Chapter 147 — The Long-Awaited...
Years of Heartflutter · Page 411 of 501
Though everyone present despised the guy who needed a beating for his ungrateful face, now that a life was at stake, no one dared to speak carelessly. Had it been anything else—say, the guy who needed a beating getting a sound thrashing from Zhang Bin—so long as he did not die, probably no one would have said they saw Zhang Bin lay a hand on him.
But this was different. A life was at stake, and careless words carried legal responsibility. Still, most of the people present could not stand the guy who needed a beating, so although no one spoke up to defend Zhang Bin at this moment, neither did anyone open their mouth to testify to anything.
If someone said Zhang Bin had killed a man in a moment of impulse, Yang Ce would believe it. But if someone said Zhang Bin had killed this guy who needed a beating, Yang Ce would never believe it. First, there was no deep grudge at all between Zhang Bin and this guy who needed a beating—nowhere near the point of drawing a knife. Even when Wang Lin had once done him harm, and Zhang Bin loathed Wang Lin as much as could be, he had still kept his head and done nothing excessive. How much less so now, over nothing more than a few words of quarrel?
Second, there was simply no knife on Zhang Bin. Yang Ce had come out of Wang Mei's room together with him—how could he have missed it if Zhang Bin had taken anything? Besides, the idea of Zhang Bin having nothing better to do than wander around the hotel carrying a knife was simply absurd.
And most important of all, Yang Ce felt that the attitude the girlfriend of the guy who needed a beating was showing seemed a little too normal. By any reasonable account, when your boyfriend has been killed, seizing the murder suspect and refusing to let go was normal enough—but precisely because it was too normal, Yang Ce grew suspicious.
A woman whose boyfriend had just been killed right before her eyes could still calmly and methodically analyze how Zhang Bin was the murderer? Something seemed a bit off about that.
Yang Ce believed that if the one killed had been himself, and Chen Shutang had been standing nearby, Chen Shutang would absolutely have been overcome with grief—either holding him and weeping, or fighting to the death with the killer. How could she possibly have spoken so rationally?
What on earth was going on here? A frame-up after a murder, or an accident? Yang Ce could not figure it out. Who would do such a thing? Zhang Bin should have no enemies in Macau. The only one who could be counted an enemy was Liu Jihao—but Liu Jihao had fallen to his own death hours ago. How could he possibly be playing at framing anyone now?
The only reasonably plausible scenario was this: someone bore a grudge against the guy who needed a beating, and Zhang Bin just happened to have quarreled with him. That person seized the opportunity, cleverly killed the guy who needed a beating, and then pinned the blame on Zhang Bin.
Of course, all of this was Yang Juehuan's speculation; everything else could only be analyzed as events unfolded.
"How did you end up on top of this guy?" Yang Ce asked Zhang Bin calmly.
"I didn't fall on him—someone behind me pushed me, that's how I ended up on top of him." Zhang Bin spoke with an air of grievance. "Otherwise I was already about to leave. How could I have fallen on top of him?"
Hearing this, Yang Yu nodded. He too had vaguely seen a man passing by earlier, who seemed to have given Zhang Bin a shove—only he had not paid much attention at the time and had not seen clearly. Now, thinking back, it did seem to have been that way.
As for whether that man had been the one to drive the knife in, that was hard to say. Yang Mo felt a twinge of regret that he had not focused his attention there—but what good was regret now? Matters had already come to this.
Who had called the police, no one knew, but before long officers arrived at the scene, photographed the body, and took the suspect Zhang Bin into custody.