I took a cleansing breath and smiled. “Murder? What about self defense?”
“And how would I know if you killed him in self defense? On your say-so?” He leaned over the table and lowered his voice into a menacing growl. “Let me be perfectly clear. If Manuel Rodriguez dies, he better be lying next to your dead body. Because that’s the only way I’m going to believe you killed him in self defense.”
Chapter
Forty-Three
A quick bike ride took me to the Metro Silver Line bus downtown, where I transferred onto the 770 to Monterey Park—a city with the second highest percentage of Asian residents in Los Angeles County. Daniel brokered residential and small commercial properties for Mandarin Group Realtors, whose founder was an old Hong Kong friend of Daniel’s father. From what I could tell—by Daniel’s car, clothes, and my family’s approval—he was doing quite well for himself. This assumption was confirmed when I walked into the plush offices of Mandarin Group Realtors and was greeted by a fashionably dressed receptionist.
“Good afternoon, how may I help you?”
“I’m meeting Daniel Kwok.”
“Oh, Miss Wong,” she said, as if happy to finally meet me. “Mr. Kwok asked me to inform him as soon as you arrived. One moment.” She picked up the telephone and punched in a short code. “Mr. Kwok, Miss Wong is here.” Then she smiled at me. “He’ll be right out. Would you care for tea?”
Before I could answer, I saw Daniel striding down the corridor.
“You made it.”
“I did.”
“Come on back. I have an email to send and then we can go. Are you hungry?”
“Always.”
He laughed. “Good.”
Daniel occupied an office in the back of the building with a half-moon desk and four upholstered chairs for visitors. Although he lacked a window, his walls were decorated with quality Chinese art.
“Are these all yours?”
“No. They belong to Mr. Chun. You should see the paintings in his office.” Daniel pinched the tips of his finger and a thumb in a sign of quality.
I glanced around his small but tasteful office. “This isn’t too bad, either.”
He smiled, proudly. “Have a seat. The chairs are very comfortable.”
“To captivate your audience?”
He put his finger to his lips, as if afraid someone might learn of his dastardly strategy. I chuckled. Daniel’s war tactics were a lot kinder than mine.
As he finished up his email, I sank into the über-comfy chair and sighed. Between my late-night rescue of Brianna and this morning’s ambush on Payns, I’d only nabbed a few fitful hours of sleep. Now, cradled in Daniel’s chair, I felt as content as a cat on a cushion.
I pulled up my legs and pillowed my head on the padded armrest. I hadn’t felt this relaxed in…I counted the weeks…and as I did, the anxiety of my recent past blurred into a distant…peaceful…cloud….
“Lily?”
“Huh?” I opened my eyes and blinked myself awake.
“These chairs are supposed to keep you interested, not put you to sleep.”
I stretched and yawned. “Sorry. Guess I’m a little tired. You ready to go?”
“Unless you want to keep napping.”
I flapped my hand in front of my face as another yawn rolled in and contorted my features. “No way. You promised me food. I intend to collect.”
“All right, then. But the chair stays here.”
Fortunately for me, the restaurant Daniel had chosen was only two blocks away in an outdoor Japanese plaza, featuring such necessities as fine global art, Hello Kitty merchandise, and optometry. After lunch, we could even browse ink wash paintings in the framing shop next door.
I looked at the restaurant’s sign suspended below the awning of a green temple-style roof. “Tokyo Fried Chicken?”
He smiled. “You’re going to love it.” The place was brightly lit and crowded with chalkboard menus on the walls and honey bear squeeze bottles on the tables. “Do you like craft beer?”
“Not during the day.”
He laughed. “Me neither. But they have an adventurous selection if you ever want to come back at night.”
I mulled over the possibility—meeting Daniel after work, eating dinner at the local joints, sleeping over at his apartment.
What the hell?
Daniel had brought me here for fried chicken and light conversation. I needed to take things one chicken wing at a time.
My phone rang, saving me from my wayward imagination.
“I’ll be right back. Order for me, okay?”
