MQuinn 03 - Lethal Beauty

by Wiehl, Lis

  Mia shook her head. “I don’t know if that would be easier or harder to take, but that’s not it. He just gets angry over the littlest things. He’s definitely going through puberty. Suddenly he’s got all these muscles. And acne. He must be a stew of hormones.”

  “Testosterone can make guys do some crazy things.” Not that he knew anything about that.

  “Table for two for Charlie?” the manager called out in accented English. When they nodded, he took them to a booth and set down two menus and two sets of silver wrapped in salmon-colored cloth napkins.

  Charlie and Mia had eaten here once before, when they were trying to unravel what Scott, who had been Kenny Zhong’s accountant, might have done to get himself killed. Today Charlie observed again that all the workers, from the waitresses to the bus boys, looked Chinese. Kenny Zhong had talked about how supportive the Chinese community was of each other. Maybe only hiring other Chinese immigrants was Kenny’s way of giving back.

  Charlie looked over the menu. Lo mien, spare ribs, pork-fried rice, beef with broccoli, General Tso’s chicken. All of it, according to Kenny, modified for American tastes. He had spoken enthusiastically of the rat and snake they served back home, which had made Charlie glad the dishes here were something less than authentic.

  “What do you think the healthiest thing on the menu is?” Mia asked with a frown.

  Charlie rolled his eyes. “A—we’re in a Chinese restaurant where every dish has been tweaked to appeal to American tastes, which probably means more salt, more fat, and more breading. And B—you’re seriously asking me? You’ve seen me eat.” Life was too short to diet, Charlie figured. And while he did have a gym membership, he had not seen the inside of the place for several months.

  When the waitress came back, he ordered sweet-and-sour chicken while Mia got egg flower soup and a vegetable stir-fry.

  “What’s your name?” Charlie asked the waitress.

  “Chun.”

  “Your accent is beautiful. Where are you from?”

  She looked down. “China,” she murmured shyly.

  “And how do you like Seattle?”

  “It is hard to say.” She shrugged one slender shoulder. “I work many hours.”

  “What about Lihong?” Mia asked. Charlie wished she had been a little more subtle, hadn’t jumped in with both feet. “Is he working tonight?”

  An expression crossed the girl’s face at the sound of Lihong’s name, there and gone so fast that Charlie couldn’t identify it. Confusion? Anxiety? Or had it been something more primitive, like fear?

  She shook her head without saying anything. Underneath her black bangs, her face was once again impassive. But Charlie could tell that Mia’s words had rocked her.

  “Lihong.” Mia pointed. “He works in the back? As a dishwasher or a cook? He smokes?” She put an imaginary cigarette to her lips and took a drag.

  “Sorry!”

  As Chun started to turn away, Mia reached out and caught her wrist. The girl winced and Mia quickly pulled her hand back.

  Charlie saw why she had grimaced. An oval bruise, the size of the thumbprint, had been been pressed onto the inside of her wrist. When she saw Charlie noticing, the girl pushed the sleeve of her silver blouse down, but not before he saw a line of oval bruises less than an inch away from the bigger bruise.

  Someone had grabbed her. Hard. Just like they had grabbed Lihong.

  CHAPTER 24

  From across the room, the manager barked something in Chinese at Chun.

  She flinched and then nodded rapidly. “I will request your food now.” Before Mia could say another word, the girl hurried back to the kitchen. She was sure Chun had not only understood what she was asking but that the mention of Lihong’s name had startled her.

  “Did you see the bruises on her arm?” Charlie asked.

  Mia nodded, feeling grim.

  “The body you looked at yesterday had bruises like that too. But I guess that doesn’t prove anything. They both got grabbed, but human beings like to grab each other’s arms. It could be whoever killed our floater grabbed him before shooting him. It could be that our waitress is in a domestic violence situation. She could even have gotten the bruises from practicing wrist grabs in kung fu. Bruises don’t tell you how they came to be there.”

  When a young man came to pour tea, Mia tried again. “Is Lihong working tonight? In the back?”

