Back in the car with the documents, Dean discussed the case with Holden.

"I have a little impression of this case, the fourth group is in charge of Grich, and outsiders are not allowed to interfere, but the facts of the case are relatively clear, and Joan has little chance of turning the tables." Holden sat up straight, his face straight, "You have to accept it, is there a supernatural element in this?" ”

"You'll know when the time comes."

Dean drove all the way south to Strip Avenue and got off the bus, and soon found the Gawain Hotel, where Jayne Harden was killed, on the side of the long street lined with hotels.

Walking to the door of the hotel, Dean paused, his eyes swept under the street lamp against the wall.

A middle-aged man in a truck hat, a white vest, and a cigarette in his mouth is entangled in a well-dressed lady in a blue smock and suit skirt.

The lady is in her thirties and forties, with thick red hair, a tall and graceful figure, and beautiful facial features.

At this time, she was forced into a corner, and her face with light makeup was nervous and frightened.

"Isn't this Rust's mom Grace?"

"Stand back, stay away from this lady, I'm going to call the police!" Dean shouted and approached from behind, his strong body full of intimidation.

"Man, why are you so excited?" The man with the scar on the bridge of his nose turned his gaze and swept his eyes over the faces of the two like mice, spread out his hands and said with a hippie smile, "I didn't hurt this lady at all, I talked to her as an old friend, didn't I, Grace?" ”

The woman pursed her lips and did not speak,

Holden looked at the man with sharp eyes, took out the document in his arms and showed it again, "I don't want to go to the detention center for a vacation, leave immediately." ”

"OK, OK, I'm a law-abiding citizen, I never get into trouble, I'll go." The man threw away the cigarette and stepped on it, turned around and looked at the woman again, and walked away without any delay.

"Grace, what was going on just now?" Dean walked up to the stunned woman and asked with concern,

Grace thanked her, and after a glance, she realized that one of them was her son's classmate, and she stepped forward to hold his hand in surprise.

"Dean, I haven't seen you for a few months, you are like a different person, you have grown taller and stronger, I almost didn't recognize you."

"That guy was a guest at the hotel just now, and he kept pestering me and pursuing me." Grace sighed, "But now I just want to work hard and earn money to send Rust to college, and I don't have time to think about anything else." ”

"He continued to harass you and told me that I have a bit of a relationship with LVPD, and I will help you deal with it cleanly." Dean patted his chest, he still helped the elders of his good friends.

The woman nodded and smiled,

"Where are you going?"

"There was a murder in this hotel not long ago, and we are here to investigate." Dean glanced at Grace's standard hotel overalls, "You work in there?" ”

The woman nodded, "I remember that the COP had already come to inspect last week, and after they made it clear that the investigation was over, the hotel cleaned the murder room from the inside out, and the second floor where the room was located was also cordoned off. ”

"Blockade?"

"Someone just died, so as not to cause adverse effects, the entire second floor will not be inhabited for a short time." Grace smiled bitterly, obviously the hotel had suffered a lot of losses because of this,

"Neither the cleaning nor the lockdown had a big impact on me. As long as the room where the case occurred is still there, the clues are still there. Can you help, Grace? Dean's words made Holden's brows furrow, which was completely inconsistent with the basic principles of detective rigour, and what it meant to have little impact.

The woman thought for a moment, nodded and smiled gently, "Follow me, but try to be as careful as possible so as not to affect the normal operation of the hotel." ”

The two followed Grace into the hall, retrieved a bunch of keys from the front desk, and went up the stairs to the second floor.

After the blockade of the second floor, the electricity was also cut off, and the corridor was groggy, only a few rays of white light were cast into the windows at the end of the front and back, and the cool breeze blew through the corridor, like a ghost hand touching the neck, which was inexplicably cold and terrifying.

Dean looked at the dark surveillance cameras all over the ceiling,

"Can you help us find last week's surveillance footage?"

"Except for the lobby, the surveillance equipment in the hotel corridor has been broken for a long time." Grace shook her head,

"Broke down on the day of the accident?" Di An's head moved.

"It broke down more than a year ago."

"Uh, you haven't found anyone to fix it for so long?"

