Kang drained the last of his beer before looking at his watch. “It’s a little after ten. Should we head back to the hotel and punch in the answer?”
I was about to nod my head in agreement but hesitated. “You know what? Let’s have one more drink, then we’ll head back. We’re not robots. We need a little R&R from time to time.”
“Good move, Agent.” Kang wasted no time heading back to the bar to grab us another round, and I went back to enjoying the rooftop sights.
By the time we planted our feet back on street level, it was 11:00 p.m. Still, there was no shortage of sightseers funneling themselves into the building for a drink at the famous bar. We pushed through the crowd and onto the sidewalk that was lined by six or seven food vendors.
We both stopped in front of a cart that sold grilled pork. It was as if our stomachs had read each other’s minds. The vendor moved his hand along the small grill, flipping the skewered morsels of tender meat over one by one. The red-hot coals seared from the fatty drippings, sending billowing gray straight up my nose. It smelled like my kind of heaven. Kang motioned for two. I quickly told him I wanted two for myself. He smiled and then changed the two fingers he held out to four.
We stood by the vendor while we munched until a taxi tout approached us. “Taxi? I have taxi, take you hotel.”
We needed a taxi, so we followed the man. He led us down the soi, away from the vendors and toward a dark alley. Kang and I stopped. It was obvious to us there was no taxi there. Before we could turn and head back to where the vendors were situated, four men appeared from the darkened alley and closed in.
The one nearest us wrapped his arms around me, immobilizing my arms. I instinctively threw my head back into his face. He cried out and released me. I followed up with a hard elbow to his gut. From the corner of my eye, I could see Kang engaged in his own fight with two men. I wasn’t worried about him; I had already seen what the guy could do.
I wasn’t in the mood for a street fight and had my weapon tucked away in my purse. I quickly backed away from my attacker to buy me time to get to it, but another man had already closed in, and he kicked my purse right out of my hands. Perhaps he sensed what I was about to do, or perhaps he just got lucky with his kick. Either way I was faced with what my father lovingly called “a swingin’ donnybrook”.
I raised both arms into a defensive position and easily blocked two fist strikes from the man who had kicked my purse away. I wasn’t so lucky with the leg kick into my side. I doubled over from the pain and took an elbow to the face. It was then that I realized he was a skilled fighter—Muay Thai, possibly. Before I could recover fully, he struck a third time and in seconds had me kissing the street.
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Kang held his ground against his two attackers. He, too, quickly realized both were trained in Muay Thai, but their level of skill wasn’t enough to overcome the detective’s lifelong pursuit of mastering the art of kung fu.
It didn’t take long for Kang to deliver two perfect tiger strikes to one of his attackers. He heard the dull snap of a rib and watched the man double over. He clamped his hands on the back of the man’s head and followed up with a knee strike to his face. The man was unconscious before he hit the asphalt.
That’s when something hard hit the back of Kang’s head, sending him down to one knee. Dazed and with his sight blurred, he never saw the foot rushing straight toward his face, snapping his head back.
Kang’s instincts took over, and he covered up with his arms as he anticipated another blow, fearful of what would happen should he take another direct hit. Another kick did come, but his arms soaked up the bulk of the impact. By then, his eyesight had righted, and he fended off yet another strike from the man’s leg.
Kang retaliated with a foot sweep, knocking his attacker to the ground. He pounced onto the man’s chest and delivered a fury of fist strikes until his attacker lay unconscious.
Kang rose to his feet quickly, arms up, ready to defend or strike. He knew at least four men had attacked them. Spinning around, his balance still a bit wobbly, he counted three men on the street. The two near him were not moving. A wooden bat lay next to one of them. The third man lay a few feet away, moaning. The fourth was nowhere to be seen. He had disappeared. And so had Kane.
Chapter 29
Kang reached inside his coat and felt his weapon sitting securely in its holster. A relief, considering a crowd of Thais had gathered around him; they didn’t look friendly.
