The Tycoon's Mysterious Darling Wife
Chapter 220. Human Trafficker? (First Update)

Chapter 220: 220. Human Trafficker? (First Update)

"Auntie, I want to ride that one." Little Douding pointed at a roller coaster and said. Shen Qinglan looked over and saw the warning sign, "You’re too small, you can’t go on it now. When you grow up, you can."

Little Douding was a bit disappointed, "But I’m already big."

"You’re not big enough yet, you need to be a little bigger." Saying this, Shen Qinglan pointed at the merry-go-round not far away, "Let’s go play on that instead."

Little Douding was somewhat reluctant, "That’s for girls."

Shen Qinglan: ...

Fu Hengyi saw Shen Qinglan’s troubled expression, his eyes brimming with a smile, which drew an annoyed glance from her. Fu Hengyi squatted down and picked up Little Douding, "Didn’t you say you wanted to ride the pirate ship? Let’s go play on the pirate ship."

Hearing this, Little Douding cheered up, hugging Fu Hengyi’s neck and even forgot his favorite aunt, "I want to ride it twice," extending two plump fingers.

"Okay."

"What about three times?"

"That’s fine."

Shen Qinglan followed behind the two, catching a glimpse out of the corner of her eye of a mom sitting on a bench with her young son nearby. The little boy squatted on the ground, playing with a toy train, not much older than Little Douding. The young mother was looking down at her phone.

Shen Qinglan glanced and then looked away.

The amusement park had a pirate ship designed especially for kids Little Douding’s age. Seeing the pirate ship, Little Douding was thrilled and grabbed Shen Qinglan’s hand, "Auntie, let’s go play on it."

Shen Qinglan glanced at the mini pirate ship, truly uninterested in it, and then at Fu Hengyi. Fu Hengyi lifted Little Douding up, "Your auntie doesn’t like to play this. Uncle will accompany you."

Little Douding glanced at Shen Qinglan and then at the pirate ship, finally nodding, "Auntie, you wait here for us. I’ll go play with Uncle."

Shen Qinglan smiled and nodded, taking the little backpack off Little Douding’s back.

By the time Fu Hengyi brought Little Douding down from the pirate ship, half an hour had passed. Little Douding was red in the face and sweaty.

Shen Qinglan took out a towel from her bag and wiped Little Douding’s face, "Have some water and rest a bit, then we can go play something else." Seeing Little Douding obediently nod, Shen Qinglan took out a bottle of water and handed it to Fu Hengyi.

Fu Hengyi took a drink and for the first time felt that playing with a child was more tiring than training with a bunch of new recruits for a day, secretly relieved they hadn’t planned on having children so early.

"Mommy, I want to play bumper cars." A little boy nearby gently told his mother, holding her hand. Little Douding heard this and looked at Shen Qinglan with hopeful eyes, "Auntie."

"Understood, we’ll go in a moment."

Little Douding’s eyes sparkled with joy. Shen Qinglan and Fu Hengyi took Little Douding to the bumper cars, Fu Hengyi and Little Douding sharing one, Shen Qinglan on her own.

Since the age of nine, Fu Hengyi had never been to an amusement park again. As for Shen Qinglan, she never needed to mention it—in her memory, it was her first time visiting a kindergarten. Initially a bit reserved, she also got competitive after Fu Hengyi purposely bumped into her a few times, playing as gleefully as a child.

"Auntie, these bumper cars are so much fun. Can we come again next time?"

Shen Qinglan nodded, her face all smiles, "Sure."

Fu Hengyi watched the cheerful pair, his eyes filled with tenderness.

"Uncle, I also want to ride the train." Little Douding tugged at Fu Hengyi’s trouser leg, pointing at the distant train. Fu Hengyi resignedly lifted him, "I’ll take him to play with the train first. You find a place to rest."

Today’s sun was a bit strong. Fu Hengyi pointed at a bench nearby under the shade of a tree. Shen Qinglan nodded, "Go ahead, I’ll wait for you here."

Shen Qinglan sat down on the bench and flipped through her social media feed. Other than Yu Xiaoxuan and Fang Tong, it was pretty quiet. Fang Tong had recently gone through a breakup and was feeling down. When Shen Qinglan saw Fang Tong two days ago, she might have seemed fine on the surface, but the sadness in her eyes was still unmistakable. However, she looked a lot better than before. These things needed time for her to process, and as a friend, Shen Qinglan couldn’t interfere too much.

Yu Xiaoxuan was still filming with Andre but wasn’t in the country recently. They were heading to Y country to shoot scenes abroad. Cissily had also gone back, with Eden staying in Beijing, joining a medical research institute to continue his odd research, rarely in contact with Shen Qinglan.

