Family Business

by S. J. Rozan

  “I’ll see if she’s in.” Beefy took out the cell phone he wore clipped like a weapon to his belt. I’d expected She’s not here right off the bat, so this was a slight improvement. I’d never tell Beefy I thought of him as a receptionist, but I was pretty sure my receptionist-language theory held: Tan was in, though I’d bet we were about to find out, not to us.

  Jackson Ting, though, was also used to office games, and right now it appeared he wasn’t interested in playing. He gave his name loudly and said, “Tell her I’m here.”

  Beefy made his phone call, and Jackson’s name worked like a charm. He clicked off, let us in, shut the door behind us, and said, “Wait here.”

  40

  Beefy hadn’t finished telling us to wait before I heard a door open above and the quick trot of footsteps down the stairs. Tan Lu-Lien came into view, frowning as she descended. Reaching us, she cast a swift glance at the rest of the group and addressed Jackson Ting. “What are you doing here?” The question of the hour.

  “I think you know.”

  “I don’t know. Come with me. The rest of you, wait here.”

  “No,” said Jackson. “They come too.”

  Tan’s entire body stiffened. I looked for Jackson in her hard features. Now that I knew, I could see the resemblance, though he was softer, the product of an easier life. A life she’d given him.

  Ting was also searching Tan’s face. When she didn’t speak he said quietly, as though to himself, “It’s true. I can see it’s true. Oh my God.”

  Wordlessly, Tan turned and stalked without looking back, not up to her comfortable third-floor lair but straight behind the staircase to the lower-order reception room where Mel and I had met with Mr. Loo. This time, though, I suspected it wasn’t a need to make a point that brought us here, but a need to get us out of the way fast, before word got around the building that we were here.

  Once we were all inside and Tan had shut the door, she turned to Jackson again. “You shouldn’t have come here.”

  Before he could answer Mel snapped, “You shouldn’t have kidnapped my sister.”

  So much for keeping silent, but that instruction had been more for Tim than Mel anyway.

  Tan turned slowly to face Mel. “What are you talking about?” she said in measured tones.

  “Oh, for God’s sake, cut the crap!” Mel took out her phone and played the video.

  Tan watched, her face impassive. When the screen went blank she said, “Play it again.”

  Mel did.

  “Let her go,” said Jackson, after the second time. “You didn’t need to do this. Mel and I had come to an agreement already for me to buy the building. We just weren’t ready to announce it yet.”

  Tan gazed at Jackson, then gave a small laugh. “For a real estate developer, you lie rather badly.” After a moment she smiled. “I’m pleased to know that.” The smile faded. “Wait here. All of you.” Striding to the far end of the room, she turned her back and sent a text on her phone. The answer came. She sent another and then slipped the phone away. Crossing the room again, she opened the door and called Beefy over.

  She spoke to him quietly at the door. He unhooked his phone again, made a quick call, and half a minute later another white-T-shirted guy, a little shorter and broader—Beefy’s next of kin?—came down the stairs and took up the front door post while Beefy came into the room.

  “Gong-Niu will remain here with you,” Tan said. “I’ll be back soon.”

  “No!” said Mel. “I’m not staying here while you—”

  “Mao-Li. You and your sister were Choi Meng’s family. You grew up before my eyes. Do you really believe I would threaten her life?”

  “I don’t know what to believe, except what I saw on that video.”

  “You have nothing to fear. Please, wait. I’ll come right back.”

  Bill looked at me, ready to take my cue, and I looked at Mel, ready for hers.

  Mel stared into Tan Lu-Lien’s eyes.

  Tan didn’t blink.

  Mel stepped aside and let Tan pass.

  Tan, with one more glance at Jackson Ting, left the room to go who knew where. Beefy shut the door behind her, crossed his arms, and looked around at us all.

  Gong-Niu, Tan had called him.

  Bull.

  His name really was Beefy.

  The room had plenty of chairs, but while we waited none of us sat.

