CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

 

"We'd hit a lot of head shops around the city. Some of them a few times . . . the easiest ones, ya know?"

"Any of them belong to the Jade Dragons?"

Armstrong nodded. "They were as easy as the other head shops, so we thought the one in Chinatown would be the same. By then, we had things dialed into perfection."

"So you thought.”

"At the time, we didn't know anything about who ran the Dragon shops or who owned them, but since the others were easy in-and-outs . . .”

"Tell me what happened."

“From the moment we walked into the Chinatown shop, we knew we were in a whole other world. Everything we'd learned from knocking over the other shops went out the window and things went south fast. It was like the first place we'd robbed—back to square one, like we didn't know what we were doing."

Armstrong shifted in his chair and looked out the window. He tightened his arms around his chest. He was frazzled. When he finally looked back at Jack, he said, "We played it by the book . . . what we'd learned from robbing the other shops. Go in with masks on, all of us dressed in black. We each had different colored T-shirts on under the black shirts so when we took them off outside, no one could identify us on the street."

Jack nodded. "I get it. Go on."

"First, we cased the shop. When we knew there weren’t any customers, we went in and fanned out. Tristan locked the door and turned the sign to closed. Kyle went to the counter, gun drawn, and got the counter guy under control. Then Tristan and I helped ourselves to the money in the register. Easy.”

Jack rolled a hand, urging Armstrong to hurry up.

“The next thing was for Kyle to take the counter guy into the back office to get the heavier shit—most of those shops have an under-the-counter trade. And it's surprising how many shops keep large amounts of petty cash in little metal lockboxes in their desk drawer.”

"But?”

“Normally, we’d take the stash and run, but when Kyle and the counter guy came back to the shop, they weren’t alone. They'd seen us come in on the CCTV or some shit because as the office door opened they were all standing with guns drawn like some goddamn Bruce Lee movie. When one of the thugs pushed Kyle toward me and Tristan, he freaked and started shooting. He hit the counter guy and bullets started flying. Tristan and I ran for cover behind the displays, but Kyle took a bullet before he’d emptied his clip." Armstrong sat up straight and looked Jack square in the eye. "You have to understand. Until then, we'd never shot anyone. I don't know where Kyle got the gun or if it even actually worked. It was just meant for show. I didn’t even know it was loaded."

"Warren's weapon was the only one? You and Rybak were unarmed?" Armstrong nodded. "Okay. Then what? You and Rybak obviously survived."

"Once Kyle was down and they saw we weren't carrying, some of the guys dragged us in front of some scary looking fucker with a scar across his face." Armstrong indicated the scar started at the side of the man's chin and traveled diagonally across his nose, eyebrow and forehead and disappeared into his hair. "The scar went halfway back. He tried covering it with his hair, but that scar was gnarly. That shit musta hurt!"

"I bet. Keep going.”

"Kyle was still alive when they dragged him into the middle of the floor. Then they pulled over the counter guy and laid him next to Kyle. He wasn’t moving. They made Tristan and me get on our knees, then the scar face guy walked over and looked down at all of us. I thought I was going to wet my pants."

"Did he say anything?"

"Yeah. He looked at each of us with his squinty eyes and said—” Armstrong imitated the Chinese man’s accent—-“'You have dishonored your families, and mine. And you have insulted me with what you have done here. For this, you must pay.' We were scared shitless and agreed to do anything he wanted; just don't shoot us." Armstrong started wringing his hands together to keep them from trembling.

"Obviously, he didn't."

"He said we would be paying him back, but neither of us had any idea what he meant."

"Who was this guy with the scar?"

"Li Zihao, the leader of the Jade Dragons."

"Holy shit! You guys were robbing shops owned by the most dangerous gang in the city and didn't know it?" Jack's voice hitched up with disbelief.

"Believe me, we didn't know it at the time. We'd never heard of the guy before, or who owned any of the shops," Armstrong said. "If we had, we never would have hit any of the Dragon shops."

Jack took a breath and asked, "Okay, what happened next?"

"Li said Tristan and I had to work off our debt with him. We hadn't even had the chance to pocket the money from the register, so what debt did we have?"

"It was an honor debt." Armstrong nodded. "What did he make you do?"

"He said he had a job for us. Some guy owed him money and was late paying. He wanted us to either get the money and bring it back, or bring back the guy and his men would collect on the debt. It seemed like an easy task."

"What went wrong? Sounds like you guys were batting a thousand for fuck ups that night."

