You Mingxu turned and pushed open another door beside them.

When she pressed the light switch on the wall, nothing happened—it was broken. This appeared to be a storage room, no more than 3-4 square meters, pitch dark inside with several storage racks and items piled up in the corners. On the opposite wall, a window opened to darkness, with only starlight filtering through.

They searched carefully with their flashlights.

You Mingxu went to the window first, seeing the street below and the building opposite where they had hidden during the day. She examined the window—it was dusty with no signs of being opened recently. Her heart inexplicably tightened as she said, “We’ll need someone to check for fingerprints here later.”

Yin Feng held his flashlight high, eyes wide as he searched and rifled through the miscellaneous items.

You Mingxu asked, “What are you looking for?”

He replied, “Heaven knows what I’ll find—just trying my luck.”

You Mingxu left him to it and crouched down, searching carefully for footprints. The cement floor hadn’t retained many marks. She lay flat, pressing her face to the ground, searching inch by inch along the flashlight beam. Suddenly, she froze—near the windowsill, there was a tiny dark brown mark with a shoe tread pattern less than two centimeters long.

“Yin Feng!” she called out.

Yin Feng turned to see the woman of his dreams lying prone on the floor, her rounded buttocks raised toward him, her legs long and straight.

All his earlier dejection from her hints, her rejection, her seeming coldness—suddenly vanished.

He touched his face and walked over to those upturned curves, lying down beside her, their heads close together as they examined the floor.

“Is it blood?” she asked.

He leaned in closer, his straight nose almost touching the mark, and sniffed hard: “It’s blood.”

Huddled together, You Mingxu’s face nearly touched his. His profile appeared even sharper in the dim light, but his behavior was like that of a loyal police dog.

You Mingxu couldn’t help but smile as she pulled him up: “The blood’s fresh. Whose could it be?”

“Let’s assume this blood is related to our case, because if we assume it isn’t, then it’s meaningless,” Yin Feng parroted her earlier words back to her, then continued: “If it’s Fan Jia’s blood, it’s too little—did she just prick her finger? Maybe it’s Zhou Rongfeng’s blood from her shoe. She was here.”

You Mingxu called forensics, asking them to come immediately.

After hanging up, she found Yin Feng lying by the storage rack, face pressed to the floor. He wore jeans and an open jacket today, exposing his narrow waist. Though he looked thin, his hip lines were firm and shapely, his long legs straight and slender.

You Mingxu thought he looked both foolish and undignified—a handsome man looking ridiculous. Without thinking, she lightly kicked his buttocks again, asking, “What are you doing?”

Yin Feng’s heart and bottom quivered simultaneously. He thought: you won’t have me now, keeping me at arm’s length, yet you keep teasing me like this! But the investigation came first, so he pressed his lips together and said coolly, “Ah Xu, come here.”

You Mingxu crouched beside him, and he pulled her down, directing his flashlight beam toward one of the rack’s support legs.

You Mingxu startled slightly.

“Look, isn’t there a scratch mark on the floor? Made by the metal leg.”

In the illuminated patch of dark gray cement, there was indeed a white scratch mark.

“The scratch is as fresh as the blood,” Yin Feng said.

You Mingxu stared intently, saying, “The scratch is uneven. From its shape, it wasn’t dragged deliberately—something crashed into it hard.”

“Yes.”

You Mingxu: “Perhaps Fan Jia and that person had a brief physical struggle here.”

Yin Feng squatted up, hand under his chin: “Ah Xu, if you were Fan Jia, facing a strong enemy, physically weakened, knowing escape was impossible, what would you do?”

You Mingxu was quiet for a moment before her chest suddenly tightened. “I would…” She scrambled up from the floor, saying, “I would do everything possible to protect the evidence, to keep it from falling into their hands!”

Her heart raced with excitement and distress. Her gaze darted to every corner of the room, and suddenly all those dark, messy items seemed to glow with possibility.

Yin Feng stood up, saying, “Maybe it’s right under our noses. Fan Jia was at a disadvantage—how could she hide the evidence without that person finding it? She probably only had one barely adequate chance.”

Their eyes simultaneously fell on the storage rack that had been knocked askew by about ten centimeters.

This was their only chance.

If Fan Jia had made it here, hidden in this room, left that blood. If she had fought with that person, when the rack was knocked sideways and items scattered—that instant might have been her only opportunity to hide the evidence.

Without another word, they began searching carefully around the storage rack and its vicinity.

Soon, beneath a messy stack of file boxes on the bottom shelf, You Mingxu’s eyes lit up: a corner of that black object was visible. You Mingxu moved away the file boxes on top, her eyes growing hot—wasn’t this the decoder storage device Fan Jia had taken on her mission?

You Mingxu grabbed the storage device, letting out a few dry laughs. Yin Feng was overjoyed too, shouting, “Ah Xu, we did it! We found the evidence Fan Jia hid!”

You Mingxu looked up smiling, and their eyes met, both freezing for a moment.

Usually, if she were working with Xu Mengshan or any other colleague, they would have hugged excitedly and jumped around like children to release their joy. But now, seeing Yin Feng’s eyes bright with excitement as he gazed at her…

You Mingxu suddenly smiled, hooked her arm around his neck, and pulled him close, letting him rest against her shoulder. This man is over 180 centimeters tall, held by someone barely 160 centimeters, his eyes wide and silent. She kept smiling, genuinely happy, patting his back lightly: “Thank you, handsome. Well done.”

Yin Feng could have easily lifted her entire body into his arms with one hand. Instead, he maintained that awkward position, leaning against her, closed his eyes to breathe in her scent deeply, and smiled: “No need for thanks. This is what Yu Handsome willingly does for You Mingxu.”

His silly words made You Mingxu’s heart flutter. She closed her eyes, not wanting to analyze anything, just absorbing his scent and warmth. After a long moment, she released him naturally, her expression completely normal.