  Jackson Ting paced, and it seemed to me he sidestepped the rest of us, even avoided meeting our eyes. If I’d just come face-to-face with the woman I hadn’t even known was my mother until an hour ago and had come to accuse her of kidnapping Natalie, not to mention killing the window guy, breaking the arm of the union rep’s wife, and assorted other mayhem, I might have done the same.

  Mel stood rigidly by the door, her arms hugging her sides.

  My brother Tim practically hugged her sides, too.

  “You think we did the right thing, letting Tan leave like that?” I whispered to Bill. “We might never see her again. Or Nat.”

  Bill watched Jackson pace, and answered, “This is the first time she’s met her son since he was a child, and he’s thinking bad things about her. She’ll be back.”

  “Bad things” was an understatement, but I let it go.

  Ten minutes went by. I knew it was ten because I checked the clock about forty times after Tan left. I was about to join Jackson in pacing, too, when Mel burst out, “That’s it! She lied and she’s taken off. I should have called the police. I’m doing that now.” She pulled out her phone, which made Beefy drop his arms and step toward her. That made Bill step toward him.

  Tim squared up to Beefy also.

  Much as I would’ve loved to see Tim and Bill together on a tag team, I grabbed Tim’s arm. “Are you insane?” I hissed. “He’ll mash you into juice.”

  “Let me go!”

  “Bill can handle him.” I actually only gave that a fifty percent chance of being true, but if I got my brother out of the way, I’d be able to pitch in, too.

  Mel swung the phone behind her, out of Beefy’s reach.

  Bill moved between them.

  Beefy shoved Bill.

  Bill shoved back.

  Tim balled up his fist.

  I yanked him aside and stepped up next to Bill.

  And then, just before the action could really start, the door opened.

  Everyone froze. All eyes swung to the three people in the doorway.

  Natalie Wu, disheveled but free, stepped tentatively into the room. She saw Mel and with a small, wordless sound rushed over.

  Mel grabbed her up in her arms. Still in the doorway was Tan Lu-Lien, and behind her, wearing a black leather jacket with a red stripe down the sleeve, stood the tall, thin gangster I’d seen a couple of times before, the man not from Chinatown whose identity no one knew.

  41

  I was pretty sure I knew, though.

  As Mel comforted Nat, Tan and the tall gangster walked into the room. At Tan’s instruction Beefy stepped back outside and closed the door.

  I faced the new man. “Well, well,” I said. “Johnny Gee, am I right? Direct from Hong Kong? Once the leader of the Black Shadows, now high up in the Hong Kong branch of the Li Min Jin?”

  “And also,” Bill said, “an accomplished motorcycle rider and not a bad marksman. Welcome to New York.”

  Jackson said, “An investor. You said you were a potential investor.”

  “Wait,” Tim erupted. “A motorcycle rider? A marksman? He’s the guy who shot at me?” By the end of that he was practically squeaking.

  Tan held up her hand. Radiating tightly coiled fury, Gee pushed past everyone and strode across the room. He stopped and stood staring out the window. Down here on the first floor there was nothing to see except the brick wall across the rear yards, but I didn’t think he was standing there for the view.

  Tan watched him, then turned to Mel and Nat. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I didn’t know. If I had, I would have stopped him.”

/>   Mel gave a tiny nod.

  Tan walked over to Jackson. She spoke directly to him as though the rest of us weren’t in the room. “I never wanted you to learn this, and I’m sorry that you did. It can’t be helped now, though. I’m your mother, as I suppose you already know. Johnny is your father.”

  Jackson stood as motionless as if he were rooted to the ground. He didn’t say or ask anything.

  My brother Tim, though, can always be counted on to demand an explanation, as though he has a God-given right to any facts he wants. “What the hell are you talking about?” he challenged Tan. “Who is he”—pointing at Johnny Gee—“and who are you anyway? What’s going on?”

  He did have a point. Why would my straight-arrow brother know who anyone was in the Li Min Jin, aside from his strange bedfellow Big Brother Choi? Also, the bewilderment in Tim’s voice was reflected on Mel’s face, though minus the aggression. She knew who Tan was, but this was the first she’d heard about why Jackson was here. Nat, peeking out from Mel’s embrace, showed the same perplexity. Well, it was better than panic, the embers of which were now fading from her eyes.

