Chapter Fifteen: The Corpse in the Bathtub

The cleaning lady’s residence was not far from the villa district. After questioning her, Wen Ke let her leave.

Wen Ke reopened the file on An Shi and began to review it.

A renowned psychologist in S City.

From a wealthy family.

With a considerable income.

The last page of the file contained a list of all the patients who had been treated by An Shi.

There was nothing suspicious to be found from the file.

But that was precisely the biggest suspicion.

Because colleagues from the police station had visited the psychiatric hospital where An Shi worked and found that the nurses and doctors there spoke unusually highly of him.

And the patients treated by An Shi also praised him endlessly.

The An Shi described by these people was completely different from the An Shi the cleaning lady had spoken of.

Who was lying?

Or perhaps no one was lying, and An Shi had two faces?

Wen Ke’s eyes quickly scanned the patient list. Just as she was about to close the file, a sudden flash of insight struck her mind.

The next moment, she fixed her gaze on the patient list. The list recorded all patients who had visited over the past year, and six months ago, a man named Zhuang Dong had sought treatment from An Shi.

The name “Zhuang Dong” was scrawled carelessly; at first glance, one might mistake it for “Zhuang Mu Dong.”

Six months ago.

Zhuang Dong.

Whether by timing or name, it was too coincidental.

Wen Ke immediately sensed something was amiss and called over a colleague. “Check if this person on the list was the victim’s ex-boyfriend.”

Her colleague took the file, and upon seeing the name clearly, showed a look of obvious surprise. “Yes, Team Leader Wen.”

At that moment, a masked colleague ran out of the villa. “Team Leader Wen, a breach has been made in the wall.”

Hearing this, Wen Ke donned her mask and gloves hurriedly and entered the villa’s bathroom.

The once delicately decorated and elegant bathroom now had a large hole broken through the wall, big enough for an adult to bend and pass through.

Behind the wall was a hidden room.

Pitch dark, without any light source.

Wen Ke held a flashlight in her left hand and drew her pistol with her right, aiming it steadily. “Xiao Wang, Xiao Zhang, come with me. Everyone else, stay on standby outside.”

“Team Leader Wen, I’ll go first,” Xiao Wang volunteered.

Wen Ke glanced at him. “When did you ever beat me? I’ll let you lead then.”

Xiao Wang immediately wilted and scratched his head.

Wen Ke was the internal sanda champion of the bureau.

Without weapons, she could take on a dozen grown men alone; with weapons, she was a moving female tyrannosaurus.

Once, while pursuing a criminal, she delivered a high kick to the man’s face, knocking him unconscious on the spot. He remained comatose for three days and nights before waking.

“Team Leader, you first,” Xiao Wang retreated sulkily.

Xiao Zhang, standing nearby, chuckled but quickly stifled it, knowing the gravity of the situation.

The three formed a circle and cautiously entered the hidden room. As their eyes gradually adapted to the darkness, aided by the flashlight’s beam, they barely made out the layout inside.

Wen Ke was taken aback.

The layout of this hidden room was exactly symmetrical to the bathroom.

Instinctively, Wen Ke shone her flashlight on one side of the wall. The bathroom door lay in that direction, but the hidden room had no door.

“Be careful and spread out,” Wen Ke whispered.

Xiao Wang and Xiao Zhang began to carefully inspect the room’s contents.

The hidden room was not large.

It was a perfect mirror image of the bathroom.

A washbasin, vanity mirror, toilet, shower, and bathtub—all were there, but thick dust covered everything, suggesting it had not been used for a long time.

Suddenly, Wen Ke recalled Lu Yuan’s earlier image of looking in the bathroom mirror.

Thinking of this, she approached the mirror in the hidden room and glanced up.

Immediately, she sensed something was off.

This was a one-way mirror.

From the bathroom side, it appeared as a normal mirror, but from inside the hidden room, it was simply a pane of glass.

Anyone hiding inside could clearly observe everything happening in the bathroom through it.

Wen Ke frowned slightly.

She found it hard to understand.

This villa was usually occupied only by An Shi, with occasional visits from the cleaning lady.

If An Shi was hiding inside this secret room, what was he intending to watch?

“Team Leader!” A startled shout drew Wen Ke’s attention.

She turned toward Xiao Zhang nearby.

At this moment, Xiao Zhang was trembling visibly, as if he had seen something terrifying.

“What’s wrong, Xiao Zhang?”

Wen Ke glanced at Xiao Wang, who silently nodded.

Both approached Xiao Zhang and patted his shoulder.

Xiao Zhang shuddered, then turned to Wen Ke, lips quivering, and pointed the flashlight toward the bathtub.

“Found An Shi.”

Wen Ke and Xiao Wang followed the light and looked into the bathtub.

In an instant, their pupils contracted sharply.

Wen Ke was relatively composed.

Her psychological resilience was strong.

But Xiao Wang and Xiao Zhang were young and inexperienced, and seeing the scene in the bathtub sent chills down their spines.

A wave of nausea overwhelmed them, nearly causing them to vomit.

Xiao Wang’s face turned pale; he covered his mouth and ran out of the hidden room.

Xiao Zhang forced himself to stay calm, but acidic bile churned in his stomach. “Team Leader, I’ll head out for a bit.”

The hidden room was left with only Wen Ke.

She felt a bit queasy but not as severely as the others.

Covering her mouth and nose, she examined the scene in the bathtub closely with her flashlight.

Inside lay a corpse, immersed in foul-smelling water.

From the facial features, it was the missing An Shi.

His head and torso were severed into two parts.

The torso was fully submerged in the water, while the head was neatly placed on the edge of the tub.

The water was murky, indistinguishable whether it was blood or some other liquid.

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