Jiwoo lifted his fist and knocked on the door, receiving no response. This girl is something... I thought we agreed at 7 am sharp. As he was about to knock on the door again, it slowly creaked open, welcoming Jiwoo inside.
Jiwoo's heart dropped to his stomach as he watched the familiar living room intimidate him with an eerie atmosphere, ushering him inside.
He hurriedly let himself in, heart hammering against his chest. "Seohyun? Seohyun!" he hollered, his voice bouncing off the walls of the empty house.
Unaware Jiwoo was inside the house, Seohyun exited the bathroom, adjusting her towel around her chest. Jiwoo swiveled around to find the doctor wiping her feet on the mat, only a soft towel wrapped around her.
Seohyun lifted her head to see Jiwoo frozen in place. Unfazed, she was about to enter her room but halted in her tracks. She snapped her attention back at him, and once the situation had finally dawned upon her, she released an ear-piercing scream.
"Hey! You stupid pervert! Go away, you piece of shit!" Seohyun angrily cursed, pointing at the entrance whilst tightening her grip on the towel to keep it from falling. Jiwoo, flustered, put a hand up to cover his vision before tiptoeing out of the house, closing the door after him.
"That crazy bastard..." Seohyun shot a death glare at the door, before rushing to her room.
* * *
"You prick! Don't barge into someone else's house before knocking!" Jiwoo frowned, before shooting her an annoyed look and rolling his eyes.
What a hypocrite, I said nothing when she took a peek at my abs.
"Tch, it's not like there was much to see, anyway." Seohyun glared at Jiwoo, tightening her fists to keep herself from punching him in the face.
As they continued walking, Seohyun stopped in her tracks and tilted her head down at the ground. Jiwoo looked behind, noticing Seohyun was no longer beside him. "What's wrong? Dropped something?" Seohyun didn't reply, her eyes glued to the object on the ground.
Jiwoo kneeled on one knee and furrowed his eyebrows, but his face turned serious as he scrutinized the small pocketknife. The black handle was marked with scratches, and the brand had been cleanly rubbed off, leaving no trace of evidence but a speck of dried blood tainting the sharp blade.
"Wait." Jiwoo unzipped his suitcase and took out a pair of gloves and a ziplock bag.
"Do you bring those to wherever you go?" Seohyun, unconvinced, watched as he strapped on the latex gloves and picked up the pocketknife from the ground, dropping it into the clear plastic bag in his other hand.
"There." Jiwoo zipped it shut and put the fresh evidence inside his suitcase. "Do you believe the kidnapper used this last night?" Jiwoo questioned Seohyun as he stood up from the ground, dusting off his pants.
Seohyun's mind momentarily flashed back to the moment the man had snatched the knife from behind and swiftly dug it into her throat. "I believe so."
They both entered the police station, Seohyun grasped Jiwoo's wrist and dragged him further into the police station, making him slightly trip over himself. "Hey! Where are we heading off to!?" Ignoring Jiwoo, Seohyun maneuvered her way through the halls as if she lived there all her life.
"Oh? Seohyun? What are you doing here?" A man dressed in a police uniform and a dark blue parka looked up from his paperwork, surprised to see an unexpected visitor.
"Oppa, we need to report a crime." She stated, standing in front of her older brother's desk. His eyes strayed down to Seohyun latching on to Jiwoo's hand, and she was quick to let go before he would suspect something malicious between the two.
"Ah Oppa, this is Park Jiwoo, my neighbor. He was with me during the crime, and he's also a crime investigator." The policeman stood up and held out his hand for a handshake.
"Min Seojin, head of the criminal department." After a firm and almost rough handshake exchanged between the two, Seohyun and Jiwoo sat down in front of the police officer's desk and recounted the tale of the incident that occurred last night. "Could you describe the men? What did they look like? How about the girl?" Seohyun and Jiwoo looked at each other as if to search for an answer, knowing very well it wasn't on their faces.
"The men were wearing a dark mask.. and a cap, it's hard to tell during night time. But I believe they were around 5'8.. and they had quite a muscular frame." Jiwoo stared at the ceiling as he recalled the events of last night and snapped forward, his eyes lighting up like stars in the midnight sky.
"The girl... she had shoulder-length hair and fair skin. She was petite, and I saw her wearing an I.D around her neck. She looked very young." Jiwoo uttered confidently, relying on his sharp memory to provide a statement. "But the contents of the I.D were too small for me to identify her, sorry."
Possible student... kidnapping... inside job? Seo Jin scribbled the report with a pen and Seohyun waited, feeling as if she was at the edge of a cliff, waiting to fall into a painful abyss. "Anything else?"
"Yes actually," Jiwoo added. He opened his bag and took out the ziplock bag. Seojin raised an eyebrow, intrigued by the plastic bag Jiwoo slid across the desk. Seojin carefully picked up the clear plastic bag, examining it with a sharp eye.
