Chapter 44 p1
Fan An was just about to get into bed when a knock came at the door.
She had been recording the variety show all day, searching for bombs on the cruise ship, her step count exceeding ten thousand. Then she had a private meeting with Hiromitsu to deliver the slander-and-scapegoat gift package to Gin. Her entire day had been packed. It was time to rest.
“Director Kawamura gave me a box of face masks. I’ll try one before bed,” the girl said to herself.
She twisted open the lid and scooped out the mask, applying it to her face.
Knock, knock.
A knock came from outside. An’an had just finished applying the mask and it wasn’t time to wash it off yet. She hurried away from the mirror and ran to open the door.
In the hallway, Amuro Tooru, who had been looking down and contemplating his opening line, lifted his eyes.
A girl with black hair, black eyes, and black skin looked at him in surprise. “Eh—Mr. Amuro?!”
Heavens, what kind of fate is this? she thought. Am I sure I’m floating on the sea and not squatting at home? Why is my neighbor everywhere?
The blond, dark-skinned young man looked even more shocked than An’an. Amuro asked cautiously, “An’an, is your pre-bedtime activity cleaning the fireplace in your room?”
“No,” An’an said, puzzled. “Why do you ask?”
Because a little black person was standing in front of him.
In that moment, Amuro finally understood the dominant power of blood ties. An’an and her cousin, Mr. Hanzawa, were indeed family.
The Fan Clan: The Black Organization is to return our clan’s support color, free of charge.
“I’m wearing a face mask,” An’an said, generously offering to share the mask with her neighbor, who might have skincare needs.
“Volcanic mud mask. Want to try?”
Amuro: Thank you, but no. I’m very satisfied with my current skin tone.
The Osaka detective, Hattori Heiji, might need it. The volcanic mud mask was infinitely close to his original skin. Skincare without a trace.
“Is An’an going to bed?” Amuro’s gaze swept over the thin straps on the girl’s shoulders. The cotton slip dress barely covered her thighs.
On a cruise ship full of strangers, she was opening the door to people dressed like this, completely unguarded… He pressed his lips together.
“I plan to sleep after I wash off the mask,” An’an said truthfully. “But I’m not very sleepy or tired. If you want to ask me to go night fishing, that’s okay too.”
In fact, before she had opened the door, An’an had thought it was Director Kawamura or another actor knocking. No matter what they wanted, she had been prepared to put them off with, “I’m so sleepy and tired, I can’t open my eyes. Can we talk about it tomorrow?”
Because it was indeed very late, she had just put on her mask, and there was nothing more comfortable than lying in bed, listening to the sound of the waves, and letting sleepiness wash over her. An’an was not the type to wrong herself to please others.
“If it’s Mr. Amuro asking me out…”
The dark-haired girl thought for a moment. She suddenly felt that night fishing wasn’t a bad idea, and moon-gazing was also quite interesting. KTV, the billiard room, the movie theater, the barbecue bar—there were so many fun activities on the cruise ship. It would be a waste to just stay in the room and sleep.
Amuro met the girl’s sparkling eyes, and a smile unknowingly appeared on his lips.
The pressure, suspicion, and worry that had been weighing on his heart before he came seemed to turn into a light mist, blown away by the night wind into the boundless ocean.
“Actually, there’s something I’d like to ask of An’an.”
Between covering it up with a lie and telling the truth, the undercover Public Security officer had, for once, frankly chosen the latter.
“Come in and talk,” An’an said, stepping aside to let the blond young man in.
It wasn’t the first time the two of them had been alone in a room late at night. It was already a familiar situation. An’an went to the bathroom to wash off her mask, and Amuro leaned against the doorframe and talked to her.
“I watched the live broadcast today,” he said. “An’an’s popularity is getting higher and higher.”
Amidst the splashing water, the girl, who was busy patting her face, freed a hand and proudly flashed a peace sign.
Amuro continued to praise her. “You’ve also practiced your signature very well.” Although it was practiced by signing police reports.
The two fingers of the peace sign happily tapped her head.
“It’s just that,” the blond young man’s tone changed, “the program’s arrangement was for autographs, but the scene turned into a handshake event. It must have been very tiring for An’an.”
The dark-haired girl, having washed off her mask, looked up. Clear water droplets slid down her cheeks. An’an had a puzzled expression.
“It was okay,” she said, thinking for a moment. “I don’t feel tired. Everyone wanted to shake my hand because they like me… But there was indeed someone who held on and wouldn’t let go. I used a little force, and he screamed like a pig being slaughtered. It startled me.”