After chatting with Yu Xiaoxuan for a bit, Shen Qinglan had just put down her phone when she saw a woman looking frantic, calling out a name as she searched, "Doudou, where are you? Doudou."

She recognized her at once as the young mother who had been playing with her phone.

"Have you seen a child in a black and white striped T-shirt, wearing dark jeans?" the young mother grabbed a passerby, gesturing, "He’s about this tall, with a bob haircut."

The passerby shook their head, indicating they hadn’t seen him. This was a theme park, there were so many children, who would notice just one?

The young mother was nearly in tears. She had only looked at her phone for a moment, and her child was gone. "Doudou, where are you? Come out," she said, her voice already breaking with a sob.

Shen Qinglan stood up and walked over. "Instead of panicking here, you should ask the theme park staff for help to see where the child has gone." The theme park was full of surveillance cameras, finding a child wouldn’t be hard.

The young mother seemed to awaken from a dream, looking gratefully at Shen Qinglan. "Thank you, thank you. I’ll go right now."

Soon, an announcement looking for someone blared from the speakers. Shen Qinglan noticed that the staff seemed to be helping in the search for the child.

Before long, Shen Qinglan saw the young mother again; she appeared to have been crying, still calling her child’s name, "Doudou, Doudou, where are you?" It seemed the child hadn’t been found yet.

"Have you seen my child?" The young mother asked Shen Qinglan, frantic.

Shen Qinglan’s eyes flashed lightly. "You haven’t found your child?"

The young mother shook her head. "No, I’ve looked in many places, and the staff helped too, but we haven’t seen Doudou." Her voice was hoarse.

"There are lots of surveillance cameras in this theme park. You should ask the staff to check the surveillance to see exactly where the child is," Shen Qinglan suggested.

The young mother nodded, "Right, right, I’ll go right now," and hurried off in a direction.

Shen Qinglan thought for a moment, sent a text to Fu Hengyi, and followed.

The staff were quite cooperative and pulled up the surveillance footage according to the young mother’s directions. Shen Qinglan’s gaze swiftly swept across the monitor screens, suddenly freezing on one.

In a particular frame was the child she had seen before, in a black and white striped T-shirt and jeans, squatting on the ground playing with a toy train. The toy train was electric and moved far off, the little boy chased after it, leaving the young mother’s field of vision, while the young mother, head down, played on her phone, oblivious to her child’s departure.

The boy called Doudou had followed the toy train to an open area in the distance, then appeared to want to go to the toilet and ran into the nearby restroom. After coming out, he seemed to get lost, looking around blankly.

After a while, probably failing to find his mother, he finally became scared and started to shed tears, walking and crying, calling for his mother. Then, a man in black clothes approached the boy and said something to him, and the little boy followed the man.

The man wore a hat, and the surveillance cameras didn’t capture his face. Shen Qinglan pointed at the man’s silhouette on the monitor, "Do you recognize this man?"

The young mother shook her head, "I don’t know him."

According to the surveillance footage, this man took Doudou towards the exit of the theme park, and as they approached the gate, Doudou began to cry again. The man picked up Doudou, took out a handkerchief to wipe his tears, and then Doudou fell asleep on the man’s shoulder. Seeing this, everyone understood; they had encountered a human trafficker.

The young mother’s legs went weak, and she collapsed to the ground, her face pale to the point of transparency. The theme park staff also understood the seriousness of the situation, immediately called their superiors, and then called the police.

Shen Qinglan did not watch this; instead, she stepped forward to pull up the surveillance video of the theme park entrance, watching as the man got into a black sedan. After glancing at the license plate number, Shen Qinglan left the surveillance room directly, with no one present noticing her departure.

Walking out of the surveillance room, Shen Qinglan headed toward the parking lot, pulling out her cell phone to call Jin Enxi, "Enxi, where are you now?"

"At home, yeah." Jin Enxi, sleepy and confused, responded instinctively.

"Turn on your computer now. I need your help to track a car, the faster, the better."

"Now?"

"Now, immediately, right this second." Shen Qinglan’s voice carried a chill. Jin Enxi’s foggy mind instantly cleared, and she sprang out of bed.

"License plate, model."

Shen Qinglan reported the license plate and model, and Jin Enxi’s fingers flew across the keyboard. After a while, she spoke, "Heading north, in the direction of Xinhua Road."

Shen Qinglan floored the accelerator, and her car sped away. Pedestrians could only see a car racing down the road, overtaking one car after another, leaving behind a trail of curses, which Shen Qinglan seemed not to hear.

"An, is there something wrong with that car?"

Shen Qinglan’s expression was icy, "There’s a kidnapped child in that car."