Normally, I wouldn’t subject my stomach to someone else’s menu choices, but Daniel had a discerning palate and a gastronome’s sense adventure. I was in good hands.
I hit the green button on my phone and headed outside to talk.
“Hey, Ma. What’s up?”
“Doesn’t anyone say hello anymore?”
“Hello, Mother. Are you well?”
“Don’t be fresh, Lily. Where are you?”
“Monterey Park.”
“Visiting Daniel?”
“As a matter of fact.”
“Hmm.”
“What? You don’t approve?”
“No, I was just thinking. How long will you be?”
“An hour, maybe?”
“Meet me for tea after?”
“Is everything okay?”
She sighed. “Can’t we just enjoy a cup of tea?”
“Yes,” I said, suspiciously. “Where do you want to meet?”
“The Six.”
Ma’s tea destination was a cornerstone restaurant in San Gabriel, specializing in rice noodle rolls, Korean crêpes, and fancy boba drinks, which included my favorite Bird’s Nest Cheese Cream Osmanthus Oolong Tea with Gold Leaf. Just the thought of that creamy concoction made my mouth water. Bird’s nest was a Chinese medicine delicacy formed by the hardened saliva of the swiftlet bird. It had numerous health and beauty benefits. As run-down as I felt, I could use an immunity boost.
“Can you meet me at two?” Ma asked.
I checked the time. That left me less than an hour for lunch. I didn’t know how long Daniel could be away from work, but now that I was here, I didn’t want to leave him. “Make it 2:15?”
“Fine. See you then.”
I went back inside and joined Daniel at the table. “Sorry about that. Ma wants to meet me for tea.”
“Leaving me already?”
“Not until we eat.”
I fought a grin, and—just like the night of Ma’s party—my cheeks hurt from the effort. What was it about this man that always had me grinning like a fool?
Relief washed over me as a waiter arrived with a basket of fried chicken and an assortment of Japanese side dishes. Not only did my empty stomach need filling, my goofy brain needed a distraction, ASAP.
Daniel watched as I stuffed my face with sautéed lotus root and quick-fried shishito peppers. “Good, right?”
I nodded, too famished to speak. So far, every interaction with Daniel had involved him watching me eat.
“Were you closing a big deal with that email?” I asked, hoping to switch his focus, so I could enjoy the lunch unobserved.
Daniel smiled. “As a matter of fact. Hong Kong investors have been buying up homes in the neighborhood. If this one closes, it will be easy to lease.”
“And you’ll get paid twice?”
He nodded. “Commissions for the sale and for the lease.” He studied me as I sucked out the truffle butter edamame and discarded the pods. “And how about you? What is it you do for a living that you can come all the way to Monterey Park to meet me for lunch?”
I gave the stock answer. “Web consulting, social media branding, that sort of thing.”
“Really? I would have guessed a more active career.”
“Like what?”
“Fitness trainer, bike messenger, professional m
ountain climber—”
“Sounds fun. Maybe I should switch.”
“Is there a lot of money in web consulting?”
“Not really. But I help out in Baba’s restaurant to cover my rent and food, so I don’t need much.” Which reminded me—I hadn’t waited a table or washed a dish in weeks. I frowned. Not only was I failing to find Emma, I was failing my father.
“I didn’t mean to insult you,” Daniel said, misinterpreting my frown.
“You didn’t. But I’m not an ambitious career person. So, if you were hoping to date the next Forbes Billionaire, you’re buying fried chicken for the wrong woman.”
He laughed. “Actually, that’s one of the things I like that about you. It would drive me crazy to date someone as ambitious as me.”
“Is that what we’re doing? Dating?”
He shrugged. “Would that be so bad?”
I felt the heat rise up my neck and reached for the ice water to halt the inevitable blush. If blood flow and sweat were signs of health, I’d live to a hundred. Still, at times like these, I wished my body was more discreet.
Daniel waited patiently for his answer—him in his designer jacket and me, dressed up in my nicest tank and jeans. Mr. Perfect Chinese Son and a renegade ninja daughter. Could this really work? Could I hide the most important facets of my life and still open myself up to a relationship? Was that even possible?
