Wiser Than Serpents

by Susan May Warren

  Even if she found it more often than most—which gave him enough reason to worry. She didn’t deliberately put herself in danger, however. A girl who had stared death by serial killer in the face and won didn’t take risks with her life.

  Which meant that when her phone shifted over to voice mail the third time, he opted not to say any of the crazy things that had plagued him, simply hung up and slipped the phone back into his pocket.

  Roman motioned him over and, by the time he joined him, Roman was thanking whoever was on the other line. He snapped his phone closed. “Okay, Yanna is headed to a friend’s house, courtesy of my Chinese friends at church. Apparently, they have members who have cousins in Taichung. She can land there and we’ll go pick her up. Meanwhile, that name you gave me earlier has been bugging me, so I called a pal back at HQ who looked it up.” Roman glanced outside. “Did you get a hold of Gracie?”

  “No.” Vicktor gave him a smile that said, So what, yes, I called her.

  “Call her back. That guy, Sokolov, that name is familiar. There’s a mob boss out of Seattle who’s on our radar. He makes trips in and out of Russia to see so-called family. He’s been on international watch lists for years—for human trafficking, child pornography, the works. He’s got family everywhere, especially in the big Russian hubs—Florida and New York. Seattle.” Roman shrugged, but his eyes didn’t match the no-big-deal body posture. “Tell her to steer clear.”

  Vicktor pulled out his phone, wrapped his hand around it, and that old, painful feeling returned to the center of his chest. The one that said, You idiot, why aren’t you married already? He opened the phone and hit Redial, glancing at Roman. “I’m going to find myself the next flight out of Taiwan for America.”

  “Viktor, you can’t just get on a plane—”

  “I’m going to America, Roman. Today.”

  Was it so much to ask that his son obey him? Kwan rose from the pool in the private room of the Ming Shan spa, the room so filled with steam from the natural spring, it seemed to seep into his lungs, his eyes. As he rose, dripping from the square, tile-lined pool, his skin barely recognized the difference between water and the humid air. A towel, slightly damp, lay folded on the floor, next to the bucket he’d used to wash himself. As he sat on the edge, exhaustion wrung him out, the water sapping his strength.

  Or perhaps he should blame his fatigue on his son’s failure, again. The fact that yet again, he’d put them all at risk. He couldn’t believe that twice now, Curtiss had gotten away, and this time, with a Russian spy who could only put a snarl into his operations.

  Kwan picked up the towel, wiped his face, then his hair. Out of all the Asian customs, this treasure nestled in the Taiwanese mountains, used in secret by people of his position, ministered to him the most.

  That, and the masseuse waiting in the next room, hopefully with a tray of sea bass baked in lemon sauce. He stood, wrapping the towel around his waist.

  The woman in the next room stood beside the door, her head bowed, waiting.

  He smiled, but his attention cut to his cell phone, vibrating in his pants pocket, folded over the chair. Debating a moment, he wrestled it out of the pocket.

  “I thought I told you not to call me on your—”

  “This isn’t my phone. It’s safe.”

  “You’re a fool if you belie—”

  “Father—”

  He gritted his chin against the Mandarin—why had he spent years teaching the boy English if he planned on never using it?

  “I only want to know that our problem has been taken care of. No more mistakes.”

  Silence. Then, “He got away from the safe house. But I found a way to find—”

  “Finish it. And then I will talk to you.” He hung up, turned his phone off.

  Tough love—wasn’t that what they called it in America? Thankfully, his other son, the one stationed on the other side of the ocean, understood the importance of obedience. He was a son a man could count on.

  He slid the phone back into his pants pocket, next to his diplomatic pass, and smiled at the woman waiting to ease from him the stress of his position. Obedience, was that so impossible?

  Chapter Ten

  D avid had very few dreams. He had goals—like fix up the 1967 Mustang in his storage unit, or learn to paraglide, but the dreams, the ones he’d sacrificed a decade ago when he signed on the dotted line committing his life to Uncle Sam, he rarely even took out to regret. He liked his life, the challenges, the travel, even the friends. It suited him.

