Cinephile hustle

He wanted to say something to him, but everything was locked in his throat.

"Hey, you've played enough." Ian frowned.

Hailey shook his head with difficulty, and held Ian's palm, covering his heart.

Ian's palm could clearly feel the rise and fall of his chest, as if breaking through some restraint with force, it was about to explode.Ian suddenly remembered that Wendell's cause of death was a heart attack.

And Haley was still immersed in Wendell's feelings.What will his heart be like?

His eyes seemed to be filled with water, and he looked at Ian hard, just like the moment he was shot by a shotgun eight years ago.

look at me.

That's the only thing he asks of Ian.

At that moment, the panic deep in Ian's heart gushed out from the gap like a gossamer, and at a certain moment, it was uncontrollable and overwhelming, overwhelming all his defenses and rationality.

Eight years later, he felt fear again because of Haili, the feeling of being on the verge of being torn apart. He once said to himself that he never wanted to experience it again!

"Haley! Haley I'm here! You're not Wendell! Remember what I told you? You're a survivor not a victim, you're a winner in life!"

Under Ian's palm, Haili's heartbeat still hasn't calmed down.

He lowered his head and tried to get as close to Hailey as possible, "Haley, you are lying on the bed now. You are covered with soft bedding, this is reality! You once said that you are afraid of falling, so you have to believe that at this moment you Lie in my sight! This is not a hallucination! It's safe here, you won't fall! You're not going anywhere!"

Hailey's throat slipped, and the back of his head was pounded against the pillow, his body still stiff.

"Hailey, think about other... other good things, things that make you feel happy... Get out of that world and come to me." Ian's forehead touched Hailey's forehead lightly, and he used the most Be careful not to speak to him in the softest tone.

It seemed that a breath was exhaled from Haili, and his heartbeat gradually slowed down.

He looked up, and when his lips touched Ian's bottom lip, Ian knew he should move away, but there was something almost begging in Haley's touch.

He begged him not to leave.Ask him not to say no even for a moment.

Ian closed his eyes, and Haili's heart was beating under his palm. It was a very special feeling, as if only he could control Haili's heart.

Ian's lips were squeezed in by the other side bit by bit, and he kissed.

Everything becomes very simple.

No need to doubt, no need to hesitate and back off.

Haley's fingers run up Ian's back, clasping the back of his head, between the strands of his hair.

Until Ian suddenly felt that Haili's heart was beating calmly and powerfully, he suddenly propped himself up and stood beside the bed.

Hailey closed his eyes with a regretful expression.

Ian secretly breathed a sigh of relief from the bottom of his heart, and said in a cold voice: "You shouldn't do this. Cliff is very worried. Fortunately, he didn't see any media reporters, otherwise, as the heir of the Russell family, you will be on the front page. The public will think you're suicidal. And there's a good chance the Russell family stock will crash."

Haili turned his face to the side and smiled, "Did you buy those stocks?"

"No."

"Then you have nothing to worry about."

"What did you see?"

"Wendell has a fear of heights. The murderer must be someone Wendell knows, so that Wendell came to the roof without warning. The murderer attacked her from behind Wendell and injected her with a tranquilizer. Will The shards of glass were tied to her body, tied her to the edge of the roof, stuffed something in her mouth, and threw it down. At this time, Wendell was not dead. The murderer used a piece of black cloth to block Wendell's body. In front of her, people couldn’t see her. When Wendell woke up, she found that her feet were hanging in the air, and she was very far from the ground. She suffered from acrophobia, panicked in her heart, and died of a heart attack. The murderer was always on the terrace Waiting for her until she was motionless, he put away the black curtain, took what was stuffed in Wendell's mouth, and left."

Ian walked around the room, and Haley was right. If Wendell really died of a heart attack due to fear of heights, it would explain the cause of Wendell's death analyzed by Dr. Byrne.The murderer really needed something to cover Wendell, otherwise Wendell would be discovered before he woke up, and he would be rescued early.

Ian called Dr. Bourne: "Doctor Bourne, is there anything in Mrs. Wendell's mouth?"

"There are some fibers. After testing, it matches the napkins in the hotel."

Ian called the "little idiot" again and asked him to check the hotel surveillance to see if anyone might enter the hotel or even go up to the top floor wearing a black curtain.