“I didn’t mean that to be a hard question,” Daniel said.
“Right.”
“Right, it’s not a hard question or, right, it wouldn’t be so bad to date me?”
I held my breath as I deliberated on an answer. The double negatives were spinning my brain. This wasn’t a matter of national security. It wasn’t even a major life decision. Daniel just wanted to know what I’d already been daydreaming. And yet, I couldn’t bring myself to speak the words.
I picked up a shishito pepper and fed it to Daniel, then blushed as it touched his lips.
Was it wrong to feel envious of a vegetable?
Chapter
Forty-Four
“So,” Ma asked, after I had arranged my backpack and bicycle helmet on the chair beside us. “How was your lunch with Daniel?”
I thought of the pepper and blushed again. That was the closest we had come to touching since the nesting plates moment at Ma’s party. The memory of both lingered.
Ma slid my icy drink closer toward me. “Don’t bother answering. I can see it in your face.”
I popped off the clear lid and stirred the bird’s nest into the layers of clear tea and foamy cream cheese. “Thanks.” I took a long sip and felt the heat cool from my face. Ma, on the other hand, had ordered a glass pot of hot tea.
“Where are Gung-Gung and Po-Po?”
“They’re napping.”
“And you snuck out of the house?”
“I didn’t sneak. I needed a break.”
“Do you really have to go to Hong Kong?”
“Apparently so. Although your grandfather won’t tell me what this board meeting is about or why they scheduled it at such an irregular time.”
“Are you worried?”
She sipped her tea. “A woman’s life is precarious. No matter how high we climb, there’s always a man to shake us down. Remember that, Lily, as you pursue your dreams and, hopefully, decide upon a career. Although the men around you may be colleagues, it doesn’t mean they’ll accept you as an equal.”
I didn’t have many colleagues in my line of work, and the ones I did have were either as close as family or already treated me with suspicion and doubt. Law enforcement men like Lieutenant Payns didn’t even pretend to treat me as an equal. To them, I was a fly buzzing around their soup. Ma, on the other hand, was inundated with false smiles and corporate subterfuge. She had good cause to be cynical.
“Do you think they’re restructuring HKIF?” I asked.
“I don’t know. But I’d feel better if my house didn’t belong to your grandfather.” She patted my hand. “This is why it’s so important for you to go back to school.”
“What?”
“It doesn’t have to be UCLA—although I’m sure they’d be happy to readmit you. If you want to succeed in this world, you need a degree and maybe even a masters.”
“Where is this coming from? You had all of those things and you’re still plagued by inequality and job instability. It’s been seven years since I dropped out of college. Why are you bringing it up now?”
She sipped more tea. “It was on my mind, that’s all.”
“Oh my God. Did Gung-Gung say I was a bum?”
“No. Of course, not.”
“Po-Po?”
“Lily, stop it. No one’s said anything bad about you. I’m just concerned.”
I sucked my tea until the straw sputtered on the ice. “Why are we here, Ma?”
“For tea.”
I sighed. “Why are we really here?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know what to do.”
“About Hong Kong?”
“About any of this. Everything in my life feels so…arbitrary.”
I nodded. “You want to be in control.”
“Don’t we all?”
I thought of Brianna and Emma and all the other girls I’d encountered over the last six days. Then I thought of myself. None of us were in control.
I covered Ma’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “It will be all right. I don’t know what’s going on with Gung-Gung and HKIF, but I do know that whatever it is, you’ll be able to handle it.”
“Thank you, Lily.”
“Now, believe it or not, I have to go to work.”
“Really?” She raised her brows in surprise. “How odd.”
Chapter
Forty-Five
Since it was three o’clock on a Monday afternoon in San Gabriel, and I was twenty-one miles from my apartment in Culver City, I opted for a rideshare and took the nearest available driver. If I’d waited thirty minutes longer, rush hour traffic would have doubled my travel time. So, I really had needed to leave. Could I have lingered with Ma and cut my travel time by riding my bike through gridlock traffic? Sure. But I needed to conserve my energy for the night ahead.