He removed his wallet from his back pocket and held up his badge. “I’m a police officer,” he said, not sure if anyone understood him. They didn’t.
The crowd’s concern wasn’t that Kang had just been attacked or that he had in his possession a badge, but that he had just attacked one of their own. And it wasn’t pleasing to them.
“They attacked me first,” he continued. “You saw that, right?”
Kang’s pleas went unheeded. Members of the crowd, made up of food hawkers and motortaxi drivers, shouted at him while pointing at their fallen compatriots. Kang didn’t know what they were saying, but he didn’t like their tone.
At this point, the crowd of angry Thais formed a circle around him. He had to remove himself from the situation. Fast. He looked around for an escape route but saw something better.
He approached a motortaxi. “Sorry, pal.” Kang pushed the owner off the bike and hopped on. He hit the electronic starter and gunned the engine before the confused man could react. Off he went, weaving the bike around the mob. In the process, he took a few blows but eventually bypassed them all. But Kang wasn’t out of the woods yet.
He looked back to see that the other motortaxis had given chase. There were six closing in on him. Kang twisted the throttle back and sped down the soi. He had no idea where he was headed—he hoped not deeper into the neighborhood.
The only thought Kang had managed at that moment had been to make it to the safe house that he and Kane had secured at another hotel. It had been Kane’s idea to book an extra room at a different hotel as a just-in-case. If something did go wrong, they both knew to head to that location.
Up ahead, a sea of red brake lights lit up the dark street. Kang did what he saw every other person in Bangkok do while riding a motorbike: He threaded the traffic and drove between the cars.
A large truck shrunk the gap up ahead, and Kang didn’t like the odds of trying to squeeze by. He slowed and drove between the front and back of two cars, heading for the other Thai road: the sidewalk.
Not a smart move.
It was crowded with vendors and their customers. The horn on the bike bleated out as Kang shouted for the shopping crowd to clear the path, but not before he knocked a few to the ground. That slowed him down enough for one of his pursuers to ride up alongside of him and start punching him. Kang used his long leg to kick the front wheel of the other motortaxi, causing the man to lose control and crash into a vendor’s table full of fake Rolex watches.
Shouts and screams erupted behind Kang as he sped off. He had extinguished one of his pursuers, but another quickly filled the spot right behind him. The rest were still giving chase from the road. Kang knew he had to get off the sidewalk. It slowed him down.
To make matters worse, the sidewalk made a sharp left up ahead. He would have to slow his bike considerably to make the turn. He had maybe thirty seconds to figure out a plan. As he closed in, he realized the sidewalk actually turned into steps that led to a bridge. Not an ideal situation. But there was another option. One that Kang wasn’t thrilled about.
He gunned the engine of the motorbike, and it picked up speed. He watched the speedometer climb: 60km, 80km, 100km. He feared the old bike would never reach its top speed of 160km. He could already hear the engine straining while the vibration in the handlebars became increasingly worse.
Kang aimed the bike toward a narrow wooden table that had been leaned against a low wall—a makeshift ramp. He was about to attempt a jump of epic portions, one that the famous daredevil Evel Knievel
would never have undertaken.
Kang had no idea what the span of the canal was or whether he had enough speed to propel himself safely to the other side. Or even if there was another side. He hoped there was one. He took one last look at the gang of motorbikes chasing him before gripping the handlebars tighter. He lowered his head and prayed he wasn’t making the stupidest decision ever.
Within seconds, the motorbike hit the ramp and launched into the air. Kang let out a yell as the bike sailed off in the darkness over what he could only imagine was a watery staph infection waiting to envelop him. His eyes searched for the other side, but all he saw was blackness. Doubt, then regret, filled his mind. What the hell did I just do?
The engine of the 135cc bike whined as Kang held the throttle open, hoping that somehow it would add to the propulsion of the bike. But as fast as the bike rose, it started to fall. Gravity had sunk its hooks into the flying machine and was beginning to pull it back to Earth.
