Chapter 850: Pandora’s Box is Opened

Lian Guoxiao caressed an old, yellowed photograph. In it, a woman in a canary yellow sweater smiled alongside two children, a boy and a girl, both looking adorably cute. Their smiles were pure and soaked in bliss.

Tears fell on the photo, and he wiped them away, murmuring softly, “Forgive me, I had no choice!”

He then asked his subordinate, “What date was it?”

“May 17th.”

“Good, remember, May 17th is the memorial day for my daughter. On that day…”

The phone rang. Lian Guoxiao answered it impatiently, cursed after listening, and barked, “Damn police, let them in!”

He sat down, lit a cigar, and put on a composed demeanor. Seeing Lin Qiupu enter, he was slightly surprised, but his expression turned to shock upon seeing Lin Dongxue behind him. Lian Guoxiao suddenly screamed, “Ah, a ghost!”

Lin Qiupu and Lin Dongxue exchanged puzzled glances. What was going on?

Quickly regaining his composure, Lian Guoxiao returned to his usual inscrutable self, but his bizarre reaction had planted a seed of deep suspicion in Lin Dongxue’s heart.

On the drive back, Lin Dongxue stared out the window in silence. At a traffic light, the car’s gentle jolt woke her from her reverie. She asked, “He did say ‘ghost’ when he looked at me, right?”

“Yes, it was odd,” Lin Qiupu agreed.

“Brother, these past few days I’ve been thinking about why Hu Wei kidnapped me. He planned to use me to extort someone. Hu Wei was involved in our parents’ death. When I asked him, he claimed he was just paid to do a job. I asked who hired him, and he taunted—‘your dad’!”

“What?!”

“I thought he was mocking me, but what if it was a double entendre? Could our father have faked his own death?”

“That’s impossible, our father…”

“Do you even remember what he looked like? What he did? Did he have any enemies?”

Lin Qiupu fell silent. The traffic moved again, and after a few minutes, he said, “Our father was Lin Zhaoxiong. I remember he traveled a lot for work, sometimes not coming home for months. But he always brought us lots of toys and imported chocolates, turning your little mouth choosy. He loved our mother dearly, though they were over a decade apart in age.”

Lin Dongxue had no memory of these details, but she knew one thing, “Our father had no relatives in Long’an. It was our mother’s relatives who raised us after they died… Brother, can we do a DNA test?”

“You can’t do DNA tests on ashes. What are you trying to suggest?”

“Brother, don’t think my idea is too extreme, but what if Lian Guoxiao is our father?”

“Impossible!” Lin Qiupu exclaimed loudly.

“Hear me out. Hu Wei kidnapped me to extort someone he normally wouldn’t dare cross. This person has a connection to me. Could he be our father? If so, our father’s death was a fraud. He hired Hu Wei to stage the accident. Hu Wei always knew this secret, and when he fell out with his gang, he used it to attempt extortion. That night I overheard him on the phone mentioning ‘Pandora’s Box’—could this mean a secret was about to be revealed?

“From this, our father is not a good man!

“Then there’s Hu Wei’s death. He and his two accomplices died in the mountains, killed by a professional hitman. Why would Hu Wei run to the mountains? He knew those villages well and had been evading the police. I think he went there to meet someone, planning to continue a deal with a fake hostage—the girl. The autopsy noted the dead woman’s clothes, which matched what I wore that day. Why else would they change a woman’s clothes in the middle of the night while fleeing?

“Hu Wei didn’t anticipate that the other party had no intention of dealing and instead sent hitmen to kill all three. For this person, it was as if he personally killed his own daughter, burying the secret forever… Think about Lian Guoxiao’s reaction when he saw me!”

Lin Dongxue’s eyes burned with intensity, but Lin Qiupu was lost in thought. “Do you really want such a person to be our father?”

“Brother, parents can’t be chosen. If Lian Guoxiao really is our father, my theory makes sense, proving he is part of the gang, maybe even the mastermind. We could then have evidence to arrest him. Even if it’s not enough, thefact that our father is still alive would itself be problematic, because someone else died in his place that year.”

Lin Qiupu managed a bitter smile, “How can you talk about this so calmly?”

“To me, having parents or not is the same; in this world, I only have one close relative.”

“Is that person’s last name Lin?”

“No, his last name isn’t Lin. It’s Brother. My brother!” Lin Dongxue said with a smile.

Lin Qiupu suddenly remembered their childhood, how after losing their parents, they stayed with relatives. Lin Dongxue would wake from nightmares crying for her brother.

“Last time we subpoenaed Lian Guoxiao, we took his biological sample,” he mentioned.

“What are we waiting for then? Let’s head back to the station.”

Back at the station, Lin Qiupu immediately had Peng Sijue compare the samples. He didn’t reveal that the hair sample was his own. During the anxious three-hour wait, both siblings stood up nervously whenever they heard footsteps.

The phone rang, Lin Qiupu answered and then said, “I’m going to get the report.”

“I’m coming too!” Lin Dongxue said eagerly.

“No, no, I’m afraid you’ll shout. I’ll be right back.”

After Lin Qiupu left, each second felt unbearably long for Lin Dongxue. If Lian Guoxiao really was her father, how heavy that truth would be. How would she tell others, tell Chen Shi?

The door opened, Lin Qiupu returned with a piece of paper. Lin Dongxue snatched it from him and read the results, feeling a massive weight lift from her heart.

“Sis, Lian Guoxiao is our father!” Lin Qiupu declared, his emotions mixed. “This is solid evidence for his arrest!”

“Let’s arrest him now and question this old scoundrel about why he faked his death, why he caused mom’s death! Why did he send hitmen that night to kill me?” As Lin Dongxue spoke, tears of anger and disappointment welled up in her eyes.

Those words marked a profound turning point. Regardless of the past tranquility, their lives had been irrevocably propelled into a new chapter of confrontation and inevitable truth-seeking. The complexities of their family’s history now loomed before them, as dense and intricate as the mysteries they were about to unravel.