by KJ Charles
“I’m not buying Kelly as self-sacrificing. She’d sell her granny for scrap.”
“I wonder what the hell was in that bag. You know what? I want to go to that love hotel, the one where the old guy got offed.”
“That’s sick.”
He raised his eyes to the heavens. “I was thinking about the CCTV tapes, Butterfly. I’d like to see who else came in and out.”
“You think you’ll see something the yaks didn’t?”
“They don’t know about this boyfriend,” he reminded me.
“If he exists,” I reminded him right back. “Could we look for him? I mean, I’ll bet he’s American—I’ll bet he’s white, come to that—and if he’s a soldier—”
“Or an ex-soldier. Or one of those guys who pretends to be a soldier.”
“I suppose. Still, it can’t be impossible to find him. People might remember someone who was with Kelly. She’s pretty memorable.”
“Then what?”
“How do you mean?” I asked.
“Well, say he exists and say he did it, and say he’s still in Tokyo and he does have this bag, and say he says, ‘Hell, yeah, I’ve got the bag, screw you’?”
“Then I give him a two-hour start and spill my guts to the family.”
He glanced at me. “Would you? Yes, I believe you would.”
“If it’s what it takes.”
“What about Kelly? What happens to her if you tell the family, ‘This is your guy, and she’s in it up to her neck’?”
I hadn’t thought about that. I did now, and I didn’t much like what I thought. “I’m sorry, but she started it,” I said slowly. “If I could help her I guess I would, but if I need to do it to get the family away from Noriko, then Kelly can go to hell, and take her boyfriend with her. Sorry.”
Chanko nodded. “So you’ll give the yaks what they want.”
“If that’s what it takes,” I repeated.
“Everyone does, sooner or later,” he said, mostly to himself, then looked round at me. “So, specifically. How are you planning to find this guy?”
Planning? I’d only thought of him two minutes ago. I searched for options. “Start in Roppongi, I guess. That’s where the gaijin hang out. And I can hide there. Straight shoulder-length black wig, dark contact lenses, I’ll go Japanese and they’ll never see me.”
“Mmm.” He didn’t sound convinced.
“Hey, we can work on it.”
“Yeah. Yeah, I guess we can. I want to get some food soon, I’m starving. I’ll call Taka when we stop.”
“Right,” I muttered, and leaned back in my seat, feeling ill.
I couldn’t believe I was doing this. I couldn’t believe he hadn’t point-blank refused and bundled me bodily out of the country. The bastard. What sort of bodyguard didn’t save you from yourself?
But somewhere between the guns pointed at me, and the gun I’d pointed at Chanko, and the tears in Yoshi’s voice…somewhere in the raw, bloody place in my mind where I wasn’t letting myself think about Noriko, the seeds of something hot and dark and red had taken root and started to grow.
I wasn’t leaving yet.
Maybe I’d get Chanko to show me how to work a safety catch.
We pulled off the motorway at random, driving through low-rise shopping sprawl till we found a place that offered takeout. That’s not as easy to find in Japan as elsewhere—it’s socially unacceptable to eat on the move, which is why fast food places are so cheap and good—but eventually I identified a place that would provide katsudon in a plastic bowl. I got three portions while Chanko stayed in the car and tried not to look conspicuous.
Neither of us really believed they could have staked out the whole province, I’m sure, but neither of us wanted to put it to the test.
We drove out of town, if you could call it that, and stopped at a bleak roadside area with a bench to eat, because Chanko had to get out of the car and stretch. There was a sharp, cold wind whipping through the air, and I was painfully hungry—we’d skipped breakfast, what with one thing and another—so I stayed seated in the car with the door open, delving into the breaded pork cutlet and rice with tiny plastic chopsticks. It didn’t taste like much, but I suspected nothing would.
My head was full of half-formed plans, and when I wasn’t eating I was thinking. I didn’t even notice Chanko was on his mobile till I got out to bin the rubbish. He was standing with his back to me, so he didn’t notice I was there, and he was speaking Japanese.
