wjnovel Chapter 724 Everyone Seems Like a Murderer!
Chapter 724 Everyone Seems Like a Murderer!
For a moment, he really wanted to take her away from here, downstairs, out of this overly clean and overly closed-off scene, away from everyone who would write "the only one present" in their statement. But he couldn't, and he couldn't do that. Because Gwen was right—if he really wanted to get her out of this mess, the only way wasn't to stand in front of her like a protective family member, but to see the truth faster than anyone else.
The forensic team quickly provided their first assessment.
"Female, between 26 and 30 years old, the preliminary estimated time of death is between 6:20 and 6:55 this morning." The female forensic doctor lifted her gloves to examine the wound. "The fatal wound is on the left side of the back of the neck. The angle of entry was very sharp, the wound was narrow, but the depth was precise, like a very fine puncture or cutting tool that killed instantly. There were no obvious signs of hesitation or repeated probing near the wound, indicating that the perpetrator was very deliberate. The deceased did not inhale much water, indicating that it was not a typical case of drowning before entering the water, but more likely that she was first injured to death or rapidly incapacitated before falling into the water."
"Where's the murder weapon?" the sheriff asked.
"I haven't seen it yet," the forensic doctor said. "This wound doesn't look like an ordinary knife. It's more like a very thin, hard, clean-cut professional instrument. I'll have to go back and examine it further."
When Lynn heard the words "extremely fine, very hard, professional equipment," several categories immediately flashed through his mind.
Too much.
From medical puncture instruments to precision cutting tools to modified, thin metal sheets, all can produce similar results. The problem is that a typical murder at a resort shouldn't involve such a clean-cut method.
The sheriff clearly realized this as well, and his brows furrowed even deeper.
"Does she have any identification on her?" Lynn asked.
The sheriff glanced at him, probably weighing whether to answer, but still said, "So far, we've only found the room key and the cell phone. The room key corresponds to apartment 507 on the fifth floor, registered under the name Violet Hart. As for whether that's her real name, we'll have to investigate further."
Violet Hart.
The name sounds nice, but it sounds too much like a replaceable shell.
"Where are your companions?" Lynn asked.
“She wasn’t registered,” the sheriff said. “She was staying alone.”
Lynn recalled the young man in the green coat at the restaurant last night, and how he sat with her eating dessert; he didn't seem like a simple stranger sharing a table.
Just then, a commotion suddenly arose outside the platform.
A male voice rose in the doorway: "I just want to know what happened!"
Lynn turned his head and saw the young man in the green sweater from yesterday—no, to be precise, the young man in the green coat from yesterday afternoon and the dark sweater from last night—being stopped by security outside the glass door. His face was pale, but not purely from fear; it was more as if something sudden had disrupted his previously well-controlled composure. He looked through the glass, his gaze quickly fixing on the corpse, and his whole body visibly stiffened.
The sheriff gestured for someone to bring him in.
"Do you know the deceased?" the sheriff asked.
The man's Adam's apple bobbed, and he nodded: "I know him."
How did you meet?
“We met at the bar yesterday,” he said quickly. “She said her name was Violet and she was staying here for two days. My name is Ben Cardenas, and I’m here to write, a freelance writer.”
If Gwen heard this now, she would probably say that her judgment during the day, "This person looks like he's going to kill someone," was at least half right.
“You had dessert together last night,” Lynn said calmly.
Ben looked at him, his eyes first recognizing that "this person was also there last night," before realizing that now was not the time to pretend to be a stranger.
“Yes,” Ben said, “but that doesn’t mean—”
"Did you see her this morning?" the sheriff interrupted.
"No." Ben shook his head. "I didn't get up until after seven. I just heard someone downstairs say there was an accident on the top floor."
"What time did you part ways last night?"
“Around eleven o’clock,” Ben replied relatively quickly. “I escorted her to the fifth-floor corridor, and then I went back to my room.”
Where do you live?
"412."
Did she mention coming to the rooftop pool this morning?
I hesitated for a moment.
“She mentioned it,” he said. “She said the mornings in the mountains are perfect for swimming.”
"Did you mention anything else?"
"No."
Lynn looked at him: "She looked like she was waiting for someone last night."
His expression changed slightly.
"What's the meaning."
“You know what I mean,” Lynn said.
He stared at her for two seconds, clearly wanting to deny it, but in the end he just irritably wiped his face with his hand: "She did look at her phone a few times and walked away to answer a call. But she didn't tell me who it was. We're not—"
“Not her or anything,” the sheriff asked.
