Chapter 3: The Grand Duke's Encounter

  Liu Handong decided to take the girl to the public security bureau to report the case. He didn't believe that bad people could buy off the entire public security system. For these twelve hours, he hadn't eaten or drunk anything, and his spirit was highly tense. If he continued to hold on like this, he would probably collapse.

  After stating their intention, the girl nodded in agreement. Liu Handong drove the stolen car directly to the Jiangjin City Public Security Bureau, parked the car and walked to the entrance, where they were stopped by a security guard who asked them who they were looking for and if they had an appointment.

  The gate of the Public Security Bureau is not easy to enter, and you need to show your ID card to fill out a visitor's form. You have to call someone to come and pick you up before you can go in. At the entrance, two uniformed security guards are under the control of an old man wearing an old-fashioned police uniform. He asks Liu Handong who he is looking for and what he wants to do with great fanfare. After learning that he wants to report a case, he says that he should go to the local police station to report the case, and the municipal bureau does not handle such trivial matters.

  Liu Handong took off his jacket to reveal the gunshot wound on his back, saying that he had been shot and this was a gun-related case. There was also the little girl who had been kidnapped, all of which were major cases. They needed to speak with the leader of the criminal police brigade.

  The gatekeeper looked at his back and snorted: "It was shot with a steel ball gun, what kind of gun case is this." Although he said so, he still connected the internal phone line. Not long after, a young plainclothes officer came out from the city bureau's courtyard to receive him. Just as Liu Handong was about to go in, the gatekeeper said: "Wait, ID card."

  Liu Handong took out his ID and left it at the door, bringing the mute girl with him as he followed the police into the building. The young plainclothes officer was handsome and well-built, exuding an air of righteousness. He led them to a conference room, poured two cups of purified water, picked up a stack of letterhead, twisted off the pen cap, revealing a set of pearly white teeth as he smiled and said: "Don't be nervous, take your time, what's on your mind?"

  "Last night I was pulling a long-distance bus near the station, and someone hailed a car...” Liu Handong recounted the events in detail, including the missing hijacker, the suspect driving the Hanlanda, and how he was forced to drive the police car to escape. Every detail was accounted for, and the detective took careful notes on paper. After listening to him finish, he turned to the girl: "What's your name, where do you live?"

  The girl shook her head and didn't speak.

  "She can't speak," Liu Handong explained.

  Detective asked: "Were you kidnapped?"

  The girl nodded.

  The detective asked again: "If you see the bad guy who kidnapped you, can you recognize him?"

  The girl nodded.

  The detective grunted and tore off the record paper, holding it in his hand. "You wait a minute, I'll ask my superior to come over," he said, and went out the door. The conference room door closed.

  Liu Handong let out a long sigh of relief and finally relaxed.

  The girl suddenly picked up the letter on the table, tore off the top one, took a look, and stretched it under Liu Handong's nose.

  Liu Handong was taken aback, then immediately understood the other person's meaning. He carefully looked at this letterhead paper and found that there were residual pen marks from the first page, which were completely irregular scribbles. The criminal police had not recorded anything seriously!

  Blood suddenly rushed to his head, Liu Handong stood up to open the door, but the conference room door was locked. He walked to the window and found that it was welded with stainless steel bars, below which was the municipal bureau's parking lot. A black Highlander was parked in a spot, its license plate number being the same as the one that had chased Liu Handong wildly last night.

  He jumped out of the idiom "self-inflicted wound" in Liu Handong's mind, and he might become the protagonist of Huaijiang Morning Post's legal focus tomorrow. He couldn't wait to be captured, so he pushed the solid wood door of the conference room hard. The door lock was very strong, and it was estimated that it would be difficult to break open, even if it broke open, it would alarm the people in the building.

  The mute girl tugged at his sleeve and pointed at the ceiling.

  Liu Handong looked up and suddenly felt enlightened, jumped onto the conference table, tried a few times, and finally opened a ceiling gypsum board. The girl climbed onto the table, very tacitly letting Liu Handong support herself as she climbed onto the ceiling. Her body was light and slender, weighing less than 80 kilograms, making it easy for her to climb up. Liu Handong squatted down to wipe away the shoe prints on the table, then pulled himself up and also climbed up.

