He thought of Rebecca, then of other women he had known during his exile in Pattaya. All touched by the pain and darkness following in his wake.
Shaking his head, he moved on.
He stepped past a row of cubbies stuffed with bathrobes, shampoo, and slippers. The floor changed from wood to a pale pink tile. He could hear the sound of someone showering around the corner.
Damn. Mariko had been right.
He could see the lockers on the other side of the shower stalls. Whoever was enjoying her late-night shower was out of view. Caine crept forward. As he crossed the communal shower, the woman came into view.
Her back was to him as he snuck past. He watched as the droplets of water traced the curve of her thigh. She turned and threw her head back. A huge splash of water slapped the floor as she rinsed shampoo from a glistening dark mass of hair. The lather slid down her back, over her buttocks, and down her legs.
Caine tore his gaze away and moved on. The sound of the shower masked his footsteps, allowing him to make it to the lockers without drawing her attention. He turned the corner, putting himself out of her line of sight, and breathed a sigh of relief.
He found the number matching Hitomi’s key. Inside were a few of her belongings … a pair of slippers, some gum, a crumpled transit card. Caine pushed these aside and found a small, rectangular package. It was wrapped in a pink t-shirt, with a picture of Masuka Ongaku on the front. Inside the shirt was a silver metal device with black rubber bumpers on the edges.
Caine recognized the Iron Key drive immediately. He had used them before himself, to transport sensitive information. They were built by a company in America, with funding from the United States government.
Iron Key drives contained high-level hardware encryption. They could also be set to shut down, or even erase all onboard data, if accessed by an unauthorized system. Whatever was on the drive, Kusaka was serious about keeping it secure.
But Bernatto’s angle was still unclear. He said he needed leverage against Kusaka, that the man had gone too far…. What did that mean, exactly?
A shudder of disgust ran through his body. He imagined the horrors Kusaka had inflicted on Hitomi. Was the evidence of his abhorrent perversions all he was protecting? Hitomi didn’t think so, and Caine had to agree.
Kusaka had been a CIA asset, providing information through his Chinese industrial connections, but now he seemed to be working with Bernatto on something far more complex. What was their plan? What were they trying to accomplish? And why did they now seem to be at odds?
The hard drive he held in his hands was the key to answering those questions.
A woman’s scream rang out. Caine tensed and slid the hard drive into his jacket pocket. He heard a man shouting in Japanese.
Caine peered around the corner and saw a man wielding a pistol. He was waving it in front of the naked, terrified woman. She was sitting on the tile floor of the shower, struggling to cover herself with her hands as the water cascaded around her.
The man looked yakuza … flashy suit, slicked back hair, the usual signs. But Caine didn’t see Tokyo Black scars. The thug pointed the gun at the woman and shouted again, asking her if she had seen a gaijin man on this floor. She shook her head no.
Caine stepped out into the shower area. “Hey!” he shouted. The gangster wheeled around and pointed his gun at Caine. The woman looked up, her eyes wide with fear.
Caine took a step forward. “Looking for me?”
The yakuza man grinned and stepped forward. He gestured with his gun. “Someone wants to speak with you, gaijin.”
Caine shrugged. “That’s fine. Lead the way.”
The man circled behind Caine. “Downstairs. Move it … nice and slow.”
From the corner of his eye, Caine saw the man move towards him. He felt the muzzle of the gun brush against his left arm, and he knew it was time to act.
Caine shrugged his arm backwards, as if he were about to take a step. The movement was slight, but it shifted the angle of the gun backwards a hair, moving him just out of the line of fire.
As soon as he felt the gun shift, Caine’s body exploded into motion. His left arm shot out, knocking the other man’s gun up and away from his body.
Caine wrapped his hand around the wrist of his attacker’s gun hand and twisted his body sideways. As he turned, he slammed his right elbow into the other man’s face.
His victim spun around, blood streaming from his crushed nose. Caine drove his knee into the thug’s groin.