Jin Enxi instantly understood. Shen Qinglan must despise human traffickers above all else, given that she was sold into that organization by them, not to mention that many others were taken the same way.

"An, that car has stopped, and two men got out. One of them was holding a child and got into another car. It headed toward Western City, in the direction of Yong’an Road."

From her Bluetooth earpiece, Jin Enxi’s voice came through, and Shen Qinglan made a sharp turn left, nearly colliding with an oncoming truck.

Soon after, the sound of sirens echoed behind her, the police sirens blaring, but Shen Qinglan ignored them. In her mind, there were only the memories of being abducted by human traffickers: the dark, cramped little black room filled with an unbearable stench; the boy who gave her a bun, promised to stay with her forever, to help her escape, whom she never saw again; the girl covered in injuries, lying on the ground like a torn rag doll; the spreading pool of blood on the floor, and the girl’s severed arm...

Shen Qinglan closed her eyes, banishing these images from her mind, but the iciness in her gaze only deepened.

**

When Fu Hengyi came back with Little Douding, he didn’t see Shen Qinglan and thought she had gone to the restroom. After waiting for a while and still not seeing her, he took out his phone and saw the text Shen Qinglan had sent him. His face went pale, and he tried to call her back, but her phone was busy.

He picked up Little Douding in one swift motion, and Little Douding looked at Fu Hengyi puzzled, "Uncle, where’s Aunt?"

"Your aunt is somewhere else; we’re going to find her now."

Taking Little Douding in his arms, Fu Hengyi went straight to the surveillance room. Shen Qinglan had said she was there, but once he arrived, all he saw was a woman close to fainting from crying and uniformed police officers—no sign of Shen Qinglan.

Realizing something was amiss, Fu Hengyi pulled over an officer, "What happened here?"

The officer glanced at Fu Hengyi, "Are you the child’s father?"

Although Fu Hengyi didn’t understand what the officer meant, he shook his head, "No."

Hearing that he wasn’t directly involved, the officer began to dismiss him, but when he saw the military ID Fu Hengyi showed, the officer’s demeanor changed to one of stiff respect, "Officer."

"What exactly happened here?"

The officer pointed to the woman on the ground, "Her child was taken away." He quickly explained the situation, shaking his head, "This mother was so careless. She was busy playing with her phone and didn’t notice her child wandering off. What’s the use of crying now?"

As the young mother continued to cry, Fu Hengyi glanced at her with a frown. Little Douding tugged at his clothes, and when Fu Hengyi looked at him, Little Douding pointed at one of the surveillance screens, "Uncle, I saw Aunt there."

Fu Hengyi looked up and indeed saw Shen Qinglan getting into her car and driving away. Glancing at the time, it was half an hour ago, two hours since the child had been taken.

His gaze became intense as he suddenly understood what Shen Qinglan intended to do.

"What actions have the police taken?" Fu Hengyi asked the officer.

"We’ve started tracking the car, but there’s been no news so far." Time had passed, and if those people moved quickly enough, they might have already left Beijing. And once out of the city, it would be much harder to find them.

Hearing this, Fu Hengyi took out his phone and called the Traffic Police Brigade to identify his rank, "Black SUV, license plate number XXXXXX, where is it now?"

The captain of the Traffic Police Brigade was already in turmoil. A child abduction had just occurred, and they needed to coordinate the tracking of the suspect vehicle. Then another call came in about reckless driving almost causing an accident. When the captain received Fu Hengyi’s call, he recognized the car description and license plate—it was the very car involved in the reckless driving incident.

"Mr. Fu, who is in that car?" The captain of the Traffic Police Brigade felt a headache coming on, assuming someone related to Fu Hengyi—a ’rich second generation,’ might be inside.

"My wife is in the car. She’s tracking the vehicle that took the child. Follow the direction she’s heading."

"Mr. Fu, that’s not right. According to our tracking, the traffickers headed toward Northern City, but your wife is going toward Western City," the captain questioned, setting aside his confusion about when Fu Hengyi got married to raise his concern.

"Believe it or not, it’s up to you. Can you take responsibility if something goes wrong?" Fu Hengyi didn’t want to argue; the thought of Shen Qinglan chasing the human traffickers, who might be armed with lethal weapons, made his heart unbearable. If it weren’t for Little Douding with him, he might have gone after Shen Qinglan himself.

The captain of the Traffic Police Brigade took Fu Hengyi’s serious tone to heart and wasted no time handing the phone to the police chief standing beside him.

"Okay, understood. We’ll set up a roadblock on that route right away. Yes, don’t worry, police reinforcements will catch up soon to ensure their safety."

