There are some at the state university, the largest of which is on the east side of the campus, adjacent to Forest Park.

Two men in dark suits sprint around the campus, quite conspicuous along the way, constantly attracting "hey, I saw these two guys, right next to the police tape at the murder scene, they are the FBI!" "Is something bad going to happen to our school again?" Whispers like this.

Ten minutes later, Leo and Rob crossed the entire campus panting, and found the tall black walnut tree. Not surprisingly, there was no one under the tree.This is a transfer station, they must have talked here, Leo knew very well in his heart, he just hoped that Bi Qing could continue to leave some clues out of caution.He wandered around the tree, looking carefully.

"Hi, I found it!" Rob's sole stepped on a hard object in the grass, and when he picked it up, it looked like a brand-new mobile phone that fell apart, with the back cover and battery lying near the fuselage.He squatted on the ground, looked up at the dense branches and leaves, and speculated: "He should have stuffed his mobile phone between the branches, and then it fell...Maybe Lei Zhe started to use strong methods to control his external communications. While distracting the other party’s attention, secretly hide the phone on it.”

"It's reasonable." Leo said, put the phone together and tried to turn it on.Luckily, the BlackBerry is quite durable, so he took a quick look through the phone and found a recording marked 1 hour and 25 minutes ago.The recording was only 90 seconds long, and Leo pressed the play button without thinking.

"...Listen, I don't want to hurt you, I just want to have a good talk with you."

"You can say it."

"Here? No, I don't want to be disturbed by anyone. Let's go to a quiet and beautiful place."

"Lei Zhe, I don't want to go anywhere with you, and after receiving your call, I originally wanted to call the police, if you didn't threaten that once you call the police, you would throw that unconscious girl off the top floor of the teaching building!"

"It's just a joke, don't worry, I won't do that, of course, I will never hurt you, I swear. My mind is just messy, and countless thoughts are churning inside like steel knives, making me miserable... …I can't think of anyone else I can turn to for help without you, without driving myself completely insane!"

"You can call the police."

"No! No... Yes, yes, I will turn myself in, after we finish talking—Bi Qing, please, give me a chance to talk, and don't close the last door, please!"

A moment of silence.

"where to?"

"Just go there. Didn't you say you wanted to find someone to go with you, but you haven't been able to make the trip. I'll accompany you today. Let's go."

The recording came to an abrupt end.

Rob breathed a sigh of relief and asked anxiously: "Where is there? Damn, the most important sentence didn't come out!"

"I already know. He asked me to go with him several times, but unfortunately, I was always busy..." Leo put his phone in his pocket and rushed to the parking lot without stopping, "It's International Rose Inspection garden!"

Since it is not a weekend, there are few tourists in the International Rose Inspection Garden located in the southwestern part of Portland. The flower fields all over the mountains are bathed in the clear light of the blue sky.

Roses, Chinese roses, Rosa, no matter what family or genus they are, they are just stumbling vegetation and obscuring shelters for Leo at this moment. He and Rob trekked in the hills, valleys, and woods to find reinforcements. on the way.

When they passed by a hidden mountain depression, they smelled a faint fishy smell in the air, surrounded by the ubiquitous fragrance of flowers, spreading in all directions... "The smell of blood!" Rob seemed to be strangled by someone's neck owl hooted sharply.Leo trembled all over, and used his arm to break through the thorny wall of roses and force his way in, oblivious to the bloodstains drawn on his face and neck.

In the depths of a large bush of multi-flowered roses, lying face down was a bloody naked human body, pierced by more than a dozen freshly broken rose stems, and pools of blood spread out from under him like ripples. , the fertile soil under the flowering branches greedily sucked blood, dyeing the ground an ominous dark brown.

Leo staggered and fell towards the bushes in front of him. Fortunately, Rob grabbed his arm, but was pushed away by him in the next second.He's completely blinded by the moment, forgets his partner, doesn't even have time for crime scene protection regulations—to hell with everything!He wants to know immediately whether it is Bi Qing!

He rushed to the side of the corpse desperately, and turned him over—

Not his boy!

Thank goodness it wasn't his boy...

"It's Lei Zhe! He's actually dead?!" Rob rushed over in two or three steps and said, "This kind of death... an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, is a way of 'finishing'! The body is still warm, probably half dead For more than an hour, the 'killing' may not be far away, we must quickly notify the special service team to search and arrest!"

"Bi Qing should still be around here... Find him quickly!" Leo raised his red eyes and stared at Rob as if he hadn't heard of it. s eyes!

