Lock palmed his cell phone to Ty, who took it, angling the screen so he could get a better look at the pictures. He winced. It wasn’t something Lock had seen him do all that often. Like most men who had seen active duty on the frontline, it took a lot to get a reaction from him.
Ty swiped the screen, working his way stoically through the pictures.
“That’s some ISIS-level shit right there,” said Ty, handing back the phone.
Lock pulled up to the valet stand. He and Ty got out. Lock passed the key fob to the valet with a twenty-dollar bill. “Keep it close. We may not be staying all that long.”
“Yes, sir,” said the valet.
The two troubleshooters hustled up the red-carpeted stairs of the hotel. A man in livery held open the door for them. They walked into the lobby, and headed to the desk.
“We’re meeting with Mr. Chow Yan.”
The receptionist lifted the phone and made a hushed phone call. “If you could take a seat for a moment, someone will be with you presently.”
As he put the phone down, Lock leaned over the desk and snatched it from his hand. “Excuse me.” He held it to his ear. “We’re coming up.”
He returned the phone to the startled desk jockey. “Which room?”
The receptionist struggled to regain his composure. “It’s not our policy to––“
Ty cathedraled his fingers and cracked his knuckles. “The man didn’t ask you about hotel policy, he asked what room.”
The receptionist hesitated. Lock slid a fifty over the desk with his fingertips. “We’re kind of in a rush here.”
“Penthouse suite,” said the receptionist, the fifty disappearing.
They turned and made for the elevator.
“Remind me never to recommend a principal stay here. Their security sucks,” said Lock.
“Word,” said Ty.
The elevator doors opened directly into the suite’s private foyer, another hefty tip having secured the attendant’s cooperation. Lock knocked at the door.
“He’s going to be pissed,” said Ty.
“Too bad,” said Lock.
The peephole darkened. Lock and Ty stepped back so whoever it was could see them clearly. They could make out a muffled conversation. It sounded like a young woman and a man. Lock couldn’t tell if the man was Li or Chow Yan, but the slightly deeper timbre suggested Chow.
The door opened to reveal Miss Po, the attractive young woman, with no visible means of support, who lived opposite Emily and Charlie. Her hair was wet, and she had a fluffy white hotel bath sheet wrapped around her. Her expression hovered halfway between embarrassment and resignation. At least, thought Lock, it wasn’t Chow Yan’s wife who was the unannounced visitor.
“May we?” said Lock.
Without a word, she held the door open, and he and Ty walked in.
The suite was cavernous and suitably plush. It ran about five thousand square feet and ten thousand dollars a night, two dollars per square foot per night. Miss Po padded away and disappeared into one of the three bedrooms as Lock and Ty walked past the kitchen area and into the lounge.
Chow Yan walked out of one of the other bedrooms. He was wearing trousers but no shirt, his belly spilling in rolls over his belt.
From what Lock knew of ernai, mistresses in China tended to focus entirely on money and power. Aesthetics didn’t come into it, which was just as well for Chow Yan. He wondered if the tycoon was aware of Li Yeng’s closeness to Miss Po. It was something he could deploy, but only if he had to. Right now, his focus was clear. To find out what the hell was going on.
Chow grabbed a white silk-blend dress shirt from the back of a couch and began to put it on.
“Who let you up here?” Chow said, buttoning the shirt, and opening a jewelry box to reveal a pair of diamond-studded gold cufflinks.
Lock tossed the briefcase onto the couch. It slid off. “I’m returning this. It’s light the money we gave to one of our associates to get his car fixed. My not invoicing you for our fee more than covers it.”
“I don’t understand,” said Chow.
“The hell you don’t.”
Chow stared at him.
“Do you remember the last thing I said to you?” Lock asked.
“When we last spoke you were negotiating.”
Lock advanced on him as Ty hung back.
“Secrets,” Lock said, now within touching distance of Chow Yan. “They get people hurt.” He dug out his cell phone, opened the photograph folder, and tapped on the first of the images he’d received an hour before from Noah Orzana.
The image was of a kidney-shaped swimming pool. But the water was not so much azure blue as muddy brown-red. Four men floated in it, face down, limbs splayed out like starfish.
Lock passed the phone to Chow Yan. He looked at the image, his expression shifting instantly from irritation to shock.
He looked up from the cell phone. “Who are these men? Why are you showing me this?”
“They’re MS-13 gang members. Or soldiers from a cartel linked to MS-13. Or they’re freelance muscle of some kind. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is that they work, pardon me, they worked for the people who have your daughter and your nephew. Someone killed them and dumped them in the pool of a house between Hidden Valley and north Malibu.”
Chow Yan stared at him, disbelieving.
“I know I didn’t do it. And I’ve been around long enough not to believe in coincidences. So that leaves you.”
Chow glanced around the suite. “I’ve been here the whole time.”