"I found it this morning on the way to the police station, near the sidewalk where the girl was kidnapped," Seohyun chimed, whilst he cautiously inspected the recent piece of evidence. Last, he set it down and nodded, convinced.
"I'm busy these days, but I'll try to find the time to look deeper into this case." Seojin stood up from his chair, and the two immediately followed. "Thank you for reporting the crime..." he trailed off, and both he and Jiwoo exchanged a handshake, before Seojin's gaze snapped back at Seohyun. "Be careful, dongsaeng, don't walk alone late at night," he sternly warned her, earning a simple nod.
After leaving the police station, Jiwoo released a heavy sigh of relief, the pressure that burdened his chest now carried away. "Are you okay?" Seohyun asked, detecting the anxiety emitting from him.
"Ah yeah, I'm okay," he awkwardly replied, scratching the back of his head. Your brother is extremely intimidating. He stares at me like a wolf ready to pounce on its prey. Jiwoo shoved his hands inside the pockets of his coat and passed by the subway, confusing Seohyun. "I am going to meet someone at the hospital, it's important," he blurted out, avoiding eye contact with Seohyun.
"I didn't ask."
He shrugged his shoulders, unfazed. "I can read your face like an open book." Jiwoo leaned closer to Seohyun, and she could feel goosebumps as his breath tickled the curve on her neck. "Perks of being a crime investigator, you could say," he added, lips curled into a sly smirk. Seohyun scoffed, trying to mask how nervous she felt. She let it go and focused on crossing the street. She set foot on the pedestrian lane and as soon as she did, a silver car raced towards her direction. Seohyun quickly whirled her head to the incoming car, her feet fixed to the asphalt.
Jiwoo watched the scene unfold before him, almost in a state of shock. Everything seemed to slow down, and the thrumming of his heartbeat blocked out any noise. He quickly reached out and wrapped his fingers around her elbow, yanking her arm back to the sidewalk, causing Seohyun to hit right into his chest. He stumbled backwards, unable to balance himself for a second. Seohyun's cheek was pressed against Jiwoo's chest, and she stood still with wide eyes, slow to wrap her head around what had just taken place.
Everything happened so fast...
Why does this scene feel so familiar?
It was a moment where everything seemed to slow down; the people blurred out of her vision and all she could detect was his heartbeat echoing in her ears, a grim reminder of her own mortality. It beat so loudly that it seemed to want to escape his chest. Jiwoo's breaths came a little heavy, and he was caught in a dilemma of chasing after the driver who drove through a red light, or consoling the traumatized doctor.
Despite not a single hair being harmed, an excruciating pain suddenly hit the side of Seohyun's head. It throbbed so violently around her skull she wondered why it didn't just crack open. "Argh." She shut her eyes close as if the darkness would save her, and tightened her grip around Jiwoo's coat, enduring the pain which felt like her skull was being crushed under the weight of a hundred trucks.
Jiwoo was stunned for a minute, hesitant about his next course of action. Until he reluctantly placed a hand on Seohyun's back and patted her to reassure her, all the while his train of thoughts disturbed him and painted a gore picture of an alternative occurrence.
If I didn't follow her to work, what would've happened?
* * *
"Prosecutor Kim, you will be assigned the serial killer case, which has been garnering a lot of criticism these days." Atty. Kang announced, his face holding no signs of guilt. Eunho's jaw dropped, and his innocent eyes were suddenly lit with fire.
"Sir, you can't do that! I'm still a junior prosecutor!" Eunho slammed his fist on the table, but his protests fell upon deaf ears. He felt a pang of betrayal, knowing this could either make or break his career. Underneath his lens, Atty. Kang's eyes gleamed with nothing but merciless condemn.
"After seeing your newfound popularity when solving the recent accident, I'd like to put you through the actual test and give you the opportunity of solving this case." He stated, looking out his window at the dreary sky. "Besides, you have a brilliant crime investigator working with you," he added, raising an eyebrow as he watched Jiwoo step out of a taxi in a rush and scurry into the Law Firm.
Eunho couldn't tell whether he was being sincere, or his words were dripping with sarcasm. He bowed and left his boss's office, ignoring his co-workers who scrambled back to their stations after being caught eavesdropping.
Eunho barely arrived back at his desk when his assistant strolled in with a tower of documents in her arms. He was quick to receive them from her before she'd lose her balance and drop the papers everywhere. Hardly had he even started to comprehend all the work he needed to do; two men had stormed into the office carrying another stack of documents as if it were a parade.
Eunho frowned bitterly as they left it on his desk without uttering a single word. He sighed, exasperated, and stared at his cluttered desk with gritted teeth. He felt a light tap on his shoulder and turned around. "Oh, Sunbae," Eunho immediately bowed out of respect after coming face to face with the senior prosecutor who worked on the case before he did.
He handed two clear plastic bags to Eunho, and he looked down at them, overwhelmed. "These are the only shreds of evidence I could accumulate from the crime scenes. Good luck on this," he said, his tone dry and emotionless.