  His eyes widened at the mention of Lihong’s name, but she wasn’t sure if he understood more than that. He shook his head and left, not making eye contact.

  When Chun brought their food, Mia looked over her shoulder for the guy with the bow tie. He had his back to them, talking to some diners on the other side of the room, but she still kept her voice low. “Could we talk to you during your break?”

  The girl hesitated and then finally said, “No break.”

  Mia would not be deterred. “How about after work?”

  “Too late.”

  Her eyes cut to one side. She stiffened. The manager had turned back around and was now watching them, his face stony.

  “Here is your order,” she said in a louder voice. “Sweet-and-sour chicken and vegetable stir-fry with egg flower soup. Please to enjoy.”

  Even when Chun had left, the manager was still eyeing them. Mia picked up her fork. The food, which had smelled so delicious before, now just reminded her of the rotting reek behind the restaurant. Which was true and which was illusion? Or was it all just a matter of perception?

  “Do you think they don’t understand or they don’t want to say?” she asked Charlie.

  Charlie’s mouth twisted. “If you don’t want to talk about something, pretending not to understand goes a long way. Either way, it’s clear they’re not comfortable talking about Lihong.”

  They were just finishing their food—Charlie appeared to be having no trouble polishing off his—when a small Chinese man came in the front door.

  Kenny Zhong. Charlie and Mia exchanged a look.

  Kenny came up to their table. “Mia, Charlie,” he said, inclining his head. “How nice to see you here again.”

  “The food’s always good,” Charlie said, putting the last forkful into his mouth.

  “I understand you have been asking questions about one of my employees,” he said with disconcerting directness. “Or should I say, my ex-employee. Would you like to speak in my office?”

  Ex-employee. Mia exchanged a look with Charlie as they both got to their feet. As Charlie reached for his wallet, Kenny waved his hand. “No, no, it is my pleasure.”

  “I insist.” Charlie’s voice had enough steel in it that Kenny didn’t persist.

  Mia caught a glimpse of the bills as Charlie laid them on the table. It was enough to pay for their meal twice over. Maybe it would be a start on helping Chun get out of whatever situation she was in.

  Kenny took Mia’s elbow and steered her through a narrow hallway, with Charlie following. They went past a kitchen where cooks tended woks nestled in flames, down a short hall, and into his small office. Mia and Charlie sat in two chairs that looked like they had been retired from the dining room after they had gotten too battered. The only thing that wasn’t utilitarian was the large fish tank behind him, filled with a half dozen silver fish that swam in sync with one another.

  “So why were you asking about Lihong?”

  Kenny’s expression was mild, but she remembered the way he had yelled at the young man, not knowing he was being observed, and then dealt him a stinging slap.

  Mia had spoken with Lihong twice. He had called her Mrs. Scott. And he had tried to tell her something about Scott, saying, “He help.”

  His words had lit a tiny wavering flame of hope in Mia. Sure, Scott had cheated on her, and he had helped many of his clients avoid taxes, but he had also drawn the line at assisting a drug dealer with money laundering—a decision that had ultimately cost him his life. However Scott had helped Lihong, it had made it possible for Mia not to be so angry at him.

 
; Mia answered Kenny Zhong’s question with a question. “You said Lihong no longer works here?” She did not want to get him into trouble.

  Kenny shook his head. “I had to let him go two weeks ago.”

  “The last time I was here, I happened to talk to him. He said that Scott had been helping him.”

  Kenny’s brows drew together. “Helping him? Did Scott tell you about it?”

  “No,” Mia admitted. But by that time Scott hadn’t really been talking to her. Not about anything that mattered. “And then Lihong asked if I could help him.”

  “But help him with what?”

  “That’s just the thing. He seemed to know only a few words of English. And he seemed frightened. He left before I could figure out what he wanted.” She skipped over the part about how Kenny had yelled at him and then slapped him.