“That I don’t doubt,” said Lock, with a glance to the closed bedroom door his mistress had disappeared through. “Interesting coping mechanism, by the way. A shrink would have a field day. Anyway, I’m not suggesting you did this. But you know who did, don’t you? Just like you knew when we spoke last who the man coming out of that house in East LA was.”
There was a knock at the door. Ty went to answer it, his hand falling to the butt of the Glock riding high on his hip. If Chow Yan had other people on the payroll there was every chance they wouldn’t appreciate this unscheduled meeting.
Ty checked the peephole and opened the door. Li Yeng walked in.
“Good, I’m glad you’re here,” said Lock. “Take a seat.”
“What’s going on? Have they been back in touch?” Li asked.
“Oh, I almost forgot.” Lock reached into his pocket and pulled out the silver button tracking device he’d found planted in the briefcase. He tossed it at Li. “This is yours. It was hidden inside the lining of that.”
Li caught it one-handed. He looked sheepish. “I’m sorry.”
“You and me both,” said Lock. “Yes, they’ve been in touch. Your boss can bring you up to speed.”
Chow Yan said something to Li in Mandarin. He walked over and handed the younger man Lock’s phone with the picture of the four dead men floating in the swimming pool. Their conversation continued. It grew heated. Lock couldn’t follow it, but he didn’t need to know Mandarin to catch the general drift. Dollars to donuts, they were arguing over whether or not to let Lock cut himself loose or tell him some version of the truth.
A minute of rapid-fire back and forth later, Chow Yan held up his hand and Li Yeng fell silent.
“I told you secrets got people hurt,” Lock said to them. “Now, I don’t know if you care about what happens to your daughter and your nephew. But if you do then you have to cut out all the BS, and be honest with me. Completely honest. Whatever you tell me now stays in this room, but I need the truth. I need to know what’s going on here. What’s really going on.”
Chow Yan bowed his head. Finally they glimpsed a real man.
“You’re right, Mr. Lock. What you said about secrets, it’s true.”
Lock walked across and hunkered down so that he was at eye level with him. “So, tell me. I don’t want to walk away from this.” He glanced back over his shoulder at Ty, who was standing with arms folded. “Neither does Tyrone. Not when two young people are out there at the mercy of these people. But you have to trust us. It’s the only way we can help you.”
Chow Yan nodded. “I know.” He took a deep breath. “Can I ask you something?”
Lock gave a nod. “Go ahead.”
“Do you think that, after this, they are still alive?”
The truth worked both ways. Lock knew that. And he guessed that Chow Yan knew it too. He didn’t know if this question was a test or not. In a way it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that he extended the same respect to his client that he wanted to receive.
“Honestly, I don’t know. They won’t have taken the deaths of four of their men lightly, I’ll tell you that. On the other hand, if they kill them, this will all have been for nothing. Orzana has probably said enough that we could have him arrested. He won’t want that. On the other hand, with a good lawyer he’d likely be able to wriggle free.”
Chow Yan sat perfectly still, staring at the rug. He seemed to be shrinking inside himself as Lock spoke.
“Let’s just say that this guy you hired, the man who did this, he hasn’t helped matters.”
“I didn’t hire him. I wasn’t lying about that.”
“But you were lying?” said Lock.
“It was . . . What do they call it in your language?” He looked to Li Yeng for assistance.
“A lie of omission,” said Li.
“Yes,” said Chow Yan. “I didn’t lie. But I didn’t tell you the whole truth either.”
“Then maybe it’s time to do that,” said Lock.
Lock and Ty watched as Li Yeng ushered an immaculately dressed and made-up Miss Po out of the suite. On the way, she stopped by Chow Yan, and gave him a kiss on the top of the head, almost like he was her grandfather. The gesture ratcheted up the creepiness factor even further, thought Lock, and it was already close to off the chart.
Ty leaned in to him. “This is some weird scene, even by LA standards,” he said.
“They’re not from LA,” Lock reminded him.
“No kidding. We’re having to import our weirdness now. Seems like they do that better than us too,” said Ty.
Li Yeng walked back into the room and sat down in an armchair opposite. Chow Yan gestured Lock and Ty to seats.
“Miss Po makes me happy. I know you may not understand that. But it’s the truth. She listens to me. I can talk to her. Confide in her.”
“Never heard doing the nasty called that before,” said Ty, with a glance towards the bedroom door.
“Ty,” Lock reproached him, as both men sat down.
“Just saying,” said Ty.
Silence settled over the room. Chow Yan took a deep breath. Lock hoped that this really was it, that the time had arrived for their client to tell them the truth. He couldn’t spell it out any more plainly than he had. The lives of two young people rested on this. If, that was, they weren’t already dead, which they very likely might be. Organizations like MS-13 operated on business lines, but when it came to violence, especially violence visited upon them, they didn’t always behave like a business. Pride was involved, and they couldn’t risk being seen as weak. Someone else killing their members or associates was seen as a direct challenge, and one that was usually met with equal or greater levels of brutality.