The brown-haired and green-eyed federal agent seemed to realize that at this moment, in his partner's heart, the desire to hunt down "killed" was far less than the lost boy.If Bi Qing is not found, or worse, his body is found, Leo's nerve, which has been stretched to the critical point, will definitely "collapse" and be completely broken!Rob is not sure what the situation will turn out by then. Now he and Leo can only search around in a radial pattern with Lei Zhe's death place as the center point.

A few minutes later, behind the bushes not far away, they finally saw a figure fallen under the tree.

"Bi Qing! Bi Qing!" Leo rushed over, knelt down beside him, touching his carotid artery with trembling fingers: it was warm and throbbing!His boy was still alive, just in a coma.Leo carefully lifted his upper body, hugged him in his arms, and yelled at the policemen running from far to near: "Call an ambulance! Quick, an ambulance!"

At the Oregon Health and Science University Affiliated Hospital, a surgeon wearing glasses opened the door of the ward and walked out. Leo and Rob, who were waiting in the corridor, immediately rushed forward: "Doctor, how is he?"

The middle-aged Caucasian doctor was obviously also very concerned about the patient sent by the FBI. He looked at the report and replied: "His consciousness has recovered, but he is accompanied by symptoms such as headache, nausea, dizziness, photophobia, and fatigue. It is suspected to be a concussion, this place—" he pointed to his occipital bone as a signal, "has been hit with a blunt object."

"Is it serious? How to treat it?"

"Fortunately, no other craniocerebral injuries were found after the MRI scan, such as intracranial hematoma, so there should be no major problems. I gave him an injection of analgesics and stayed in the hospital for observation for two or three days. You can be discharged from the hospital, and pay attention to proper bed rest in the near future to avoid mental and physical labor."

"Can I go in and see him?" Leo asked.

The doctor nodded, and added another sentence when he entered the door: "By the way, he has clinical symptoms of recent amnesia, and he can't recall the situation and the injury process at the time of the injury. If you want to question something, it's better to wait for a while--I I don't want my patient to get worse after being circled by your FBI, thank you."

After Leo thanked him, he walked into the ward. The Chinese boy was lying on the hospital bed drowsily, with a mass of warm and soft chestnut hair protruding from the snow-white quilt.The analgesic took effect, he temporarily shielded his headache and dizziness, and fell asleep exhausted.Leo moved a chair and sat down by the bed, then leaned over to tuck the corner of the quilt.

Then he looked at him quietly and intently, like a statue of a guardian who remained motionless, and after a long time, got up and left the ward.

"Hi, my dear boy, do you feel better?" The glamorous female detective with light golden long curly hair walked into the ward with a large bouquet of lilies, leaned over and pressed a sweet kiss on the patient's right cheek.

"It's okay, the doctor said that he can be discharged tomorrow." Li Biqing smiled awkwardly, as if subconsciously wanting to touch Lucky's right cheek, but felt embarrassed.

"It's so cute! If I change my taste in picking men, it's all your fault." Tia looked at the shy look of the Chinese boy with interest, and seemed to find some kind of fun in the molestation, "Leo Na Has the bastard visited you these two days?"

"I have been here once or twice." Li Biqing said, and immediately explained for the other party: "I know he is very busy with work."

"Don't forgive him so easily, dear, I'll give you a piece of advice: When dealing with a drum that doesn't understand, you have to hit it with a hammer." Tina blinked at him, "Trust my sister's judgment, he is that type The man in my life—has been so slow in some respects that it makes everyone angry."

"Uh..." Li Biqing thought for a long time inexplicably, and suddenly realized: "You, and Rob—he also said similar strange things, did you misunderstand something? In fact, Leo and I just—"

"——I know, I know," Tia cut in with a smile, "It's too early to say these things before the situation is clear." Before the other party explained further, she straightened her palms neatly: "Don't worry, I'll discuss this topic with you." Will stop there."

She untied the women's Kun bag on her shoulder, rummaged through it, took out a book and handed it to the patient on the hospital bed: "This was found at Lei Zhe? Tang En's home. Some of his belongings were taken into the Criminal Evidence Department , part of it was sent to relatives. The title page of this book reads the last words of 'Gift to Betring? Lee'. According to the normal procedure, it should be handed over to you, but Leo withheld it. If I didn't accidentally work in his office Found it on the table, presumably it's gone into the shredder and the garbage truck - did I tell you that bastard is the best at being opinionated and ignoring other people's feelings?"

Li Biqing took the book, behind the strange and cold words "Demon" on the cover, the dark golden metallic texture was cut by a sharp knife, revealing half of a cold and stern face.