  Or had. Until lately. Until his friends had started getting married and he was the guy at the party petting the dog, or seated next to the other single person in the room. Until he preferred to spend his Friday nights at home, with his laptop computer, connected to a chat room with Volleygirl on the other end. And until he walked downstairs into the kitchen of the simple Taiwanese three-story home Roman had directed them to last night and saw Yanna in the kitchen, apron around her waist.

  Cooking.

  Cooking?

  David stopped on the stairs before she could see him, and just watched. He had to admit surprise last night when, after Roman had called him back and sent him to an address in Taichung, his knock at the door had opened to a Chinese man…and an American woman. Cho Yung had married Trish, a student from Taiwan University, and settled down to teach English as a second language to the students in Cho’s church where he was a pastor.

  David had a long moment of misgiving when he saw Trish’s slightly rounded belly. He’d stood on the stoop, flicked off the overhead light that Cho had turned on and asked, “Did Roman tell you—”

  “You’re safe here, under God’s watch,” Cho had said, and touched his elbow. “Come inside. We’re happy to help a brother.”

  Oh. Something full and overwhelming had filled David’s chest at that—he’d nearly forgotten what it felt like to be among people who thought like he did. He’d been sniffing around the scum of the world for so long, blending in, watching them prosper, his frustration tightening like a noose around his neck. The feeling of fresh air seemed to almost hurt.

  Still, he had drunk it in. Especially as he’d watched Trish welcome Yanna, lead her upstairs to draw her a bath, and give her all those girly things a woman needed.

  It surprised him how much Yanna had taken to Trish and her ministrations. As if, perhaps, Yanna wasn’t beyond mothering, or perhaps in this case, sistering. Possibly, he didn’t know her as well as he thought he did.

  Or maybe he only looked at the things he wanted to see. Because if he thought of Yanna as a woman, sweet-smelling, soft and gentle, well, there went another layer of defenses.

  Which was why, as he stood in the stairwell, spying on Yanna as she made…pancakes, it shook him right to his core.

  She looked good, really good. Fresh and clean, with her hair pulled back in a ponytail, highlighting her regal face, and those pretty dark eyes that could swallow him whole. Like they nearly had last night in the candlelight. He’d come so close, again, to forgetting why they were here….

  Until he remembered that she’d nearly been killed. And then it rushed back to him, and all he could think about was keeping her safe. He had to wonder at God’s timing that Roman might be in Taiwan, armed with hints to help him accomplish the keeping-her-safe part. The only reason David let himself step over the threshold into the Yungs’ home was that he felt pretty sure Bruce, and thereby, Kwan, didn’t know the Yungs, or even that David and Yanna might still be alive. Yet.

  At least David had found the mole. Because if he did the math, only Bruce had known—twice now—where David would be. Only Bruce had known that he’d be meeting Kwan.

  Fool him once, shame on Bruce. Fool him twice, well…somewhere in David’s list of things to do was to have another face-to-face with Bruce and make him painfully aware of everything he’d nearly cost them.

  Yanna looked at Trish and laughed at something she said, her face lighting up, her eyes twinkling. It made a sort of explosion
in his chest, and he had to ease back into the shadows lest he make a fool of himself by breaking into tears.

  In every buried dream, every unlikely Norman Rockwell photo, Yanna was always front and center. And for that very reason, David had stopped dreaming.

  Why bother trying to find it with someone else, when it would only be a sorry substitute? He was a one-woman man. He’d known it for years, and watching her in the orange apron as she poured batter into a pan only confirmed it. No, he didn’t want a housewife, but seeing her had him conjuring up two little dark-haired boys hanging on her apron strings.

  “You okay, pal?”

  The voice, coming from above him, made him jerk. David looked up, and yes, he must be dreaming, because there was Roman, sitting on the top steps, giving him a small shake of his head.

