With the thought that he might get lucky, he let the little bug fly through a box of files discarded by the police station. There were many files in it that stated the details of some cases, but most of them were solved cases. This was information that could be found online, and it was not considered classified, so they could be handled any way the police wished.
The little bug flew through a few boxes to check the contents. Li Du shook his head, as there was nothing valuable in them.
The little bug flew once again into a box. By this time, Li Du was only searching half-heartedly. But in a split second, he saw a familiar photo. Li Du suddenly realized that this photo should not be there!
He immediately ordered the little bug to fly back, and he carefully looked at that photo. The photo showed a family of four. A Chinese man and woman stood in front of a fake mountain. There was a tall young lady with ponytail standing in front of the man, and the woman was carrying a little one.
This young lady was Luo Qun. Li Du had seen this photo inside Luo Qun's study. There were a total of 14 photos, and this was the last one. The photo was simply kept inside a document folder. There were also some other documents kept inside together with the photo. Written boldly on the first photo was the year of the murder of three members of Professor Lynch Roe's family - 1998!
Connecting the dots that it was young Luo Qun in the photo, along with Professor Lynch Roe's name on this document, Li Du suddenly understood that this folder recorded the murder case of Luo Qun's family.
Even now, he still remembered when Luo Qun was drunk and had said some things about it. She said that her parents were shot to death, and her brother was drowned in a toilet bowl. If she had not hidden herself so well, she was sure she would have been killed, too. It was, without a doubt, a massacre. But how did the information about this case come to appear at the Phoenix police station? And why was it being handled as recycled junk?
He quickly read through some of the files via the little bug's vision. Just as he thought, this was the information about the massacre. There was a lot of professional description in it such as the time of the incident, autopsy results, and investigation results by related personnel.
Apart from that, there was a clear plastic bag in the box. There was a white nylon glove inside. It was the type of glove commonly used by construction workers. Seeing this glove, he had a thought, and he used the little bug's time traveling ability.
As time reversed, scene after scene appeared…
The first scene that appeared was the glove being weaved by a machine before being put into a box, sent to a grocery store, and bought. Then, someone put it on…
Li Du looked carefully at this person's face. It was a black guy in his thirties with dreadlocks, high cheekbones, thick lips, a slim body, and a tattoo that was even darker than the color of his skin.
The last scene happened in a bathroom. The black guy removed the glove to wash his hands, and the glove fell down. The black guy seemed to have forgotten about it as he turned to leave. Next to the glove was a toilet bowl. There was a child kneeling over it, motionless!
Li Du's blood seemed to have suddenly boiled. Adrenaline was rushing insanely throughout his body, and he could not stop his hands from trembling. He knew what this was. He knew what he had just witnessed!
This black guy was the killer who had massacred Luo Qun's family!
And he was not alone. There was another person in the picture, but because the other guy had not crossed paths with the glove at all, he didn't appear much. Li Du had only seen a back, a very strong back!
The time traveling scenes the little bug showed were just like movies being replayed, and Li Du could fast forward as they played. Initially, he did not pay much attention while he was watching, but after he understood what these scenes were revealing, he had gone straight to the last part.
Now that he was sure of the identity of the glove and the situation surrounding these files, he knew that he must take the files and then look for Luo Qun after that.
Li Du remembered Luo Qun had said back then that the cops and FBI were helpless with this case. In the end, they did not close the case, as they had not found the killer. They did not even have a description of the killer. With this glove and these files, not only had Li Du discovered the killer's characteristics, he even knew exactly what the killer looked like.
Storage unit number ten was about to be auctioned, so Li Du joined the bidding crowd. He was determined to win this one.
He did not know how the files and evidence had ended up in this abandoned storage unit, and he could not understand how could the cops be so careless and let such important files and such important evidence of such an important case be chucked into the garbage pile.
Anyway, since he had found these things, he could not miss the opportunity.
He had focused all his thoughts on the case files, so he did not notice his surroundings. He also had not noticed that when he was walking into the bidding crowd, Conrad had followed him.
The auctioneer shouted, "Alright, alright, I won't say the rules again. The starting price remains at 500 bucks. Anyone who is interested come forward. You may start giving me your bids. Five hundred, 500, 500…"
Li Du raised his hand and said, "I will take it."
Just as the auctioneer started to speak, a voiced sounded, "One thousand bucks!" Hearing this voice, Li Du immediately frowned. He could hear whose voice that was. Conrad Anthony had also bid.
Li Du turned around and of course, Conrad was not far behind him, staring at him with icy cold eyes.
Because there was a rule in this auction that anyone who viewed the storage unit after seeing the booklet had to bid, whenever someone made a huge leap in their bid, it would make the others very upset. This rule was mainly to save time and not for trapping treasure hunters. Although everyone had to bid, it could be a small bid.
For example, when someone accepted the initial bid of 500 bucks, those who had viewed but were still not interested could bid 501 bucks, 502 bucks, and so on. The auctioneer would let everyone have a chance at bidding, so these people could bid without violating the rules, and at the same time, they could avoid getting a storage unit that they did not want.
A normal bid would always use 100 as an incremental unit. If there was somebody interested in that storage unit, then he would bid with more than 500 plus a few bucks or 500 and a few tens. The treasure hunters who were not interested would not bid again after bidding once.
If no one wanted the storage unit, then there would be no choice but to see who was the unlucky one to make the last bid. He would then have to take the storage unit. However, the price would usually be so low, it would not even reach 600 bucks. The loss would be so little that the treasure hunters could handle it.
As Conrad had suddenly increased the price to 1,000 bucks, those treasure hunters who were prepared to give up after bidding small were depressed. As they might actually win at that price, the loss would be much more than 600 bucks.
Li Du knew that Conrad was bidding just to annoy him, so he did not continue bidding. Instead, he let the other treasure hunters make their small bids. Thus, after that, they began a series of bidding at 1,001 bucks, 1,002 bucks, 1,003 bucks and so on. When these treasure hunters were off the hook after making their bids, he started bidding again. "One thousand one hundred bucks."