"Maybe the curtain wasn't brought by the murderer at all, but it was already in the hotel." Haili lay on the bed and reminded lazily.

Ian immediately called the hotel to confirm.

It turned out that it was on the upper floor of the dinner venue, which was a meeting room.The curtain in the conference room is black!

"Is that curtain still there?"

"It's still there. Wait, the front and back of the curtain seem to be wrong! The smooth side is the inside, and the velvet side should be the outside!"

Ian immediately notified Finn Keating to send someone to take the curtain away for inspection, and strictly inspect and monitor. The curtain will be taken out of the meeting room and will definitely be photographed.

"Aren't you tired, Ian? Look at your eyes, they are all blue. If I were you, I would just sleep well now." Hailey said leisurely, leaning on his arm.

"Maybe while we're sleeping, someone else will die."

"Okay... Ian, have you seen the photos of Wendell being hung on the top floor of the hotel taken by the media?"

"Didn't all the information be taken away by you?"

Mentioning this, a burst of anger surged in Ian's heart.

Of course, it doesn't make any sense to be mad at Hayley Russell.

Haili slowly took out a photo from his pocket and shook it, "Look carefully at this photo, can you think of anything?"

Ian took the photo and saw Wendell with her head down, her dress and long skirt tumbling like waves in the night sky, like a bird in flight.And those fragments of stained glass, reflecting the city lights, were like stars twinkling around her.

"I know you have a good memory, Ian. What's on your mind right now?" Hailey's voice sounded in Ian's ear.

He closed his eyes, and he suddenly remembered that when he and Hailey left the Griffin Gallery, a painting was hung on the wall, and the white cloth was torn off. It was a painting by Van Chart.

The colors on the painting and the flying stars are very similar to this photo.

Ian suddenly opened his eyes and turned to look at Haili.

Hailey shrugged, "Since you don't want to sleep with me, how about we go to the Griffin Gallery?"

"Is all of Van Chart's work there?"

"should be."

"let's go."

Ian got up without any explanation, and Haili quickly left the bed and followed Ian.

They came to the Griffin Gallery.

Here, a total of three paintings by Van Chart are on display.

The first one is called "Morning Thinker".The picture is in a warm daylight. A man is tightly bound by cloth strips, with his head raised and his eyes wide open, yearning for the sky.The passers-by around him looked at him numbly.

Ian called up Adam's photo from his phone, compared it with the painting, and sighed heavily.

Hailey came to him and admired the painting with him, "The colors are bold and the sky is gorgeous. We have been thinking about why Adam's body must be exhibited on that day after being frozen for two weeks. Out', look at this painting and you will have the answer."

"Because before that day, New York was cloudy. Until the weather turned warmer that day, the morning light in Cavendish Park fit the mood of this painting." Ian took a breath, "What is the second painting?"

"The Dreamer."

The color of "Dream Man" maintains the same gorgeous style as that of "Morning Thinker".

It was a woman enclosed in a narrow space, with her hands on top of her head.But the sunlight fell from the entrance of the cave, but the woman still refused to look up.

"The conflict between reality and ideal. This painting is really good. Especially in the coloring, it is bold but not superficial. Although it is gorgeous, but if you look closely, you can see the sense of space between the colors." Haili crossed his arms Viewers.

Ian wasn't in the mood for art, and he compared Amanda's photo to it.The woman on the screen is cement gray and dark blue, and her posture is very similar to Amanda.

Ian covered his eyes.

"The third painting is "Dancing Stars". You have seen it."

"So the murderer did it according to Van Chart's work?" Ian received a text message from Finn Keating on his cell phone.

He told Ian in a text message that the number and color of glass shards on Mrs. Wendel's body were exactly the same as those in Van Chart's "Dancing Stars".

"Haley, let's not talk about the first two paintings, "Dancing Stars" should be this year's work, right?"

"Of course." Haley shrugged.

"What kind of person has access to this painting. I mean can see its details clearly?"

"I have to ask Griffin, the owner of the gallery, about this."

Griffin told them that in order to prevent the painting from being imitated and made into fakes, the gallery only exhibited it, and no one was allowed to take pictures, nor did they put the photos on the website.As for the gallery's brochure, although there is a print of the painting, it is only 2 inches in size, and many details cannot be seen at all, so it is impossible to imitate.