Kang’s high-pitched scream echoed into the night as he readied himself for an unavoidable crash landing into a polluted canal. But no sooner had that thought crossed his mind than hope appeared in the form of a flat, cement embankment, one that led to a road.
Kang knew he could stick that landing. He was sure of it. A perfect touchdown would set him free from his pursuers. He just needed to reach the other side. But there was one problem. The bike was falling short.
Chapter 30
A dark bag sporting a smell reminiscent of motor oil had been secured over my head, eliminating my ability to see or even detect the slightest source of light, but still, I knew I had been thrown into the trunk of a vehicle. The sound of an engine, jerky movements, and a bad suspension that sent periodic jolts into my spine only confirmed the obvious.
I didn’t squander any precious time trying to decipher how I had ended up in that situation. That was an answer I could ponder later, after I escaped, which was my only concern at the time. Instead, I kept track of how many turns and stops the vehicle made. I wasn’t sure if it would help, but I did it anyway like my life depended on it. It probably did.
For twenty minutes, I made mental notes of the vehicle’s movements. There were many things to count, and I worried I would start to lose track. But no sooner had that thought waltzed into my mind than the vehicle came to a stop, and the engine shut off.
I could hear the voices of two Thai men speaking and the crunch of gravel from their footsteps nearing. A beat later, I heard the click of a latch. Rough hands grabbed me by my arms and yanked me out of the trunk. My legs flailed for a second before finding their footing on the ground.
I could still only detect the two men, but I had to assume there might be more. They each grabbed an arm and ushered me forward, grunting in Thai. Left and right they jerked me forward. I wondered for a second if they were drunk but tossed that thought. I was pretty sure one of my captors was part of the group of men that had ambushed Kang and me.
The two men dragged me forward until my feet bumped up against stairs. Up we went, me half walking, half being carried. I counted five flights of stairs. We walked for what felt like another ten feet before we stopped abruptly. I heard a knock on a door, then I felt a whoosh of cool air before my captors escorted me into an air-conditioned room.
After a few steps, one of them forced me to sit down on a metal chair. A hand grabbed the bag that covered my head but not before more discussion took place. I could only guess that my captors were debating whether they should remove it.
Seconds later, I sucked in a deep breath as the manufactured air chilled my hot and sweaty face. I struggled to open my eyes, but the light in the room stung, forcing me to squint at best. I could see that there was a desk in front of me with someone sitting behind it. I decided against speaking and focused on regaining my eyesight.
“Do you know why you are here?” The male voice had a Thai accent and came from across the desk. I shook my head no.
“We’re here to help you, Agent Kane.”
They know who I am?
“There is a man killing women in Bangkok. We can give you information that will help you capture him.”
Who is killing women? Is this about the game? A million thoughts raced through my mind as I worked to comprehend what he had said to me. “Who are you, and how do you know who I am?”
“Agent Kane, we’ve known about you for some time.”
This has got to be about the game. “Are you the mastermind behind the Chinatown Chase?”
“The man you’re after calls himself the Creeper.”
I know that name from the leaderboard. Team Creeper is in Bangkok. “I’m supposed to know who that is?”
“Don’t pretend to be stupid, Agent. You know what this is about.”
By now, my eyesight had normalized and allowed me to look directly at the plump man behind the voice, except he wore a clear plastic mask that disguised his face. It was disturbing.
He went on to give an accurate description of what we knew the Creeper to look like, but still, I didn’t know why the people behind the game were helping me to catch one of their players. Perhaps they had lost control of him and wanted him eliminated, literally. Or they were setting me up.
“How do I know you’re not lying to me? Surely you must know how odd this conversation is,” I asked.
“He made som tam out of human flesh.”
Okay, he got that right. “Why are you helping me? Answer that.”
“Catch him, Agent Kane, and we’ll answer all your questions.”
“You seem to think that the information you’ve given me is revolutionary. It’s nothing we didn’t already know. You’ve got to give me more.”