  “Tan Lu-Lien is in charge of the Li Min Jin New York’s finances,” I explained to my brother. “She’s also the temporary head, since the death—natural—of Big Brother Choi and the death—by murder—of Mr. Chang.”

  I held up my hand to fend off whatever else he was about to ask, and raised my voice to include the room at large. “When Tan Lu-Lien came here from Hong Kong nearly forty years ago, she was pregnant by Johnny Gee. Who didn’t know, am I right?” Johnny Gee, by the window, didn’t acknowledge the question. I went on. “She gave the baby away and spent her life in the Li Min Jin, taking care of the money and also, from a distance, taking care of her son.”

  I looked at Jackson, still motionless. I could see, from the corner of my eye, understanding start to dawn on other faces.

  “Why?” Jackson finally asked Tan. “Why not…” Stay with me, I was sure he wanted to say, but he didn’t say it.

  “Because,” Tan said, “she’s wrong. Johnny did know.”

  Johnny Gee still didn’t turn. His shoulders were set in an angry line.

  “With a baby,” Tan said, “there would have been no way I could keep my position in the Black Shadows. Nor any way I could keep you out of it. You and I would have become dependent on Johnny, and you would have been raised in the gang. In the tong, if Johnny was accepted there, which was no better. Many young people join gangs for the romance of crime or the power of violence. I joined the Black Shadows to be free. I had limited options for a future, and that’s the one I chose.”

  She looked into Jackson’s eyes for a long moment. “I wasn’t going to let your options be limited, too.”

  Jackson looked away.

  Tan’s hard face didn’t change, but I thought I saw something like resignation in her eyes.

  “I’d managed to disappear and come to New York,” she said, “but I knew he’d keep looking, and I knew he’d find me. Not because he wanted me back. But he would have come for you.”

  Jackson finally spoke. “For me.” It wasn’t a question, just the kind of repetition you use to make sure you understand.

  “The only way I could safeguard you was to join the tong. Johnny was still a Black Shadow. If I could get the tong’s protection, you and I would both be safe. But,” she said, “not together. It was hard enough for a young woman to join the Li Min Jin. The financial skills I’d developed made it possible, but for a mother with an infant, the idea would have been ludicrous. Even if I’d been allowed in, being raised in the tong was the future I’d run away to save you from.

  “Maria Ting was my cousin. Maria and Ke wanted children very badly and had been unable to have them. The solution was obvious. And,” Tan added with a smile, “it’s worked out well for you.”

  “Worked out well,” Jackson repeated. “With your… help.”

  “Of course. I wasn’t in a position to raise you, but you were still my son. It was my share of the profits from the Li Min Jin’s enterprises that sent you to prep school, to college and graduate school.”

  “Did they know?” Jackson said. “My parents.” He emphasized the word. “Did they know where the money was coming from?”

  “They knew it was mine. They had no idea I was in the Li Min Jin. When I joined the tong, I told Ke and Maria I’d taken a position in an accounting firm. They thought I was rising through the firm. They never knew anything else.

  “I watched you grow, but from a distance. I didn’t want anyone to associate Ke and Maria with the tong. I went to your high school debate club finals. I attended your college graduation. Public events where my presence wouldn’t be noticed. After you got your MBA, I watched you join Ke’s firm and learn the business. I was very proud. You were a natural. You’ve inherited my ability with numbers.”

  At first, Jackson said nothing. Then, in a hard voice, he said, “You gave me other help, too.”

  Tan tilted her head in acknowledgment. “When I saw a need, I tried to meet it.”

  He’d been talking about the violence that had trailed his projects, but a different light bulb went off in my head. I said to Tan, “Ironman thinks you’ve been stealing money from the tong.”

  Six people were scattered around the room in addition to Tan and Jackson, but Tan spun around as though startled to find she and her son weren’t alone. She searched me out, met my eyes, and said, “Ironman is wrong.”