One of the commonest problems English speakers have with Japanese is remembering to leave out the subjects and pronouns that English repeats incessantly. If you mention that a dog bit your ankle, in English you might add, “I kicked it.” The same comment in Japanese, though, would be, “Kicked.” It’s obvious from context who kicked and what got kicked, so unless you’re bringing in something new, you don’t need nouns and pronouns, even though most English speakers keep on putting them in for safety.
So it’s pretty much impossible to follow one side of a phone conversation conducted in good Japanese. And, unfortunately, the one flawless aspect of Chanko’s Japanese was that he was just as good at stripping down sentences to the bare essentials as he was in English.
“[Someone] not help,” he said. “[Someone] wants to hurt… Yeah…dangerous, but…[someone] knows something useful. Okay, [someone will] go along with [something or someone] for now, but… No, [someone] not tell. Don’t tell,” he added, using an imperative. A brusque one, of course.
Don’t tell who? Don’t tell what?
“Yeah, well, come back, talk, get on plane. No, not stop. Hurt. Hit hard. Got reasons, know. No, don’t tell,” he snarled. “Wakaranai.”
Someone didn’t know, or didn’t understand, something. Possibly Chanko, possibly Taka, possibly the person who wasn’t to be told things. I wondered if that was me.
“Okay… Lunatic.”
That was probably to Taka’s address.
“Yeah, totally crazy…cute, though.”
Please God, that wasn’t.
“Yeah. Thanks. See you.”
I took a few silent but rapid steps away and binned my rubbish thoughtfully. Chanko had sounded pretty angry, and he evidently wanted to keep something quiet. But Taka knew what it was.
I estimated forty-five minutes to get it out of him.
Chanko stretched enormously and rolled his shoulders, then turned to me. “Ready to go on?”
“Yeah. Was that Taka? What did he say?”
“Sure was. He thinks you going back to Tokyo is a fine idea.”
“You’re just saying that to put me off. So is there a plan?”
“All under control. You want to tell me what your problem with Taka is?”
Nice change of subject, big guy. I decided to let it ride, for the moment. “I don’t have a problem with him. He’s got the problem. Okay, if you want the story: Karaoke box one night, five or six months back. Taka brings out a bucket—”
“Hang on, hang on.” Chanko was shaking his head as we got into the car. “Is this story going to involve pufferfish?”
“Heard it, huh?”
“About forty times, and I don’t believe a word. People say a lot of stuff about Taka.”
“They say a lot of stuff about Charles Manson too. I was there, and I don’t know what you heard, but I can assure you it was pretty bad.”
“Funny thing, everyone who’s told me the story was there. Must have been the biggest karaoke box in Tokyo.”
“Well, I was there,” I insisted, buckling myself in as we set off again. “And I know exactly who else was there too. Yoshi and Noriko. Three amazingly drunk salarymen, one of whom hit the floor and missed all the fun. Another Taka—stocky, going grey already, works at the fish market. A Malaysian diamond dealer—”
“Fat Jimmy?”
“That’s the one. Two Kitty-ra girls who couldn’t have been seventeen, an Australian who had come into the wrong booth, and Taka and his bucket of fish. He comes in wired to the e
yeballs—” I imitated the characteristic amphetamine sniff, “—plonks this bucket on the table, and lines up three songs. ‘My Way’, ‘Sympathy for the Devil’ and ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go’.”
“Now, that’s not what I heard.”
“I’m sure it isn’t. So he pulls on these thick gloves, and as the first tune starts up, he throws down the mike, reaches into his bucket, pulls out a pufferfish, slams it right on the table. He’s got a sashimi knife with a ten-inch blade in his other hand—whack. Takes its head off in one go, and then starts chopping it up while it’s still twitching. And all the while, he’s singing. Going full Frank Sinatra with a sashimi knife. I don’t know what you’re laughing about. There was fugu juice flying everywhere. He could have killed people.”
“Oh, come on.”