"Heartsick", that is a suspense thriller novel that Leo once read on the sofa in the apartment. He wanted to read its Chinese version, but he couldn't buy it here.He remembered that he mentioned it to Lei Zhe once. At that time, the Hispanic boy smiled casually and said casually, "I have a friend in Taiwan. I'll ask him later if he can send me a copy."

Unexpectedly, Lei Zhe still remembered this little thing.

What was even more unexpected was that it was not until after his death that this long-overdue book was sent to him with some long-overdue meaning.

Li Biqing rubbed the smooth cover with his palm with a complicated expression, and after a while, he said to the female detective in a low and sincere voice: "Thank you, Tia."

As if feeling the indescribable emotions of the other party, Tia said goodbye very considerately, and printed a kiss on his left cheek before leaving.

Li Biqing was sitting on the hospital bed, flipping through the book quietly, his fingers gliding across the pages, as if he was touching the trembling on the tip of his heart... He didn't stop until he turned to the last page, from both sides Between the pages, something stuck like a bookmark appeared—it was a sprig of withered crimson rose, and on the fragile and thin petals that had been dehydrated, there was still a delicate and plump aftertaste of life.

In the blank space at the bottom of the book page, there is a hand-drawn sketch in pencil, the lines are simple, but lifelike: two closed gates, tightly wound with countless thorny vines, as if sealed by a dense net, unable to open.In the center of the gate, a naked man was tied up on those vines covered with thorns, and the blood stains bloomed a sad red rose on his body.

There were slight and familiar footsteps in his ears, and Li Biqing stroked the text below the sketch, and asked without raising his head: "Do you recognize these two lines of words, what are they writing?"

"That's in Latin." The black-haired federal agent stood by the hospital bed and replied in a low voice, "'There is a demon living in my heart, please turn into a thorny rose vine and bind it forever.'"

Li Biqing looked up at him, with tears welling up in his eyes, "This is the book he gave me! It's his plea to me! God, if I could be earlier... earlier..." He choked up As he spoke, it seemed that he had lost his voice.

Leo stared at him condescendingly, his eyes were gentle and cold: "I want to tell you a real case. The FBI once hunted down a serial murderer. His greatest hobby was to make the victim's ribs into wind chimes and hang them on the eaves Next, there are a total of 27 strings of wind chimes. When we were about to catch him along the clues, he suddenly disappeared. Not long after, he sent us a letter saying that he met the right girl during the hunt and they got married. For that The girl he loves so much, he is willing to wash his hands and put down the butcher knife. Guess what happened?"

"He disappeared forever on your wanted warrant?" Li Biqing asked with a strong nasal voice.

"No, a year and a half later, he came out again, and we caught him as soon as he found a new target. When I searched his hut on the edge of the desert, I saw a string of shocking things on the eaves and corridors. Wind chimes—the number of wind chimes increased to 28 strings at that time, you know, whose rib is the last string?”

Li Biqing showed a look of disbelief: "...God, is it his wife? The woman he loves so much?"

Leo didn't deny it, and then said in a deep voice: "The scariest thing about serial murderers is not the methods they use or how many people they kill, but the fact that their purpose is to kill themselves. They are psychopaths and don't care about the pain of others." Feeling, not remorse for their crimes, unresponsive to the punishment they face, no guilt in their psychological makeup, just never-ending desire.

Occasionally, under very special circumstances, they seem to feel that they have been saved and purified, and they have the idea of ​​doing good, but that is just an illusion—morality and law, when these two iron chains that control the inner beast are cut off by themselves , that roaring man-eating beast, no matter how many thorns and thorns there are, it cannot be restrained, even in the name of the so-called 'love'! "

"Don't feel guilty, Bi Qing, this is not something you can do, only God can save his soul." Leo pressed his hand heavily on the shoulder of the Chinese boy, "Remember, they are serial murderers, From the moment the blood of the first victim is on your hands, there is no turning back."

"Yes..." Li Biqing lowered his eyelids and murmured, "From the moment his hands were covered with the blood of the first victim, there is no way out." He looked up at Leo, the corners of his lips curled up A very faint smile: "I don't need this book anymore, you can do whatever you want with it."

"I'm going to burn it, as the demon's grave, okay?" Leo asked.

Li Biqing nodded, crushing the withered rose in his palm.

(Rose punishment ends)

Preview of the next part:

In the new city, there are serial murders without any clues, Leo is in a desperate situation and almost dies, and he officially debuts as a killer.

Stay tuned~

The three rolls of the cage are like dark blue