“Detective Kim, did you bring the suspect in?”

“I was just about to do it,” Taeyeon nodded as she sat back, relaxed on her chair while eating her Macdonald’s famous cheeseburger.

“And when will that be?” Jessica lowered her eyelid and stared at Taeyeon. The older girl then immediately stood up with her burger still in her hands and left the room.

Jessica rolled her eyes at that. She then looked over to Sooyoung.

“Lieutenant Choi, was there any DNA samples at the crime of the scene?”

“The whole place was well cleaned of DNA and fingerprints,”

“What about ? Was there a chance she was ually assaulted?”

“The coroner said no,”

“What about the weapon that caused the injury to her head? Maybe there will be some prints there,”

“We couldn’t find it anywhere in or outside of the house,”

“Have you tried digging them up in the backyard? Killers love burying everything these days,”

“Nope. But we did use a metal detector but everything seemed fine,”

“So this wasn’t . But if this was a burglary, where did all the items go? And what was stolen?”

“Maybe nothing was stolen. Maybe the police came before Wooyoung could steal anything,”

“But the witness saw him running away and that’s why she called the police,”

“So what did he steal? Hmmm…”Jessica pondered aloud before turning towards Sunny.

Sunny was just about to bite into her Subway Sandwich when the Captain called her.

“Detective Lee, could you drive back to the crime scene and check the vicinity if Wooyoung dumped anything nearby?” Sunny hurriedly took a bite off the sandwich before rushing out of the room.

Jessica frowned.

“SOOYOUNG! STOP INFLUENCING EVERYONE TO BE LIKE YOU. IT’S ONLY 4 O’CLOCK AND YOU GUYS ARE EATING AGAIN?!” Sooyoung blinked at Jessica’s sudden outburst and halted at the act of unwrapping her Wendy’s T-Rex Burger. The Captain saw the HUGE burger on Sooyoung’s table and shook her head in disbelief.

“Pigs,” She muttered under her breath as she headed back into her office.

-

Lee Teuk entered the chatting room only with the intention to deactivate his account. And since this was a confidential chat, there was no way the website could track the conversation he had down right? Lee Teuk could only hope for that.

No one was supposed to know that he took the story somewhere else, now that publishers were finally contacting him. It was the only way to end his financial difficulties.

-

“Captain! Look at this!” Sooyoung pointed to the book on her table.

“How has that got to do with anything in this case?” Jessica frowned. That book really looks familiar, like she had seen it in the newspaper of something. No doubt Jessica loved reading, but now wasn’t exactly the best time to introduce her to a new book.

“This case seems awfully similar to this bestseller that was recently published,” Bestseller, no wonder Jessica found it familiar. She must have stumbled across it a few days ago while browsing through the Life! section of the papers.

“What is the book about?”

“Well, it’s about this auditor who had been murdered and the suspect was found on a tree and guess what Captain, he was also dressed like a ninja. But the suspect in the story had a partner who was the real murderer. He was just a lookout for the partner. But the suspect was not found guilty and the partner was never caught, though,”

“A partner… This author seems to know the details of our case pretty well. Lieutenant Choi, I need you to bring him in,”

-

“I know nothing about this! I-it’s just a story, I swear!”

“But your story is PRETTY DAMN ACCURATE, DON’T YOU THINK!” Jessica slammed the book onto the table.

“Lo-look, I think it’s time to admit this, but the plot was bought,”

“At such a convenient time,”

“IT’S TRUE! LO-LOOK! I SWEAR I BOUGHT IT! I’-I’M NOT LYING!”

“Who did you buy it from then?”

“I-I DON’T KNOW! I mea-mean this guy was an anonymous user in the chat room,”

“What a convenient excuse,”

“IT’S TRUE! GO LOOK IT UP!”

“Private chats are never recorded, you know that don’t you,”

“Then what do you want me to do to prove that I’m innocent?”

“What’s your username?”

“I-I deactivated the account,” Lee Teuk looked sheepish.

“Why?”

“Promise me you wouldn’t leak this secret out,”

“YOU TELL ME WHY OR I WILL CHARGE YOU WITH MURDER IN THE FIRST DEGREE!”

“BE-BE-BECAUSE I-I WASN’T GOING TO PAY HIM FOR HIS WORK! GOODNESS! THERE, YOU HAPPY? NOW EVERYONE WILL KNOW THAT I’M A STUPID USELESS AUTHOR WHO CAN’T EVEN THINK OF HIS OWN STORY. DAMNIT!” Lee Teuk banged his fists against the table. And Jessica, after seeing his agitated state, decided it was best to speak softly to him now.

“I need you to tell me, did anonymous contact you afterwards?”

“Yeah, he did,” Lee Teuk was in tears now.

“How?”

