The dinner was held at a grand restaurant.

No one remembered who first started toasting to Xia Xiaolan, but she had drunk quite a bit. By the end, she was swaying while walking and struggled to open the car door after several attempts. A pair of hands steadied her from behind – it was Zhou Cheng.

“Aunt Liu, let me take care of her.”

Liu Fen trusted Zhou Cheng completely, but Liu Yong coughed twice, “What if she gets sick in your car? Just get her back to the hotel quickly.”

Being a young man in his prime, with Xiaolan having drunk so much, Liu Yong wasn’t entirely comfortable with Zhou Cheng! As her uncle, he naturally worried about his niece. Even though their relationship was stable, some things should wait until after marriage… In any case, Zhou Cheng wouldn’t be at a disadvantage, but it was different for Xiaolan.

Liu Yong watched Zhou Cheng like a hawk, but Zhou Cheng pretended not to notice:

“I need to discuss something with Xiaolan. I’ll wait until she’s sobered up a bit. Uncle, don’t worry – she’ll be perfectly safe with me watching over her!”

Nonsense!

It was precisely his presence that made it unsafe.

Xia Xiaolan docilely let Zhou Cheng lead her away.

She was still conscious, just tipsy with heavy eyelids. Leaning against Zhou Cheng felt quite comfortable, so she couldn’t be bothered to open her eyes. After all, Zhou Cheng wouldn’t harm her – being with him felt safe and reliable.

Xia Xiaolan wasn’t drunk – she was truly exhausted… The incident with Luo Yaozong falling from the building had kept her up all night, and today she’d been busy non-stop with selling houses at Jinsha Pool.

She was aware of Zhou Cheng carrying her to the seat and fastening her seatbelt.

After driving for a while, Zhou Cheng noticed Xia Xiaolan had fallen asleep.

“Just how tired are you…”

He leaned over and kissed her lightly, the lingering alcohol on her lips not unpleasant. Everything about his future wife was sweet to him, be it the smell of alcohol or even sweat.

Xia Xiaolan still didn’t wake up. Zhou Cheng’s eyes darkened with desire, wanting to indulge himself further, but seeing how exhausted she was, he couldn’t bear to wake her. He satisfied himself with another gentle kiss on her red lips before covering her with his jacket.

Xia Xiaolan’s exhausted sleep lasted over two hours.

They had left the restaurant at 11 PM, and now it was 1 AM.

Xia Xiaolan groggily tried to check the time: “Where are we going? Aren’t we there yet?”

Zhou Cheng handed her a cup of water, “You must be thirsty after drinking. Have some water first.”

Many people who drink too much first need to use the bathroom when they wake up, then want water. In her previous life, Xia Xiaolan had been undefeated at business drinking – after all, how could you secure contracts without being able to handle your alcohol? In this life, she lacked practice opportunities and thought she could still handle half a kilogram of alcohol when in reality, a quarter kilogram was her limit.

Her throat felt like it was on fire, and it took half a cup of water before she felt better.

Zhou Cheng felt her forehead, worried she might be unwell, then withdrew his hand after a moment:

“We arrived long ago. You were sleeping so soundly I wanted to let you rest a bit longer. We’re in Yang City.”

What were they doing in Yang City in the middle of the night?

Xia Xiaolan perked up, “…Are we moving against Ke Yixiong tonight?”

Zhou Cheng nodded, “Luo Yaozong woke up, and those small-time criminals couldn’t withstand interrogation. Ke Yixiong was indeed clever – none of them had ever met him. They said someone called Mosquito ordered them to do it, promising that Qihang would certainly pay to settle Luo Yaozong’s death. Mosquito promised to split the extortion money with them, and that’s why they agreed to act!”

Xia Xiaolan was curious, “How much were they planning to extort?”

“One million yuan, split between five people!”

So one person had escaped. Xia Xiaolan sneered: “These thugs are too naive. Did they think Ke Yixiong would let them each freely spend 200,000 yuan? How long would it take Ke Yixiong’s sand business to earn a million yuan!”