  The ceiling was a maze of pipes, probably newly renovated, not much dust. When they came in, Liu Handong noticed that the west side of the conference room was the men's restroom, he pointed to the direction, the girl nodded and crawled over to the west side, Liu Handong followed behind her on all fours.

  In the office on the same floor, the police officer who had just taken notes was making a phone call: "Yunshan squadron? This is Little Zhang from the Municipal Bureau. The mentally ill person who stole your police car last night is here with me and has been subdued. You can send someone over to identify him later."

  After hanging up the phone, several female colleagues walked into the office, holding welfare and labor protection supplies issued by the bureau. Little Zhang started chatting with them, laughing and talking animatedly.

  In the men's restroom on the west side of the corridor, two policemen were leaning against the window smoking. Liu Handong was sweating profusely as he waited for them to leave, trapped in a desperate situation that sent shivers down his spine. But for a soldier who had once been stranded alone in the Tibetan snowfield for three days, this was just waiting. He turned his head to look at the girl, and in the darkness, a pair of bright eyes were quietly watching him.

  Two policemen chatted for a while about the personnel arrangement in the bureau, extinguished their cigarette butts in an empty tin can on the windowsill that had been converted into an ashtray, and left. Liu Handong heard the sound of the bathroom door closing, quietly lifted up one corner of the cover plate, was just about to go down when suddenly the door opened again, a person rushed in hastily, unzipped his pants at the urinal, and another person followed closely behind, standing side by side at the urinals.

  Liu Handong carefully put down the plaster decorative board, and just as he was about to let go, he saw that the person below was none other than the driver of the Hanlanda, that scar-faced guy!

  The following conversation was heard.

  "Lao Gu, you didn't even give us a heads up before coming back to the office. I had plans for noon." This is what the person who arrived first said.

  "I've got something to take care of, and I still need to head back at noon. Besides, isn't there a ban on drinking? The new one just took office and is said to be quite strict. Let's drink again tonight." This was the voice of Scarface.

  The two of them chatted as they finished urinating and walked out the door.

  A moment of silence, the corridor was quiet, Liu Handong lifted the decorative board, pulled the girl's hand and put her down, then jumped down himself. He opened the bathroom door to take a look, no one outside, beckoned, took the girl quickly downstairs through the fire escape route. They had just entered the stairwell when Little Zhang came out of the office, called three colleagues, arrived at the conference room door, used the key to open it and looked inside, shocked and pale, the people were gone!

  Xiao Zhang and his colleagues rushed around looking for something, Scarface walked over and asked: "What's wrong?"

  "Oh, Lao Gu, the madman who stole the police car from Shan Da last night came to report the case, but he vanished in an instant." Little Zhang said with a puzzled face.

  Lao Gu reacted quickly: "Call the security guard, don't let them get away."

  Xiao Zhang suddenly came to his senses and rushed into the office to dial the internal phone of the security room. Lao Gu quickly went downstairs, and the leather sole of his suede shoes knocked out a tight rhythm on the marble staircase.

  At the entrance of the Public Security Bureau, the gatekeeper returned Liu Handong's ID card and was about to ask a few questions when the phone rang. He waved his hand to dismiss them and picked up the phone in a slow and deliberate manner: "Hello, security room."

  A hurried voice came from the receiver, and the old man suddenly stood up, knocking over all the tea cups on the table. He rushed to the security guard at the door and shouted: "Quickly stop those two!"

  The road in front of the city hall was crowded with cars and people, where a man and a woman were seen.

  A sudden loud horn, the Highlander drove out of the yard, Old Gu pressed the horn, the gatekeeper quickly pressed the button to open the door, the Highlander sped out, Old Gu rolled down the window and asked: "Wang Tou, where is he?"

  "The gatekeeper shook his head and said, 'In the blink of an eye, they ran far away.'"

  "Which direction is it going?"

  "West."