“Isn’t it like the most powerful neurotoxin in the world or something? One badly prepared mouthful can kill you, and there’s Taka, chopping it into bits, blood and slime spraying onto faces and into drinks, shouting, ‘Sashimi for everyone!’, and half the people at the table too drunk to see what was happening. Not to mention him flailing around with a massive razor-sharp knife like he’s Zatoichi the Blind Swordsman. I’m sure it sounds hilarious when he tells it, but I was really scared, and so was everyone who wasn’t plastered. He was way out of control.”
Chanko glanced at me. “So what’d you do?”
“Well, Noriko and I got the Kitty-ra out—they were hiding under the table with the drunk, screaming their heads off—and Fish Market Taka took them away to put them in a cab. By this point, Crazy Taka was waving the knife in one hand and a pufferfish in the other, all swelled up like a spiky balloon, and he was laughing like a hyena. The salarymen were too blitzed to move, so me, Yoshi and the Aussie started hauling Fat Jimmy out the door, while Noriko hung off his wrist to try and stop him drinking his beer, which had bits of fugu liver floating in it, and that was when the security guards arrived. Okay, you can laugh now.”
“Quite an evening,” he said, grinning.
“I had to empty my account to bribe the karaoke people not to have Taka beaten unconscious—and that wasn’t my idea, either. Fish Market Taka got in trouble with a passing cop who thought he’d done something awful to the Kitty-ra; I had to throw away my handmade raw-silk top that I’d just bought in Ginza because it was covered in fish poison, which meant I went home in my bra; and Fat Jimmy threw up on the Australian. We had a lovely time. I’ve stayed the hell out of Taka’s way since.”
“And then he pretty much begged me to get my ass up to Matsumoto the second he heard you were in trouble.”
“Yeah, well,” I muttered. “He owes me.”
“And he’s looking after your buddy Yoshi.”
“Yeah, well, they go way back.”
“And he thinks you’re doing the right thing coming back to Tokyo.”
“Yeah, well. Just drive, okay?”
Chapter Seven
We were going to stay at Taka’s, Chanko told me.
I grumbled, naturally, but I was actually fairly happy about it. For one thing, Yoshi was there; for another, I wanted to find out what Chanko didn’t want me (probably) to be told, and for a third, it was a great place to hide out. He lived in an obscure bit of Tokyo with an international school somewhere near, so the locals were used to seeing all sorts of gaijin. It was in the northwest of town, a few stops from Ikebukero station, a compact three-bedroom house, which was very impressive for a guy his age, space costing what it does in Tokyo. I couldn’t say for sure where the money had come from. Well, I could, but it would be indiscreet.
He also had an extremely useful neighbourhood bar run by an elderly couple. It was a tiny, shabby, dark and scarcely frequented place, with the customers limited to a few ageing patrons and Taka’s people. Apparently they had had some trouble with local hoodlums—not a common problem in Japan, so all the scarier—and Taka had been instrumental in getting rid of them. The couple repaid him by never remembering or objecting to whoever was with him, and that was something Taka found very convenient indeed. I’d missed the place over the last few months—it’s not easy for a crowd of hostesses to have a quiet drink anywhere, and a few of us had spent a lot of time there before I’d fallen out with Taka.
In fact…
“You ever go to that izakaya near Taka’s place, Chanko?”
“In Ekoda, run by the old couple? Sure.”
“Think it’s safe?”
“If anywhere is. Why?”
“I need to talk to the girls from the bar.”
He took in a breath, stopped himself, then began again. “I’m gonna assume you don’t plan to wander in and say hello.”
“I was planning to phone.”
“Watch it, then. Can’t assume they’re not listening.” They always meant the yakuza now.
“Maybe,” I agreed. “But I have a secret weapon.”
“Don’t tell anyone where we are this time,” he suggested.
I looked up a number in my phone and dialled it on my pay-as-you-go. It rang fourteen times and clicked through to voicemail, as I’d expected: she’d only have made it to bed a couple of hours ago. I hung up and repeated the call. On the fourth try, she picked up the phone.
The language was Dutch. The tone was a purring, sensual voice, husky with sleep but still alluringly inviting. The exact words of the greeting were “Your mother is a whore, you shit-eating pig.”
Sonja wasn’t a morning person.
“Your mother’s so fat, her passport photo is an aerial shot,” I replied in a sugary tone and the same language. “It’s your Swedish friend here. No names.”