"No shit. One of the thugs had Kyle’s gun and handed it to Tristan along with the address. If we stopped to call the cops, they'd kill Kyle. If we didn't bring back the money or the guy, they'd kill Kyle. They gave us an hour and if we got back late, they'd kill Kyle. Honestly, I think they were just looking for any reason to kill him." Armstrong inhaled deeply and scrubbed his forehead. "I need another Coke."

"I'll get it. You finish your story." Jack rose and grabbed another Coke from the fridge before returning to his chair.

Armstrong popped open the can and took a long guzzle. He refrained from belching in Jack's face by directing it down the inside of his hoodie collar. "We did what he asked. We got in the car and raced like bats outta Hell to the address he gave us over in the Sunset District." Jack's heart thumped hard. Could have been anywhere, he kept telling himself. It was a big district. "On the way over, we formulated a plan—play it cool, talk to the guy, get the money."

"It didn't go down like that."

Armstrong shook his head. "The wife answered the door. We said we were there to pick up some money, but she said her husband wasn't home and didn't know anything about it. When she tried closing the door, we pushed our way in. Li had said to do anything necessary when he gave us Kyle's gun, so Tristan put it in the broad's face and told her to tell us where her husband was or give us the money. She runs through the house to the kitchen, screaming that her husband isn't home and to get out of her house or she'd call the cops. The dog is in the kitchen and starts barking. We were already jumpy as fuck and didn't need all the static. We just wanted the money or her husband so we could get the fuck outta there."

"He wasn’t there, so what happened?"

"I swear, it all went down in a blur. I've tried forgetting it, but I still have nightmares, man."

"Tell me," Jack urged.

"The dog kept barking, she kept yelling, the kid started crying—"

"Kid?" The hairs stood up on the back of Jack's neck. This wasn't sitting well. Sunset District, wife, dog, and now a child?

"Yeah."

"And the husband definitely wasn't in the house?" Jack asked.

Armstrong shook his head. "Nah. Tristan kept the gun on the woman while I checked the house."

"Go on."

"I go back into the kitchen and the dog rushes us. Tristan fires a couple times, but we don’t realize until then the gun doesn’t have any bullets. The gun is just for show. Of course it is. There was no way Li was going to let us walk out of the shop with a loaded gun. What would have stopped us from turning around and shooting him? The wife must have realized it and rushed toward us. I grabbed her to keep her back and Tristan grabbed a knife off the counter. He stabs the dog to stop it from attacking us. The wife starts screaming, and the kid is screaming at the top of her lungs. Tristan shouted to shut the kid up. She tried quieting the kid, but she kept screaming."

Through clenched teeth, Jack growled, "Go on."

"The woman wouldn't tell us where her husband was, no matter how much we threatened her. I kept telling her to shut the kid up but nothing she did worked. Not even trying to rock the kid in her arms. I’ve never heard a kid scream like that, and the woman was yelling, and Tristan . . . He was about to lose it. He kept pacing and babbling, What're we gonna do? I looked at my watch and told him we had to do something. Our time was almost up, and if we didn't get out of there, Kyle was going to die, and the cops were going to come because of all the noise."

Jack slowly asked, "Next?" What he really wanted to say was, Tell me which one of you killed my Zoë, and what did you do with my wife?

"Tristan grabbed the kid out of the woman’s arms and I held her back. He put the kid back in her highchair and before I could stop him, he'd slit the kid's throat."

"He did what?" Jack shouted, nearly coming out of his chair. By now, he was barely managing to restrain himself.

"I couldn't believe it either. When I asked why he did it, he said the situation was getting out of control and he just . . . panicked."

Rybak had been the man who'd killed his daughter? Was that why he’d left the I'm sorry note?

The revelation hit hard. After all this time, Jack finally discovered who killed his daughter and why she had to die. He wanted to puke and scream at the same time.

His forehead ached where his eyebrows had bunched together. His eyes burned with bottled emotion as he stared holes in the man in front of him. It took all his strength not to climb over the table and beat the shit out of Armstrong and demand to know where Leah was.

Instead, he asked, "What did you do with the woman?" When Armstrong stopped to guzzle more Coke, Jack snapped, "Tell me, goddammit. What did you do with the woman?"

"I'm getting there. Hold your horses! The car was just a two-door. We'd never get her in the back the way she was thrashing around—it took both of us just to get her out of the house. We knew just one of us would never be able to control her for the long drive back across the peninsula. The only place for her was the trunk. Tristan bound her hands and feet and I put a gag in her mouth. We took her to the shop for Li to deal with."