  Of course, his voice made Yanna look up, but David ducked up the stairs and into the relative safety of the next flight. “Shh. You trying to get me busted?”

  Roman grinned, but it wasn’t a grin of triumph. He, better than anyone, knew about unrequited love. Only, his love had finally been returned. While David’s…

  He shoved those dreams right back where they belonged, in never-never land.

  “You’re a sight for sore eyes. When did you get here?”

  “This morning. Early. Took a bus from Taipei. Vicktor’s in the shower.”

  “He’s here, too?”

  Roman looked like he’d been up for about a week, with circles under his eyes, a two-day beard growth, and his hair matted on his head. David guessed he didn’t look much better, although his shower last night had at least made him feel human.

  Roman confirmed his assumptions with a sorry look. “You need a haircut.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” He rubbed a hand down his face, sat down next to Roman. “Tell me everything you know about Elena and her disappearance.”

  Roman filled him in on the details. “Truthfully, I think Yanna knows the most.”

  “Which is painfully little,” David said. “For all she knows—really knows—Elena was kidnapped by someone else, or is even still in Korea. Or ran off with Bob to Maui.”

  “No, she’s here. Elena passed through passport control over a week ago. And the fact that she used the same dating service, stayed at the same hotel and ended up in the same country, well, I’m thinking that Yanna’s at least warm.”

  “Great. I was really holding out for Maui.” Although David could have guessed that Yanna wouldn’t be that far off the trail.

  “I probably shouldn’t ask what you’re doing here, huh? Something about top secret, and special forces?” Roman scratched his beard, making a face.

  “Something like that. But it’s all gone south, and my partner’s been shot—”

  “Chet?”

  David nodded.

  “Who shot him?”

  “See, that’s why you don’t want to ask.”

  Roman raised an eyebrow and wisely said nothing. Finally. “How are we going to track down Elena?”

  “We’re going to track down Kwan, that’s how.” Yanna stood on the landing on her way up the stairs. “If you think I can’t hear you then you must think I’m stupid. I’m going to track down the GPS I left on the boat, and see if I can find Kwan.”

  Roman got up and gathered Yanna in his arms. “You really scared me.” He let her go and dug into his pocket, pulling out what looked like a necklace.

  Yanna took it and held it to herself. “Where’d you find it?”

  “At the hotel. A maid found it.”

  David looked up at Yanna, saw that her eyes glistened. “What is it?”

  “It’s my locket. I wasn’t sure where I lost it. It must have been ripped off when they snatched me from my hotel room. My sister has one just like it,” Yanna said, opening the locket. She handed the picture to David to look at. A girl who resembled a younger version of Yanna, without as much verve, stared back. He gave it back to her.

  “She is very pretty.”

  “Thanks for coming after me.” She backed away from him, looked at them. “I find it extremely eerie that here I am, in Taiwan, with two of my best friends—”

  “Three. Vicktor’s in the bathroom.”

  “Three—when I need you the most. Thanks.”

  David saw emotion flicker into her beautiful eyes, and his throat tightened. He knew what it cost her to say that. He touched her hand. “We’re not the only ones on your side, you know. I think you might need to chalk this up to God’s providence. Maybe He’s trying to tell you something.” Please, please, Yanna, listen.

  Her smile fell and she stared at him, her face unreadable. Roman glanced at David, then back to Yanna. “It smells great down there.”

  “Pancakes. American-style.” She lifted the apron, swayed with it. “Like my new outfit?”

  David took a breath and said nothing.

  The door in the hallway above them opened. Vicktor came out, trailed by a gust of steam.

  “Any hot water left?” Roman asked, rising.

  “Hey, Yanna,” Vicktor said, but David wasn’t sure if it was relief or a question his tone held. “I’m glad to see you. How fast can you get me a visa to America?”

  “First, stop hovering. Second, you’re acting like I haven’t the foggiest idea what I might be doing. Go back to your corners and let me work.” Yanna opened up the laptop computer Roman had brought with him and entered her password.

