Five
Trickling RedLooking at a gravestone, Jaejoong chewed the insides of his cheek. Fighting back his tears, he picked up at a bottle of soju. Jaejoong's fingers ran across the letters craved on the tomb.
"Blackcrow... I came to give you my respect. Now that Lee Dong Hyuk is behind bars, you can finally rest in peace..." drawled Jaejoong.
He tilted the bottle and emptied its content on the soil.
Jaejoong threw his head back a little and sniffled, "I would never expect forgiveness from you... I caused your death..."
A harsh breeze blew across Jaejoong's face as if the dead man was showing his hatred. Jaejoong closed his eyes and sighed.
"I will spend the rest of my life repenting."
*****
"Oh! Jaejoong-sshi. You're back!" a female police officer uttered in surprise.
The man had his black hair styled, revealing his forehead. He wore a crisp white dress shirt which was tucked into his pants and, he had a pistol fastened to the side of his hips.
He gave a simple smile and headed for his office.
"Good job, Mr. Undercover!"
"You're amazing."
"Cracking such a big case in a year."
"Wow. I heard you managed to be the most trusted man of Lee Dong Hyuk in such a short time."
Praises flew to him as he entered his work place. All this compliments just made his head swell.
"I..." Jaejoong began. He looked about him with the trapped gaze of a spider sinking into honey.
"Jaejoong hyung! Chief wants to see you," Yoochun called out.
Seeing that it was the chance to escape from the small crowd around him, he said,"Got it."
He his heels and bounded for the head of department's office door. He rapped on the glass door.
"Enter."
He pushed open the door and saluted to the chief.
The middle-aged man boomed, "At ease."
The chief was a strict person. He had a stocky body and a loud voice. One would recognise him even if he just spoke a word.
"Welcome back, Jaejoong. I must say that you have done a remarkable job. That, I must praise you," the chief said.
"Thank you, sir," replied Jaejoong.
"But–" the head paused. "I see that you can do much better than this." He stared straight into Jaejoong's eyes.
"Yes, sir," said Jaejoong.
"Here," The chief held out a grey file. "I've decided to hand this over to your team."
Jaejoong eyed the file before taking it.
The chief continued, "This murder cases... have no leads. Not a single trail was left behind for us to trace."
Jaejoong looked stunned. It was the first time seeing a troubled look on his boss' face. He scanned through the pages and reassured the chief, "I'll handle it."
The head of department smiled solemnly.
With that, Jaejoong left the room.
Jaejoong waved the file in front of his team members.
"What?! Another one?! We just solved one a little while ago!" exclaimed Changmin.
"You're barely here for an hour and have to start on another case?!" sighed Junsu.
Yoochun clapped his hands twice. "Well, we lived up to our expectations of being the best unit of the plain clothes cops. Therefore, we should expect to have more work than others."
Jaejoong nodded in agreement, "Just bear with it."
~.~.~.~
Jaejoong scooted his chair nearer to the meeting table after he looked through the file once again. He began,"No DNA results... Method of killing is the same... So, there's a high chance that this killer... is the same for all eight cases."
"The wound has the depth of 1-inch and the width of 0.1-inch," added Yoochun.
"The possible weapon is a swift knife," Junsu piped in.
Jaejoong listened as he marked out the dates of murder on the calendar. "It... occurs once every fortnight."
"The victims did not struggle at all. It was as if they were willing to die," Changmin paused for a while to open a packet of chips. Munching, he continued, "And the place of death is always in the alley where it is deserted."
Jaejoong dropped his pen to the table and it rolled towards Yoochun. He watched the pen and it moved.
"2 days ago..." Jaejoong began. "...was exactly a fortnight after the last case. If I'm not wrong, a murder should have taken place,"
"2 days ago..." Yoochun pondered, stopping the pen with his arm.
Changmin interrupted their thoughts, "Isn't that the day when we're trying to nab Lee Dong Hyuk?"
The other three gasped. Accidently, Yoochun moved his arm and the pen rolled off the edge of the table. The pen fell onto the carpet floor with a small little thud.
Suddenly, they heard a commotion outside their meeting room.
薔薇色の事件's title is changed to Trickling Red. Pls take note if u see it in ur updated subscription section. Tks!
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