  Lao Gu turned the steering wheel in the opposite direction and chased after him towards the east.

  Security guard asks the gatekeeper: "Who is that, so awesome?"

  The old man said: "Lao Gu, who used to be a detective, made mistakes and was demoted. I heard he's now working as a security manager at some big company and is doing quite well."

  The security guards laughed: "Others are also security guards, we are also security guards, how can the difference be so big?"

  The CR-V sped down the street, overtaking several cars in a row. Lao Gu's eyes were sharp and he spotted Liu Handong and the girl waiting for the bus at the bus stop in the distance, so he stepped on the gas and chased after them urgently.

  Liu Handong did not drive the stolen car again. Firstly, driving a conspicuous vehicle made it easy to be tracked down. Secondly, he had parked the car in front of the police station with the intention of returning it to its owner. He chose to take the bus instead and deliberately took a detour, first heading west before turning back east. The No. 520 bus arrived at the stop, and there were only a few middle school students carrying backpacks on board. As soon as Liu Handong and the girl got on the bus and sat down, the girl pulled his sleeve nervously, pointing to the back. Liu Handong turned around to see the Hyundai Santa Fe following them again. He quickly shouted: "Stop the car!"

  The bus's pneumatic door closed, and the female bus driver, dressed in sunglasses and cowboy shorts, skillfully shifted gears and stepped on the accelerator while coldly saying, "The door can't be opened until the next stop."

  There were many cars on the road, and the CR-V quickly caught up. It tried to overtake and block the 520's way. The female driver was furious, turning the steering wheel to squeeze past. Although the CR-V is a large SUV, it was still no match for the bus. Old Gu slammed on the brakes to slow down.

  Liu Handong wanted to jump off the car, but he didn't want to abandon the girl either. Just as he was hesitating, the girl stumbled and staggered to the driver's side, holding onto the railing with one hand and making gestures with the other, pointing at the Hanteng and then mimicking a throat-slitting motion on her own neck. Her pitiful and frightened expression filled the young female driver with sympathy, who asked: "Is that black car chasing you?"

  The girl nodded vigorously.

  "Sit tight and hold on, watch my driving skills."

  Five or six middle school students on the bus, regulars of 520, heard this and suddenly became excited, grasped the handrail tightly, their expression was just like they were on a roller coaster.

  Liu Handong was at a loss, wondering if the bus driver was going to have a drag race with the Land Rover. Suddenly, a strong push came from behind, and the bus accelerated rapidly, like a mad beast rushing forward. The ponytail of the female driver swayed back and forth in front, while the passengers on board were like those in a small boat on a stormy sea, sometimes being tossed high into the air, sometimes falling into a low valley, and sometimes being flung by centrifugal force to the point of almost being thrown out of their seats.

  The police car suddenly accelerated, and all the vehicles on the road pulled over to make way. The Accord was quickly left behind, and the old-fashioned driver honked the horn frantically, but no one gave way.

  "Is there a stop at the next station?" The female driver asked, turning the huge steering wheel without looking back.

  No one responded.

  The 520 train whizzed past the empty platform, Liu Handong stuck his head out to look, and the Hanlanda had already disappeared.

  "Next stop, get off." Liu Handong shouted.

  The next stop arrived soon, and when getting off the bus, the girl stretched out her thumbs to express gratitude to the female driver. Liu Handong also said thank you. The female driver wore a baseball cap and sunglasses, with a pair of long and powerful legs under her cowboy hot pants. She nodded casually and drove away in her 520 car.

  This is a bus stop in the suburbs, with huge real estate advertisements standing by the road. The picture shows sparkling lake water and beautiful Nordic-style villas, with white sails dotted on the lake surface, and the scenery is picturesque.

  A team of dump trucks roared by, kicking up clouds of dust everywhere. Liu Handong said loudly, "I haven't introduced myself yet, my name is Liu Handong."

  The girl points at the sailboat on the billboard.

  "What's your name?" Liu Handong asked.

  The girl nodded.

  "What's your surname?"

  The girl gestured for a while, Liu Handong didn't understand, and said: "Just call you Xiaofan."