Ben gritted his teeth: "He's not her boyfriend, nor her guardian. We only met last night."
This statement is probably true, but it's incomplete.
Lynn didn't need to ask much to tell that Ben was at least interested in Violet, while Violet seemed to be using this interest to kill time or to make herself look like she was having an ordinary night at the mountain lodge.
The sheriff clearly didn't quite believe his claim of "knowing nothing about it since we only met last night," but since the evidence was more directly on Gwen's side, he just had Ben taken to give a statement first.
The exploration on the platform lasted for more than an hour.
The access control log was copied, and the surveillance cameras on the rooftop, stairwell, elevator lobby, and maintenance doors were all sealed off. When the forensic doctor took the body away, the pale red layer in the pool was finally dispersed to almost invisible, leaving only a visually cold impression. Gwen was temporarily placed in a small meeting room on the fifth floor, with someone guarding the door. Although she wasn't handcuffed, the meaning was clear—she couldn't move freely until the case was solved.
When Lynn first went to see her, Gwen was sitting on the sofa, holding a cup of hot water, but she hadn't touched the rim of the cup. She had changed her clothes; the light gray sweater and dark trousers made her look more like herself than she did in the morning, but her complexion was still poor.
"Have they finished the first round of questions?" Lynn asked.
“Hmm.” Gwen looked up at him. “You keep asking the same few questions. When did you go up? When did you go into the water? When did you see her? Did you talk to her? Why did I go to the pool alone so early?”
"What did you answer?"
“Tell the truth,” Gwen said. “I also told them you could testify that it was I who kept talking about wanting to see the pool in the morning last night.”
Lynn sat down opposite her.
How do they treat you?
“Not bad.” Gwen shrugged, her smile faint. “The local sheriff doesn’t seem like the kind of jerk who’s in a rush to arrest people to get things done, but everything’s going against me right now, so he can’t be too gentle.”
She paused, staring at the steam rising from the cup.
“Lynn,” she said, “when I actually touched her, she was already very cold. Not completely ice-cold, but definitely not like someone who had just been killed a few seconds ago.”
Lynn's eyes darkened.
"you sure?"
“It’s not 100% scientifically certain,” Gwen said, “but I touched her shoulder and arm. She didn’t look like she had just collapsed.”
This is very important.
If Gwen's intuition is correct, then the time of death might be earlier. That would mean the deceased might have already died somewhere on the rooftop before Gwen came up, and then entered the water, or perhaps had always been in the water somewhere Gwen hadn't noticed at first.
“There’s one more thing,” Gwen said softly. “I didn’t tell them too much detail just now because I was afraid I might have misremembered.”
"What."
Gwen frowned, trying to recall: "When I swam my second lap back, I think I smelled something." "What was it?"
“It was very faint,” she said. “Like burnt metal, or… a very thin burnt smell. It wasn’t smoke, more like the smell left after something was heated by friction. At the time, I just thought it was carried by the wind, or the smell of the equipment room. Now that I think about it, something’s not right.”
Lynn's mind almost immediately flashed back to the smell left by the cut parts, thin wires, and precision metal petals from last night's case after friction and high-speed vibration.
so similar.
But he didn't voice this connection immediately, only asking, "Where is it located?"
“West,” Gwen said, “near the area where I later discovered her.”
Lynn stood up.
"Where are you going?" Gwen asked.
"Go check out her room."
Gwen looked at him, nodded, and didn't stop him.
"Don't get into a serious fight with the sheriff," she said.
Lynn glanced at her.
Gwen's lips twitched slightly: "I'm serious. The look on your face right now is like you're about to tear the whole building down."
"It will be dismantled if necessary."
“I know,” Gwen said softly. “That’s why I told you not to target the people you can see first.”
When Lynn went to find the sheriff, he was standing outside room 507 at the end of the fifth-floor corridor, accompanied by a deputy sheriff and the front desk manager, Elena. The door was open, and forensic personnel were going in and out. Violet's room was similar in layout to Lynn's, but smaller, nestled against the mountain rather than the lake, with views of the treeline and the back slope. The room was impeccably clean, as if the owner was ready to leave at any moment but didn't want to leave anything behind.
"Did you find anything?" Lynn asked.
The sheriff glanced at him, as if considering whether to let the federal agent's family member get any closer, but in the end he stepped aside.