“If you wish. The Creeper has completed the first Attraction and will soon take on the second one.”
“So he’ll head over to the Sky Bar like I did tonight for an answer to the riddle?” I was unsure about Kang’s status, so I decided not to acknowledge him.
“No.”
My patience with his cryptic answers started to run thin. I let out a breath. “Are you telling me the game play differs for each player?”
“The Creeper has a specific task for completing the second Attraction, one that will lead him right to you.”
“Really? I’m all ears.”
“He’s been ordered to eliminate Team Carlson.”
Chapter 31
The back wheel of the motorbike took the brunt of the impact as it fell short of the embankment. The jolt that followed sent Kang up and over the handlebars, flying through the air like a wannabe superhero, but Kang had the mindset to tuck into a roll as he landed, minimizing what surely would have been an impressive amount of road rash.
Kang lay on his back, dazed for a brief moment, before hurrying to his feet. He scanned the bridge and saw the motorbike gang fighting their way through the crowd. Kang turned and ran in the opposite direction toward a taxi that had just dropped off a fare. He jumped in the back seat.
“The Sheraton on Sukhumvit,” he called out in an even tone, not wanting to alert the driver. His torn and soiled suit had already caused the young man to give pause on whether he should take the fare. Not wanting to take any chances, Kang offered up a flat rate as opposed to using the meter. “Three hundred baht,” he said, knowing the fare would only have been about 90 baht if the meter had been used. The driver jiggled the stick shift into gear and took off. Money talks.
The yellow and green cab sped down Rama IV Road heading southeast before turning onto Asoke Road and continuing north. From there, it was a straight shot to Sukhumvit. Kang patted his back pocket and felt his wallet, but his cell phone was gone. All he could surmise was that he must have lost it in the crash. At least he still had his weapon.
The Sheraton was near the Asoke skytrain stop. Unfortunately before reaching it, the cab slammed into stop-and-go traffic. Mostly stop. At the rate the cab continued to inch along the road, Kang figured he could make better time on foot and exited the vehicle. It didn’t take long
for him to notice the stares. He took another look at his tattered suit and realized it wasn’t helping him to blend in.
Custom tailor shops hawking “suits in a day” littered the Sukhumvit area. Kang figured a fresh change of clothes would go a long way considering he had no idea if he was still being followed. He walked twenty feet before spotting Raji’s Fashions. A sign on a sandwich card outside the shop touted 399b suits. The price was right, and Kang made a left turn into the store.
Inside, a short, Indian man with a round belly greeted Kang and quickly gave him a cautious once over before grinning. “Hello, my friend. Rough night?”
“You can say that.”
“Okay. You’ve come to the right place. We tailor the best suits in all of Bangkok.”
“Can you give me something now?” Kang watched the smile on the salesperson’s face disappear.
“My friend, it is late. I can deliver a new suit tomorrow evening.”
“Not good enough. I need something now. There must be something you can do. I don’t want to take my business elsewhere.” Kang looked outside the shop as if he were already considering that thought.
The salesperson took a second to realize Kang’s seriousness before whipping out a tape measure. Twenty minutes later, Kang exited the shop wearing one of the outfits from a mannequin. The pants were a bit short, but the rest of the beige ensemble fit his frame relatively okay.
Feeling better about his appearance, Kang continued north until he reached Sukhumvit Road. Thais and tourists trafficked the area thanks to the numerous bars and restaurants, the Terminal 21 shopping center and the Soi Cowboy entertainment center.
Along the way, he passed a street vendor selling disposable phones and purchased one. Kang topped up the SIM card at a nearby 7/11 before dialing Kane’s cell but got voicemail. He left a message that he was heading out for a bite to eat—code for heading to the safe location. Kang had another number to call. He dug through his wallet and pulled out the business card Artie had given him.
Lumpini Park (Abby Kane FBI Thriller - Chasing Chinatown Trilogy Book 2) Page 9