Bai turned, leaving Jimmy where he sprawled on the floor, to walk over and speak to his associates. Lee followed with his gun pointed at the ground. The Wah Ching seemed sufficiently cowed, but it didn’t hurt to have Lee at her back. She’d learned early in life that stupid people did stupid things.
The boys hung their heads to avoid her gaze. Their feet shuffled nervously. The four young girls stared at her as if mesmerized with their eyes big and their mouths hanging slightly open, like guppies.
The young women were dressed alike in anti-school uniforms: tight jeans, tight tee-shirts, and over-sized leather jackets. Their eyes were smeared with black eye shadow and their lashes clumped with mascara. They probably thought they looked more grown-up that way. They didn’t. They looked like little girls who lived on the fringe of society, seeking acceptance with little to look forward to other than a revolving door in the legal system.
Bai couldn’t help thinking of her own daughter, Dan, and wondered if any of the aimless young women who stood before her had mothers who worried about them. The thought saddened her. With a weary voice, she asked, “Who’s in charge here?” She wanted to speak with the leader. Like all packs, the Wah Ching would have an alpha male. “This is me asking nicely.” She stopped to look around and see if anyone cared to volunteer an answer. “If we can’t talk like civilized adults, you’ll soon get acquainted with the not-so-nice me.”
When she still didn’t get an answer, she stepped forward and grabbed the skinny kid by his ear and pulled down. He dropped to his knees and screeched.
“Answer my question,” she ordered, “or I’ll pull off your ear.” She looked up to glare at the skinny kid’s friends. “If that doesn’t work, I’ll pull off the other ear.”
The boys looked away. A couple of the young women put their hands over their ears protectively. Bai had to bite her tongue to keep from smiling.
The short kid with the ponytail mumbled, “What do ya want?”
She maintained a hold on the skinny kid’s ear while she turned to Ponytail. “I want Jia Yan back.”
He mumbled again with his head down. His words were lost to the checkered tiles on the floor.
Bai tried again. “Could you look at me when you talk? And try moving your lips when you speak. It isn’t that hard—really.”
The young man looked away. He seemed incapable of meeting her gaze. His words were barely above a whisper. “Ngaw din nei la.”
He’d told her to fuck off. She let go of the skinny kid’s ear to confront the smartass. “Dai jek gwan,” she said, calling him a big talker. His head dropped lower. “What’s your name?”
“Jan.”
“Jan what?”
“Just Jan.”
“OK, just Jan, tell me where the girl is,” she demanded.
He remained silent.
She leaned over to whisper in his ear. “Da sei nei.”
She told him she’d kill him. His head jerked up to see if she was serious. She locked eyes with him. From the shock on his face, he apparently believed her.
“Oaklin,” he whispered.
“Sao jee!” hissed the skinny kid. Squealer.
Bai whirled around to slap the skinny kid hard across the mouth with the back of her hand. The sound of the blow was like the crack of a whip. His head snapped back from the force of the cuff. He stumbled before catching his balance.
She’d wanted to make a point. The slap had a sobering effect. Nobody else, it seemed, was in a hurry to get bitch slapped by a girl.
She turned back to Jan. “Where in Oakland?”
He shook his head and looked at the floor before whispering, “Gai dao.” Brothel. The young thug looked up and smiled. “Ka si nai make good cheen.” He told Bai the young girl would make good money.
The little pimp spoke the words as if he were discussing an object, a thing, and not a young woman. For a brief moment, Bai lost it. Her hand shot out like it belonged to a stranger. She felt the cartilage in Jan’s nose break beneath her knuckles; the entire room heard the crunch. Jan staggered back into the girls, who caught him and kept him from falling.
He held his hands cupped to his face and wheezed, “Ou bro’ muh nose.”
“That’s just the beginning unless you tell me where to find Jia Yan. If you don’t tell me, I’ll make sure you crawl out of here—blind, deaf, mute, and crippled. They’ll prop you up with a bowl in front of the transit station where you’ll earn lots of cheen, you little shit.”
Lee chuckled. He enjoyed seeing her get wound up, and she was thoroughly pissed. High school girls weren’t supposed to be sold into the sex trade. The more she thought about it, the angrier she became.
“Nei se yan chee seen ge,” squealed Jan, holding his nose.
He screamed that Bai was crazy. She didn’t feel any obligation to dispel the notion. She glared at him and hissed, her voice seething with anger. “Gwai gung?” Who’s the pimp?
Jan stared at her and yelled defiantly. “Sammy Tu . . . tai lo . . . jal sei ma.”
He spit blood that had dripped into his mouth onto the linoleum floor at her feet. His face was twisted with rage and pain. He’d told her that Sammy Tu was the pimp, she’d better be careful, and she’d better be ready for a fight. Jan had finally found his courage.
