by Sean Black
She bristled at the smirk he hadn’t managed to keep off his face. “Yeah, gangsters. MS-13, bitch.”
“You know how many people were killed in my country after Chairman Mao came to power?” he asked her.
“I don’t even know what country you’re talking about. Who is this Mao dude?”
This Mao dude. His smile broadened. “Two and a half million killed. Another two million committed suicide. That’s a gangster.”
Her eyes narrowed. “So what? You ain’t no Mao, or whoever.” She lapsed back into her sulk.
The road opened up again. The track evened out a little.
If the satellite view was correct, they would soon reach a rise that lay above the house. He planned on leaving the car there and hiking the rest of the way at twilight. He still didn’t know what he was going to do with the girl. She had been part of what had happened, he had figured that much, but he didn’t have it in him to punish her, like he had punished her friend.
Was it because she was female? That was part of it. He found it more difficult to hurt a woman than a man.
But that wasn’t the only reason. She was around the same age as Ji Chi would be now. She was someone’s daughter. He wasn’t sure if he could wrench a daughter from someone else, like Chow Yan had done to him. He knew that pain. He had lived with it all these years. He had no reason to wish it upon someone else.
“So, what’s up with this anyway?” Princess asked.
“Up with?”
“Yeah, up with. Why are you doing this? You working for this guy?”
“Which guy?” he said.
“You know, their father.”
They began the climb to the top of the rise. The car struggled with the steepness of the incline, the engine whining in protest.
“Something like that,” he said, as the car rolled to a halt. He put on the parking brake, and got out, taking the Mossberg with him and walking to the very apex of the rise so he could take a look at the ranch-house below.
Princess watched him get out. He had been careful enough to take the gun with him. But a sunburst glint below the ignition revealed the car key with the rental fob still attached.
Her heart almost stopped when she saw it. All she could do now was sit there, and wait, counting his every step. Halfway up the slope, he turned and looked back at the car.
She made a show of studying her nails, playing the role of a disinterested teenager on the world’s weirdest road trip. He turned back, and began to climb again.
He took four more steps. Then five.
She did a quick calculation. As soon as he heard the engine start, he would react. He would be running back down the slope. That would be faster.
How many seconds did she have from that moment. Five? Six?
Would he try to catch the car? Or would he shoot?
A shotgun had a wide spread that could easily catch the rear tires.
What was her alternative? Stay with him?
And what then?
Either his mission, whatever it was, would fail, and she’d be facing Shotcaller. Or it would succeed and she’d be surplus. He hadn’t hesitated to kill Joker. Why would he behave any differently with her?
This was her one shot. And it was a gift.
He was almost at the very top of the rise. She leaned over, making sure her hand was on the key.
She pulled her knees up, clearing the gear shift, and scooted into the driver’s seat.
She pressed down on the brake pedal, and turned the key. She slammed the transmission into drive, hit the gas pedal, and turned the wheel.
She didn’t look back until she’d completed the turn and she was heading back down the dusty, dirty track. Then she allowed herself a single glance in the rear view. He was scrabbling down the slope, the shotgun in his hand.
The car picked up speed. She braced herself for a blast shattering the rear windscreen.
It didn’t come.
A fresh peek in the rearview revealed that he had stopped. He was standing, the shotgun at his side.
Two thoughts followed in quick succession. The first: why wasn’t he shooting?
The second came almost immediately. He wasn’t shooting because a shotgun made one hell of a noise. Especially on a hillside overlooking a canyon.
The final time Princess checked the rearview, he had turned around and was trudging back up the slope.
A few minutes later, as she turned from the fire road back onto blacktop, Princess glanced down at her cell phone. It lit up with an incoming message.
WHERE ARE YOU?
She reached over and powered it down.
Nowhere you’ll ever find me.
A perfectly open road stretched out before her. She glanced at the gas gauge. The tank was almost full. More than enough to take her well out of reach of Shotcaller. And this car? It had no link to her.
Unless she drove back into East LA, there was no way they would find her. Not if she stayed careful.
Okay, Joker hadn’t made it with her, but it hadn’t been her fault. She had tried to tell him there was no more time.
She looked back at her cell phone. Anger rose in her. She powered the phone back up, opened the text and hit reply.
No, she told herself. That was chicken shit.
She hit the call button and waited for the call to connect.
“Yeah, that meeting. I ain’t gonna make it. Nice crib, though. Oh, and good luck holding our two friends. Someone’s coming for them. In fact, he’s outside the house now, watching you, and believe me, he’s super-pissed. I gave him all your details too. Where to find you, all that good stuff.”
At the other end of the line, Shotcaller started to curse her out.
“Good luck. You’re going to need it.”
Now, with a feeling of real closure, and a line drawn, she lowered the driver’s window and tossed the phone out. She drove east, a smile spreading on her face.
42
Shotcaller looked down at his cell phone. She was bluffing. She had to be. He tried to call back. There was no answer. He tried again with the same result.
What was she talking about? Some guy outside the house?
But he had given her the address. That much was true. She could easily call it into the LA County Sheriff’s Department.
