Police in the Zhejiang city of Ningbo are searching for a 9-year-old girl who mysteriously went missing on Sunday evening.

Zhang Zixin was last seen in the company of two adult tenants at her family home in Zhejiang province. Later, the pair were found dead in an apparent suicide but there was no sign of Zhang.

Taken to a “wedding”

With her parents getting a divorce, Zhang was living with her grandparents in a village in Zhejiang near to the capital of Hangzhou.

Two tenants also living there, a 43-year-old man surnamed Liang and a 46-year-old woman surnamed Xie, told Zhang’s grandparents that they would take Zhang with them to Shanghai where she would be the flower girl at a wedding.

Last Thursday (July 4), the grandparents called Zhang’s father who objected to the idea, only to find out that Liang and Xie had already taken his daughter.

When he contacted the pair, Liang and Xie said that they had all gone to Ningbo instead and promised to bring Zhang back on Saturday (July 6).

However, on that day, Zhang still wasn’t back home. Liang and Xie sent her dad an eletronic train ticket… which he discovered had been canceled.

On Sunday (July 7), Zhang’s dad called the pair and spoke to his daughter who confirmed that they were all in Ningbo. The father suggested that they all get a taxi back to Hangzhou which he would pay for but at around 6 pm Liang and Xie claimed that their phone’s battery was running low and their charger was broken.

Bodies in a lake

The following day, the bodies of Liang and Xie were both found tied together in Ningbo’s Dongqian Lake. It is believed that they took their own lives.

Zhang is around 1.3 meters tall with long hair and red glasses. She was last seen on surveillance tape on Sunday evening, walking with Liang and Xie in front of a Ningbo hotel alongside Liang and Xie. She was wearing a white top, green skirt, grey sandals.

Card by the shore

On Wednesday, Zhang’s Hangzhou resident card was found along the Ningbo coast by a fisherman.

Hundreds of rescuers have been searching the sea and nearby mountains but they have recovered no other trace of the girl.

Police are now offering a reward of 20,000 yuan ($2,900) for information that leads to finding Zhang.