Ian glanced at the brochure, and it was true that some of the stars in "Dancing Stars" had turned into small dots on the brochure, and the colors could not be discerned at all.

"Ian, what are you thinking?"

"Don't you know what I'm thinking?" Ian looked at Haili and raised his chin.

"Okay, okay, I'll go talk to Griffin."

The murderer knew so many details of "Flying Stars", either he had visited the gallery many times to look at the painting and remembered the color of each star clearly, or he had seen it at Van Chart I have drawn many times.

Haley asked Griffin who had watched the video of "Flying Stars" from its exhibition to the present, and Fern Keating sent someone to take the video away.

Ian and Haley walk out of the gallery.Now that the three murders were all related to the paintings of Van Chart, they must pay another visit to the great painter.

When they came to Van Chart's villa, Van Chart was drinking black tea on the balcony, and Dr. Manning was also there.

"Oh, dear Detective Russell is here. It seems that I not only have black tea, but also you, a pleasing handsome man."

"Since Mr. Charter invited me, please also give me a cup of black tea." Haili sat down gracefully beside Van Charter, with a posture like a nobleman.

Ian sat beside Haili silently.

The servant came up with the black tea, put down the teapot, and put down the milk cup, syrup and chocolate sauce.

Van Chart poured the syrup into his teacup, and Mr. Manning, who was checking his heartbeat, stopped him, "Mr. Chart, syrup and chocolate sauce can't be eaten recently. Your blood sugar is a bit high."

"Oh, what a shame..." Van Chart shrugged at Haley.

"But the milk is still okay." Dr. Manning raised the milk cup, poured half a cup of fresh milk into Van Chater's teacup, then nodded to Ian and Haili, and left.

"Mr. Charter, you have three paintings on display at the Griffin Gallery, and you also know that Adam the insurance salesman, Amanda Cooke the art dealer, and Mrs. Wendell the art critic have all been murdered."

"... Wendell?" Van Chart showed a surprised expression, "She died?"

"Yes, Mr. Charter."

Van Chart was stunned for two seconds, and then shouted downstairs: "Dr. Manning! Dr. Manning!"

"I'm here, Mr. Chater, what's wrong with you?"

"Agent Russell told me that Mrs. Wendell is dead!"

"Yes, it was in the papers this morning."

"Then why didn't you tell me!"

"I'm just worried that your emotional agitation will affect your health." Dr. Manning showed an apologetic expression.

Van Chart waved the back of his hand, covered his heart, lowered his head, his face pale.

Dr. Manning hurried to the water and the pills came to him.

"I thought you would be relieved to hear of Mrs. Wendell's death. After all, she was very harsh on your new work."

Van Chart shook his head, "No matter what Wendell says, I can bear it. You say she was murdered? Who killed her? Why?"

"You care about Mrs. Wendell?"

"Of course! Don't you know? I have pursued her for 22 years, and the only one she loves is her husband. Her evaluation of my paintings is very harsh, but that is her truest opinion. I will never Will be angry at her evaluation." Van Chart leaned back in his chair with a look of great pain on his face, "My God... my God...she's dead...I thought she wouldn't die before me..."

Dr. Manning looked at Haili with a hint of reproach in his eyes.

Haili took out the photo from his pocket and put it on the tea table.

"Mr. Charter, I have not shown you the photographs of these three cases because I was concerned about your health. But now, I think it is time to show you. Please tell me, what was the most important thing you saw when you saw these photographs?" Real feelings."

Van Chart took a breath, and Dr. Manning wanted to persuade him, but he just waved his hand to ask Dr. Manning to leave.

He picked up the three photos, and when he saw the first one, he was puzzled.In the second photo, he showed a surprised expression.And the third photo, of Wendell being hung in the night sky, caused Van Chart to flip the photo over and put it on the table.

"This is impossible... This is impossible? Who would kill Wendell in this way?"

Ian carefully observed Van Charter's expression, his breathing and the twitching of the corners of his eyes, which showed that he was really surprised.

"Mr. Charter, can you tell us where you were last night between six and three in the morning?"

"That's...you suspect that I killed Wendell?" Van Chart looked at Haili with a distressed expression.

