by Ian Hamilton
“Or me them.”
“I heard you wrapped them around your finger,” he said, smiling.
“They felt sorry for me.”
“And then you managed to get enough money out of the guy to look after everyone. That’s when Uncle said, ‘I need to meet that girl.’”
“And the rest is history.”
“Shenzhen was smaller then,” he said.
“Still had to be five or six million people.”
“Yeah, and now it’s over fifteen million.”
“What a place.”
“I knew it before it became the first special economic zone. It was the late seventies and I was dating a girl from there. It was all farmland and fishing villages back then — maybe a couple of hundred thousand people spread across the entire area. And it was pretty, with Shenzhen Bay on the coast and all rolling hills and orchards inland. Shit, what a change. I don’t think there’s a hill left.”
“I’ve never seen anything but the ugly side of it,” Ava said. “I’ve been there five or six times. I don’t know why those thieves thought it was a good place to hide; it never really worked out for them. But every time I came, there were two more skyscrapers, another highway, another industrial park filled with factories that weren’t built to code and were prone to blowing up or falling down.”
“Half an hour from Hong Kong but a world away,” Sonny said.
“Sonny, that is profound.”
He smiled. “Uncle used to say that. He never got over his hatred of the Communists. Whenever he heard people talking about Shenzhen as a symbol of the new China, he would start ranting.”
“I never heard him rant.”
“Did you ever say Shenzhen is a symbol of the new China?”
“No.”
“Then that’s why.”
The train arrived at Lok Ma Chau on schedule. They got a taxi and drove to Nongyuan Road. The ride took them through neighbourhoods that were a mixture of soaring apartment buildings and commercial towers. Nothing was small in Shenzhen. The architecture wasn’t quite as boxy as Ava remembered, but even the odd design gem couldn’t take away the oppressive feeling inspired by the line of buildings looming over the highway.
The restaurant was in the middle of a block of shops and eateries that ran down both sides of the street. Every building was the same height and every façade was the same distance from the street. Only the store signs and windows offered any visual variety.
It was just past eleven when they got out of the cab in front of the restaurant. Ava scanned the street. “There’s a coffee shop that has some decent sightlines,” she said, pointing across the street and to the right.
“I’ll meet you there in a while. I want to take a walk,” Sonny said.
Ava nodded. She knew he would walk down and around several blocks. In all her years with Uncle, she couldn’t remember him going to a meeting with Sonny where Sonny didn’t case the area. At first she thought he was being overly cautious, but after a meeting in Sha Tin went sideways and they had to make a hurried early exit, she never questioned his preparation again. Her insistence on arriving early for meetings mirrored that caution. People who were supposed to be alone arrived with henchmen. Secure locations turned out to be anything but. The only thing she ever wasted by arriving early was time. And the thing she saved more than once was her well-being.
The coffee shop had a rack of Chinese newspapers. She picked up three and then bought a black coffee. She sat at a table near the window that gave her a clear view of the Imperial Manor and most of the street. She had read one newspaper and was on her second coffee when Sonny entered the shop. He nodded at her, ordered a tea, and then sat at another table with a slightly different view.
The street was busy with a steady stream of traffic, both automotive and pedestrian. By twelve they had seen nothing out of the ordinary. At twelve fifteen a black BMW with tinted windows parked almost directly in front of the Imperial Manor. The driver’s window opened just far enough for a cigarette butt to be flicked out.
“Can you see anyone in the BMW?” she asked Sonny.
“No.”
After five minutes had passed, she thought about asking Sonny to take a walk past the car. Just as she was about to, the BMW pulled away from the curb and drove down the street.
The coffee shop was filling with the lunch crowd, and Ava saw the manager eyeing her and Sonny with their empty cups. Just as it looked as if he was about to approach them, Ava caught sight of a black Range Rover pulling up in front of the Imperial Manor. Xu stepped out of the passenger side and Suen from the driver’s. They looked around and then Suen accompanied his boss inside.
“There’s Xu and Suen. I’m going over to the restaurant now,” she said.
“I’ll go with you,” Sonny said.
As they crossed the street, Ava saw a panel truck in a no-parking zone beside a raised manhole surrounded by orange cones, almost directly across from them. Five men stood over the manhole. The truck had no markings. The men were wearing blue safety helmets and yellow fluorescent vests. Ava saw two of them turn when she and Sonny approached. One of them looked startled. He had a row of rings in each of his ears.
When they were well past them, Ava said, “I think I know one of those guys.”
“How?” Sonny asked.
“I think his name is Ko. If it is, he works for Li. He was the one they sent to London to kill me.”
Sonny stopped and looked back quickly towards the workmen. “Three of them are wearing running shoes. What kind of maintenance workers wear sneakers?”
Ava turned and stared at them. They were focused on the manhole, chatting among themselves. The man with the earrings was in profile, and now his resemblance to Ko didn’t seem so apparent. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. It might not be Ko, and running shoes may be what workers wear here. But tell Suen about them all the same,” she said.