She got in his face, standing toe to toe with him, her voice soft but filled with threat. “Puk gai baan chat. Get Real.”
She’d called him a stupid prick and told him to drop dead in gang slang. “Get Real” is universal gang speak for “prepare for war.” Bai had declared war on the Wah Ching.
Only after he’d dropped his gaze was she willing to turn away to sit on a stool at the counter. She needed time to think—time to let her temper cool. Ling stood behind the counter as a silent observer.
Bai turned to the girl. “Any chance I can get a cup of coffee nobody’s spit in?”
Ling smiled and turned around to pick up a pot that had been resting on a warming station. She poured the steaming liquid into a brown mug and handed it to Bai. “You take cream or sugar?”
Bai’s tone softened at the courtesy. “No. Thanks.”
“You really wanna thank me, you can kick Jimmy in the balls again.”
The request was delivered in a soft voice, but Bai could see from the look in her eyes that Ling was serious. She looked down at Jimmy as she sipped. The coffee had been sitting too long on the warmer and was bitterly strong. He gazed up at her, having heard the appeal. She took a guilty pleasure in witnessing his fear. She hadn’t forgotten he’d called her “old.”
With her back to Lee, she heard him addressing the Wah Ching. “Why don’t you all sit down again until we decide what to do with you? And no phone calls,” he warned. “I’d feel really bad if you compelled me to shoot one of you.”
His tone implied he wouldn’t feel bad at all.
The scrape of chairs and angry grumbling informed Bai the Wah Ching were complying with Lee’s request. He came to sit next to her while keeping an eye on the gangsters. “I told you it would be fun.”
He turned briefly to smile at her in encouragement. She stared at him, unamused.
Her face scrunched up as she took another gulp of acidic coffee. “Great. I’m glad you’re having a good time. Jia Yan is being held in Oakland, and we’ve got a pack of juvenile delinquents on our hands. Now what do we do?”
He swiveled his stool around to watch the Wah Ching while showing Bai his profile. “Have you thought about calling Jason?”
Jason, her ex, was Hung Kwan, Red Pole of the Sun Yee On triad. He led their strike teams, which meant he commanded a small army of triad enforcers. In the hierarchy of the brotherhood, he held the number three position. Jason epitomized what the Wah Ching strived to become—a stone-cold killer. They probably wouldn’t know Jason, but they’d surely know of him. And, they would fear him.
Bai spoke softly. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”
“So eloquent.” Lee put his hand on hers. “I couldn’t have put it better myself.”
She dug into her pocket to pull out her cell phone. She had a number for Jason but was reluctant to use it. If she called him, she’d be admitting she’d run into a situation she couldn’t handle on her own. If she didn’t call him, she’d have to deal with the Wah Ching herself, which would entail beating the little thugs into submission. Although tempted, she dialed.
Jason’s voice surprised her. She usually got his voice mail. “It’s been a while, Bai. How are you? How is Dan?”
“I’m good. Dan’s good.” She hesitated. “Jason, I’ve got a bit of a situation.”
There was silence. She thought maybe she’d lost the connection.
“Am I going to be sorry I answered this call?” he replied with caution in his voice.
She gritted her teeth. “I’ve got a mess on my hands. I could really use your help.”
“Last time I helped you it cost me. This time I think there should be compensation.”
She swallowed an angry reply. His comment was only a tease, but she wasn’t in the mood to play. Her hand hurt from smacking the Wah Ching around, and she was hungry. She could ignore the throbbing hand, but her empty stomach put her in a foul mood.
“I’ll make it worth your while.”
She put meaning behind the words but couldn’t filter out the resentment in her voice.
He must have sensed her mood. His voice changed, becoming more serious. “Where are you?”
“I’m at the Far East Café. And Jason, come alone.”
Jason disconnected before she could add anything more. She turned to look at Lee. He raised his eyebrows.
“You are such a slut,” he said with a sly grin on his face.
“Yeah, I’m working on that.”
Bai thought she might have made a mistake in calling Jason. His Chinese name was Hu Lum, forest tiger. There was a saying . . . something about letting sleeping tigers lie.
Jason was a violent man. She’d grown up around violent men and understood them well. Her grandfather had been legendary, perhaps the only Shan Chu in history to die of old age. In an organization where assassination was the ladder to success, his longevity spoke volumes about his survival skills. Her grandfather had raised her, and the brotherhood had become her family. It was, she mused, probably the most dysfunctional family in existence.
Jason pounded on the café door to disrupt Bai’s reflections. He must have been close when she’d called. She stood to unlock the door. As he stepped into the room, the Wah Ching muttered then grew silent.