After hanging up, Fu Hengyi was about to leave the surveillance room when a man burst in. He slapped the woman sitting on the ground crying, "You can’t even look after a child, and you have the nerve to cry here."

The woman was knocked to one side by the man’s slap, not daring to resist. Seemingly in a temper, the man kicked her again, "If anything happens to Doudou, you won’t get off easily either."

The man muttered profanities as the woman could only weep. As he was about to raise his fist again to hit her, Fu Hengyi grabbed his hand. "The most important thing right now is to find your son, not to beat your wife here."

Stopped by someone, the man was about to curse out loud, but when he met Fu Hengyi’s icy gaze, the words at his lips suddenly changed. "How I discipline my wife is none of your business."

Fu Hengyi gave the man a cold glance, let go of him, and walked away. He didn’t have time to waste here.

Arriving at the entrance of the amusement park, Fu Hengyi saw a car waiting for him. He got in straight away, with Little Douding curled up in his arms. "Uncle, was that auntie’s child taken by the bad people just now?"

Fu Hengyi nodded. "That’s why even if you get separated from your family, you mustn’t go with strangers, understand?"

Little Douding’s face showed fear, remembering what Pei Yinong once said to him — that if he were taken by bad people, he would never see his parents again.

"Uncle, then can that child still see his parents?" Little Douding clutched Fu Hengyi’s collar.

Fu Hengyi held him tight. "He will."

First, Fu Hengyi went to the Pei Family’s house to drop off Little Douding. "Hengyi, what happened? Where is Qinglan?" Chu Yunjin asked, not seeing Shen Qinglan.

"Aunt, I’ll explain this to you later. I have an urgent matter and must leave now." Fu Hengyi turned and left. Chu Yunjin called out to him but seeing that he had already gotten in the car, she had to let it go.

Fu Hengyi drove off towards the direction of Northern City.

The human traffickers had switched vehicles several times along the way, changing directions frequently with practiced skills that clearly weren’t their first time committing such a crime. Considering several child disappearance cases reported before, Shen Qinglan had reason to suspect they were all done by the same group.

Jin Enxi continuously updated the status of the human traffickers. "Enxi, I’ll head out to help you. If there are too many of them, I’m afraid you’ll be at a disadvantage unarmed."

"No need, just keep updating me with their location." Shen Qinglan declined, believing that after all this time, Fu Hengyi must have learned about the situation. With his capabilities, finding her would certainly not be hard.

Jin Enxi kept reporting the traffickers’ location, and Shen Qinglan was closing in on them. "Enxi, they are now less than a kilometer from you. Do you want to rescue the child now, or follow them to their hideout?"

Shen Qinglan thought for a moment. "I want to catch them all at once."

So she chose to track them down. After all, these were human traffickers, not kidnappers; they abducted children to sell them, therefore the children were not in immediate mortal danger.

"I’ll contact Fu Hengyi now; you continue the pursuit and get in touch with me if anything arises."

"Okay." Just as he was about to hang up, Jin Enxi suddenly spoke up. "Enxi, wait — they’ve left the highway and turned into the road on the left. There’s no surveillance there; I can’t track their direction."

Shen Qinglan’s expression darkened in an instant. She hit the gas, speeding up again. "I got it. I’ve seen that road, leave the rest to me."

After ending the call, Shen Qinglan called Fu Hengyi. "Fu Hengyi, where are you?"

Fu Hengyi gave his location, which was about half an hour away from her. "Fu Hengyi, I have a plan."

After sharing her plan with Fu Hengyi, "Fu Hengyi, what do you think?" She had already spotted the police roadblock up ahead and the suspects’ vehicle awaiting inspection in the queue.

"Qinglan, I can have law enforcement work with you, but you have to promise me to ensure your safety."

"Alright, I promise."

After extracting her promise, Fu Hengyi reiterated his concern before calling the Chief of Public Security.

"Mr. Fu, isn’t this too risky? What if those people turn vicious..." After all, they still had the child.

"This is clearly a criminal gang. Even if we catch a few of them, others remain. If we can’t catch them all at once, there might be more children harmed in the future." Fu Hengyi analyzed the pros and cons calmly. "Given their skilled methods, following them might lead us to more missing children."

The Chief of Public Security listened silently; he knew that if this operation succeeded, it would be a major achievement. Perhaps he could even get a promotion this year. But if they ended up harming the child involved in today’s incident, it could very well mark the end of his career. It was a gamble.

"Alright, Mr. Fu. I’ll immediately call for traffic police cooperation along the way. But they have now left Beijing, and I will need the cooperation of police forces in other provinces," the Chief of Public Security said with difficulty.

Fu Hengyi understood at once. "I’ll arrange for maximum cooperation."