Sonja dropped the phone. I put my own away from my ear as she fumbled for it, knocking it against whatever cluttered the floor. “K—you. Oh, my God.”
“Keep it calm and stay in Dutch,” I warned her. “Are you okay?”
“Oh, yeah, fantastic. What do you think?”
“I think we’ve all been royally screwed by the bitch-queen. Are you still working at the bar?”
“Just about. I’m getting out soon, though, they’re pissing me right off. Where are you?”
“Arse end of nowhere. I got chased out of town, the family have nearly caught me twice. With guns.”
“No way. Oh, God, this is really bad. What happened? Did you have anything to do—”
“No, I did not. It was the bitch, Miss Selfish, you know who I mean. She set me up to confuse things.”
“But the, you know, the people are after you too.”
“They’re easily confused,” I snapped. “Did you hear about my flatmate?”
“Nor—”
“No names! Yes, her. She’s in hospital. Brain damage.”
“Min—the shortarse said she got beaten up,” said Sonja softly. “I didn’t realise it was so bad. Those sons of bitches.”
“Yeah, well, they’re still threatening her. And the rest of us. Sonja, I need some help. Nothing to get you in trouble, but there might be a way out of this mess, and I need a hand to find it. Are you on?”
“You? How? Me? For what?” Sonja sounded bewildered, but there was a spark of interest there. I’d bailed her out enough times to know that she had no fear, and very little sense of danger.
“I need inside information,” I told her. “Plus I need someone who knows—ah—you know, the place where all the foreigners hang out.”
“What is this no-names shit?”
“Your phone might be tapped,” I said, feeling ridiculous. “No, seriously. Look, just take my word for it, okay?”
“Whatever.” Sonja stifled a yawn. “What do you want me to do?”
“Tell me about the others, for a start. Is, ah, Round-Faced Girl okay?”
“No. She’s got herself hooked up with one of the family, and he’s slapping her about.” Sonja’s voice tightened with anger. “Some fucker she knew from somewhere else. Apparently he made a pass at her one time and she knocked him back, and it looks like he’s been holding a grudge. She’s s
cared to death. Zombie eyes. Remember Kimiko?”
I remembered. She’d been a sweet, quiet girl who flinched at sudden movements and never made eye contact. She hid the bruises well, but we all knew. Eventually, Minachan and I found the addresses of some women’s refuges and tried to talk to her. Kimiko bowed repeatedly and thanked us in a voice rendered almost inaudible by humiliation, and never came back to the bar. One of Nature’s victims, Minachan had said.
Minachan. “How’s Very Small Girl?” I asked.
“Very pissed off. Been waiting to hear from you. I wouldn’t say anything to the others. They’d do anything to get the hell out of this, and I don’t blame them. And don’t trust, you know, Mummy, either.”
“I don’t plan to trust anyone,” I said. “Can you come and meet me tonight? Keep it quiet and don’t tell anyone where you’re going.”
“Okay. Where am I going?”
“You remember that place we went a couple of times, and we had teriyaki mackerel and there was a long grey hair on the plate?”
“Euw. Yeah, I know, okay. When?”
“Tonight, call it seven? If you can get away without being followed.”
“What am I, James Bond? Nobody’s following me, nobody gives a fuck.” She snarled. “I tell you what, Miss Selfish did the right thing stoving one of the bastards’ heads in.”
“If she hadn’t landed us all in the shit, I’d agree with you.”
Chanko raised a brow at me when I ended the call. “What was that, Swedish?”
“Dutch. I was talking to Sonja from the bar, and if the yaks have anyone who can speak Dutch, I’ll be impressed. I arranged to meet her tonight, that bar in Ekoda.”
“What?”
“She says they aren’t being followed. And I’ve had a few ideas about how we go about finding the boyfriend.”
“Hang on. You already got stitched up by your mama-san and another girl, remember?”
“Sonja’s different. For a start, she’s got a European passport, she can get a long way away without needing a visa. For another thing, she’s never done what she’s told, or anything in her own best interest, in her whole life.”