He pulled up another number. This call was answered immediately.
“Move them.”
The man at the other end began to question him. Shotcaller cut him off.
“Just do it. Now.”
43
The automated ranch-house gates of 17786 Yerba Buena Road slid open. A hulking black Suburban barreled through, waved in by two guards toting semi-autos. Gravel sprayed from under the wheels as the driver beat a path to the front of the house.
The instant the Suburban came to a stop, side on to the front door, the rear passenger doors popped open. The driver and front-seat passenger exited. Both were armed, the passenger with the same semi-automatic rifle, and the driver rocking a pistol on his hip.
The main entrance door of the house opened and two men guided Emily and Charlie, blinking, into the sunlight. Their hands were cinched behind their backs with plasti-ties.
The two men hustled them down the steps towards the Suburban. They helped them up into the rear of the vehicle. The front-seat passenger climbed in with them. The doors slammed. The driver got back in, turned the Suburban in a wide circle, and headed out through the open gates.
From arrival to departure had taken less than sixty seconds. The two men on the gate walked slowly back to the house to begin the clean-up. Their task was to remove any trace of its most recent guests in case the LA County Sheriff’s Department made an unannounced visit.
44
Lock palmed his cell phone to Ty, who took it, angling the screen so he could get a better look at the pictures. He winced. It wasn’t something Lock had seen him do all that often. Like most men who had seen active duty on the frontline, it took a lot to get a reaction from him.
<
br /> Ty swiped the screen, working his way stoically through the pictures.
“That’s some ISIS-level shit right there,” said Ty, handing back the phone.
Lock pulled up to the valet stand. He and Ty got out. Lock passed the key fob to the valet with a twenty-dollar bill. “Keep it close. We may not be staying all that long.”
“Yes, sir,” said the valet.
The two troubleshooters hustled up the red-carpeted stairs of the hotel. A man in livery held open the door for them. They walked into the lobby, and headed to the desk.
“We’re meeting with Mr. Chow Yan.”
The receptionist lifted the phone and made a hushed phone call. “If you could take a seat for a moment, someone will be with you presently.”
As he put the phone down, Lock leaned over the desk and snatched it from his hand. “Excuse me.” He held it to his ear. “We’re coming up.”
He returned the phone to the startled desk jockey. “Which room?”
The receptionist struggled to regain his composure. “It’s not our policy to––“
Ty cathedraled his fingers and cracked his knuckles. “The man didn’t ask you about hotel policy, he asked what room.”
The receptionist hesitated. Lock slid a fifty over the desk with his fingertips. “We’re kind of in a rush here.”
“Penthouse suite,” said the receptionist, the fifty disappearing.
They turned and made for the elevator.
“Remind me never to recommend a principal stay here. Their security sucks,” said Lock.
“Word,” said Ty.
The elevator doors opened directly into the suite’s private foyer, another hefty tip having secured the attendant’s cooperation. Lock knocked at the door.
“He’s going to be pissed,” said Ty.
“Too bad,” said Lock.
The peephole darkened. Lock and Ty stepped back so whoever it was could see them clearly. They could make out a muffled conversation. It sounded like a young woman and a man. Lock couldn’t tell if the man was Li or Chow Yan, but the slightly deeper timbre suggested Chow.
The door opened to reveal Miss Po, the attractive young woman, with no visible means of support, who lived opposite Emily and Charlie. Her hair was wet, and she had a fluffy white hotel bath sheet wrapped around her. Her expression hovered halfway between embarrassment and resignation. At least, thought Lock, it wasn’t Chow Yan’s wife who was the unannounced visitor.
“May we?” said Lock.
Without a word, she held the door open, and he and Ty walked in.
The suite was cavernous and suitably plush. It ran about five thousand square feet and ten thousand dollars a night, two dollars per square foot per night. Miss Po padded away and disappeared into one of the three bedrooms as Lock and Ty walked past the kitchen area and into the lounge.
Chow Yan walked out of one of the other bedrooms. He was wearing trousers but no shirt, his belly spilling in rolls over his belt.
From what Lock knew of ernai, mistresses in China tended to focus entirely on money and power. Aesthetics didn’t come into it, which was just as well for Chow Yan. He wondered if the tycoon was aware of Li Yeng’s closeness to Miss Po. It was something he could deploy, but only if he had to. Right now, his focus was clear. To find out what the hell was going on.
Chow grabbed a white silk-blend dress shirt from the back of a couch and began to put it on.
“Who let you up here?” Chow said, buttoning the shirt, and opening a jewelry box to reveal a pair of diamond-studded gold cufflinks.
Lock tossed the briefcase onto the couch. It slid off. “I’m returning this. It’s light the money we gave to one of our associates to get his car fixed. My not invoicing you for our fee more than covers it.”
“I don’t understand,” said Chow.
“The hell you don’t.”
Chow stared at him.
“Do you remember the last thing I said to you?” Lock asked.
“When we last spoke you were negotiating.”
Lock advanced on him as Ty hung back.