Holden glanced at Dean, "Monitoring damage is the core competitiveness of this hotel, otherwise why would customers deliberately choose such a small place?" ”

Dean was thoughtful, Grace smiled silently, and after a few moments, she used the key to open the door of the 2-21 room where the victim lived, and handed the flashlight to the two men.

"I work in the lobby on the first floor, and something comes to me."

“OK。”

Seeing the woman leave, Dean shook a flashlight, and the dark room was furnished with a double bed, bedside table, TV, large closet with shutters against the wall, and an independent bathroom.

Although it is only a standard room, the size is not inferior to that of an ordinary suite, which is enough for the man with unique tastes to show his "eighteen kinds of martial arts" to his heart's content.

Dean walked to the center of the room and stood at the end of the bed, opening the God's perspective, after the last upgrade, the vision covering a radius of twenty meters easily penetrated the entire room, including the room next door, and searched and examined in great detail.

There are no windows, and there are no secret passages at the foot of the ceiling.

Not surprisingly, the previous LVPD has been searched three feet into the ground, and the hotel cleaning has been cleaned countless times, and there is not a single hair or footprint left.

……

"What a daze, boy," said Holden, who was crouching by the TV cabinet, "keep searching." ”

"Search isn't very useful." Dean shook his head and grinned mysteriously, "I have another better way to investigate." ”

Holden's eyes flashed with anticipation when he heard this, and he saw his companion pull the door to the bathroom.

Then he untied his bag and took out a bunch of strange things: a divination plate full of letters and symbols, a few white candles, a board, an incense burner with sage, a lighter...

"Now that you've accepted Alvin's claim, believe in the existence of ghosts. So this time I'm going to let you see the soul of Jayne Harden who died in this room. ”

Dean explained, "The dead don't lie, its soul tells us the truth of the case." ”

Holden's pupils constricted, and he raised one eyebrow,

"You're not kidding? Does the medium really work? ”

"Those who claim to be masters on TV are 100% liars. But I kid you not. ”

Dean smiled casually, but his hands didn't stop.

This operation was the result of his deliberation, and the ability of the medium was the most common and the most indistinguishable between the real and the false compared to the mimesis and the shadows of the past.

Show it out and win over FBI Holden, and Dean will have a strong helper in the future.

Investigations will be made very convenient.

"What should I look out for?"

Holden rubbed his hands, and the ants on the hot pan kept spinning in circles,

"Sit down with me and do my bidding." Dean put the divination expectation on his and Holden's knees. "Whatever you see or hear, don't make a sound, keep absolutely quiet, well, just play a game of wooden man."

"Relax, too much tension will scare the other person away."

Dean lit a row of candles with a lighter, allowing the candlelight to envelop the area near the divination board.

"Will it be dangerous?" Hall took a deep breath and reached out a hand to touch the holster under his armpit, "Will Jayne Harden's soul hurt us?" ”

"With me to take care of you, as long as you honestly follow my arrangement, it's safe." Dean's tone was full of confidence, and he casually lit the incense burner again,

"OK, I swear to God," Holden breathed a sigh of relief and rubbed his nose, "you're the chief for the next hour, and I'm your officer." ”

"Very well, I'll ask you later, and you honestly wait for the soul to push the board together to piece together the answer. Ordinary people can't see the spirit with their naked eyes, but I'll give you a glimpse of it with the help of a board. See the so-called supernatural beings. ”

Dean tried his best to use a relaxed tone to popularize the relevant steps of psychic to the other party.

A room dimly lit by candlelight, where everything is ready at a certain moment.

Dean grabbed the board and slashed his left index finger with the sharp tip.

Tick tock.

Blood slid down on the board.

Then two fingers pressed the board up, and slowly turned it round and round.

"Friends get together, sincerely."

"Soul near, we call you."

The board is turning.

The claustrophobic room echoed with a calm voice.

"Now that I'm going to start divination, let the spirits that wander in this house listen to my words."

"Dear Jayne Harden, is your soul near us?"

The board turns, turns.

Holden slowed his breathing and pricked up his ears.

Hmmm-

All of a sudden.