That tourist had been quickly persuaded to leave by the staff. An’an hadn’t thought much of it.
“I only used a little bit of force. It definitely wasn’t enough to fracture or break a bone,” she said, making a small gesture with her thumb and index finger. “So it doesn’t count as my fault.”
Of course it didn’t. Amuro had actually brought up the handshake event because he was bothered by Scotch Whisky mixing in with the crowd to get the girl’s autograph.
Who knew what evil purpose that guy had? And An’an’s attitude towards him was so friendly. If he liked handshakes so much, he should try arm wrestling with him to test his strength.
Bourbon did not hesitate to assume the worst of the distillery’s body-double literature spokesperson.
“I should have gotten in line too,” Amuro said, half-joking, half-serious. “Would An’an have given me special treatment?”
“Giving special treatment is a disqualification for an idol,” An’an said righteously.
“But I’m not an idol. I’m just an actress,” she concluded cheerfully. “I can be very, very biased.”
“You can sign wherever you want,” the girl said, spreading her arms wide. “I’ll even draw a great big heart.”
A great big heart wouldn’t fit on an autograph board. Amuro thought, If she really were to draw it…
The signing pen twirled in the dark-haired girl’s fingertips. She bit off the cap, and the tip of the pen glided across the young man’s wheat-colored abs, ending with a large heart. “Thank you for your support~”
No, no, no, that kind of fantasy is too much. Get out of my head!
An’an, bewildered, saw the person in front of her suddenly shake his head vigorously. What’s wrong now?
She had been very well-behaved today, and hadn’t done anything bad.
At the stroke of midnight, all of Suspect An’s past misdeeds would be automatically refreshed. The wind and waves at sea were too strong; the sound of Gin jumping into the sea couldn’t reach her ears.
Amuro calmed down for a moment and got to the point. “Does An’an remember the bombs she found during the live broadcast?”
“I do,” the girl said, listing them off as if they were family treasures. “The easter eggs hidden by the production team. There were nine in total. I found all of them by myself. I almost thought it was rigged.”
Director Kawamura didn’t say the live broadcast had a script. Was I being set up?
Amuro: “Those weren’t easter eggs. They were real bombs.”
An’an: “…Eh?”
The ticking sound and the flashing red light flashed through her mind. An’an had a sudden realization. “So that’s why the props were so realistic!”
She had been praising them in her heart at the time. A variety show, yet the props were so well-researched. The conscience of the industry.
The conscience of the industry was dead. Gin was the real conscience of the industry. The nine bombs were all high-end goods that had just been smuggled in, with no shortcuts taken.
“Does Mr. Amuro also study bombs?” An’an asked.
“Identifying and defusing bombs is a basic skill for a detective.” Taking advantage of the fact that Mouri Kogoro was not on the cruise ship, Amuro answered without batting an eye:
“We Beika Town detectives went to Hawaii for advanced training as a group.”
The Hawaii cram school. Such an authoritative detective training institution, so famous. An’an immediately believed him.
“You came to find me in the middle of the night. Is it because I didn’t find all the bombs during the day?”
The girl’s face showed a look of shame. To think I missed an easter egg. I really shouldn’t have.
Bourbon: No, you didn’t miss a single one. Total annihilation.
Who would dare to question a conceptual god?
“Let’s just say that’s the case,” Bourbon said vaguely, feeling a little guilty. “There are still bombs hidden on the cruise ship. Can I ask An’an for help?”
An’an was always happy to help, but she was worried. “But it was purely by chance. What if I can’t help…”
“There’s no ‘what if’,” the undercover Public Security officer said with conviction. “In this field, no one can compete with you.”
Even Gin, with his waterlogged brain after jumping into the sea, might not remember the locations of all the bombs. How could he dare to compete with the one true god?
This heavy trust moved An’an.
“Alright,” she smiled. “Since Mr. Amuro trusts me so much.”
The dark-haired girl changed her clothes. Because so many people on the cruise ship recognized her, she put on a black mask, covering the lower half of her face, leaving only her ink-black eyes exposed.
“This feels like I’m doing something bad behind people’s backs,” An’an said, looking at herself in the mirror. “Should I cut a hole in a pair of stockings and put it over my head?”
Amuro placed his hands on her shoulders and, with a mix of coaxing and deception, pushed her towards the door. “It’s already perfect. Leave some room for fashion for others.”
