Chapter 96

It had been many years since I last took a train.

In my perception, there was not much difference between high-speed trains and regular trains, except for the speed.

If I was pursuing efficiency, I would choose to fly, rushing to the interview with round-trip tickets reimbursed by the company.

Otherwise, I would take the train. The sound of the wheels rubbing against the tracks had a mysterious rhythm, and it suddenly reminded me of what Alan once said, that it was the mark of time passing.

The last time I took a high-speed train was probably a few years ago when I accompanied my mom on a trip down memory lane.

At that time, my mom's health was already failing, and I vaguely felt that she didn't have much time left. She was very open about it, saying she had no regrets in her life but didn't want to be lying in bed with tubes all over her body. Instead, she kept comforting me and my dad, and Alan, who was silently standing by with red-rimmed eyes.

That night, she called me and asked if I could take some time off to accompany her to visit her hometown, the place where she spent her childhood.

My mom was a woman from Peach Blossom Town in the South. After graduating from college, she married my dad and rarely went back. When a person reached the end of their journey, they always thought of the starting point.

I was about to book plane tickets, but my mom said we should take the train back because that was how she came at first.

Considering my mom's health, I booked a sleeper berth, but most of the time, she sat on a small chair in the corridor, looking very excited, eagerly gazing at the scenery outside the window like a child on their first trip.

Peach Blossom Town in the South was beautiful, especially for someone like me who was born and raised in the North. My mom took me to her old house where she had spent her childhood. There were the lotus leaves in the pond, the small river by the street, and the fragrance of Southern breakfast wafting in the morning.

It was hard to imagine how my mom, as a Southerner, adapted to the Northern climate, with dry seasons and unbearably cold winters.

I remembered the afternoon before we left; it was overcast, with a drizzle, like a brush roughly turning the whole world into shades of gray and black.

I held an orange umbrella for my mom, and we walked shoulder to shoulder on the cobblestone-paved street.

"I don't expect it, thirty years have passed since I left. I have thought a lot on the way; it is messy and chaotic. But when I got here, I realized that my life was strung together by a thread. I have been searching for it, and when I find this thread, everything become beautiful."

"Mom, what is your thread?"

"It's you and your dad, Nancy. What about you?"

I snapped out of my memories and closed the notebook Alan had left behind.

"If I say I love you, I will love your past, your tantrums, your imperfections."

"If I say I love you, I will offer my heart, lungs, and all my organs to the god of love who has fallen into hell."

"If I say I love you, I will drain my blood, leaving only my skin to wrap around your soul, evading the pursuit of death."

"If I say I love you, we will kiss passionately, our tongues entwined, our bodies merging, a fire dissolving sin and pain."

"We will eventually meet."

This was not a love poem, nor did it have anything to do with Alan's novels. It was a guide, and it was very different from Alan's usual style and tone; it was more like written by someone else.

The organs mentioned in the poem, such as "heart" and "lungs," were almost identical to the scene where Douglas's body parts were hung from the ceiling in the Entertainment Club arson and murder case.

"Draining my blood, leaving only my skin" also matched the scene where the body was burned to a crisp.

"A fire dissolving sin and pain" referred to the fire at the Entertainment Club, but the dissolution of sin and pain here was a metaphor. As of now, it seemed that nothing had been dissolved. Tony and Lally were still missing, and Frank's revenge plan was still in motion.

From the day I saw this poem, then the photos of the scene, and received the call to identify the body, the emotional span was too great. During these two months of running around and investigating, everything was connected, and I never noticed this poem.

Perhaps I was always avoiding it, avoiding Alan's departure, locking the study, closing the bedroom door, and never going in again.

Instead, I ignored the most important clue right beside me.

Alan seemed to have anticipated this happening. He started planning early, trying to stop this terrifying revenge action. At the same time, he left a backup plan. If something happened to him, I could continue the investigation based on the clues he left, or the bodies at the Entertainment Club could lead to conclusions.

But I didn't realize this at the time. By a twist of fate, I uncovered the child trafficking in Sand Village and the old steel mill and learned about their backgrounds.

Fortunately, the information I uncovered was more in-depth, but it didn't deviate from the case itself.

I suddenly thought, if this was a guide, then the insurance policy printout placed on top of the documents when I was investigating the Sand Village demolition and brawl case in the company archives was probably put there by Alan.

I never thought in this direction, but it seemed that the only person who could enter the company and know the archive room password was Alan.

When I first came to the Silverlight City Journal, I worked day and night. Alan would bring me meals after work. At that time, I was building an electronic cloud document, putting all the case files in it. Alan helped me find information, and that was when he learned the archive room password.

I thought, "Yes, that's right." The last time Alan came to the office was just a month before the incident.

It was around early October. There was an article, and Zoey and I were working overtime on it. After we finished, Alan came to pick us up. When we got downstairs, I realized I had forgotten my keys, so Alan went up to get them. It was probably then that he put the copy of the insurance policy for Tammy in the archive room.

So, Alan had thought this far ahead. He anticipated that something might happen at the class reunion, and if I knew he was in trouble, I might overlook important clues in my panic. So, while investigating Sand Village, knowing that Tammy and Lally were giving false testimony but unable to find the relevant people, the appearance of the insurance policy led to the important clues of Tony and Tom, and Tom being Tammy's adopted son Zack.

Alan could predict this far because he already knew about this meticulous plan in advance, starting with killing Douglas and framing Laura-a strategy that killed two birds with one stone， and then having Tammy, Tom, and Lally testify, which would firmly trap Laura with the evidence.

The logic worked, but I overlooked an important issue.

They wanted to bring Laura down, but the evidence was insufficient. Laura's lawyer's defense in court was spot on.

Lally and Tammy had low education levels and might not understand the law well, but Frank, as the organizer of this plan, if he didn't understand the law, that would be unreasonable. Someone of his status would have a team of lawyers serving him.

Currently, Laura is still in custody, and it's unlikely she'll be sentenced to death.

According to the investigation, the higher-ups have started a cleanup operation, and naturally, they want to take down Laura. Frank and others have a grudge against Laura, so they naturally want to take her down too.

But if that's the case, Laura wouldn't be alive now.

Wait!

What if Frank was protecting Laura?