“We don’t appreciate trespassers around here,” he warned, his voice taut and terse as a garrote.
I began to worry that the stitches in my arm would burst if he continued at this rate.
“I’m not a trespasser. I’m a federal agent, and you’re about to land in deep trouble if you don’t immediately release me,” I hissed.
“Oh, really? I suppose that depends on exactly what type of agent you are,” he countered. “For all I know, you’re the kind that likes to play illegal spy games.”
“I’m with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service,” I furiously revealed. “And this is your last warning. Let go of my arm.”
He hesitated one tenth of a second too long, and I ground my heel into his foot while slamming my palm hard against his chin.
The man’s head flew back, clicking his teeth together. He grunted in surprise and relaxed his grip. I pulled myself free, as he spit on the ground and angrily glared at me.
“Now see what you’ve done? I bit my tongue.” His fingers gingerly probed its tip. “Look at that. You’ve made it bleed.”
“What a shame. Then I guess we’ll both have bruises from this evening,” I responded, and checked my arm.
Unbelievable. The stitches were still all in place.
“You’re going to regret this,” he vowed. “It’s common knowledge that Fish and Wildlife has no jurisdiction over the docks. National Marine Fisheries Service won’t be very happy to learn that you’ve been snooping around their territory.”
“I have a suggestion. Why don’t you give me your name, along with that of your company, and I’ll be sure to report this to them,” I caustically responded. If he thought that kind of threat was going to scare me, he could join the crowd at the back of the line.
He smiled and his face glowed like a pale moon in the night.
“My company is Capital City Fish Products,” he obligingly revealed.
An inner alarm warned me that the answer had come way too easily.
“But I have a better idea,” he continued. “Since you seem to be so interested, why don’t I take you on a personal tour right now? You know, I have the strangest feeling that not a soul knows where you are this evening.”
My suspicions were confirmed as the man suddenly lunged for me. I reached for my gun, knowing I’d be in trouble if he again grabbed hold of my arm. But we both stopped cold as a figure abruptly lurched from out of the dark. He bumped into my assailant, knocking him off balance, and then swayed from side to side and back and forth like a punch-drunk fighter as he stood between us.
“Hey, Mikey! So you finally got yourself a hot date, huh? Whatsa matter? Doesn’t she like your moves?”
My hero hiccuped and burped, exuding a wave of booze that came rolling toward me like a tsunami.
“Be a pal. How ’bout cuttin’ me in on the action? What can I tell ya? It’s been a while since I’ve had a woman,” he slurred, and leered suggestively at me.
He stood close enough so that I saw what I’d thought was a sweater was actually his hairy chest. His pot belly flopped over shorts slung dangerously low around his hips, and a pair of yellow rubber boots reached up to his wrinkled knees.
My knight in denim cut-offs had a complexion to match his hoary breath. Broken capillaries snaked across his nose and cheeks like crooked routes on a road map, attesting to the fact that he’d been drinking for too many years. A pair of droopy lids hung heavy over bloodshot eyes that were positioned above a nose the shape and size of a rutabaga. Even his hair looked as if it was on a bender, sticking out on all sides. As for his voice, it sounded as though he’d gargled with broken glass, most of which still remained in his throat.
Mikey’s gaze coldly flitted between the two of us.
“Sure, Dave. She’s all yours. Have yourself a blast,” he replied, clipping off the end of each word as if it had frostbite.
He pulled a wad of cash from his pocket and peeled off a ten-dollar bill. “Here. Buy another bottle of booze while you’re at it, and have yourselves a really good time.”
“Aw hell, Mikey. That’s awful nice of ya,” my booze hound said, choking up and getting all teary-eyed.
He moved in to give Mikey a hug, but Mr. Capital City shoved him aside.
“Get off me, you lousy drunk,” Mikey contemptuously responded, and began to brush off his clothes.
I took the opportunity to leave while the going was good.
“I’ll be seeing you,” I called from over my shoulder, while heading for the gate.
“You can count on that, Agent Porter,” Mr. Capital City replied.
