by Nova McBee
Kai proves to be a faithful partner investing what he can into my two-part plan. While working at his internship, he contacts banks and companies and potential donors. This frees me up to focus on Madame and King. I buy my ticket for the Shanghai Expo and try to learn as much as I can about Maxima Moreau’s new summer line. Come July 10th, I have no idea what will happen.
At some point I’ll need to involve the police. Should I tip them off to the shipments? The hotels? The Pratt? But tip off who? I need someone on the inside of the police, someone who can be trusted.
As for the shipments arriving in China in a few weeks, they’re part of my plan. They’ll contain both money and girls. King will also be present. I’ll need to successfully steal all of the money and catch King red-handed first. Then I will get the police involved. After running through eighteen failed scenarios, I haven’t figured out how to pull it off without getting caught. My brain needs a rest. I pull out the article about myself I printed a few weeks ago.
I stare at the little girl’s eyes in the picture and read it for the 16th time. I set it down just as Kai enters and sets a cup of coffee on my desk.
“Coffee, cream, but no sugar, right?” He heads for the door, but not before he sees the article. “What’s that?” he asks. My heart races. He reads the title in two seconds, meanwhile I have already come up with seventeen reasons to explain why I am reading it. “Child prodigy, huh?” Then like a lifesaver he shrugs it off. “I thought it’d be news about the economy. See you for lunch?”
I nod and sigh in relief. “Thanks, Kai.” He leaves.
After catching my breath, I take a drink. Dark roast. No more tea for me. Even the smell of coffee energizes me. What are the odds that a Chinese boy would teach me, a girl born in the land of Starbucks, to like coffee? Kai reminds me of my father. I’m ready to savor every sip while going over the details of Chan’s latest deal when the secretary buzzes and asks me to report to Chan’s office immediately.
I tuck the article about Josephine Rivers away in my desk and head for the door.
I wonder if Chan changed his mind about Asia Bank? It’s torture to sit one office away from the only person on the planet with the resources to pull this off. Again, I marvel at the circumstances that brought us to the same city. No coincidences. Pondering this thought lasts only 53 seconds—the time it takes to walk into Chan’s office. His eyes burn like fire the moment I enter.
“You have decided to show up for work.”
Instead of answering, I pass him a file so he can be impressed with the money my investments have made, and we can finish on a good note, for once. “Good morning to you too.”
He opens it, glances over the contents, and sets it aside. “Why are you investing in Maxima Moreau’s Textiles? My new accountant says you’re following her businesses like a hawk.”
“Her investments are profitable for us all,” I say, cutting it short. I need to invest for her to believe I’m a real buyer or the Expo will be a bust. He picks up a new paper.
“And why is China Generation investing in global shipping transportation, hotel chains, and a farm over 1 million acres? What are you up to?”
They’re following my every move? “Your numbers are rising,” I say. “I make the calls in what to invest in. That was the deal.”
“Six more months—”
“What?”
“Six months. Then I want you gone.”
Months dissolve into fractions of days and minutes. King and Madame will be done. I’ll be free to go home. Start over. Maybe even visit my family’s graves. I should be happy, but the thought stings me.
“Fine,” I say.
“There’s more.” He examines my hair, which has changed again, this time to an even darker brown. My lipstick is lighter though. A soft pink. Maybe he’s looking for another bruise. “Why are you and Kai spending so much time together?”
“I’m seducing him to the dark side,” I say drily, enjoying the expression of horror on his face. I sigh and shake my head. “It’s just business, Chan. You know that.” Kai told his father about his decision to help me. But as I stand here, I wonder if Chan is more bothered by Kai bringing me coffee this morning. Even I don’t know what to think of it.
Chan holds his finger to his lips. He puts up with me because his investments are doubling. He knows I’m working on my own investments, but he doesn’t even ask. He still doesn’t trust me, and I guess I don’t trust him either.