“Speaking of Suen . . .” Sonny said, pointing ahead.
The big man was in front of the Imperial Manor, leaning against the Range Rover. When he saw them, he straightened up.
“Hey,” Sonny said, extending his hand.
“Good to see you,” Suen said, then lowered his head in Ava’s direction. “The boss is inside already. I went in for a few minutes — it looks clear.”
“Well, I guess I’ll join him. You two boys behave yourselves out here, okay?”
“We will,” Suen said.
“Sonny, just a word,” Ava said, motioning for him to join her near the door. “Your phone is on, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Mine too. If you see anything suspicious out here, you call me right away.”
“Count on it.”
Ava squeezed his arm, turned, and walked into the restaurant. She was instantly enveloped in an aromatic cloud of garlic and ginger. They’re cooking seafood, she thought, then saw the row of tanks full of geoduck and Manila clams, spiny lobsters, crabs, shrimp, eels, garoupa, and snappers. “I’m here to meet with Mr. Wing,” she said to the hostess.
“You have a private room in the back. Let me show you the way.”
The restaurant was full, and Ava had to fight off hunger pangs as she walked past tables loaded with steamed and fried seafood.
The private room wasn’t much more than a cubicle with enough space for one circular table. Xu sat in a chair against the back wall so that the door was in his direct line of sight. He was wearing his usual black suit, white shirt, and black tie. He stood when he saw her. “I am glad you decided to come, mei mei,” he said.
“It was hard not to.”
There was a teapot on the table and four cups. Xu poured tea into the cup next to his. “They should be here soon.”
Ava checked her watch. It was five to one.
“Did you bring Sonny?” he asked.
“Yes, he and Su
en are outside.”
“Precautions. There was a time when they were not necessary,” Xu said.
“And there was a time when having a fax machine and a mobile phone that weighed five pounds was considered high-tech.”
Xu smiled. They were standing next to each other. Ava stretched out her arms and gave him a small hug, then they both sat.
“I have to tell you that, despite the way it came about, this meeting was long overdue and is probably a very good thing. I had been putting off having to deal with Wing, but as a long-term strategy it was never going to work. So we will get things settled and move on,” Xu said.
“You seem confident that he’ll agree to your offer.”
“I am hopeful more than confident, but if I read him correctly, he will agree.”
Ava glanced at her watch again. It was one o’clock. The door was open and she could see into the restaurant. There was no sign of Sammy Wing or Jimmy Tan. She felt a flutter of disquiet in her stomach.
“Wing did say one o’clock?” she asked.
“Yes.”
Her phone rang. It was Sonny. “Yes,” she said.
“Three of those workers just got into the truck and drove away.”
“Where did they go?”
“Down the street and around the corner.”
“What are the others doing?”
“Looking down the manhole.”
“Have they done anything other than that?”
“No.”
“Any sign of Wing?”
“No.”
“Thanks.” She looked at Xu. He held a cup of tea to his lips, seemingly relaxed.
“I’m starting to get uncomfortable,” she said.
“They are only a few minutes late.”
“I’m giving them another five minutes, no more than that.”
“I spoke to Wing this morning when I got in. He said he was driving here from Hong Kong. He could be tied up at the border or in traffic.”
“If he is, why doesn’t he call?”
Xu shrugged, but Ava saw his eyes narrow and knew she had his attention now. “I will phone him.” She watched him search for Wing’s number in his log and then press the call button. A few seconds later he put the phone back in his pocket. “The call went to voicemail,” he said.
“I think we should leave,” Ava said, rising from the table.
They heard a clatter of dishes from outside the room, raised voices, and then a woman’s scream. Ava slid around the table. Xu moved even faster and reached the door before her, blocking her view for an instant. She wasn’t sure which she saw first, the flash of a yellow vest or the bare arm with a knife in its hand. She moved to the right and saw the knife catch Xu’s upper chest near the left shoulder. As Ava tried to get past him, the knifeman struck again, his blade catching Xu’s side.
Ava finally found space and struck. With the middle knuckle of her index finger extended, she smashed her right fist into his face. Blood exploded as the assailant’s nose crumbled into a mass of bloody pulp. The man lurched back, falling to the floor and blocking the path of the two men who stood behind him.
“We don’t want you. All we want is him, but if you get in the way I’ll fuck you too,” the man who Ava now knew for certain was Ko said. “Move out of the way.”
Xu was slumped behind her. She stared at the two men holding long, lethal stilettos.
“No,” she said.
“I should have killed you in London,” Ko said.
“You couldn’t do it then and you can’t do it now.”
“Bitch,” he said.
Ko rushed her from the left. Ava swivelled as he thrust the knife towards her neck. She moved her head back a few inches, and as the weapon hissed past her she drove her foot into his groin. He gasped and folded forward. Her knuckle rocketed into his ear, and then she raised her foot and drove the heel of her shoe into his forehead.
