Chasing Murder

Chapter 8

I swallowed hard, looking up at Cyrus, and said loudly, "Why would you do this?"

I never understood. In my mind, Cyrus had always been a sunny, upright young man. He liked to laugh, and he could stand up bravely against social injustice. To me, he was like an older brother, showing me endless care in my childhood.

But when I heard Evelyn say that the pendant bore the initials LH, my mind was filled with images of Cyrus.

　　"I remember, every time Cyrus got injured, he always had this hexagram pendant with him. He told me that his mother left it for him when he was five years old. She gave him the pendant and told him to wait for her at the street corner, but she never came back.

And the initials engraved on this pendant, L and H, are the abbreviations of his mother and father's surnames.

If my guess is correct, Cyrus placed this pendant on the chest of that female corpse...

"Why did you do this? Everyone tells lies, but when the lie can't hold up, people always use another lie to cover it up. Noah, you know, I never liked lying, and I never lied. To you, I was sincere."

"Cyrus..."

"Noah, do you know why I killed those women?" Cyrus looked down at me, his hands resting on the armrest in front of him. I didn't speak, just stood below, looking up, quietly waiting for Cyrus to explain.

Cyrus let out a bitter smile and said softly, "Those two women, what do you think they were? You know? Just a few words from me, and Scarlett willingly threw herself at me. And Luna, she even thought of buying insurance for her husband and secretly poisoning him. Ha, such vicious women, living in this world, don't you think they tarnish it?"

"So, you cut out their tongues? To punish them for lying?" I stood still, calmly speaking to Cyrus.

"Coincidentally, I ran into you, and even more coincidentally, your father turned out to be the Chief of Police. Your appearance disrupted my plans, Noah, you only know that I was abandoned, but you don't know why they abandoned me."

Cyrus told me that his parents' marriage had no feelings from the beginning. His father met another woman while working outside, and his mother, after giving birth to him, started having affairs with several men nearby. Over time, his mother's gaze wandered even further, and she knew that it was impossible to be with the man she liked with a child.

So, Cyrus's mother brought him to the streets of California to fend for himself. But miraculously, Cyrus survived, and as for later...

"I found her, found her holding a fake ID, cuddling up to another man who seemed only a little older than me. I killed her and cut out her tongue. But, I loved her, Noah. She was my mom, how could I not love her? So, I bought this mansion, to keep her with me forever."

When Cyrus said this, I interjected, "Cyrus, think about it. Is this love? In your heart, she has become the woman you hate the most. And because of her influence on you, Luna, Scarlett died, right? Putting her body on the rooftop of the detective bureau..."

"Yes, you know, I hate the police the most. After she abandoned me, I once sought help from the police, but they handed me over to the welfare home, where the director beat me every day. In the end, I ran away and met you. But what about you? Why did you become the person I hate the most, Noah, you know, you have always been my family, my only family. Please don't be a police officer anymore? You..."

"So, for our conversation just now, you intentionally put the access card back in my pocket, and you were confident that I wouldn't call the police to arrest you?"

　　I had profiled the killer in this case, and they are meticulous. There was no evidence left at either murder scene, so why would the used access card end up back in my pocket? Before returning to the detective bureau, I had encountered Cyrus, and he was the only one who had physical contact with me. Yet, two hours later, after Cyrus had left, the access card mysteriously reappeared in my pocket. He's taking a gamble, betting on whether I'll bring the police?