A flurry of goosebumps instantly broke out on my skin. I’d never told him my name.
I whirled around to confront the man, but he’d already disappeared inside. Only the drunk remained, staring at me with an odd expression.
A sickening feeling took hold as I realized that everyone seemed to know more about what was going on than I did. I hurried forward, increasingly aware that I was living on the edge of a sword—one on which I didn’t have a very good grip.
I’d just about reached the gate when the squish, squish, squish of rubber soles, pounding on pavement, swiftly came from behind, and a hand landed on my shoulder. I took no chances this time, but spun around, grabbed onto it, and twisted the offending arm behind its owner’s back.
“Hey, wait a minute! We gotta talk,” a raspy voice protested.
I didn’t have to see a thing to know who I had in my grip. His breath provided all the clue that was needed. It was my ninety-proof, alcohol-embalmed friend Dave, with the bloodshot eyes.
“I think you’d better sleep it off,” I suggested, not in the mood to deal with him.
I released the drunk and started to walk away.
“Like hell, I will. I’m trying to help you here. This is serious business. Or are you too dense to understand that?” he challenged.
I slowed my pace, having become aware there was something about him. For one thing, he no longer slurred his words.
“You’re the Fish and Wildlife agent, aren’t you?” he continued to address my back. “In which case, you damn well better be interested in what I have to say.”
I came to a halt, turned, and looked at the man.
“I thought you were wasted back there.”
He tapped his temple with his index finger and shrewdly smiled. “Nah. That was just an act to help save your ass. You can trust Sharkfin Dave. I never get more than a little wasted. It don’t matter how much I drink.”
“Sharkfin Dave?” I repeated.
The name rolled off my tongue, conjuring up an image as vivid as Davy Crockett or Daniel Boone. Only this was a shirtless drunk that stood before me.
“Why are you called that?” I questioned, my adrenaline kicking into action.
“Because I’m so goooood at catchin’ sharks,” he responded, with a greedy gleam in his eye. “You know what I like to call ’em?”
“No. What?” I asked, my stomach beginning to hatch butterflies.
“Wolves of the sea,” he said, licking his lips as though he could taste the words.
“What made you give them that name?” I continued, half repulsed, and half mesmerized.
“Because if you listen real close, you can practically hear them howl when they’re caught.”
He burst into a raucous laugh, and a sour taste filled my mouth.
“So then, you still catch them?” I followed up, determined not to let the man off my hook.
He silently nodded. “At least, I did until about a week ago. But I’m not the one you want. I can help you land the real son of a bitch that’s running this business.”
“And why would you do that?” I promptly inquired, afraid this might only be a dream, and I’d suddenly wake up.
“Because that bastard you were playing mano-a-mano with a minute ago is the dirtbag that killed my boss,” Sharkfin Dave disclosed.
My pulse joined my heart in a whirlwind sprint.
“And who w
ould your boss have been?” I queried although certain I already knew.
“Charlie Hong, owner of Pacific Catch Products,” Sharkfin replied. “I was his right-hand man. I just about ran this place in the good old days, when finning was legal. That’s how much fin we used to bring in. Once it became banned, I turned into his cargo man, going out to sea to rendezvous with tankers. We’d pick up bags of fins off the ships and smuggle ’em back in. The money wasn’t as good, but it was still a living. ’Course, even that’s over, now that Charlie’s dead.”
He hacked up a lugie and spat on the ground.
“I’m telling you, that bastard took my livelihood away. So he threw me a tenner tonight. Big friggin’ deal. It won’t pay my rent, or keep me in food and booze.” Sharkfin wiped the back of his hand across his lips in distaste.
“If you’re not still involved in finning, then why are you hanging around the docks?” I asked, not yet ready to trust him.
“This is where I live these days. In a shack that used to be my office. Hell, I can’t afford anything else. Besides, you oughta be damn grateful that I was here tonight, keeping a watch on things. Mikey would have killed you the same as he did Hong, and thought nothing of it,” Sharkfin attested. “Come on. We can’t talk out in the open. Let’s go to my place.”