  Kenny’s face smoothed out. “I am too soft. People come to me with very low-level language skills. They do not realize that in America you must speak English to get a job. But I still try to help out people from my homeland. Lihong was one of those people.” He shook his head, his expression changing to one of disgust. “And how did he repay me? Every time I came looking for him, he was out in the back taking a cigarette break. We have a saying. ‘When a lazy donkey is turning a grindstone, it will take a lot of breaks to pee and poop.’ I told him again and again that it wasn’t acceptable, but he wouldn’t listen.”

  Mia nodded, remembering the flare of Lihong’s lighter, how it had revealed how thin his face was, how drawn.

  “But it turns out he had taken advantage of me in other ways as well,” Kenny continued. “And that was probably how he wanted Scott to help him. With something illegal.”

  Mia blinked. “Illegal?”

  “Two weeks ago, I learned that Lihong’s papers were false. Of course I fired him on the spot. He may have asked Scott to help him get a better set of documents.”

  It felt like she had swallowed a boulder. She hadn’t even considered that possibility when Lihong had said Scott was helping him. To Lihong, a better set of false papers would have been a good thing, allowing him the flexibility to find employment somewhere else without the risk of being deported.

  “Do you look at the papers for all your restaurant workers?” Charlie asked.

  “Certainly. But I’m not an expert. If it looks right to me, how am I to know it’s wrong?”

  “Then how did you figure out it was wrong?”

  Did Kenny hesitate? “Another worker told me.”

  And what had Lihong said to her, at least what had her phone translation app said he said? He pay, so they will look the other way. Your husband is trying to help. Was Kenny bribing someone to look the other way about people’s immigration status? Maybe he had decided, for whatever reason, that it wasn’t worth keeping Lihong.

  “Why didn’t you report his immigration status to the authorities?” Mia asked.

  He leaned across his desk. “We all have problems within our family.” He looked at her for a long moment. “But we don’t talk about them outside our family.”

  Mia heard the subtext. As far as the wider world was concerned, Scott had died in an accident. Scott’s mistakes had died along with him. They hadn’t been paraded before the public.

  “Do you have an address for Lihong?” Charlie asked.

  Kenny shrugged. “I do not know where he is.”

  “Are any of the staff here friends with him?” Mia asked.

  “No.” A decisive shake of the head. “He worked here for less than a year and he kept to himself.”

  “A man’s body was found in Puget Sound two days ago,” Charlie said. “Mia thought it looked like Lihong. I have a photo of the man’s face on my cell phone. Would you mind looking at it?”

  He stiffened. “I am not sure I could be of help, but of course I will look.”

  Mia didn’t say anything. Officially, Charlie should be showing Kenny a sketch made by a forensic artist, not a snapshot of an actual corpse, especially one that wasn’t in the best shape. But Charlie had never been one to play by the rules, and clearly there had been no love lost between Kenny and Lihong.

  Charlie pulled his cell phone from his pocket, found the photo, and handed it over.

  Kenny looked at it for a long moment. He pressed his lips together. Then he handed it back. “It could be him. But with the condition of his face, I am not certain. I am sorry.” He tilted his head. “Did this man kill himself?” The thought did not seem to particularly bother him.

  “The cause of death is still being determined.” Charlie scrolled forward. “Let me show you another photo. There were some marks on his wrists. They looked like burns.”

  When he saw the second photo, Kenny nodded. “Those are burns from the edge of a wok. I do not know if it is Lihong, but I believe whoever it is worked at a Chinese restaurant.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Mia sat slumped in the car, the side of her forehead resting against the cold window. Charlie had moved the car down the block, where it was half hidden by a Dumpster. She squinted at the clock on Charlie’s dash. “I can’t believe it’s after eleven and they’re all still working.”

  Charlie was watching the Jade Kitchen with a small pair of binoculars he had taken from his glove compartment. Kenny had driven away hours ago. When Chun finally left, their plan was to follow her home to see if she would be more willing to talk when she wasn’t surrounded by witnesses.

  With a sigh, Mia pulled out her cell phone and called home.

  “Hey, Kali,” she said after the other woman answered. “I hope I didn’t wake you up.”