She turned to face the remaining man. The knife was in his left hand, and in his right he held a gun. Ava looked at Xu. He was leaning against the doorframe, clutching his side, half of his shirt soaked in blood. She saw the man raise the gun and aim at Xu. Before she could move, a shot rang out. Wing’s man looked at her in shock and then crashed to the floor. She looked down at what had been the back of his head. All she could see was blood spreading around him like a halo.
“We need to get out of here,” Sonny said, still holding his gun at shoulder height.
Ava turned towards Xu, who was slipping to the floor. She leapt forward and caught him by the right arm. He groaned and his eyes rolled back. “You’ll have to help him,” she said to Sonny.
Sonny crossed the five metres between them in two steps. He slipped his arm under Xu’s good arm, lifted him partially off the ground, and pressed him against his side. “These guys obviously came in through the back door. We should leave that way. Four more of the guys in yellow vests just arrived. They were walking towards the restaurant when I came in to warn you.”
“Where’s Suen?”
“I told him to drive the Range Rover around to the back alley. He should be there by now.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
Sonny looked down at Ava’s two victims. They were still alive but barely moving. “Is one of these the guy who tried to kill you in London?” he asked.
“The one with the rings in his ears.”
Sonny pointed the gun at his head.
“Don’t bother. It’s not worth it,” she said, just as he pulled the trigger.
( 22 )
The room was at the rear of the restaurant, so all they had to negotiate was the kitchen and its staff. Six chefs were manning more than a dozen giant woks, and the noise was intense from steel spatulas hitting cast-iron pans and the sizzle of food in oil. No one gave them more than a passing glance, out of indifference or fear or simply because they hadn’t heard the shouting and gunshots over the noise.
The back door was open. The idling white panel truck the thugs had used was blocking their view. Sonny poked his head out and looked up the alley. “Here comes Suen,” he said.
The Range Rover drove past the truck and then eased in front of it before stopping. Ava knew Suen was using the truck as cover in case he had been followed; she also knew it would provide serious cover for only a few seconds. She opened the truck door, reached over, turned off the engine, and put the key in her pocket. She saw no point in leaving the men an easy way to follow them.
Sonny opened the back door and lifted Xu onto the seat. Ava ran around the car to the other side and climbed in beside him.
“I’ll drive,” Sonny yelled. “I know my way around this town.”
Suen nodded and slid into the front passenger seat. His eyes never left Xu, and a look of worry, bordering on panic, was etched across his face.
Sonny closed his door and gunned the car, speeding to the end of the alley. He hesitated for a second, then executed a hard right turn and raced to Nongyuan Road, shooting through an amber traffic light. Suen glanced down the road towards the restaurant.
“Those four new guys in vests arrived in a black BMW,” he said. “It’s still there.”
“Anyone visible?” Ava asked.
“No. They must still be in the restaurant or in the alley,” Suen said. He looked back at Xu, whose eyes were shut and whose breathing was laboured. “Was he shot?”
“Stabbed,” Ava said. “Once in the shoulder and I think the second one caught him in the side.”
“I am okay,” Xu said softly. “Get us out of here.”
For ten minutes Sonny weaved through traffic, turning down street after street until Ava had lost all sense of where they had been. Suen kept his eyes locked on Xu.
They were in a residential area, the street flanked by rows of towering apartment buildings, when Sonny finally slowed and looked carefu
lly at their surroundings. “There’s a shopping centre near here called Emperor’s Landing,” he said. “Everyone look for it.”
During the drive Xu had remained still, his head slumped against the back of the seat. His breathing seemed less strained, but when they hit a bump on the road, he groaned. Ava was relieved that he was still conscious.
Suen turned to Sonny. “What happened to the guys who did this?” he snarled.
“Two of them are dead,” Sonny said. “Ava obliterated the other one’s face.”
Suen’s rage seemed to subside, but only slightly. Ava knew that worry about his boss would be competing with thoughts about Sammy Wing, as it was for her.
Sonny drove the Range Rover for another two blocks before Ava spotted the shopping complex, two streets down and to their left. Sonny circled the parking lot until he found an isolated spot. He turned off the engine and leaned forward over the steering wheel. “I haven’t had to drive like that in years,” he said.
“Great job,” Suen said.
“Well, we lost them,” Sonny said.
“But we can’t stay here, not with the boss hurt,” Suen said.
“I know.”
“We need time to think. Sonny has bought us that,” Ava said, reaching towards Xu. She slid back his jacket. The entire left side of his shirt was soaked in blood.
“We need to get him to a doctor,” Suen said.
“I don’t know any here. Do you?” Ava asked.
“No.”
“Sonny?”
“No.”
“We can’t take him to a hospital,” Ava said. “There would be too many questions, and we have no idea who to trust.”
“Ava is right,” Xu said, his eyes opening.
“We’re less than an hour from Hong Kong,” Sonny said. “I know a doctor there who has a fully equipped clinic. It’s as good as any hospital.”
“Is he affiliated with the Triads?”
“He’s my girlfriend’s brother. I’m the only Triad he knows.”
“We’re agreed, then, that there’s no way we can go to a hospital here or risk looking for a doctor?” Ava said.