Jiang Yun left with Lin Qianjie and Lawyer Wang, brushing past Mu Mian as they went.
Mu Mian froze, unsure whether to call out to her or if this woman could possibly be her mother. She had always imagined her mother as a poor, struggling woman who couldn't afford to visit her abroad despite working hard. In her mind, her mother wore tattered clothes and had a face lined with wrinkles... but this woman looked nothing like that.
If she was her mother, why hadn't she come to see her when she seemed so wealthy?
"Mu Mian, daydreaming again?" Fang Rui tapped her shoulder. "Save that for the office, or you'll affect our City Police Bureau's image."
Mu Mian forced a smile worse than crying. "Got it."
"Did something happen?" Fang Rui rarely saw Mu Mian looking so upset.
Mu Mian shook her head. She was fine, she just needed to revise the mental image of her mother in her mind.
"Fang Rui, I'm okay now," Mu Mian smiled again, this time genuinely.
Fang Rui had the tech team verify the authenticity of the photos. They reported that none showed signs of digital manipulation and appeared to be genuine.
Fang Rui and the police psychologist Li Lanlan took Lu Tian's statement together.
Lu Tian, 27 years old, was strikingly beautiful with classical features. But sitting in the interview room, she looked haggard, her pretty phoenix eyes swollen from crying.
Li Lanlan asked gently, "Miss Lu, what is your relationship with Lin Qianjie?"
"He's a friend of my best friend. I guess we're friends too."
"But he says you two are in a romantic relationship," Li Lanlan said carefully, not wanting to upset the fragile-looking Lu Tian.
"He's lying! I don't like him at all, and he's never confessed to me. We're just normal friends. He's making this up to avoid punishment. He must be lying to save himself."
"Miss Lu, please calm down. Why did you let him into your home on the night of the incident?"
Lu Tian kept wiping away tears. "I've said this many times. He told me he had arranged an advertising deal for me and came over to discuss the details. My best friend was there at first, but she left after getting a phone call. We were in the middle of discussing contract details, so I couldn't just kick him out. I had no idea he would drag me into the bedroom and force himself on me."
Each recollection was deeply traumatic for Lu Tian. She was already emotionally fragile, and this retelling pushed her further towards a breakdown. She began crying uncontrollably.
Fang Rui produced a photo of her with Lin Qianjie. "Miss Lu, how do you explain this picture?"
The photo showed Lu Tian and Lin Qianjie posing together, Lu Tian smiling sweetly with a blue ocean in the background. They looked very intimate.
"This photo was taken with my best friend and Lin Qianjie. Why is it just the two of us now? My friend should be there too!" Lu Tian looked at the photo in shock. "This must be fake. I've never taken a photo like this with him alone."
Fang Rui pointed out, "But there are many such photos in different settings."
"Impossible! I've never taken photos alone with Lin Qianjie. In this one, we're wearing matching clothes because we were at a charity event. Many people wore the same shirt. This photo has been altered - we took it with a large group..."
Lu Tian had a somewhat plausible explanation for each photo. But faced with so many pictures, her excuses seemed weak.
Fang Rui latched onto a key figure in her story - her best friend.
His instincts told him Lu Tian wasn't lying.
Fang Rui knew Lin Qianjie fairly well. Lin had been constantly dating girls since middle school and led a chaotic personal life. He was unscrupulous and had a history of deceiving girls. This was why Fang Rui used to beat him up so often!
"Boss, you don't think Lu Tian is actually lying, do you?" Zhang held up his phone. "A cleaner from Lu Tian's apartment complex posted online saying she'd seen Lin Qianjie leaving Lu Tian's place multiple times. Some female employees from Lin Qianjie's company also claimed they saw Lu Tian passionately kissing him in his office..."
After reporting to the police, Lu Tian had posted about the incident online, fearing the police might favor Lin Qianjie.
As a popular social media influencer, her story spread quickly. Public opinion initially sided with Lu Tian. But when her "intimate photos" with Lin Qianjie appeared online, along with the efforts of Lin Qianjie's paid internet trolls, public sentiment rapidly turned against her.
"Have Li Lanlan stay with her 24/7. Her mental state is already fragile. If she sees these comments, she might even attempt suicide."
"Boss, do you really think Lu Tian was raped?" Zhang was starting to waver in the face of so much evidence. While Lin Qianjie didn't seem like a good person, did that necessarily mean the seemingly weak and pitiful Lu Tian was innocent?
"Let's find her best friend first. Maybe we can get some leads from her."
Lu Tian's best friend was named Wang Xiaoya, a sales assistant at a luxury goods store.
When Fang Rui and Zhang arrived at the store, they saw Lawyer Wang just leaving.
Lawyer Wang noticed Fang Rui and greeted him before driving away.
"Boss, we're too late. That lawyer Wang probably already bought off Wang Xiaoya."
When they entered, Wang Xiaoya was touching up her makeup.
After learning why they were there, she continued applying foundation: "Ask what you need to quickly. Don't make me late for work."
Zhang was indignant: "Miss Wang, your best friend went through such a traumatic experience, and you're worried about makeup?"
"What's that supposed to mean? I didn't stop doing my makeup even at my father's funeral," Wang Xiaoya rolled her eyes at Zhang. "What's wrong with putting on makeup? Is it a crime?"
Fang Rui asked, "Were you at Lu Tian's place on the night of July 20th?"
Wang Xiaoya's eyes lit up when she saw Fang Rui. She flipped her hair, "Officer, do you have a girlfriend?"
"Please answer my question."
"Fine, no need to be so harsh! Yes, I was at Lu Tian's that night, but they seemed to be having a great conversation, so I felt like a third wheel and made an excuse to leave."
"You say they were chatting happily?"
"Of course."
"Are Lu Tian and Lin Qianjie in a relationship?"
"I can't say for sure. Lin Qianjie changes girlfriends all the time, who knows what their relationship is? But Lin Qianjie seemed to really like Lu Tian. And Lu Tian took advantage of that to get a lot of benefits from him."
Fang Rui showed her the stack of photos: "Were you present when these were taken?"
"I was there for this one on the yacht. I don't remember when this one was taken. I don't think I was there for this one with the matching outfits." Wang Xiaoya cooperatively explained each photo.
"I don't know why Lu Tian is making such a fuss. This should be a good thing, I can't understand why she reported it to the police! I suspect she might be mentally ill. She's not quite right in the head, always going to see psychologists."
"A good thing?" Zhang was stunned. "How is this good?"
"Lin Qianjie runs an influencer management company. Lu Tian hooking up with him means she'll have no shortage of resources in the future. If Lin Qianjie marries her, she'll become a rich man's wife! So many people would kill for that kind of luck, but she goes and offends her meal ticket!"
Fang Rui realized they wouldn't get any useful information from Wang Xiaoya.
"Officer, is that all you're going to ask?" Wang Xiaoya looked at Fang Rui, seeming reluctant to let him go. "Why don't you leave me your number? If I remember anything, I'll contact you right away."
Fang Rui gave Zhang a look, and Zhang quickly wrote down a phone number for Wang Xiaoya.
Wang Xiaoya took the paper with obvious disappointment.
As soon as Zhang exited the luxury boutique, he quickly took a deep breath of fresh air. "My goodness," he exclaimed, "that woman's perfume was so overpowering it nearly suffocated me."