My hand strayed to the butt of my gun as I followed, assuring that I’d be safe.
Sharkfin Dave led the way past shuttered buildings, slumbering forklifts, and sheds of corrugated steel, as my feet slogged through water and slippery strands of fish guts. His yellow boots reflected in pools of scum like twin golden suns as we stealthily traveled across the warehouse lot.
He walked with a limp, and I realized that his one leg was as deeply scarred as a cat’s scratching post, its girth much thinner than the other. I wondered what had happened, and if Mikey had something to do with it.
We arrived at a small gray shack with a plywood door and a white plastic bucket in front. Sharkfin kicked the pail aside and booted in the entrance.
To describe the place as a crash pad would have been to give it too much credence. The hut was an absolute dive. Girly calendars were plastered on the walls, and the furnishings consisted of rusty filing cabinets, a three-legged table, and a broken down chair. A mattress as old and thin as Methuselah lay like a corpse on the floor. Sharkfin flopped down on it and motioned for me to take the chair. I gingerly balanced myself on the wobbly seat.
The only thing of interest in the room were two shark jaws that hung on the wall. One had a mouthful of notched and serrated teeth, while the other contained what could have passed for a collection of lethal knives. Sharkfin Dave caught my eye, and his lips curled up in a smile.
“Those belonged to a couple of badass friends of mine—a mako and a tiger shark. I can tell you it was one helluva job yanking those things from their mouths. I cut the shit out of myself. They may not look lively now, but those two gave me quite the time. Yep, I’ve got fond memories of ’em. We’ll always have Paris, isn’t that right, my little beauties?” he bantered, looking up at the two deadly sets of jaws.
“The man that confronted me out there—Mikey—is he a shark-fin dealer?” I questioned.
“You betcha. Michael Leung is now the main mover and shaker of fins in Hawaii,” Dave said, and then discharged a snort. “Did I say Hawaii? Who am I kidding? We’re talking the whole goddamn world.”
Leung. My stomach tightened, and the pain in my arm began to throb even more. My assailant had the same last name as the notorious ivory dealer in Hong Kong. Not only that, but Leung had also been scribbled on Sammy’s drawing of a shark.
“His father wouldn’t happen to be George Leung, by any chance, would he?” I asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.
Sharkfin responded with a shrug. “I couldn’t tell you. All I know is that his daddy lives in Hong Kong and makes big bucks. Word has it the family’s rich as shit. Daddy set Mikey up in the shark-fin trade over here. And to do that, you’ve gotta be plenty wealthy and have a chunk of ready change in your pocket, ’cause this is purely a cash business.”
Fins would naturally change hands for cash only. It was one of those gray markets in which most transactions weren’t even recorded. It made me all the more curious as to how Sammy had gotten hold of those papers.
So that’s what George Leung was doing with his money from the illegal ivory trade these days. He was setting up another lucrative cash business for himself and his family.
“Mikey’s job is to buy and dry the fins over here,” Sharkfin explained. “After that’s done, he sends them on to his daddy’s factory in Hong Kong, where they go through the final process.”
Sharkfin Dave watched me with the stealth of a spider and I knew what was going on. He was waiting to see if I took the bait. Most likely, he was turning on Leung in the hope of taking his place. That would be something I’d have to deal with later on. Right now, I needed to learn all I could about Leung and the shark-fin trade.
“I saw a boat unloading about twenty garbage bags into a pickup tonight. After that, it drove into the warehouse area. Do you suppose shark fins were inside those bags?” I probed.
“You’re talking about the blue pickup that’s parked over at Mikey’s place?” Sharkfin asked, and began to scratch the back of his head.
I nodded.
“Probably, but that’s just kid stuff. Mikey usually gets anywhere from eleven to twenty tons of fins in at a time. What you saw tonight was a small haul.” Dave kicked off his boots and proceeded to pick at his toes.
“Eleven to twenty tons? That would be one hell of a lot of garbage bags,” I remarked. “He couldn’t possibly pull it off without drawing a lot of attention. How does he manage to do it?”