“That had better be all, Phoenix,” he says quietly. “My son has a future. I don’t want you holding him back. We are Chinese. I don’t care how well you speak our language. You will never be one of us. If I learn of anything else between you two, the deal is off immediately. I want you to back off.”
This is why he called me in. Because of Kai. It had become routine for me to eat lunch with Kai—on the company, of course. It was a chance to bounce ideas off him about solving the crash. Although he took me to high-end restaurants downtown where I’d calculate the price of a shrimp into days and years and people, I still enjoyed just listening to him tell stories. But lately, every time Kai invited me for lunch, Chan would schedule a meeting, or send me a new list of companies to investigate. I get it now. It’s his way of keeping me away from Kai. And for the sake of preventing the crash, I must obey his wishes.
“Sure. Whatever.” A lump gathers in my stomach. “Is that all?”
He looks up. Worry spreads across his face. “You said before that you had a plan. I want to hear it.”
My eyes snap up to meet his. “You’re willing to help?”
“No. I want to know what my son has gotten himself into. That’s all.”
“All right.” While I explain my two-part plan and how the J.J. Bond will work he doesn’t say a word. His eyes are locked onto something small in the corner of the room. On a shelf sits the old pawn from Red.
28
Present: Phoenix
SHANGHAI TOWER, SHANGHAI, CHINA
Chan watches me like a hawk for the next three days, especially when I’m with Kai. He also works me like a dog.
Thoughts of home distract me. Seattle will be affected by the crash too. During the Great Depression, President Hoover’s initiative built affordable housing for the poor in Seattle called “Hoovervilles”. The idea failed. Nice neighborhoods, like my old one, became shantytowns like the Pratt where gambling, prostitution, and crime of all sorts rose drastically. If Chan doesn’t contribute to the super bond, it could happen again. Madame and King will grow richer while the good guys suffer.
A picture flashes in my mind of my sister Lily living in a place like the Pratt. I shudder. Lily may be gone, but her spirit is not. I can’t let that happen—regardless of who it is happening to.
Once, during one of the smaller recessions when I was growing up, I asked my dad for a new computer, pointing out he could pay for it with the money I had helped make, but he refused to give it to me. In hindsight, he never gave me any control over the money.
I’m suddenly very sad. Madame explained five times how she’d contacted my dad, but he refused her ransoms because he only wanted me for the money and that wasn’t possible anymore. She said my dad would never try to get me back. After months of waiting…it made sense. I guess I never saw it before. After all, when my mom died, he dove into business headfirst, telling me it was his cure. My dad had a good heart once. He wasn’t always driven by money. Once he had paid our neighbors’ insurance bill when they didn’t have enough. Mara even made them chocolate chip cookies. They used to be so caring. What happened? When did his vision of helping people dissolve? I slump back in my chair. These questions are useless. I’ll never get an answer to them, so I should stop asking.
Everything is gone. My family. My father’s company, iVision. My home. Even the concept of home is a murky puddle. Right now, the only thing I’m clinging to is that feeling on the beach with Kai. My ocean and a new beginning.
A knock on the door breaks my thoughts apart. Kai sneaks in
. I’m thankful for his distraction.
“The menu for today is Italian.” Kai lifts my jacket from my office chair.
“Sorry, Kai.” I pull the jacket back. “I can’t.” Beside the fact that it’ll upset Chan, I have to give Kai space to find the right girl—the one he described in the car. I’ll never be that girl. The thought both surprises and grieves me. Did I ever want to be that girl?
“What’s wrong?” Kai says, plopping down in the chair in front of me.
“Everything’s fine,” I say, twirling a pen in my fingers.
A twinge of guilt pinches when I look at his eyes full of concern. For once I wish I could just talk about what happened to me. Red understood the shame, the weakness, the pain. But Kai’s from a world where his family loves him. If I admitted to him how I was betrayed and kidnapped and forced to do horrible things, he’ll know how weak I am, and worst of all, he’ll understand it was because I wasn’t loved. He’ll wonder what’s wrong with me. Kind of like I do sometimes.