A cold wind blew from a corner of the window, blowing the yellow light of the candle and the white smoke of the sage.

Holden sat up straight like an electric shock.

An eerie chill crept up the back of their hand along the point of contact between the board and the fingers, and up the arm, causing goosebumps all over his body, and cold sweat oozing from his forehead.

The next second.

The board shook violently and stopped at a word.

“YES。”

He's around here!

Holden's round eyes shone with excitement and fear, and he looked around cautiously, but all he could see was darkness and emptiness.

Dean lifted the board and placed it in front of Holden's eyes, allowing his eyes to see through the glass of the board into the darkness three meters away.

The originally empty place was so strange that there was a figure in the middle of nowhere, a middle-aged white man in his forties, with a few sparse black hairs on his head, wearing only a pair of underwear, revealing a bloated waist like a bucket, and a pile of soft and wrinkled fat, staring at the void with an expressionless face, as stiff as a puppet.

The figure is like a reflection in the water, slightly changing with the surging air, full of a strange sense of unreality.

After this glance, Holden's body shook suddenly, his mind buzzed, and the whole person fell into a stupor and confusion.

The outlook on life and values shaped over the past 30 years seem to have been crushed by a magical, invisible hand.

The so-called false ignorance, the things that he once despised, actually existed!

Dean gave him a sympathetic look, the supernatural phenomena that occurred frequently to him were no less than miracles to the ordinary.

He took the board at the right time, put it back on the board, and asked,

"Jayne Harden, I deeply regret your death."

"But you shouldn't have died unexplained, someone should be responsible for the accident. Now, tell me, what happened to you before you died? ”

Zizi...

The board rotated for a long time, moving and stopping, skimming letters one by one, and finally piecing together an intermittent answer.

"I put on my hood, stood on a chair, put my neck in the rope, and got dressed for Joan..."

"So did you deliberately or accidentally kick over the chair under your feet?" Dean then asked,

Zizi...

The board deviated from YES and stopped moving—

"I didn't do it."

Dean looked to the side, and Holden saw the result, his confused face tensed up, and his expression was extremely serious.

"So it was Joan Cardri in the room who was plotting against you?"

"I don't know." "Someone overturned the chair, but I was blinded by a black hood and couldn't see who it was. ”

The progress of the survey has increased from 5 percent to 15 percent.

Dean took a deep breath, his expression nearly out of control.

Jayne's coquettish operation is not a clear way to kill himself.

If you really want to be a person, you can't play too much, otherwise you won't even know how you died.

"In your daily life and work, do you have any grudges with anyone?"

“No。”

"Who do you think is most likely to be the murderer?"

"I don't know." Jayne's face was sluggish, and he manipulated the board to turn rapidly, "Joan is a good girl with a sweet heart, and she is unlikely to hurt me." ”

Dean repeated the murder several times in a different way.

Finally asked for a clue.

"In the process of choking, I heard a man's laughter. Then there is the sound of the door opening and closing. ”

Jayne Harden's answers were pieced together, and the progress of the investigation suddenly increased by 15 percent, jumping to 25 percent.

……

Dean rolled his gaze and asked a series of questions in succession.

"You've been in your bedroom since you came inside and haven't been to the bathroom?"

"Nope."

Dean bowed, the bedroom was only one door away from the hallway, and Jayne had been in the bedroom, so he would know that someone came in halfway.

"Did you notice a third person entering the bedroom from outside the house during the whole course of the crime?"

"Nope."

"After the chair was kicked down, you were strangled by the neck and struggled desperately before you heard the man's laughter, and the sound of the door opening and closing?"

"Yes."

……

Dean's question came to an abrupt end, and he neatly took out the transcript of the conversation between Attorney Luckville and Joan Cardrich, and flipped to one of the paragraphs—

The woman claimed that after entering the house with Jain Harden, she locked the door of the room from the inside, and the room had no windows, so even if someone else had a key, it was impossible to invade from the outside.

But after the incident, she was too panicked when she opened the door for help, and she didn't pay attention to whether the door was still locked.

This statement is exactly what Jayne described.

Synthesize Joan and Jayne's confessions.