"What did he do to her?"

"He was pissed, man. What did we expect he was going to do with her, he wanted to know? She didn't have the money. He wanted the husband."

"Get to the point, and do it fast."

"He told two of his guys to take Tristan and deal with her."

"What did he mean?"

"I don't know, but I never saw her again. He made me stay in the shop and wait for them to get back. I sat with Kyle and tried to assure him everything would be okay. He was losing a lot of blood, but they refused to get him help. It was the longest hour of my life."

"So, they come back and then what happened?"

"Li and two thugs went into the back room. He had some other bad dudes watching us. Tristan was really freaking out by then. I thought he was going to run. Those bad dudes looked like they had itchy fingers and I didn’t want Tristan getting shot too. I tried getting him talking, thought that maybe talking would calm him down a little. I asked him what happened, but he refused to talk about it. Just kept wringing his hands and looking at the front door.”

Jack nodded. The kid was undoubtedly traumatized. “Then?”

“They weren’t gone too long. When Li and his thugs came back into the shop, one walked over to Kyle and shot him. Just like that. Bang, right between the eyes." Armstrong choked on a breath. "They killed him, man. Like putting down an animal."

"If they wanted him dead, why not kill him earlier?" Jack asked.

"My guess? Leverage. With Kyle still alive, Li knew Tristan and I would be back. Once Tristan was back with Li’s goons, there was no reason to keep Kyle around anymore. Li said one of our men had killed one of his men so one of us must also die."

"Harsh, but I get it. Equal justice. Maybe it was a mercy killing since Kyle was already bleeding out and Li was never going to get him help.” Armstrong shrugged. “What happened to the bodies?"

Armstrong shook his head slowly. "I don't know, man. Li and his goons took Tristan and me in back and later when we came out, Kyle and the counter guy were gone."

Jack paused to get his rage under control. His heart felt like it was pounding a hole in his chest. Sweat dripped down his back under the leather jacket, and his body shook with anger.

"So let me get this straight. You got caught robbing Dragon’s Lair. To repay Li, he sent you and Rybak to collect a debt. Since the husband wasn't home, you killed his daughter and the dog and kidnapped the wife." Armstrong hesitantly nodded. "And you never saw the wife again after Rybak and Li's goons took her away." The guy nodded again. "Did Rybak ever tell you what happened to the wife?"

"No. I asked but he said he couldn't talk about it. He never did. I don't know what happened to her."

"I can't imagine you'd paid back your debt to these people with one failed collection attempt."

"No, he put us to work for him."

"Doing what?"

"Mostly selling his drugs on campus and around the city. When he found out I was a chem major, he forced me to work in his lab."

"Doing what, exactly?"

"He's been trying to come up with a new party drug."

"Ecstasy's already widely available," Jack pointed out.

Armstrong nodded. "Li wants to up the game. He wants a drug that makes partiers high as kites, euphoric like never before, and in one tablet that keeps them going all night instead of having to pop another pill a few hours later. And he'll charge a premium for each tablet."

"That's a lot to ask. If it was possible to create something like that, wouldn't it have been done already?" Jack asked.

"Nothing like X, man, but Li seems to think I have it in me to create what he wants. Just because I majored in chemistry in college doesn't mean they taught me anything about party drugs."

"I'm guessing you haven't succeeded, since I haven't heard of a change in the market for party drugs," Jack said.

"No. I've tried dozens of formulas. Some were just amped up versions of X but didn't last long, or they made people really sick. The closest I've come to anything workable was just coating X in LSD, but it didn't last long, and the euphoria-hallucination balance was off. Trips were bad, man." Armstrong's face screwed up, making Jack wonder if he was remembering his trip on the beach Ray had told him about.

"So, back to square one?" Jack asked.

Armstrong nodded again. "Pretty much. It's been like that for years. Try something and it works but not exactly like Li wants it to, or people can't handle the side effects. Some even ended up in the hospital. Word got out, sales went down to nothing because people went back to the shit they knew and trusted, like X and Special K."

"Are you working on anything now?"

"It freaked me out the last time thinking I'd killed someone who'd been taken to the hospital. Li's not happy about it, but I need a break. You know. Go back with a fresh mind and shit.”

Jack downed the last of his now-warm Coke and crushed the can in his hands. It didn't help how he was feeling—absolute rage.

Now Jack knew what had happened to his family, but according to Armstrong, it was all on Rybak. And he was too dead to find out what he'd done with Leah and where her remains were.