  “I was still awake.”

  “I’m afraid I’m not going to get home until pretty late. Probably not until well after midnight.”

  “Oh. Okay.” Kali’s voice was flat. She sounded exhausted.

  “Is everything all right? Are you having problems?”

  Kali had had chemo two days before, as she did every Wednesday. It seemed like each treatment left her weaker. She had lost all interest in food, and there were days Mia feared she had lost interest in life as well.

  Now she sounded like even the simple act of talking required too much of an effort. Had she been throwing up again? Was she dehydrated? She had had to go to the emergency room once before for IV fluids.

  Mia calculated how long it would take her to get home. Her car was still at the parking structure, but if it was really bad, Charlie could just drop her off and she would take Kali’s car.

  Charlie had taken his binoculars away from his face and was now watching Mia.

  “No, no, I’m fine.” Kali’s tone was unconvincing.

  “Well, something’s wrong. I can tell.”

  “Eldon and Gabe got into a little bit of a fight.”

  “A fight?” Mia thoughts flashed to Eldon’s fists, as big as hams. “Was anyone hurt?”

  “Not really, expect maybe bruised feelings. There was some shoving and name calling. I’m not sure who started it, but I sent Eldon to my room. I didn’t feel right disciplining Gabe so I didn’t tell him to do anything. He went to his room anyway.” The two women had talked about how Kali could deal with Brooke if Mia wasn’t there, but Mia had assumed Gabe was too big to be concerned about. Obviously erroneously.

  “Could you do me a favor and give the phone to him?”

  Kali’s breathing grew labored as she climbed the stairs. “Gabe,” she called, “your mom’s on the phone and she wants to talk to you.”

  After a moment Gabe said, “Yeah?”

  Just the way he grunted that one word made Mia grit her teeth. “Kali says you and Eldon got into a fight. What the heck happened, young man?”

  “I just lost my temper.” A long pause, as if he were calculating what he could get away with. “Sorry. And I already said sorry to Eldon.”

  Probably with the same lack of enthusiasm. “You’ve been losing your temper a lot lately.”

  An exasperated sigh. Mia didn’t need a video feed to know that Gabe was
rolling his eyes.

  “Please don’t start talking to me about puberty. Because if you do, I’m going to hang up right now.”

  “Gabe!” She fisted her free hand and knocked it against her lips. What should she do? What was her priority? Her kid? Her job?

  She remembered something Anne, who worked down the hall, had once told her.

  “My rule is, wherever my feet are, that’s where my heart is,” Anne had said, looking down at her flats. “So now when my feet are at work, my heart stays at work. And when I’m at home, my heart stays at home. I don’t split my attention anymore.”

  Easy enough for Anne to say. While she did have four kids, she also had a husband who could backstop her. Still, Mia decided to put her advice into practice. Her feet were in Charlie’s car, so that’s where her attention would be.

  “We’re going to have to talk about this more tomorrow morning. For right now, I expect you to behave yourself. Don’t start any arguments and don’t respond to any. When I come home, I don’t want to hear there were any more problems tonight. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  He still sounded sullen. But she would deal with him when her feet were in the same room as he was. She tapped the button to disconnect.

  “Everything all right?” Charlie asked. He must have figured it wasn’t too bad because he had put the binoculars back up to his eyes.

  “You probably heard the high points. Eldon and Gabe got in a fight. Nobody was hurt. I don’t even know what it was about. Maybe it’s partly my fault. I didn’t ask Gabe before I moved another kid into his room. And not just any kid. You’ve seen Eldon. He must weigh like two hundred twenty, two hundred forty pounds? He takes up a lot of space.”

  “He’s two forty, easy,” Charlie agreed. “But he’s also so mellow he always looks half asleep.”

  “I wish some of that would rub off on Gabe. It seems like lately he’s got a hair-trigger temper. Last week I had to ground him because he threw his glass against the wall.” Mia remembered how they had all stared at the milk trickling down the wall, the curved pieces of glass gleaming on the floor. Even Gabe had looked surprised.