The man grunted and pitched forward. As the air exploded from his attacker’s lungs, Caine’s grabbed the barrel of the gun. With a quick twist, he yanked it free from the man’s grasp. In one fluid motion, he swept the arm back, whipping the other man across the face with the pistol.
Then he lashed out with his leg and kicked the man forward.
The terrified woman screamed and scurried out of the way as the yakuza collided with the shower wall. Caine stepped under the spray of water and grabbed the man’s hair. He slammed his face into the wall over and over again, until the man slumped to the ground, unconscious.
Caine stepped back, panting. The woman cowered in the corner, staring at the pulverized face of the man lying on the ground. When she looked up at Caine, her eyes glazed over with fear and shock.
Caine tucked the pistol into his waistband. He pulled off the man’s blazer, draped it over the woman, and helped her to her feet.
“Here, put this on,” he said. “Dai jobo des. Everything’s going to be okay. Go back to your capsule. Stay there. Don’t come out for anyone other than the police, you understand?”
The woman nodded, although Caine doubted she actually understood what he said. As she ran off, Caine kneeled down and tore open the man’s shirt. There were no scars.
Instead, intricate yakuza tattoos covered the man’s skin. One curled up his arm, featuring three koi fish. One blue, one red, and one black, swimming up a stream of water, through a wooden gate. Caine recognized the design at once.
The man was not Tokyo Black. He was a member of the Yoshizawa clan.
It looked like Mariko was right again. His alliance with Isato seemed to have dissolved. The old gangster had helped Caine find Hitomi. Maybe now he considered his debt fulfilled.
Caine checked the thug’s pistol, making sure it had a full load, and headed for the stairs. He could no longer trust Isato and his yakuza. Rebecca was missing, or worse. And Tokyo Black had influence over the police.
The only two people he could count on now were waiting for him downstairs in a dark alley.
Caine snuck downstairs and slipped out the side door. As soon as he hit the pavement, he knew something was wrong. He couldn’t say why exactly, but something about the thick night air, humid and heavy, felt off. The light mist that enveloped him hinted at the familiar scent of danger.
Maybe it was paranoia due to so many betrayals and surprises, but Caine had lived a life based on instinct, and he didn’t think twice about trusting his intuition now. He slid the pistol from his waistband and thumbed off the safety. He kept close to the alley wall and walked back to the street.
Peering around the corner, he saw several cars parked across the street, their headlights facing the alley. Shadowy figures approached, indistinct against the blazing backlight.
He heard the explosive blast of gunfire. He ducked back behind the wall as bullets sent chips of concrete flying through the air. He returned fire, shooting blind around the cover of the wall. Then, for a moment, there was silence.
A voice called out. “Waters-san, it’s me, Kenji! Come on out, man. We need to talk.”
Caine’s eyes darted back and forth as he tried to make sense of this new information. Isato was a gangster, yes…. He may have withdrawn his support, maybe even put out a hit on Caine, to tie up loose ends.
But there was no way on earth he would send his son. From everything Caine had seen, Isato went out of his way to insulate Kenji from his yakuza activities.
&n
bsp; “Kenji?” he called out. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“Meet me in the middle of the street. Let’s work this out before one of these ladies gets hurt.”
Caine cursed under his breath. Hitomi and Mariko. Kenji must have surrounded them, got the upper hand.
He was torn. This was a no-win situation. He didn’t have enough intel to know what was going on with Kenji. He knew the drive was the mission. Hitomi had led him to the drive. Mariko had helped. Now that the drive was in his possession, they were both expendable. Just as Bernatto had said—everyone was expendable.
The smart thing to do would be to head the other direction. Get out of the alley, before Isato’s men closed off the opening behind him. Take the drive, get somewhere safe, and plan his next move. Find out what happened to Rebecca. That was the right play.
But it didn’t feel right.
He stood up. “Just you and me, Kenji. I get the feeling your family isn’t too happy with me right now.”
“Sure, man. Just you and me. For now.”
Caine slid the pistol back into his waistband. He stepped out into the street, his hands held loosely in front of him, open and unthreatening. He took a few steps forward.