“He wouldn’t stop hounding me every time I log into the chat room. So I deleted the account. Then he started to harass me on my webpage too. And when I stopped replying, he messaged me,”

“Could you show me the message?”

“I got rid of the SIM Card when I changed my number. Wh-who knows if that stupid card had any GPS signal to lead him to me? I DID IT TO PROTECT MYSELF!”

“Okay. I need you to give me your previous mobile number and the service operator as well as your username and the name of the chat room you were using,”

-

“Captain, you don’t believe him do you?”

“Why not?”

“It’s just that his excuses are just too convenient to be true,”

“But it does seem legit,”

“No doubt, bu-”

“Just give him the benefit of the doubt. Meanwhile dump his phone and notify me if anonymous tries to contact him,”

“Ohh and Detective Kim, could you help to check if the chat room kept any conversations between him and Mr Anonymous? I would just like to be sure. And see if you can trace the IP address of the anonymous user. Thanks so much, Taeyeon,”

-

“Captain, Mrs Kim is here to identify Wooyoung,”

“Okay, bring her into the media room and I’ll be there shortly,”

-

“Take your time to identify him. We wouldn’t want any mistakes,”

Mrs Kim scrutinised everyone in the line. Jessica looked at her. The old lady didn’t seem to be sure who it was. She had even skipped looking at Wooyoung.

“It’s none of them,”

“But it was dark, how could you be so sure?”

“All of them are too big. I remember him being small and petite. I would have mistaken him as a girl if it weren’t for the speed at which he was running. Very fast, that boy,”

Jessica was dumbfounded.

“So it’s someone else?” The Captain turned her head at Lieutenant Choi’s question only to see her holding onto a pair of chopsticks.

“Lieutenant! Could you please stop eating at a time like this?”

“But I’m hungry and I can’t think well when I’m hungry,”

Jessica rubbed her temples before ordering the tall officer, “I need you to read the whole book. Seems like Mr Anonymous, or should I say Ms Anonymous, knew the plan very well. I need you to read about the motives of the criminal and we can start investigating from there,”

“And take your food with you. Damn, the whole room smells like Shin Ramyeon now,”

-

“Look Jessica, you’re running out of time,”

“I know, Chief. But there are just so many unanswered questions. Like what on earth was Wooyoung doing at the victim’s house if he didn’t kill or her or even took anything from her house? And for one, we haven’t caught the other runner yet who virtually disappeared from the world altogether,”

“Jessica, I had an offer,”

“What offer?” The blonde looked up at the Chief with suspicion. She really hoped this was something he wouldn’t pressure her to take up. But after seeing the looks on his face, she was sure that it was going to phrased out as an order if she were to say no.

“Tiffany Hwang, Wooyoung’s lawyer, had offered us a deal. If you were to let him get away with manslaughter, he would give us the name of his partner,”

“Well, no thank you. We’re already onto his partner,”

“But you just said you haven’t caught the other runner,” The chief raised an eyebrow at her inconsistency, clearly suspecting her of lying.

“We-well, I was lying. See you chief,” Jessica hurriedly got out of the room and fished out her phone.

“He had a partner, it’s confirmed,”

-

“I’m telling you it’s Lee Teuk! Now that Tiffany confirmed he had a partner, it has to be Lee Teuk!”

“But my guts is telling me he is innocent. He might be a deceiving little who cheats, but I seriously doubt he had the audacity to kill someone. I mean, look at how he trembled in the interview room. Besides, the witness said the runner was small and petite. And Lee Teuk doesn’t seem that petite to me,”

“Captain! I found something,” Jessica turned her head towards Sunny.

“What did you find?”

The detective didn’t say a word, but raised her hand to show a Ziploc bag filled with burned paper.

“I found these in the woods near the crime scene. It seems like the runner was trying to hide something,”

Jessica took the Ziploc bag from Sunny’s hand and opened it. She removed a small, unburned piece with a pair of tweezers.

“Detective Lee, I need you to find out what was on these papers and if we could get any fingerprints off this. Oh and, well done detective,” She saw Sunny pick up the phone before another call diverted her attention.

“Captain! Anonymous messaged Lee Teuk again,”

“Did you manage to track down the number?”

“It was untraceable because it was from a disposable cell,”

“What about the IP address?”

“The user has been using PC Cafes to get online. The IP addresses change all the time,”

“Okay, get Lee Teuk to reply him,”

“What do you want him to say?”

Jessica thought for a while before replying, “Get him to meet up with him to pass him the money,”

-

“Captain, the Chief is looking for you,”

a/n: HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR GUYS! I'm presuming that most of you are asians... And since I am unable to give you any red packets, I hope that this new chapter can serve as a red packet from me to you! :) Please leave a comment if you enjoyed reading it!