Leticia cleared border control at Shanghai Pudong International, which proved that the German passport Milo’s people had scrounged up was good enough to get her into China … but would it get her out once she’d dealt with Liu Wei? A question for later. For now, she sailed through customs and found Poitevin waiting at arrivals, looking small and wired in his heavy coat. She remembered him from Tokyo, hovering on the periphery of her meeting with the Cabinet Intelligence and Research Office. When she approached, he said, “Where is your luggage?”
“They lost it in Seoul,” she said, and saw him relax.
“I’m looking forward to working with you, Kanni,” he said, using the Library cryptonym Milo had handed her before she left; she hated it.
As they stood in the taxi queue, the cool night breeze off the Yellow Sea washing over them, Poitevin whispered to her that Tóuzī’s office was located in Lujiazui, on the eastern bank of the Huangpu River, where new skyscrapers grew wildly.
Leticia knew Lujiazui; it was the new China, built up since the nineties to overshadow the old financial district of the Bund, that reminder of foreign domination on the western side of the river. As they climbed into an overheated taxi, her phone rang. It was Kristin, calling to tell her about the link between Skorost Endeavor and four companies: MirGaz, Nexus, Salid Logistics, and Tóuzī. “What does that mean?” she asked.
“We don’t know. But MirGaz purchased twenty-two acres of Nigerian coastal land using Skorost.”
“Why?”
“Again, it’s a mystery.”
“I’ll put it to Liu Wei,” Leticia said, then hung up.
As the taxi worked its way north, she gazed out the window at the modern city full of afternoon activity. She’d been to Shanghai plenty of times before—any serious Asia work seemed to bring her through Shanghai’s golden streets—but she’d never loved the place. She’d once spent weeks in Xi’an, inland, and compared to that austerity Shanghai was a gaudy whore that had nothing to do with the Chinese culture she’d been fond of.
The Mandarin Oriental, a block off of the Huangpu, was right in the thick of the action. They were a quick walk from the Times Finance Center, Foxconn, China Minsheng Bank, Huaxia, and, on the fifth floor of the China Development Bank Tower, Tóuzī.
“I’m going to need a nap,” she admitted as they got out. “It was a long flight.”
Poitevin shrugged. “I’ll look around some more. See what I can find.”
“Whatever suits you,” she said, then went inside to get her key.
Her room was expansive, with a view of the Huangpu and the watercraft of the rich lazily floating by. She hadn’t stayed in a posh place for nearly six months, and the sheets reminded her why she missed it: the smell. Large-screen TVs and fully stocked fridges didn’t do much for her, but the smell of overpriced soaps and linens made the cost worth it. “I’ll have you,” she told the enormous bathtub, suddenly feeling the exhaustion of the long flight that she’d been pushing back ever since landing.
When she woke, it was after midnight, the city now a firmament of lights through the window, and the bathwater had gone cold. Someone was banging on her door. She threw on her robe and found Poitevin in the corridor. Looking at his wild eyes, she first thought he was loaded, but he was only excited. “Yanlord Garden.”
“What?”
“Yanlord Garden—that’s where he’s staying.”
It turned out that Poitevin was less inept than he appeared. He’d left the hotel and headed straight to the China Development Bank Tower, where he’d ridden up to the fifth floor and talked his way inside with a story about scouting investments for a Chinese-American billionaire.
“Did it work?”
“No. They’re not interested. I just wanted to get inside and note names and faces. There are only three people in their big office—the secretary, a mainlander who kicked me out, and a Pole named Kowalczyk.”
“A Pole?”
“Strange, yes? And lucky—he wasn’t hard to pick out of a crowd. So I waited downstairs for him to leave. Followed him over to the riverside, all the way to the Paulaner Bräuhaus, where he met at one of those wooden tables with…” His dramatic pause was a little too self-conscious.
“Liu Wei,” Leticia said dryly.
A big smile. “I had a beer, and when they split up I followed Liu Wei back to Yanlord Garden, West Gate. Huge place.”
“Do you know which apartment he’s in?”
Poitevin smiled and opened his hands. “Right on the buzzer.”
“So you’re not just a pretty face.”
She dressed quickly, and they walked the half hour down the Yincheng Middle Road to reach Yanlord Garden. The midnight cold bit, and the streets were empty save for early-morning workers trickling out of busses. Poitevin was upbeat and eager, and she asked how much time he’d spent in China.
“I’ve only been here once for the Library,” he told her. “Courier job.”
“Is Milo afraid of China?”
“Just careful,” he said, then lowered his voice: “Guoanbu.”
Xin Zhu, Leticia thought. That’s who Milo was afraid of. “Was anyone following you?” she asked.
“What?”
“The Pole stood out, but so did you. Were you followed?”
“I don’t think so.”
It was as honest an answer as she could expect, and as they made their way across the enormous park reserved for Yanlord’s residents she thought she could hear in the cold stillness the aperture shift of surveillance cameras and the wet movement of eyes watching them.
Poitevin brought her to a high tower on the southern end of the estate. Once they reached the foyer, she told Poitevin to stand down. “We don’t need to both go up there.”
“What am I going to do?”
“You’re going to keep an eye out.”
He sighed, as if he weren’t getting the respect he deserved for all he’d done, but then he shrugged. “Milo told me to follow your lead.”
“He did?” she asked, surprised.
She left Poitevin in the foyer, and in the cramped elevator pressed 16. It was a long, slow ride, and Leticia wondered how many crappy elevators, in how many cities, she’d ridden. Sometimes, like now, she rode them to interrogate people; a handful of times she’d headed up to kill someone. Other times she rode aspirationally, to collect payment for work done.
As she passed the twelfth floor, her phone vibrated. She answered it and heard gasping, the sound of someone running. “What?” she said.
“It’s a trap,” said Poitevin. “Get out of there.”
Leticia slapped the emergency-stop button, but it was too late. She’d arrived at the sixteenth floor, and the elevator lurched to a halt with a loud bang. She took a breath as the doors opened, and she found herself looking into the face of a young Chinese man in a black turtleneck gripping an automatic pistol in both hands, pointing somewhere around her stomach. Behind him stood two more men, also in turtlenecks, as if they were members of a boy band, but one that only played death metal.
“Gàn,” Leticia said, which was as close to “fuck” as she knew in Mandarin.