“Secrets,” Lock said, now within touching distance of Chow Yan. “They get people hurt.” He dug out his cell phone, opened the photograph folder, and tapped on the first of the images he’d received an hour before from Noah Orzana.
The image was of a kidney-shaped swimming pool. But the water was not so much azure blue as muddy brown-red. Four men floated in it, face down, limbs splayed out like starfish.
Lock passed the phone to Chow Yan. He looked at the image, his expression shifting instantly from irritation to shock.
He looked up from the cell phone. “Who are these men? Why are you showing me this?”
“They’re MS-13 gang members. Or soldiers from a cartel linked to MS-13. Or they’re freelance muscle of some kind. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is that they work, pardon me, they worked for the people who have your daughter and your nephew. Someone killed them and dumped them in the pool of a house between Hidden Valley and north Malibu.”
Chow Yan stared at him, disbelieving.
“I know I didn’t do it. And I’ve been around long enough not to believe in coincidences. So that leaves you.”
Chow glanced around the suite. “I’ve been here the whole time.”
“That I don’t doubt,” said Lock, with a glance to the closed bedroom door his mistress had disappeared through. “Interesting coping mechanism, by the way. A shrink would have a field day. Anyway, I’m not suggesting you did this. But you know who did, don’t you? Just like you knew when we spoke last who the man coming out of that house in East LA was.”
There was a knock at the door. Ty went to answer it, his hand falling to the butt of the Glock riding high on his hip. If Chow Yan had other people on the payroll there was every chance they wouldn’t appreciate this unscheduled meeting.
Ty checked the peephole and opened the door. Li Yeng walked in.
“Good, I’m glad you’re here,” said Lock. “Take a seat.”
“What’s going on? Have they been back in touch?” Li asked.
“Oh, I almost forgot.” Lock reached into his pocket and pulled out the silver button tracking device he’d found planted in the briefcase. He tossed it at Li. “This is yours. It was hidden inside the lining of that.”
Li caught it one-handed. He looked sheepish. “I’m sorry.”
“You and me both,” said Lock. “Yes, they’ve been in touch. Your boss can bring you up to speed.”
Chow Yan said something to Li in Mandarin. He walked over and handed the younger man Lock’s phone with the picture of the four dead men floating in the swimming pool. Their conversation continued. It grew heated. Lock couldn’t follow it, but he didn’t need to know Mandarin to catch the general drift. Dollars to donuts, they were arguing over whether or not to let Lock cut himself loose or tell him some version of the truth.
A minute of rapid-fire back and forth later, Chow Yan held up his hand and Li Yeng fell silent.
“I told you secrets got people hurt,” Lock said to them. “Now, I don’t know if you care about what happens to your daughter and your nephew. But if you do then you have to cut out all the BS, and be honest with me. Completely honest. Whatever you tell me now stays in this room, but I need the truth. I need to know what’s going on here. What’s really going on.”
Chow Yan bowed his head. Finally they glimpsed a real man.
“You’re right, Mr. Lock. What you said about secrets, it’s true.”
Lock walked across and hunkered down so that he was at eye level with him. “So, tell me. I don’t want to walk away from this.” He glanced back over his shoulder at Ty, who was standing with arms folded. “Neither does Tyrone. Not when two young people are out there at the mercy of these people. But you have to trust us. It’s the only way we can help you.”
Chow Yan nodded. “I know.” He took a deep breath. “Can I ask you something?”
Lock gave a nod. “Go ahead.”
“Do you
think that, after this, they are still alive?”
The truth worked both ways. Lock knew that. And he guessed that Chow Yan knew it too. He didn’t know if this question was a test or not. In a way it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that he extended the same respect to his client that he wanted to receive.
“Honestly, I don’t know. They won’t have taken the deaths of four of their men lightly, I’ll tell you that. On the other hand, if they kill them, this will all have been for nothing. Orzana has probably said enough that we could have him arrested. He won’t want that. On the other hand, with a good lawyer he’d likely be able to wriggle free.”
Chow Yan sat perfectly still, staring at the rug. He seemed to be shrinking inside himself as Lock spoke.
“Let’s just say that this guy you hired, the man who did this, he hasn’t helped matters.”
“I didn’t hire him. I wasn’t lying about that.”
“But you were lying?” said Lock.
“It was . . . What do they call it in your language?” He looked to Li Yeng for assistance.
“A lie of omission,” said Li.
“Yes,” said Chow Yan. “I didn’t lie. But I didn’t tell you the whole truth either.”
“Then maybe it’s time to do that,” said Lock.
Lock and Ty watched as Li Yeng ushered an immaculately dressed and made-up Miss Po out of the suite. On the way, she stopped by Chow Yan, and gave him a kiss on the top of the head, almost like he was her grandfather. The gesture ratcheted up the creepiness factor even further, thought Lock, and it was already close to off the chart.
Ty leaned in to him. “This is some weird scene, even by LA standards,” he said.
“They’re not from LA,” Lock reminded him.
“No kidding. We’re having to import our weirdness now. Seems like they do that better than us too,” said Ty.
Li Yeng walked back into the room and sat down in an armchair opposite. Chow Yan gestured Lock and Ty to seats.