I press the thought from my mind “Any progress?”
“We’re plugged into a few banks, some of the stocks you advised, tech companies. We have also invested so much into the largest dairy, maize, and potato farms in the world, we’re practically owners,” he reports.
Suddenly Kai amazes me, investing his money, time, and faith into my ideas. Sometimes, when I’m talking about the math side of things, he asks me to explain the equation. He’s no fool. He knows there’s more to me than a good math student.
“Well done,” I say,
“I saw the Sang Brothers last night,” he says, smiling. For three minutes he tells me about his practice session, making me laugh.
He’s quite unlike his father, so sociable and creative. Hard to imagine he’ll follow in his father’s footsteps. And that face, too...I catch myself staring. His smooth brown skin. The way his eyes smile when he talks. It’s like they’re the only thing I see…
Wait.
His eyes are the only thing I see—there are no numbers—just two dark eyes staring back at me.
The numbers are gone!
My world goes black, like I’m blind without my faithful numbers defining everything. I’m about to panic when one by one the numbers turn on like a switch. A full screen of graphs, dimensions, and measurements, everything normal. I exhale.
What just happened?
It was only for a moment, but my brain begins panicking as to why. I add up the reasons around me, examining everything in the room to add to the equation of possibilities. The lighting, the coffee, an allergy, Kai? Nothing accounts for it.
“I need to get back to work, Kai,” I say, obviously uneasy.
“Ok. Do you need a ride home today?” he asks. “Or are you going to dart off after work like the last several weeks?”
Kai is becoming very suspicious. For the past week he has offered to drive me home every night, but I’ve refused. I’ve been searching everywhere for more X girls—the squares downtown, I hang around the hotels and Golden Alley. But I’ve come up with very little. Frustration is building. I can’t enter the hotels alone, and I can’t risk buying them yet.
“No ride, thanks. I’m busy tonight,” I answer.
“A boyfriend?” he asks.
At this, I can’t help but laugh. “You’re kidding, right? With all that we have going on? I’m far too busy for that—”
“Well, that’s a relief. We wouldn’t want the second Great Depression to happen because of a secret affair.” He laughs. “Seriously, where do you go at night?”
“I hang out with prostitutes,” I say, in a deadpan voice. His face goes flat, eyes wide. “I’m joking. I just like being alone. Time to think, you know.” I shrug.
“Time to think, huh?” he repeats, his head bobbing. “I’ll just have to find a way into your thoughts then.”
My cheeks flush with warmth. Kai holds my gaze before he walks out. He’s on to me, determined to find out what I’m doing. If I know Kai, it won’t take him much longer.
Today I play the part of Chan’s nameless, personal assistant. We sit at a table with twenty-five experts in finance and government and watch their faces pale as Chan explains the pattern behind the mega-recession.
An economist with a round face speaks up. “Already the price of gas has gone up. The stock market has dropped dramatically,” he says. “Airlines, too, are reporting major losses. How bad are things going to get?”
“The worst is yet to come,” Chan tells them, not mentioning it would’ve been much worse if Kai and I had not picked up some of those stocks. “As we know, if China falls, then it will have serious implications on other countries. We’d like to offer a possible solution to cushion some of the damage…”
Chan gives me the floor to pitch my solution for the bailout plan and the J.J. Bond. I keep my eyes on the charts as I speak. I use a pure dialect of Beijing Mandarin, throwing in local northern words to disguise my origin. I don’t mention my name—it doesn’t matter. They have to believe this plan is Chan’s if it is ever going to be approved.
“Thanks, but our government has its own protocols,” one official replies in response to the proposed plan. “We will, however, publicly support your super-bond program for private individuals and corporations after you initiate it.”
“Thank you.” Chan catches my eye, as if to say. I tried. It’s wasted breath to explain again that those protocols won’t save the economy nor that my solution is impossible without Chan’s money. I leave frustrated, hanging on to a fool’s wish that Chan will change his mind or that King’s and Madame’s gold will be enough.