  The breakfast dishes had been pushed away, and she hadn’t felt this full in—actually, she never let herself eat as she had today. And being here with Vicktor and Roman and David, watching them interact…it felt like college again.

  It felt like maybe, yes, everything would be okay.

  “So you work with computers?” Trish said, coming to sit beside her. Slim—except for her cute little belly, with short brown hair and hazel eyes that seemed to pick up more than Yanna expected, Trish hadn’t even asked last night—just instinctively known that Yanna needed privacy. Some time to sit in the bathtub and…cry.

  And stupid her, she was crying just as much for herself as for Elena. While she knew she should have every thought focused on finding her sister, Yanna couldn’t help but wish, with everything inside her, that David loved her. That he’d hijacked a scooter and flagged down a bus and jumped in front of a thug with a knife because he couldn’t live without her.

  But even last night, when she’d all but begged him with her eyes to kiss her, he’d simply done the I’d hate to lose a friend act.

  So this morning, when Trish handed her an apron and wire whisk and asked her to stir, she’d decided it would be fine to let him see what he might be missing.

  It was his loss. She made good pancakes.

  “Yanna runs the IT department in Khabarovsk,” David answered for her.

  She did more than run it. She had single-handedly brought the lot of them into the twenty-first century. And she made pancakes.

  “Tell me your brilliant plan,” David said, apparently not listening to a word she said about hovering. Then again, when did he ever? Like his comment about God. Thanks, but she wasn’t going to take some good fortune and start proclaiming revival. Even if she did believe there was a God, she’d done just fine on her own.

  She simply didn’t need someone else letting her down.

  “Hopefully Kwan still has my cell phone. Even if it is off, the GPS is working. We can use it to track down Kwan, who will lead us to Elena.” She looked over at him. “So, you see, this isn’t over—not by a long shot.” She smiled, real big, at the men in the room. “Brilliant.”

  “You do surprise me,” David said, smirking. He glanced at what was left of his pile of pancakes.

  “Tracking down Kwan isn’t necessarily going to lead you to Elena,” Roman said.

  “How do you even know this guy was a member of the Serpents?” Vicktor asked, turning away from the window. “Maybe he was just a human trafficker.”

  “His ring,” David said. “We’ve disc
overed that all the major players in the Serpents are given a ring, usually with a snake emblem. Kwan had one on his middle finger.”

  Yanna’s hand went to her cheek, where said ring had left a bruise. “That brings me to brilliant plan number two,” she said. “What if Kwan were to see me, the girl who got away. And I’ll be wearing another tracking device, but now that you are in the country, I let myself be captured again and—”

  “No way. Not on your life.” David cut her off, shaking his head as if maybe she couldn’t understand him. “I’m not letting you near him. He’d kill you, and laugh while doing it. No way. Uh-uh. Nope.”

  “Okay, okay, I got it. I just thought maybe you’d be hiding in the bushes, and do that thing you did last night.”

  “What did he do last night?” Roman asked, shooting David a look.

  “Someone jumped us. Tried to kill Yanna.”

  “I don’t think he really cared who he stuck his knife into, as long as he started with one and ended with the other,” Yanna said with a shake of her head.

  Silence filled the room.

  “Okay, David’s right, there’s no way you’re getting near Kwan.” Roman wore a strange look as he glanced at David. “I’m really sorry, I should have never let her go alone.”

  “Oh, that’s not the half of it, Roma,” David said in a dark tone. “I haven’t told you about the boat, or the ocean or her stealing my wallet. She’s lucky I haven’t wrung her neck and sent her home in handcuffs.”

  “Which I’d just take off.”

  “And throw in the ocean.”

  The silence in the wake of their words made Yanna realize she’d been yelling. She glanced at Trish, who was staring at her coffee. Yeah, nice one, David. Now she sounded like some gangster in front of this sweet woman. She directed her attention back to her computer program, and her GPS system and what she did best.