“They come off his boat packed in bales and are thrown directly into containers,” Sharkfin matter-of-factly stated.
I looked at him, clearly puzzled.
Sharkfin Dave sighed and sat up. “Okay. Let me lay it out for you. Mikey has an eighty-foot boat called the Magic Dragon. It rendezvous with those big-ass foreign mother ships about two hundred miles out at sea.”
“I’ve never heard the term ‘mother ship’ before. What are they?” I asked.
Sharkfin Dave shook his head in disbelief, as if unable to imagine such a thing. “They’re the large vessels that roam the high seas, refueling and resupplying fishing boats. Think of them as sort of giant UPS platforms. These same mother ships also collect shark fins from the boats that they supply.”
“Why would they do that?” I asked, curious as to the reason.
“Because eighty-foot fishing boats don’t have enough space on board to store hundreds of shark fins. Not if they want to have plenty of room for all the tuna they’re hoping to catch. Besides that, they also need lots of storage space for the ice that’s used to keep the tuna fresh until they finally get back to port,” Sharkfin explained.
That was something I hadn’t thought about before.
“So the fishing boats will leave all the fins they’ve gathered so far on the mother ship whenever they refuel. Well, Mikey, being the shrewd businessman he is, decided to work out a deal with them. He takes pre-orders for shark fins from traders in Asia, and then guarantees the fishermen that he’ll buy all the fins they’re able to collect. That way, the fishing boats don’t do business with anyone but him, and Mikey’s able to monopolize the trade. Pretty clever, huh?”
That was putting it mildly.
“How does he go about actually collecting the fins from these boats?” I questioned, curious as to every aspect of the trade.
“As I said, the fishing boats transfer their haul of shark fins to the mother ship. Then Mikey’s boat makes a five-day trip out to sea to pick them up all in one place. That’s what’s called trans-shipment. It’s also why he wanted my boss out of the way. Now there’s no other competition in Hawaii, and he’s king of the hill.”
“No wonder Leung makes a fortune,” I exclaimed, softly whistling under my breath.
“Don’t be fooled,” Sharkfin corrected. “The big money isn’t made just by drying and sending the fins on to other buyers in Asia. It’s Daddy Leung, and his shark-fin processing factory in Hong Kong, that gives sonny boy Mikey the edge. This way, the Leungs are able to keep the entire business in the family. Hell, I heard their company made over twelve million dollars in profit last year alone.”
The papers I’d found at Yakimov’s had revealed the Leungs were also involved in the restaurant trade. They were clearly able to keep their customers well supplied in high-priced shark-fin soup. The Leungs were nothing less than a one-stop, one-shop shark-fin operation.
“Except that Daddy’s been getting pretty mad at Mikey lately,” Sharkfin dryly revealed.
“Why’s that?” I inquired, always eager to hear the dirt.
“It seems that Mikey’s gone and gotten himself a sideline that’s taking time away from the family business. I guess he’s grown tired of being under Daddy’s thumb, and wants to branch out and make his own money,” Dave said, idly scratching his belly.
“What kind of sideline is that?” I asked, figuring it probably involved the chameleon trade. Why else would his name and Yakimov’s have been linked together on that same piece of paper inside Sammy’s box?
“He’s gotten hooked up in some sort of bootleg Viagra scheme. Talk about a booming business. I hear that his company’s growing about six inches an hour,” he joked. “Mikey’s got a cousin that handles the distribution of it in Hong Kong.”
Of course. Magic Dragon Medicinals. So Leung was the big fish that Vinnie was after. There was no question but that I needed to snag Leung before Vinnie uncovered this information and tracked him down.
“I think we can help each other out,” I told Sharkfin, figuring he could interpret it any which way he chose. “But I need proof to back all of this up.”
Sharkfin looked at me, and that same greedy gleam snuck back into his eyes.
“How about if it’s arranged so that you’re here to see the fins off-loaded for yourself? Would that be good enough?”
My nerves stood up and gave a twenty-one-gun salute. “You can do that?”
Restless Waters Page 21