In the meantime, I made use of my time in the car by calling Aleisha to check in and inform her of my plan to infiltrate Manolo’s lair. She wasn’t happy about it. But then, she wasn’t happy with our last conversation, either. The only thing that would make her truly happy was for me to find Emma and bring her home safely. And to see someone about my alleged PTSD.
“Are you sure this is a smart thing to do?” she asked.
“I’m out of options. The only way I’m going to find Emma, short of a serendipitous encounter at Starbucks, is to get close to Manolo.”
I waited through the silence, wondering what more I could say to make her understand. Then she broke it with a long, suffering sigh. “Be safe.”
I didn’t respond. My safety was not a priority. I didn’t want to lie by pretending it was. Instead, I ended with the only truth I could offer. “I’ll call you when I can.”
When I arrived home, I hung my bike and grabbed a tray of easy access food. I didn’t want to engage in conversation, which was what would have happened if I’d asked Baba, Uncle, Ling, or Bayani to fix me a plate. I didn’t want to waste my energy with small talk and pretense. I had a long and possibly violent night ahead of me. I needed to eat, shower, and sleep.
I set my alarm and slept until 8:30 p.m., then I woke and started to pack.
Payns had described a bleak future as he tried to scare me away from pursuing Manolo. Gang rape, branding, imprisonment, starvation—these were the dangers I needed to consider as I prepared myself.
I opened a drawer beside my office mini fridge and stuffed a handful of sesame candy into my backpack. I stuffed a few more into the pocket of my shorts and the cups of my padded lace bra, in case Manolo confiscated my backpack. If any of
his girls were hungry, I’d sneak them food.
What kind of horrors would I see? Girls chained to beds, starved, beaten?
It would kill me not to rescue them immediately, but I’d have to wait until I found sufficient evidence for Payns. As he had pointed out—and as I’d learned on my own—Manolo’s victims wouldn’t testify against him. I needed proof that would take him off the streets and out of their lives. And I needed to find Emma Hughes.
I carried the backpack into my bedroom and added a few extra shirts, leggings, shorts, socks, undergarments, and a brush—rudimentary items for a girl living on the streets. I also packed a toiletry bag with a small scissors, nail file, bobby pins, tweezers, sewing needles, thread, alcohol pads, antibiotic wipes, reusable cold pack, bandages, toothbrush and toothpaste. If Manolo checked my pack, as I assumed he would, the contents should suggest pragmatism not infiltration. Let him laugh at my fastidious preparedness, as long as he let me keep my tools, weapons, and supplies.
I pulled on my ankle-high, low-heeled boots and a super deep V-neck tee—royal blue, this time, to match my shorty shorts—and debated whether or not to wear the wig. I didn’t want to hassle with braids, wig cap, and glue, but I looked decidedly Asian without it, which meant the surviving members of the Norwalk Varrio 66 would be more likely to recognize me. I opted for a ponytail bun and the wig—no cap, no glue. Just a handful of bobby pins to anchor it in place.
I stared into the mirror and assumed my streetwalker persona. I looked a lot different in full makeup and a sexy getup. I just needed one more accessory.
I opened a box, removed a black velvet choker, and fastened it around my throat. The jewel in the center was a spy camera that fed to an online app. I had sent the access code to Lieutenant Payns an hour ago. I’d turn it on later tonight when I had something for him to see. For now, my privacy remained intact.
I tucked my phone into the top of one boot and my karambit into the other. The hard steel felt good against my ankle. Even if I had to give up the knife, at least I’d begin this adventure with a trusted weapon.
I walked out to my balcony patio—concealed by walls on the side and the restaurant signboard in front—and gazed up at the stars, dimmed from the city lights yet visible in the sky. Evenings were peaceful here. On another night, I might have laid on the lounge chair and studied the constellations. Tonight, I needed to sneak out of my home. At nine-thirty at night, Baba would be in his office, and the restaurant staff would be cleaning up in the kitchen. Better to leave undetected than explain my costume.
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