Chapter 47: The "Picked-Up" One

"Are you so certain that Deng Qingrong will keep her word? Have you met or had any dealings with her before this?" Ning Shuyi asked.

"No, but I know I was adopted by my parents. Plus, with my face looking so much like hers, no one would believe it if I said we weren't related." Zhang Guanghui gave a bitter smile. "Actually, if I had asked my parents, they would have told me, but I didn't want to. They would only have ended up worried sick. They’re at such an age now, there’s no need for that."

As she spoke, she subconsciously twisted her hands, not even noticing that the skin on her fingers had turned red. She let out a heavy sigh.

Just as Ning Shuyi was about to speak, the bedroom door opened. Zhang Guanghui’s mother, a thin, frail old woman, stood in the doorway, her face full of concern as she looked into the room.

Zhang Guanghui was startled. She jumped up and rushed to the door. "Mom! Didn't I tell you not to disturb us? Why did you come over again!"

The old woman sighed, took her daughter’s hand, and patted the back of it. "You child! You’ve had this same flaw since you were small! You never tell the adults in the family when something happens; you just have to shoulder it all by yourself! You never open your mouth to your father or me until you absolutely can't carry the burden anymore!"

"Mom, did you hear everything...?" Hearing this, Zhang Guanghui’s eyes immediately turned red. "Don't worry, nothing Deng Qingrong says matters! I’ve decided that you and Dad are my parents for the rest of my life, and no one else is going to come here and try to take advantage of me!"

"It's alright, it's alright!" The mother reached out, wiping the tears from her daughter’s eyes with a pained expression, and smoothed her hair. "Torturing yourself like this over such a matter—tell me, aren't you a silly child? If she just wants you to acknowledge her, then do it! We don't mind! As long as she stops bothering you, anything is fine! But if she makes unreasonable demands or tries to make things difficult for you, you tell your father and me! We were fellow villagers with her family; we know exactly what they’re like! If they dare to bully my daughter, we certainly won’t let her family off easily!"

"Ma'am, why don't you come in and sit down?" Ning Shuyi smiled at the mother and gestured toward the room. "We withheld our identities earlier because we were afraid of scaring you. We aren't Zhang Guanghui’s colleagues. We are detectives from the Municipal Public Security Bureau, here to look into the situation regarding Deng Qingrong. Since you were fellow villagers and seem to know something about her, would you mind staying and talking with us?"

The mother hadn't heard everything clearly from outside the door and had assumed they were people from the school inquiring about why her daughter had been on medical leave for so long. She had been shocked to hear her daughter mention being harassed by Deng Qingrong, but the revelation that they were police officers caught her completely off guard.

Despite her initial shock, once she learned they were police, any hesitation she might have had about entering the room vanished. She walked in with Zhang Guanghui and sat down on the edge of the bed, holding her daughter’s hand.

"Actually, you don't need to worry about Deng Qingrong bothering you anymore," Ning Shuyi said, exchanging a glance with Huo Yan. "Deng Qingrong is dead."

"What?" Zhang Guanghui stood up from the edge of the bed, her face full of surprise. "Really?"

Perhaps sensing that her reaction was inappropriate, her mother gave her a gentle tug, signaling her to sit down. Zhang Guanghui realized she had been tactless and quickly sat back down. "I’m sorry. I know I shouldn't react this way. But lately, Deng Qingrong has been harassing me so severely that my life has been in shambles and I’ve suffered quite a bit of mental anguish. So, the thought that she won’t be able to torment me anymore... I just felt a sense of relief. You might think I’m cold-blooded or heartless, but put yourself in my shoes: if your biological mother had abandoned you from birth, never asked after you for all these years, and then, upon discovering you had grown up and were doing well, came back to blackmail you for money to support her old age—how would you feel? People who can return good for evil are saints. I’m just an ordinary person; I don't have that kind of magnanimity."

"How did Deng Qingrong die? And why are you coming to us about this?" Unlike her daughter, the mother’s reaction was one of immediate anxiety. After the shock passed, she asked the question urgently.

"Deng Qingrong lived a secluded life and had little contact with the outside world. We are still investigating the cause of her death, which is why we are visiting everyone she had any recent contact with, in hopes of finding some valuable clues," Ning Shuyi explained diplomatically.

Hearing this, the mother, though still nervously clutching her daughter’s hand, relaxed slightly.

"Did you keep the fact that you adopted Zhang Guanghui a secret from her?" Huo Yan asked the mother.

The mother sighed and nodded. "How could we keep something like that a secret? Even if we didn't say anything, she might have found out through some other way when she was older, and that would have been an even greater shock. It was better to be honest. In elementary school, she had a physical exam, and when the results came back, she asked us why her blood type didn't match ours. We thought that was as good a time as any, so we told her."

"Why did Deng Qingrong give her daughter to you to raise back then?" Ning Shuyi asked.

The mother shook her head. "She didn't give her to us. We were the ones who 'found' the child."

Her statement left not only Ning Shuyi and Huo Yan confused, but even Zhang Guanghui, who already knew she was adopted, looked equally bewildered.

"Mom, what do you mean by 'found' the child?" she asked.

The mother sighed. "This happened thirty years ago. I’ve never told anyone else, and I never mentioned it to you. Even though your father and I told you that you were adopted, I never wanted you to think your birth mother was such a terrible person..."

Zhang Guanghui snorted. "I’ve seen for myself now."

"The dead deserve respect. She’s gone now, so don't say such harsh things," her mother said, gesturing for her daughter to watch her words.

"Could you tell us what happened back then?" Ning Shuyi asked.