“I assume you had a hand in this,” Anthony Qiu said. We were sitting at a corner booth in the empty Monte Carlo. It was late morning, edging toward opening hours, though nothing was set up. He’d spread newsprint over his end of the table and was cracking peanuts, dropping shells onto the financial insert.
I didn’t answer him. It was too early for a drink, and I didn’t feel like I’d earned one yet. What I felt like was a cigarette, but I’d quit, a fact I needed to remind myself of.
“Chris was a good man,” Qiu said. He raised his mimosa. “He will be missed.”
“He was an asshole.”
“Respect, David.” Qiu looked less angry than dismayed at the lack of decorum.
“And so are you,” I said. “Let’s be honest, Tony, what the hell are you doing? Well into the two thousands, and you’re shaking people down for shylock money? When there’s a Quick-Day Loans on the corner of every poor neighborhood, you need to muscle chumps like Irigary and Tranh?”
“I inherited a business,” Qiu began. He’d been too shocked to interrupt, but now his expression turned sullen.
“So did I,” I said. “But I realized pretty early that I wasn’t suited for that business, so I found something else. Why don’t you just run your restaurant, water down your liquor, and overcharge on food like everyone else? You don’t need the grief.”
Qiu’s laugh was brittle but sincere. “You have more nerve than anyone I’ve met, David. I appreciate it, though talk like that usually leads to a bad end.”
I shook my head. “It doesn’t have to. You could decide not to send your thugs after me. That way I won’t have to deal with them, the way I’ve dealt with everything else you’ve sent. This could end right now.”
“Let bygones be bygones? That what you’d recommend?”
“Either or,” I said. “I’ve got nothing else on my plate. I’m out of the PI business for now. If you’re really hankering for a blood feud, my schedule is wide open.”
He grinned. “No one wants that,” he said. “People like Chris are hard to come by.”
“Bent cops?”
“Reliable bent cops—and friends. I hate to let any advantage go, no matter how small, and Chris wasn’t a small advantage.”
“I bet the pressure’s tremendous,” I said.
He looked at the rubble amassed beneath his hands, then cracked and shelled another peanut, adding to the pile. He sighed.
“Between the triads, the Malays, the Exiles, and the gangs from Surrey, it’s a crowded playing field.”
“So get out.”
“Impossible,” he said. “My father-in-law chose me. His people wouldn’t let me walk away. They’d replace me. Their replacement might see less of the big picture, but he’d be much more ruthless. No, David, I hold a pretty weak position, but I’m holding it all the same.”
I had to respect him, even if I knew what was coming.
He said, “I don’t think we’ll be seeing much of each other any more. I can’t spare the people. You win, David. Truce it is.”
“It’s the smart play,” I said, shaking his proffered hand despite the flecks of peanut shells on his fingers.
“Good-bye, David. Best of luck.”
I left the Monte Carlo and walked toward my office on Pender. Qiu had lied about everything but the pressure he was under. That told me he was coming. He didn’t care about avenging Chambers, but others expected it. At a certain point you become what they expect you to be. A reluctant gangster, a crooked cop, a disgraced PI. Most people bend without even thinking there’s another option. Those who don’t either break, or they find out what they’re capable of.