…
The terrain of the cruise ship was large and complex. According to An’an’s experience with finding things, the more you tried to find something, the harder it was. Only a smart person knew the trick: a roundabout strategy.
She hadn’t found the bombs because she was looking for them, but because she had found them while scouting out her own place of death. There was a big difference.
“We need to give tonight’s outing a special meaning,” the girl said seriously. “During the day, I was searching alone, looking for my place of death. Tonight, the two of us are searching—”
Amuro finished her sentence, “—for the place of our death?”
She nodded, then thought for a moment. “The place of our death—that’s a bit of a mouthful. Is there a shorter way to say it?”
“Generally speaking, under what circumstances do two people die together?” An’an asked for the detective’s opinion.
Based on the cases Amuro had studied at the police academy, the files he had read as a Public Security officer, and the cases he had handled as a detective, he deduced:
A death scene where a man and a woman die together is usually called a lovers’ suicide.
The dark-haired girl readily accepted this answer. “What we’re looking for now is the place of our lovers’ suicide.”
Amuro wanted to say something, but held back.
In the end, he didn’t say anything in opposition, maintaining a meaningful silence.
A place with good feng shui for a lovers’ suicide is different from a place with good feng shui for a solo death. An’an looked at the map and did a quick calculation.
“I think the open-air bar is a good place for a lovers’ suicide,” she said. “Let’s go and check it out.”
The power of a conceptual god needs no explanation. The undercover Public Security officer had no doubts. He obediently followed the girl to the open-air bar.
The bartender on the night shift at the open-air bar was mixing drinks with a flourish. An’an tugged on her black mask, trying to avoid the drinking tourists. The blond young man shielded her from the view of others, and the two found a corner to sit down.
They sat by a wall of decorative barrels. An’an curled her knuckles and knocked on the empty barrels on the wall.
Thump, thump, thump… she knocked on them one by one, until an empty barrel made a dull sound.
The girl leaned in and pressed her ear to the side of the barrel to listen.
“Let’s have our lovers’ suicide here,” An’an said with a straight face. “No need to drown, no need to stab. When the bomb goes off, we’ll rush to hell together with a burning love.”
She had just read a few paragraphs of the script Director Yuko had sent her before bed. Her reserves of twisted, painful love lines, of love and hate intertwined, of loving even in death, had skyrocketed.
An’an had thought that someone with high EQ like Mr. Amuro would definitely be able to pick up the line and have a back-and-forth with her. To her surprise, he coughed into his fist and said in a low voice, “…Don’t talk nonsense.”
Perhaps the lighting at night was playing tricks on An’an’s vision. Otherwise, why did she see the tips of the blond young man’s ears turning slightly red?
“The bomb is hidden in the empty barrel?” Amuro tried to focus his energy on defusing the bomb. His fingertips tapped on the barrel, and he quickly found two loose wooden planks.
As expected of Gin, a sinister and cunning person. The open-air bar had two walls of decorative empty barrels. An ordinary person would never be able to just sit down in a random corner and accurately locate the bomb barrel.
But unfortunately, even someone as strong as Gin had to bow to a conceptual god. As Amuro had said, in this field, An’an had no rivals.
The undercover Public Security officer was about to start defusing the bomb. Before that, a waiter from the open-air bar came over.
“What would you two like to drink?” the waiter asked, showing them the alcoholic beverages on his tray. There was a Paloma, as beautiful as a sunset, and a Mojito, the same color as the forest.
“Two Bourbons,” the dark-haired girl said, flicking her fingers.
The waiter went to the bar to get the drinks. An’an picked up a salted plum from the table and popped it into her mouth.
She had ordered directly. Amuro was a beat too late. “Why did you order Bourbon?”
“Palomas and Mojitos are both sweet drinks,” he said, remembering An’an’s lack of knowledge about alcohol, and introduced them to her. “They’re low in alcohol content and have beautiful colors. The waiter just now emphasized these two, which means they’re his specialty. Don’t you want to try them?”
“I want Bourbon,” An’an replied. “A few nights ago… wasn’t it also Bourbon?”
Two glasses of wine were delivered to the table. After the waiter left, the remote corner was empty, with only the two of them sitting opposite each other.
Amuro didn’t touch his drink. He lowered his head to remove the wooden planks of the empty barrel and began to defuse the bomb.
The girl took a sip of her drink and gently placed it on the table.
“I remember,” she said suddenly. “I remember everything that happened when I was drunk.”