"Mr. Charter, answer our questions."

"I'm at home! Where else can I go except home is the hospital!" Van Chart became a little excited.

"And what about Dr. Manning? What time did he leave here yesterday?" Ian asked.

In his heart, he didn't know why he always had doubts about Dr. Manning.

"Yesterday? Dr. Manning left here at four in the afternoon. He said he had a medical seminar in LA."

"Thank you." Ian nodded, and sent a text message to his colleagues, asking to verify Dr. Manning's boarding information.

"Mr. Chatter, has anyone paid you any fanatical respect?" Haley went on.

"What do you mean?" asked Van Chart suspiciously.

Hailey sighed and looked at Ian.

Ian explained in a voice without the slightest emotional ups and downs: "The murderer uses your paintings, Mr. Charter, to kill people. The other party is obviously sending you some kind of information. He regards killing as an art and regards himself as an artist. He longs for the same Your identity as an artist. The murderer shows his work in public, maybe not just for other people to appreciate, but for you. This is a dialogue between you and him. But you have not responded for a long time, One day, the murderer will give up this way of communication and come directly to you. I don’t think you want this to happen.”

Fan Chart turned his head, pondered for a moment, and said slowly: "When I was just suffering from cancer, people often sent me flowers anonymously. It was a small white daisy... I used to draw a picture of a small daisy when I was young." A painting, that was given to Wendell, but she didn't accept it. It was later sold to a collector in Germany. At first I thought it was Wendell who sent me the flowers, but then I called her to confirm , she didn’t even know that I had cancer. Later, I moved to a villa in the north of New York City, and the other party still continued to send me flowers. In addition to sending flowers, he also wrote me a letter.”

"Wait, you said 'he' instead of 'she'?" Ian asked.

"It didn't look feminine. And his letters kept coming in and it bothered me so I moved. Moved here."

"Do you still have any letters from him?"

"...I burned most of them, but I did keep one. It was probably just in case. At that time, I was worried that the other party would do something crazy, so I wrote Choose to move." Van Chart got up and fetched a letter from his bedroom.

Ian took the rubber gloves out of his pocket and opened the letter.

There is only a short sentence on it: I hope your body will get better soon, otherwise I will not know where to look.love you CM

"Can we take this letter with us?"

"Of course! As long as it can help you find out who killed Wendell!"

"Are you sure you haven't received any flowers or letters from this person since you moved here?"

"It's true that I haven't received it."

"It is likely that this person has no way of knowing your new address, so he used such a drastic method to try to 'contact' you." Hailey sighed.

"Get 'contact'? That's not art at all!" Van Chart tapped his fingers on the three photos. "It's just murder. Art is creation, it requires imagination, not anyone's blood and blood. life."

"Mr. Charter, before we find this person, I hope you will not make a public statement in any newspaper or magazine. We don't want you to provoke him." Ian asked Van Charter when he left.

"Don't worry, I won't deliberately alarm the other party."

"Thank you."

Ian and Haley left Van Chart's villa.

Just as Hailey was about to open Ian's car door, Ian locked the car and drove away.

He had just driven out not far away when his cell phone rang.Ian turned a blind eye.

Hailey knew Ian wouldn't answer the phone, so he sent him a text message: I just found out about Van Chart's secret.

Ian took a deep breath and called Haley back.

"What secret?"

"When you come back to pick me up, I'll tell you what this secret is. And I want your right to ride in the co-pilot seat. No matter what reason you get into a fight with me in the future, you can't lock the door like today and walk away. "

Ian snorted softly in his heart.

It was Hayley's old trick again.When he drove the car back, he said some insignificant things, and took the opportunity to squeeze into his car door.

"Since it's a secret, you might as well never tell it."

Ian handed the letter to Fern Keating.

Instead of extracting any fingerprints on the letter, Fein's team found half a fingerprint on the seal of the letter.After comparison, they locked a truck driver Engel Norman.

"Truck driver? Which company's truck driver is he?"

"...Blizzard Freeze Company." Fein's voice paused, and he added, "You once asked us to check the video outside Cavendish Park. The one where the dead body of the art dealer Amanda appeared At night, the camera captured a figure resembling Eng Norman pushing Amanda's body to the gate of the park with a cart."

"Thank you very much, Finn."