  “I know. But by the time Jackson took over Ke Ting’s firm and started to work on the bigger projects, Choi Meng had long since given you complete control of the tong’s money for investment purposes. So you invested.”

  Bill was the first to catch on and his reaction was a grin. “I’ll be damned. Shell companies on top of shell companies. The Star Group. You’re Ting’s secret investor.”

  42

  You?” Jackson said to Tan. “You’re the Star Group?”

  “The Star Ferry,” I said. “An indelible piece of Hong Kong.”

  Tan looked at me, amused. “Very good. I didn’t want to risk a more Chinese-sounding name, but I wanted something that would bring the venture luck.” Back to Jackson: “You’ve made a good deal of money for the Li Min Jin over the years.”

  “Not just you? The tong? The tong’s been investing in my buildings?”

  “When you started to do projects bigger than your—bigger than Ke’s, you had trouble raising cash. It looked like you might not succeed.”

  “And then the Star Group came out of nowhere. I thought it was because someone saw the potential in what I was trying to do. Someone believing in my vision, my ability.”

  “I did.”

  “No. No. You were just propping me up because you’re my…” He couldn’t say it.

  “It’s part of my job to invest the Li Min Jin’s assets in conventional enterprises. I wasn’t ‘propping you up.’ I had a responsibility, which I took seriously, to grow our resources. I wouldn’t have invested in your projects if I hadn’t thought the investment would be profitable for the Li Min Jin.”

  “ ‘Invest in conventional enterprises.’ ” Jackson pronounced the words as if they were made of lemons. “You mean, to turn dirty money legit. The tong paid for my education, and I’ve been returning the favor, haven’t I? You’ve been laundering tong money through my projects for years.”

  “My job was to invest our assets,” Tan repeated. “If I hadn’t chosen your projects, that money would have gone elsewhere. Perhaps to your competitors. Tell me, has what I’ve done turned out badly for you?”

  “It could!” he snapped. “My God, it could ruin me if anyone found out.”

  “All these years, no one has.”

  Because no one’s looked, I thought.

  Jackson didn’t seem to know what to say.

  I did. “But the Star Group didn’t invest in Phoenix Towers.”

  “No,” said Tan. “How could I? Choi Meng was opposed to the project.”


  “Did you do it secretly? Are you also”—I thought back to what Linus had told us—“Advance Capital Limited?”

  “No.” That loud answer came from the man at the window. “I am.” Johnny Gee turned to face us, anger still burning in his eyes. “Lu-Lien, his mother,” he said, as though he’d eaten Jackson’s lemons, too, “successfully kept my son out of my reach all his life.”

  “You have three sons and two fine daughters,” Tan said mildly.

  “But he was my first child. My eldest son.”

  Jackson looked sick.

  “She kept him out of my reach, but not out of my sight.” Johnny Gee walked over to stand a few feet from Tan. They both kept their eyes on the rest of us and didn’t look at each other. “I got reports from America.”

  “I knew that was happening, that Johnny had forces here,” said Tan. “As long as I was under Choi Meng’s protection, there was no danger.”

  “What changed?” I looked at Johnny Gee. “Why did you come here?”

  Gee said nothing. Tan was the one who answered me. “The Phoenix Towers project is ambitious. It’s on as different a scale from what Jackson’s done before as his early projects were from Ke’s. It could be Jackson’s step into a major real estate empire.”

  “Real estate empire?” my brother burst out. “It’ll destroy the neighborhood!”

  Tan shrugged. “Neighborhoods change.”

  I shot Tim a glare. Mel laid a hand on his arm. One of those things worked because he turned purple but clamped his mouth shut.

  “But,” Tan said, “because of the need to assemble a complicated site, many investors were doubtful. They held back, waiting. When even the Star Group didn’t invest, neither did anyone else. The project’s financing was endangered.”

  “So when I couldn’t raise the money…” Jackson trailed off.

  “I called Johnny.”

  “Finally,” said Johnny Gee. He was gloating. “Finally, she needed me.”

  “The phone calls you made to a high-up Li Min Jin Hong Kong member,” I said. “They were to him. About this.”