People die for wealth, birds die for food.

Getting 200,000 yuan each, no wonder they dared to push Luo Yaozong to his death.

Even for 20,000 yuan, some people would take such risks. With 200,000 yuan, one could buy a 90-square-meter house in Jinsha Pool, complete with three Peng City household registration quotas. Few individual businesspeople on the mainland could produce such a sum.

A business that could have earned several million yuan was nearly ruined by these lowlifes. Xia Xiaolan’s uncleared alcohol seemed to ignite: “Ke Yixiong is so cunning. Even if these people confess, the police probably won’t find this person called Mosquito.”

Zhou Cheng nodded, “Right, Mosquito has been missing for several days. But finding him is secondary – it’s just to lull Ke Yixiong into a false sense of security. The real target is catching Ke Yixiong himself. He thinks he’s being invited to the police station to assist with investigations… Once he walks in, he won’t be walking out.”

Inviting the enemy into the trap!

Would Ke Yixiong run?

The police were watching him closely – how could he run?

Running would only confirm his guilt. Ke Yixiong believed the evidence couldn’t be traced to him, not realizing this was just a pretext.

“Once he’s detained, they can take their time investigating. He thinks he’s being called in about Mosquito’s disappearance, but he doesn’t know the human trafficking case has already been exposed.”

Zhou Cheng wanted Ke Yixiong to walk into the police station of his own accord.

Xia Xiaolan found this incredibly satisfying.

She finally noticed where Zhou Cheng had parked – at the Yang City Public Security Bureau!

This was beyond a local police station’s jurisdiction; the city bureau had mobilized directly. Ke Yixiong was in serious trouble.

“While I was investigating this, Mayor Tang had his secretary bring me some evidence. Do you know how Ke Yixiong connected with Du Zhaohui?”

Xia Xiaolan’s eyes sparkled, and Zhou Cheng didn’t keep her in suspense: “It’s related to the Xia family. When the Xia family tried to go to Peng City, they were trafficked right after getting off at Yang City train station. Xia Dajun reported it, but Yang City police never found them. Later, I guess Xia Dajun begged Du Zhaohui to intervene. After Young Master Du spoke up, Ke Yixiong, being the local kingpin, quickly found the Xia family and handed them over to Du Zhaohui.”

This was what Tang Hongen had people investigate.

The Xia family had conflicts with Liu Fen then and were arrested after Chen Xiliang reported them.

The Cheng Rong Group managed to bail out Xia Dajun but couldn’t get Xia Hongbing and his family of three released.

Actually, Tang Hongen disliked how the Xia family kept bothering Liu Fen and wanted to divert Xia Dajun’s attention. Of course, this wasn’t purely personal – after all, Xia Hongbing’s three family members had truly lost their introduction letters and couldn’t prove their identity. The Yang City police were just being a bit stricter.

At the time, Tang Hongen also found it strange that they didn’t even have introduction letters. He looked into it and discovered that Xia Hongbing’s family of three had been trafficked for a while, and Ke Yixiong had found them. Ke Yixiong used this as a favor to get to know Du Zhaohui… Du Zhaohui never understood why Mayor Tang didn’t like him, but associating with people like Ke Yixiong naturally made him unwelcome!

However, Tang Hongen didn’t pay much attention to it at the time.

This time, when Zhou Cheng discovered that human traffickers were operating at Yang City train station, Tang Hongen remembered this incident.

Ke Yixiong hadn’t found the Xia family quickly because of his status as a local boss – if his people had done the trafficking, he would naturally know how they were sold and how to get them back, making the process incredibly fast.

“Perhaps this was even Ke Yixiong’s scheme targeting Du Zhaohui from the start?”

Despite the serious situation, Xia Xiaolan felt an inexplicable urge to laugh.

When Du Zhaohui, such a gloomy and ruthless person, discovered he had been deceived by Ke Yixiong, he would probably tie Ke Yixiong to a rock and throw him into the sea! Unfortunately, they would miss seeing this clash between the outside dragon and the local snake… What a pity!