"No way, this can't be the only leads in this case." Eunho murmured to himself, staring at the contents of the ziplock bag. His senior shrugged his shoulders with nothing else to say, before walking out the door.
"Aish, where the hell is Jiwoo in times like these?" Eunho grumbled as he leaned back to the edge of his table, reading through the summary of the overall case so far. As if on cue, the discomposed crime investigator burst right through the office.
Ms. Shin, Eunho's assistant, straightened her back and popped out her chest forward with the top buttons intentionally off, hoping to catch the crime investigator's attention. His good looks and charm were enough for most of the female employees to swoon after Jiwoo, and Ms. Shin didn't waste a second once she finally grabbed the coveted position that abled her to get closer to him.
Jiwoo spared her a glance with an arched eyebrow, knowing full well what her attentions were before Eunho spoke up. "Hey, what's wrong with you, you've never been late to work before Jiwoo." Eunho criticized, sending Jiwoo an annoyed glare.
"Hey, that's not how you're supposed to talk to your seniors, you punk." Jiwoo retorted back, smacking Eunho's back with a thud.
"I've been late for 10 minutes; how can you fall behind like this?" Jiwoo commented when he noticed Eunho's desk was piled up with thick reports waiting to be reviewed.
"Sure, because it only takes 10 minutes to solve a serial killer case, I'd like to see you try Mr. Park." Jiwoo's eyes instantly stretched open in disbelief.
"No way, let me see that." Jiwoo snatched the file right out of Eunho's grasp, and his eyes rapidly scanned the report as Eunho folded his arms on top of his chest, watching Jiwoo read the document. "Doesn't this case belong to Prosecutor Yang? How is this in your hands?" Eunho sighed and took back the main report to continue reading through it.
"I don't know..." he trailed off, preoccupied in the file he was holding. Jiwoo's eyes strayed off to the desk when something caught his eye.
"I've worked with Prosecutor Yang before, and his skills are beyond precise. To see that this is the only solid evidence he has collected says a lot about this case." Jiwoo picked up the black leather gloves encased in the ziplock bag.
"18th of December, 12:56 am. Sun Yeol Pi was murdered in a secluded alleyway in Bungdae, Seoul at around midnight as she was walking back home from the library where she was last seen by her friends. No witnesses, no CCTV, fingerprints don't match any listed suspects." Jiwoo's ears perked up as Eunho read the statement out loud, his mind rewinding to the events of last night. "It is said that the killer attempted to kidnap the young university student but failed to do so and murdered her right on the spot to stop her from calling help. A resident of the area, Jong Tae Won, investigated the area after hearing some commotion to find Ms. Sun near the alleyway, cleanly stabbed to death 16 times in the neck, chest, abdomen, and arms."
"Two days after the murder, police could recover a pair of leather gloves in the dumpster near the crime scene, covered in bloodstains that matched the victim. However, fingerprint analysis determined that it doesn't correspond to any listed suspects. The perpetrator rubbed off any brands or tags on the gloves to prevent any further investigation." Eunho inhaled a deep breath after reading the lengthy report of one crime committed by the sinister man and continued to flip through the pages.
"At least five women have been murdered and over 6 girls have gone missing, suggesting they have been kidnapped by the criminal." Eunho shook his head, intimidated by the seriousness and complexity of the recent case they assigned him.
"Wait, what's this?" Jiwoo grabbed the second evidence sitting on the desk, intrigued by the familiarity of the item. Eunho took one look at him before going back to the file.
"Evidence no. 002, Black swiss pocket knife. Found during the murder of Chul Na Yeon, 10th of January, 2:42 am. Believed to be the murder weapon, however, no DNA or blood analysis proves this statement. The handle is covered in scratches and the brand has been thoroughly erased off to prevent the police from tracing it to any store." Thrills of goosebumps ran through Jiwoo's arms as he noted the very fine similarities to the pocket knife Seohyun had found earlier near the road.
Eunho closed the report and circled his desk to sit down and begin working. "Where do I even start, I have no clue at all," he murmured, threading his fingers through his hair. "Mr. Park, can you please search for the list of suspects? I will get us a search warrant so we can start investigating them by tomorrow," Eunho ordered. Jiwoo grimaced, putting down the pocketknife on the table.
He obeyed Eunho's request, despite knowing his efforts were useless. Prosecutor Yang leaves nothing undone.
As Jiwoo scanned through file after file one by one, he couldn't help but think about the kidnappers last night and how closely they were related to the case they were working on. Prosecutor Yang thinks it's a one-man job, but could it be that it took a lot more brains to plan their heists?
Hello my dear readers, I've finally published chapter 4 for you! I would love to hear your thoughts about this chapter! I will begin regularly updating this new novel for you to read so I hope you'll love the adventure we're about to start! Please do leave a vote and comment if you enjoyed this so far! Cheers~