Chapter 147 — The Long-Awaited...

What surprised Wang Yanqiu was that Yang Ce should have the idle curiosity to meddle in such a thing. Assassins, after all, were generally cold and indifferent, the sort who hang high above and let what does not concern them stay out of their way—yet Yang Ce had followed her here purely out of his own curiosity.

"Is everything you've said true?" Wang Yanqiu looked at Yang Ce, trying to read something in Yang Juehuan's face.

"It's true," Yang Ce said with certainty. "Otherwise, what do you think I came for? If I were with Zheng Shaopeng's lot, I wouldn't have saved you. And if I were with your lot—well, that's even less likely. So I can only be with my own lot."

Wang Yanqiu thought it over and found Yang Yanzhou's reasoning quite sound. Indeed, that was how it was—Yang Yongjin belonged neither to her side nor to Zheng Shaopeng's.

"Then thank you for saving me today." Wang Yanqiu naturally knew to repay kindness with gratitude. Since it appeared that Yang Juehuan had indeed saved her by chance out of curiosity, Wang Yanqiu felt no hostility toward Yang Shuoxuan at all anymore.

"It was nothing," Yang Linyue said mildly. "If there's nothing else, I'd suggest you leave Macau as soon as possible. I don't know what grudge Zheng Shaopeng or whoever is behind him bears you, but they failed this time, and it's quite likely they won't let it go. Since they can slip into your room at will to plant listening devices, they could just as easily come in directly and do you harm."

"Ah!" Wang Yanqiu gave a start. Hearing Yang Cenbin say this, she grew tense at once.

"All right, I have other business to attend to. You have a way to contact me, I take it? Now that we've met, we're friends—let's keep in touch." Yang Yanzhou said.

Wang Yanqiu hesitated for a moment, then at last picked up the pen and paper from the writing desk, wrote down a phone number, and handed it to Yang Ce. "If you come to Songjiang, you can reach me at this number."

The last thing any assassin should do is reveal her identity to another, but Wang Yanqiu was still green to the world, and Yang Ce had saved her life. So after some hesitation, she gave him her private number.

"And how should I address you?" Yang Ce took the card and asked with a smile. The number really was Wang Yanqiu's private line—it was already stored in Yang Juehuan's phone at that very moment. It seemed Wang Yanqiu's vigilance still had room for improvement.

"My surname is Wang. I'm not lying to you." Wang Yanqiu did not give her full name, but she did confirm her family name.

"My surname is Yang." Yang Minlan smiled at Wang Yanqiu.

"Yang… Yang Lei?" Wang Yanqiu asked instinctively.

"Certainly not." Yang Ce shook his head. "Once we've had more dealings, you'll naturally learn my name. All right, I have other business to attend to now. Good luck to you."

As Yang Cenbin walked away, his mind was still on the matter of Zhang Bin and Wang Mei. Otherwise he could have accompanied Wang Yanqiu back to Songjiang and taken the opportunity to probe that "Black Widow" organization for himself.

Still, by comparison, Zhang Bin's affairs were more important, and Wang Yanqiu's could only be set aside for now. He had said all that needed saying; presumably Wang Yanqiu would leave Macau at once and return to Songjiang.

The middle-aged man wore a headset and held a highly precise instrument in his hands, sitting inside a fish-white camper van. The van was parked in a very well-concealed spot, surrounded by buildings, yet through the gaps one could clearly monitor the activity at the entrance of the Xinhai Hotel.

"Skreee—krrk—clang!" A tremendous burst of noise came through, nearly deafening the middle-aged man. He yanked off the headset and rubbed at his ears without stopping.

"The young miss couldn't have discovered it, could she?" the middle-aged man said with a bitter smile. "It's over. Now I can't hear a word she says—how am I supposed to report to the master?"

That was right: the listening devices in Wang Yanqiu's room at the Xinhai Hotel had all been installed by this middle-aged man. On this point, both Yang Ce and Wang Yanqiu had guessed wrong.

The middle-aged man sighed and turned toward the rear compartment of the camper. The rear compartment was fully enclosed, completely cut off from the outside world; without the lights on, it would be pitch black inside.

The middle-aged man casually flipped the switch for the interior wall lights, and the compartment was instantly bright—and there on the floor, plain as day, lay a man and a corpse.

Had Yang Ce and Wang Yanqiu been present, they would certainly have recognized them: these two were Zheng Shaopeng's bodyguards. One had been shot dead by Yang Ce; the other had been struck in an acupoint and was unconscious.

The middle-aged man turned on the camper's tap and filled the washbasin with icy cold water. Then he seized the unconscious bodyguard by the collar, hauled him up, and shoved him headfirst into the water, repeating the process several times.

"Cough, cough—" A violent fit of coughing, and the bodyguard was jolted awake by the cold water.

"Hmph." The middle-aged man gave a cold snort and flung the bodyguard onto the floor.

Just awake, the bodyguard stared around in terror, taking in his surroundings. "Talk. Who sent you?" The middle-aged man did not wait for him to collect his wits before demanding an answer.

"Who sent me? Who are you?" The bodyguard steadied himself and studied the stranger before him.

"Some things don't need spelling out so plainly. I think you know well enough in your heart." The middle-aged man sneered. "Don't provoke me. My temper isn't good, and when the time comes you'll wish you were dead. Don't say I didn't warn you."

After leaving the Xinhai Hotel, Yang Ce was about to hail a taxi on the road when he suddenly stopped dead at the curb.

It seemed someone was watching him. Yang Ce had felt this way since that afternoon, yet he had never been able to find the person. Yang Juehuan's sixth sense was sharp; this did not feel like an illusion, but a genuine sensation that someone behind him was watching, following him.

But when he turned to look, all he saw were ordinary faces. He had even used his special ability to probe the area in every direction, and found nothing out of the ordinary.

Wait—something suddenly came back to Yang Ce. During the New Year, when he had been with Wang Yanqiu, he had felt something similar. And he had even caught the person tailing them. Could it be that even then, the target had been Wang Yanqiu—and this time as well? In other words, Wang Yanqiu had already been marked for surveillance while she was in Songjiang.

Never mind. None of this had much to do with Yan herself, and Yang Ce simply put it out of his mind. Sure enough, once Yang Ce got into a taxi and left the Xinhai Hotel, the feeling of being watched vanished at once.

This time he could be entirely certain: whoever it was, the target was Wang Yanqiu, not himself. Yang Ce let out a breath of relief and returned to the hotel where he was staying.

To be continued.

847. The Man Behind Zheng Shaopeng

847. The Man Behind Zheng Shaopeng. The middle-aged man was genuinely getting irritated. This fellow before him truly would not respond to either carrot or stick—no matter what he was asked, he said he did not know, or that he was not clear on it. Many cruel methods had been applied to him, and still the bodyguard kept his mouth shut.

But his body was hardened by years of martial training, long since grown thick-skinned and calloused; this much pain of the flesh he could still endure.

"Fine. Since you won't talk, I'll use this knife to slice the flesh off your body, piece by piece, and see whether you talk then!" The middle-aged man was truly at his wit's end—otherwise he would never have resorted to slow slicing.