He could see Kenji, flanked by a group of eight yakuza thugs. Caine recognized a few of them as Isato’s men. One had an arm draped across Mariko’s neck, her hands tied behind her. Caine looked her in the eye as he walked towards the group, and she returned his gaze. She looked scared, but she lifted her chin and nodded slightly. She was ready to make a move if need be.
Behind the group of men, Caine saw Hitomi sitting in the passenger seat of a pearl white Lexus LFA. She turned to look at him, her eyes blank. They showed no fear, or regret, or recognition. Caine knew that look. He had seen it in the mirror many times. It was the look of someone who had made peace with death. Someone who longed for it. Because the alternatives that awaited them were far worse.
Not this time, Caine vowed.
Caine stopped walking and turned his attention to Kenji. The young man nodded and approached him.
“I hope this isn’t about the GTR, Kenji. Sorry, you know how Tokyo traffic can be.”
Kenji smiled. “Of course not. I was tired of that ride anyway. As you can see, Mr. Caine, I’ve already replaced it.” He nodded back towards the Lexus.
“Call me Tom. I’m glad you know my name. It was getting awkward hearing you call me Waters-san all the time. So what’s this all about?”
Kenji stopped in the middle of the street, ten feet away from Caine. He slid his hands in his pockets, arched his back, and smiled. “This is about family. It’s about my father. Isato Yoshizawa.”
Caine looked at Kenji warily. “Does he know you’re here?”
“He doesn’t know anything anymore. He’s dead.”
Caine gritted his teeth. So Isato was gone. The man had been a criminal, a killer for sure, but in some strange way, Caine had felt a kinship with the old man, a connection of some kind. Now that the connection was severed, he felt a pang of loss. “I’m sorry to hear that. I really am.”
Kenji took a few more steps forward. He leaned closer and murmured, “I’m sure you are, Tom. I’m sure you are. Because, these men here, they’re under the impression you killed him.”
“What? Why on earth would they think that?”
“Because that’s what I told them.”
“Kenji, what are you—”
Kenji cut him off. “I don’t have time to explain it. You have something I want. Give it to me, and I’ll tell them the truth.”
Caine dipped a hand into his jacket. He saw the gunmen tense, but Kenji smiled and nodded. He slipped out the small silver hard drive and held it up so the others could clearly see it.
“You mean this, don’t you? This is what Kusaka wanted. Now you want it. You’re working with him, aren’t you? You’re his mole inside the Yoshizawa clan.”
Kenji reached out for it, but Caine pulled it back from his grasp. The young man’s face flushed with anger, but Caine also glimpsed shock and fear there. The kid was in over his head. He was struggling to tread water in a situation that had escalated beyond his control.
“Kenji, what’s on this drive? What is Kusaka planning? It’s not too late. You can help me stop it. We can fix this.”
“Are you fucking crazy? It’s not too late? My father is dead. This is all I have now. If this doesn’t work, then everything … my father … it was all for nothing!”
Kenji’s features hardened. “I’m not gonna let that happen. Give me that drive, or I swear my men will shoot you down and I’ll take it from your corpse. But first, I’ll make the cop lady beg for a bullet in the head.”
Kenji gestured at his men, and the man holding Mariko shoved her forward. She stumbled and fell to the pavement. Cursing, she blew her hair out of her face and stood back up. The gunman led her to the middle of the street, stopping just behind Kenji. The yakuza looked back and forth between the two men with a confused expression on his face.
Kenji held out his hand. “The drive. Stop wasting my time, and you can have her back in one piece.”
“Hitomi, too.”
Kenji shook his head. “She’s not part of the deal. Kusaka has other plans for her.”
“You disgusting little piece of trash,” Mariko hissed. The gunman clubbed her on the back of the head, and she dropped to her knees.
Caine looked into Kenji’s eyes. He saw pain, uncertainty, even fear. But he also saw neglect and determination. What he didn’t see was a way out. He held the drive out to Kenji. “Your father would be ashamed of you, Kenji.”