“She didn’t have much luggage,” he said. “Two sets of clothes, a laptop, a cell phone, a toiletries bag, and some cash. I didn’t see any obvious murder weapon, nor any personal documents that would clearly identify her or explain her purpose. It was too clean.”
"Can I turn on my laptop and phone?"
"The technician is doing it."
Lynn's gaze slowly swept across the room.
The bed wasn't completely made, indicating she had indeed returned and slept there last night, or at least sat on it. The towel in the bathroom was damp, and there were faint traces of makeup in front of the mirror. On the table was a half-finished glass of water, next to a hotel notepad, the top sheet torn off.
He walked closer to the table and glanced down at the notepad.
Very faint indentations remain on the top layer.
“Pencil,” Lynn said.
The forensic officer standing nearby was stunned for a moment: "What?"
“Try it with a soft pencil and a slanted light.” Lynn pointed to the notebook. “There were words written on the last page, and the creases are still there.”
The sheriff glanced at him, said nothing, but still gestured for the technician to do as he was told.
Before long, a few lines of letters and numbers slowly emerged from the light gray diagonal scratches.
It's not a complete sentence; it's more like a room number, time, or abbreviation.
"6F / 6:30"
"R"
"Don't bring the box."
There's also the initial of a name that looks like it was written twice and then crossed out: B or P.
The sheriff's brows furrowed immediately.
"Sixth floor, 6:30," he said.
That is, the top floor, early morning.
Violet wasn't just going swimming; she was going to meet someone.
And "R", if it is not just randomly written, is very likely to refer to a name or a code.
Lynn's mind instantly went through the list of people registered at the resort and the people she had met last night.
Who here has a name that starts with R?
Gwen isn't, Elena isn't, Harold isn't, Ben isn't. That silver-haired old lady? If her registered name starts with an R? Or is she not even among the apparent guests?
“Show me the current guest list for the resort,” Lynn said.
The sheriff did not immediately agree.
"You are not part of the investigating party now."
“But my sister is inside,” Lynn said.
“I know.” The sheriff looked at him. “It’s precisely because she’s in there that I have to be careful that you don’t see everyone as a potential killer.”
This isn't exactly polite, but it's not wrong either.
Lynn was silent for two seconds, then finally said, "Then you do the screening yourself now. See whose name, room number, and time match. Also, pull out the access control records for 507 last night and this morning, and see what time she left the room."
The sheriff nodded, and this time he didn't argue with him anymore, and directly ordered the deputy sheriff to investigate.
A few minutes later, the deputy sheriff returned with the tablet, his expression changed.
“507 returned to his room at 11:22 last night and left at 6:26 this morning,” he said. “He hasn’t come back since. There are three names on the guest list that start with R: Ruth Mason in 608, Richard Hart in 302, and Raphael Thorne in the detached house.”
Lynn immediately looked at the sheriff.
Because of the name "Ruth Mason," he knew who she was without even hearing the first part—the silver-haired old lady who always read a book in the corner of the rooftop pool.
The sheriff had obviously thought of this as well, and immediately said, "Go find someone."
But the person was found in less than ten minutes.
Or rather, they found Ruth Mason's room—608—which was empty.
Not only are they gone, but their luggage is also gone.
The room was cleaner than room 507; the bed was neatly made, the bathroom was dry, and even the trash can was almost empty, except for a small, torn label underneath with the name and some initials of a pharmacy printed on it, as if it had been removed from a medicine box or personal belongings. The front desk manager, Elena, looked completely distraught at the door: "She was clearly wearing—"
"When did she register?" the sheriff asked.
“The day before yesterday afternoon,” Elena said, her voice strained. “She said she wasn’t feeling well and wanted to find a quiet place to stay for a few days. I remember her because she specifically asked to be near the elevator, but not on the restaurant side, saying that walking too much would be tiring.”
"Where's your ID?"
“It’s an in-state driver’s license,” Elena said. “The copy is at the front desk.”
"License plate."
"I'll check."
Lynn stood at the door of 608, her gaze slowly sweeping across the room.
An elderly woman checked in two days early, with minimal luggage and a clean room, and disappeared after the incident today. She was seen reading on the rooftop last night, and no one knows where she is this morning. More importantly—if the "R" on the 507 note truly refers to the initial of a name like "Rose" or "Ruth," then Violet going to the rooftop at 6:30 was very likely to meet her. (End of Chapter)