It is likely that the real culprit hid in the room before the crime was committed, and fled the scene unnoticed after the crime.

……

Dean came to this conclusion.

The progress of surveys in the system has jumped from 25 per cent to 35 per cent.

……

Dean's thoughts are like electricity, further analysis,

"So where in the room was the assailant most likely to hide before he did it?"

He chose the timing very cleverly.

Jayne Harden is in a completely defenseless state, choosing this time to shoot, not only will not expose himself, but can easily kick over the stool and erase a life.

This is definitely not a coincidence, the murderer must have chosen a hideout where it is easy to observe the entire room.

But there are very few places in the room where people can hide.

Dean crouched down and looked under the double bed, cramped and dark.

If you hide under the bed, the left and right sides of the bed will have an outside view.

And the place where Jayne hanged himself was on the outside of the end of the bed, and the foot of the bed and the ground were almost sealed, so he couldn't be observed at all.

And when Jayne and Joan are playing games, it is very likely that they will find the person under the bed if they change their attitude, which is not a wise choice.

Dean looked up and looked straight at the shuttered wardrobe on the left side of the bed, against the wall.

The doors were smooth and there was hardly any sound.

Two disposable pajamas and thin blankets hung in the cabinet.

He went straight inside and closed the door, hid in the tapestry, and looked through the cracks in the wooden strips on the cabinet door, and the whole bedroom was unobstructed, and there were no dead ends.

He had a guess in his mind, but he couldn't be sure yet, so he returned to the divination chessboard and asked the next question,

"Have you used the shutter wardrobe since you entered the room?"

"Nope."

"Aside from last week, did you and Joan Catri play games here 2-21 before?"

"Many times."

"Have you used that wardrobe before?"

"Never, we bring our own tools, luggage and clothes."

Dean nodded, almost certain that the real murderer was hiding in the shutter closet in room 2-21 to enjoy the show, and definitely more than once.

But last week he couldn't help but do it, and then fled silently, leaving the mess and the cauldron to the hapless Joan Cardi.

This thought together.

The progress of the survey jumped to 45 percent.

……

Holden obediently remained silent, witnessing his young companion sometimes closing his eyes in contemplation, sometimes smiling inexplicably, like a psychopath.

In the past, he must have advised the other party to see a psychiatrist.

But now, after seeing the true soul.

He could no longer say the words of questioning, and at the same time sighed,

Like a rat trapped at the bottom of a well, today he finally crawled out of the shackles of pitch black, and the vast world greeted him - the world opened another magical door to him!

Countless ideas rushed in.

Asking for clues about the deceased to investigate the case has subverted all outdated concepts, and compared to the usual investigation methods of the COP and FBI, they are as slow as a snail!

……

"The last two questions," Dean's voice recalled, "Jayne Harden, what is your impression of the staff at the Gawain Hotel, the waiters, the front desk, etc.?" Is there a person or event that stands out to you? ”

"Nope."

"Have you ever offended, such as disrespect, discrimination, a hotel staff?"

"Nope."

Almost.

Dean put away the chessboard and limited the power of the board to absorb souls, and it didn't take long.

Jayne Hayden's soul vanished into mid-air, presumably returning to the Soul Prison.

……

"Is Jayne Harden gone, Dean?"

"Well, it's gone."

"So, you've been using psychic media to aid investigations in the past?" Holden finally couldn't hold back the excitement in his heart, stared into his eyes and asked,

Dean nodded, "In the case of the cheating partner who killed his wife, I talked to the poor lady's soul. ”

"No wonder you were able to lock down criminals at the speed of light!"

"Don't get excited." Dean shook his head, "Back to the current case, Jain Harden said so much just now, what do you think?" ”

"Fako, that's so cool!" The candlelight shone through Holden's reddened face that was sweating with excitement, and he said obscenities for the first time, "I have rarely experienced such a smooth and swift investigation, and I can basically locate the scope of the real culprit!" ”

He grinned nervously at the corners of his mouth, like a madman.

Instead of being impressed, Dean grinned and showed a mouth full of white teeth as if he saw his own kind.

"Oh, let's hear it."

(End of chapter)