He looked at Bai and nodded a curt greeting. He wasn’t smiling. His stolid appearance didn’t make him any less handsome. He wore a black silk suit that showed off his lean, muscular body. Black hair, worn slicked back, gangster-style, accentuated his sharp features. He looked like the ultimate bad boy. Her stomach drew taut at the sight of him.
Jason turned to look at Lee, who remained sitting on a stool at the counter, and voiced a curt greeting. “Pickle licker.”
“Psychopath,” Lee replied while raising his eyebrows in salutation.
The Wah Ching flinched at the exchange. They didn’t realize they were nicknames, crude endearments between old friends.
“What’s going on, Bai?” Jason sounded tired. Dark circles showed under his eyes.
She nodded down at Jimmy, still sprawled on the floor and apparently content to stay there. “Two days ago, Jimmy Yan here, traded his little sister to the Wah Ching as payment for admittance into the gang. She’s a fifteen-year-old high school student who’s been sold into the sex trade. I want her back.”
Jason looked at Jimmy and frowned. He then turned aside to look at the rest of the Wah Ching and their girls before his eyes came back to rest on Bai. He spoke in a low voice. “I can’t ask for her back. You’ll have to go get her. I can provide you with information that might help you find her.”
She thought about his proposal and wasn’t at all happy with the restrained offer. She’d hoped he would be able to scare the Wah Ching into giving up Jia Yan. “It’ll have to do. I realize there are limitations to what you can do on my behalf. I’m a woman, after all. I stand outside the brotherhood. There are rules.”
“And I’m breaking most of those rules just by being here,” he said brusquely, taking her arm and leaning into her. “And I’m very familiar with the fact you’re a woman. I don’t need to be reminded.”
She bit down on her lip and swallowed the sharp reply she wanted to spout. Instead, she smiled sweetly. “You’re grumpy when you’re tired.”
“And you’re shrill when you’re hungry.”
She glared at him. He knew her too well. “You might try feeding me.”
“Sorry,” he replied. “I don’t have the time. I’m a very busy man these days. I’m sure you understand.”
She moved closer and dropped her voice. “I understand that you’re being an ass, but since you’re doing me a favor I’ll just suck it up.”
He stared at her long enough to make her uncomfortable then looked off into the distance. Bai assumed he was either gathering his thoughts or searching for a scathing reply. She was surprised when he quickly turned around and walked over to speak with the Wah Ching. The punks actually stood up to bow respectfully.
She walked over to take a seat next to Lee.
Jason addressed the boy gangsters in a dispassionate voice. “The Wah Ching are in Chinatown without my permission.” Jason’s face remained expressionless. His arms were relaxed at his sides and his back ramrod straight. He’d gone deadly cold. “You’re trying the patience of Sun Yee On.”
The Wah Ching remained silent with eyes cast down. He held their lives in his hand. It was within his rights to kill them for encroaching on his territory.
“But, ‘vicious as a tigress can be, she never eats her own cubs.’” He lectured them with a proverb. “You’re free to go. You’ll speak of this to no one. And don’t let me catch you in Chinatown again without my consent.”
The skinny kid hesitated. He pointed to the pile of guns on the counter and spoke softly to Jason. Bai heard the words “cheung gai,” firearms. Jason tilted his head and stared at the thug in disbelief before his hand whipped out to grab the skinny kid’s offending digit. Before the kid could protest, Jason had forced the finger back.
The crack of the breaking finger shocked Bai. She started to get off her stool. Lee’s hand came down on her shoulder to hold her in place with an iron grip.
Jason snatched up a wad of napkins with lightning-fast hands and stuffed the paper into the boy’s mouth to stifle the emergent scream. He pushed the boy roughly away. His eyes flashed angrily. “MY PATIENCE GROWS THIN!”
The Wah Ching and their girls disappeared like smoke.
Jason strolled over to speak with Jimmy, his voice harsh. “Go back to China. If I see you again, I’ll kill you myself.”
Jason turned to Bai. “I’ll see what I can find out about the girl and be in touch.” He started to turn away then turned back. He reached up to stroke her cheek with his fingers, his touch gentle. “I’ll let you know when I’m ready to collect.”
An amused, almost playful, smile crossed his lips.
“Collect for what?” she asked, her tone tinged with disbelief. “I could have let them go myself. All you managed to do was piss them off before turning them loose. I thought you might reason with them and get the girl back or, at least, make some kind of deal with them. All you’ve managed to do is make things worse. You’re unbelievable!”
He stared at her, his lips drawing taut. His hand came up to point an index finger in her face, but he couldn’t bring himself to say anything. She stared at him and shook her head. He offered one final wave of his finger before storming out of the café, the glass rattling as the door slammed at his back.
“I love you, too,” she whispered under her breath.