That was the circle Lock would have to square. But first he had to know what was going on.
“Allow me to start at the beginning,” said Chow Yan.
“That’s usually the best place,” said Lock.
Chow shifted in his seat. He still seemed to be experiencing some kind of internal struggle. Finally, he appeared to compose himself. He leaned forward, placing his hands in his lap.
“You’re aware of the one-child policy in my country?” he asked them.
“We are,” said Lock.
“The Party was concerned about over-population. They had the best of intentions. But . . . What’s that saying you have in the West about good intentions?”
“‘The road to Hell is paved with good intentions,’” Lock offered.
“Yes,” said Chow Yan. “Exactly that. When you try to impose your will on human nature it can make things worse rather than better.”
Chow Yan snuck a glance at Li Yeng as he spoke. Lock could guess the reason. Criticism of the Communist Party, and its decisions, was risky.
“What does this have to do with your daughter?” Lock prompted.
“After we got married my wife was desperate for a child, but there were problems. We tried everything we could, but with no luck. When families could have more than one child, poor families often allowed the third or fourth to be taken in by someone else. But that had stopped. Except, of course, for little girls.”
Lock had a feeling where this was going. “You adopted Emily?”
Chow nodded. “Every family wanted a boy. Girls were often abandoned, or worse.”
“So why the big secret?” said Ty, reading Lock’s own thoughts. “Lots of kids are adopted. You did a good thing.”
“There was more to it than that,” said Chow. “Official adoptions were difficult. They took a long time. There were lots of questions. I was starting my business.”
“You didn’t want the intrusion?” said Lock.
“Precisely,” said Chow.
Lock figured he would help his client along. “So, you went through unofficial channels?”
“You have to understand the desperation of wanting a child when you’ve been told you can’t have one. The pain it causes. Especially for women.”
Lock’s life had never allowed him much time to think about having kids. He wasn’t opposed to the idea, and he hoped that, one day, he would have them. Maybe with Carmen, if things worked out between them. But he had never been at the point of needing to bring someone into the world. He could imagine, but not feel, the burning desire Chow was describing. He knew, though, that any great passion often led people to do things they wouldn’t normally. Including breaking the law. He guessed that was what was coming next.
“We got the baby home, and we couldn’t have been happier. My marriage, it was better than ever. She was a beautiful little girl.”
Here came the ‘but’, Lock said to himself.
“Then we received word that Emily’s family hadn’t given her up freely.”
Ty leaned forward. “What do you mean when you say, ‘hadn’t given her up freely’?”
Chow Yan swallowed. “I mean she had been taken.”
“Abducted?” said Lock.
Chow looked at Li, as if for guidance.
“It doesn’t matter what you want to call it. I think we get the general drift.”
“I didn’t know. I swear to you,” said Chow. “It was only later that I found out the circumstances. And by then she was settled with us. She was a happy little girl. She had a family who loved her, my business was doing well, and I could give her a life that she would only have been able to dream about.”
Lock didn’t blame Chow Yan for his justification of himself. In some ways he was correct. Emily had won the lottery. That didn’t change the fact she had a family somewhere. A family who had been robbed of a child. Their only child.
“You’ve never told her?” Lock said.
“I did my own investigation. Discreetly. It took time to get answers. We had to move carefully. By the time my investigator tracked them down, the mother had died. An accident while she was working in the fields.”
In that context the word ‘accident’ jumped out at Lock but he decided to let it go. Accident sounded convenient under the circumstances.
“And the father?” said Ty.
“He was still alive. We located him, but . . .”
Lock waited. Chow Yan seemed to be struggling to find the words.
“But?” said Ty.
“He was a dubious character. Someone capable of tremendous violence. Emily was still too young to understand. I decided it was better to let her live her life. What she didn’t know couldn’t possibly unsettle her, and she was doing so well with us.”
“This man who was capable of tremendous violence, do you mean the kind of violence I just showed you pictures of?”
“He had tracked us down.”
“And the kidnapping?” said Ty.
“A terrible coincidence,” said Li Yeng, who had held his own counsel while his boss told them the story of how he had come to be Emily’s father.
“Terrible or lucky?” Lock asked.
“I don’t follow you. I promise you that those people kidnapping Emily and Charlie aren’t in any way connected to what I just told you.”
“So you hire us to fix it,” said Lock. “But then you have this maniac as backup, ready to do the dirty work. Except you didn’t figure on him being quite as reckless as he’s been.”
“And you weren’t lying when you told us that you hadn’t hired anyone else,” said Ty.
Chow Yan gave an uncomfortable shrug of agreement.
“But you weren’t telling the truth either,” said Lock, sharply.
“I’m sorry, I truly am,” said Chow.
“So are we,” said Ty.
“Emily’s father—her biological father,” said Lock. “Does he have a name?”