The young man grabbed it. “My father never saw my value, and look where it got him.” He stared at the drive in his hands. “All this over a fucking hard drive. Unbelievable.”
He turned around and walked back to his car. “Sorry, Tom,” he called over his shoulder, “but from what I understand, you’re a pretty cold-hearted bastard yourself.” Then, he spoke in Japanese to his men. “Kill them both.”
Caine went for his pistol, but before he could draw, Mariko whipped into action.
She leapt to her feet, crashing the top of her head into the jaw of the gunman who stood behind her. Keeping her body close, she pushed backwards, keeping his gun arm outside and to her right. She stamped down with her right heel, crushing the man’s instep. He fell to his knees, yelping in pain.
As Caine’s gun cleared his waistband, Mariko spun out of the way, giving him a clear shot at the yakuza thug. Caine fired two bullets into the man’s shoulder, then aimed for his head.
Before he could pull the trigger again, a sudden explosion of light blinded him. A burst of wind ruffled his hair, and a deafening roar descended from above. The spotlights of a helicopter beamed down, sweeping back and forth across the area.
Kenji and his men were equally surprised by the arrival of the police choppers. “Let’s move!” Kenji shouted. His men scattered.
Kenji dove into his white Lexus. The engine roared to life, and he tore down a side street. As he fled, Caine caught a glimpse of Hitomi staring at him from the rear window. A split-second later, they were gone.
A line of police cars, lights blazing and sirens screaming, charged down the street. Mariko kicked the wounded yakuza’s gun away from them and jogged over to Caine. “We don’t have much time. Cut me loose!”
Caine pulled out his knife and slit her plastic restraints. The police cars skidded to a halt. Within seconds, a squad of men in blue jumpsuits and body armor surrounded them. They were wielding submachine guns, and a few were armed with sniper rifles as well. As the men began to fan out into assault positions, a loud speaker on the helicopter blared at them in Japanese.
“Mariko—” Caine began, but she interrupted him before he could finish.
“It’s Tokyo Special Unit. Like your SWAT teams.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “There’s only one way this goes down where you live. Do you understand?”
Caine nodded. He handed her h
is pistol, kneeled on the ground, and put his hands on his head. As the assault team jogged towards them, weapons at the ready, Mariko pulled out her badge and held it up. She pointed the pistol at Caine’s head.
“Thomas Caine,” she said, “you are under arrest.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
There was no clock on the wall in the Tokyo Metro Police detention room. The walls were, in fact, empty of any decoration. Just four sterile white slabs. Still, Caine’s internal clock told him it was morning. He had dozed off in fits and spurts since they’d locked him in here. During that time, no one had spoken to him or come to check on him. He had not seen a single soul.
They called it a holding room, not a jail. These rooms were for people awaiting interrogation. But the metal table bolted to the floor, the handcuffs chained to a loop on the table … they told a different story.
He had not been charged with any crimes, but his situation here was every bit as bleak as before, when he sat rotting in the Big Tiger prison. And this time, it didn’t seem like Rebecca would be coming to his rescue.
Rebecca … his thoughts wandered to her. Had Bernatto lied on the phone? Had he killed her? Or had she escaped him? If she was free, why hadn’t she made contact?
Caine shook his head to dislodge the dark thoughts from his mind. Mariko said she would talk to her boss, a director in the First Public Security Division of the Keisatsu Cho. She was certain she could convince him there was new evidence of Kusaka’s involvement in Tokyo Black. And that Caine was vital to the case against him.
Caine wasn’t so sure.
He knew the corrupting influence of money and power. If Hitomi was right, then Mariko’s superiors had been protecting Kusaka all along. They would turn a blind eye to any new evidence she presented. It was bureaucratic self-preservation. When a lie was uncovered, the lie simply grew bigger. It devoured whatever new truths came to light.
Like Hitomi had said, there were some things you couldn’t escape. He had been a fool to believe otherwise.
[Thomas Caine #1] Tokyo Black Page 21