After work, I’m at the factory. With an allotment of money, Dr. Ling remodeled. It’s fully operational and comfortable. There is a medical room, gym, food storage, and even my ‘hacking room’ full of tech stuff is equipped with plush rugs and cozy chairs.
“Wow,” I say, walking around the factory. “Everything looks great. No trails?”
“No,” she replies. “I used my cousins’ accounts to buy everything. Then they deliver in sets to the factory next door. We do everything according to protocol.”
I sigh. Dr. Ling has agreed to stay here full-time until King and Madame are behind bars. But it’s like these women are the ones behind bars. The factory is on complete lockdown, with working surveillance cameras, alarms, and rules.
Dr. Ling has become quite savvy when it comes to security. The girls rotate local vegetable markets each week, so no one notices them. They go outside only a couple hours a day. They rarely leave the compound. But they can’t live like this forever. The pressure to end this is increasing.
I take out more cash than she can count. “Here’s more for you and the girls. Give whatever you like to your family. I’m sorry.”
She gives me a motherly squeeze on the arm. “Don’t worry about us. It’ll be over soon. The girls are safe. That’s what matters.”
Revenge is not the reason she is here. Restoration is. The fulfillment of what Red wanted long ago. I can’t let them down.
I admit, without her, I’m not sure what I’d do with the girls. She’s older, wiser, and calmer. She has experienced loss and trauma and remained a stable, hopeful person with her values intact, which means she doesn’t lose it when listening to the girls’ stories. She’s helping them heal in a way I never could.
As part of her therapy, Dr. Ling gives them freedom to do very normal things, like reading, cooking, painting, and decorating. They’re healing, slowly. As I watch, I wonder if parts of me are healing too.
If only I could free more girls. My Friday trips to Golden Alley have been fruitless. But the numbers tell me I’ll hit the mark one day if I don’t give up. So I won’t. Because something tells me if I can find one, I can find them all—save them all. Then perhaps, I can save myself.
Shanghai summer sunsets are a blend of oranges, grapefruits, and strawberries. The rich colors are enhanced by the pollution, but it’s also too pretty not to appreciate.
Today
the World Bank issued a warning about the recession—to be frugal in the coming several months, to conserve supplies and resources. It was very level-headed, assuring everyone that experts were developing fast solutions.
My office is humid and stuffy. The rest of the building is air-conditioned, but I refuse to use it. I have been cold too often to enjoy it. Besides, paying to be cold doesn’t make sense to me.
There’s a knock on the door.
“I already emailed you the electronic copy, Mr. Chan,” I say without turning around.
“Wrong Chan,” says a friendly voice that makes my stomach flip.
I turn. Kai walks slowly inside. He’s in his suit as usual. “Have you eaten?”
“No, I haven’t left the office for twelve hours and eight minutes.”
“Well, maybe 48 minutes of rest and food will do you some good,” Kai jokes. “Come on, the night has really cleared up. I’ll take you to dinner. I refuse to take no for an answer.”
I look at his pinstriped tie. “Not in the mood for fancy.”
“Me neither. Now that we trust each other, I want to take you to a secret place, one of my favorite restaurants. A place not even my father knows about,” he says, smirking.
“We trust each other?” I laugh, making a joke. Well, half a joke.
“Just you and me, hao bu hao?” The way he looks at me—so sure of who he is and what he wants—makes me forget about Chan’s warnings.
I close my computer. “Hao.”
“Meet me in exactly ten minutes, thirty-seven seconds downstairs,” he says with a grin, shaking his head.
Little does he understand that showing up on the dot is not hard for me to accomplish.
29
Present: Phoenix
PUDONG, SHANGHAI, CHINA
I tug gently at my dress, which is sticking to my thighs, hoping he doesn’t notice. Then I wonder when I started caring about what Kai thinks.