by S. J. Rozan
“Loo and his senile old men can do what they want, but I’m not leaving here without the treasure.”
“What if it’s not there?”
“It’s here! Goddammit, it’s here!”
“I think you’re wrong, and I think you’re crazy, and I’m giving this phone to the hostage negotiator because I’m about to tell you where to shove it, and I think that’s not how this goes.” I handed my phone to Hsieh.
“Hi,” he said calmly into it. “Ironman? I’m Ren. Tell me what’s going on in there and what you want.” He listened, nodding, and finally said, “If no one’s hurt we can discuss safe passage. The first thing you need to do is open that door and let everyone who wants to leave, leave. Yes. No. No, not until everyone’s out. They come out without weapons and with their hands up. No. Then? We’ll make sure they’re unarmed and unhurt. Then I’ll talk to you about what comes next. No. No. Ironman, look outside. We could storm the building, or we could trap you all in there until you starve. The only reason we haven’t broken down the door yet is because we understand there’s at least one civilian inside. But if we feel he’s in danger, then what’s to keep us from coming in? Some of these guys”—Hsieh’s voice relaxed into a comfortable, buddies-at-the-bar tone—“these SWAT guys, they’d rather I just shut up and turn everything over to them. They’re chomping at the bit to use their expensive ordnance. They have big guns, two of them are Army snipers, and they like to blow shit up. I can’t keep holding them back. You have to meet me halfway, Ironman. Open the door, let people leave.” He lowered the phone and whispered to me, “Do we know his faction controls the door? Did he tell you that?”
“No.”
Lifting the phone again, Hsieh said, “Ironman, I’m going to say it again, this time through the bullhorn. To make sure everyone knows.” He raised the bullhorn and called, “Anyone who wants to come out before we come in, open the door and come now. Unarmed, hands up, slowly. We’ll hold our fire. Look around out here. Once we come in, I can’t make any promises.”
For about a minute, nothing.
Then the door cracked an inch or two, just enough to peer out of. A few seconds later it opened and a fat bald guy came out, hands in the air. One of Loo’s crew, I guessed. A riot-shielded cop dashed forward and hustled him away. Behind him, a skinny one, and then three more, miscellaneous but all Loo’s. Either Loo’s guys were controlling the door, or they were the only ones who wanted out. Cops grabbed each as he emerged. Another two, and then Loo himself. Not Jackson, and not Tan or Johnny Gee, but it was a good start.
Or not. As Hsieh lifted the bullhorn to speak again, I heard the backfire bang of a gunshot.
Loo, blood spreading on his chest, fell forward.
All hell broke loose.
More shots, from inside, from out here. Cops swarmed forward. Bullets shattered glass. Voices yelled commands. Voices shouted. Voices shrieked. I dove to the pavement.
“Shit,” I said, which pretty much covered it.
Also, 165 motionless pounds of Bill covered me.
“Are you still breathing?” I said, feeling like my heart had stopped.
“Yes.”
My heart started again. “Thank God. Now get off.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m pretty comfy.”
“You won’t be if you don’t move.”
He shifted his weight, managing to sneak a kiss onto my neck as he slid over beside me. I didn’t object.
45
The chaos lasted only about ten minutes, but it felt like days.
Jackson, Tan, Johnny Gee, even that SOB Ironman kept crowding into my head until I admitted I was worried about them; it took me a while because I knew I was worried about Mary and Chris, who’d gone charging in with the rest of the cops. Leading with their shields, the NYPD had managed to surge through the door before anyone—Beefy? what had become of him?—could shut it. That meant there’d be no long siege, which was good, but it also meant we out here had no idea what was going on in there, which was driving me nuts.
As soon as the bullets stopped flying around outside, an EMS tech in helmet and armored vest ran to where Loo was lying facedown on the street. He waved another guy over, and they lifted Loo onto a lowered gurney and whipped him away, which said to me he was still alive.
Ren Hsieh, crouched behind the car with us, kept trying urgently but methodically to reestablish contact with Ironman, alternating between the bullhorn and my phone. He shouted, got no response. He called, it went to voicemail. He texted, nothing happened. He shouted, got no response. Over and over. I guessed if I were in the middle of a firefight I might not answer a cop, either.
Even if I could.
Then it ended. The sound of shooting stopped abruptly. After a bit, the door opened. Pairs of cops began to bring out handcuffed men, old and young. Ironman was among the first, looking battered but walking under his own steam. Another couple of guys, then Johnny Gee, seething but apparently intact. A few more. A long pause.
“What the hell?” I whispered to Bill. “Everyone else is dead?” I tried to make a joke of it, but strangely, it wasn’t funny.
“They must be sweeping the building,” Bill said.
Hsieh nodded. “That’s the protocol.”
As we watched, a cop appeared at the door and called for the EMS guys. Three of them rushed forward; another three waited with rolling gurneys to be summoned by the triage guys if needed. They were, and they went in, and then a few more people trickled out, some walking and handcuffed, some on gurneys—and handcuffed to those. Bill, Hsieh, and I stood up behind the cruiser to watch the action. Bill said nothing, but he took my hand while we surveyed the cops leaving the building. I was sure he could feel my heart pounding. Then the unmistakable form of my best friend from babyhood came out the door and crossed the sidewalk. Her progress was slow because she was supporting Chris Chiang, who wore a white patch of bandage on his shoulder.
I rushed forward before a cop, or Bill, could stop me. Not that Bill tried; he was right beside me.
Hugging Mary, I said, “Are you okay?”
Hugging me back, she said, “Are you still here?”
“What about me?” Chris said plaintively. “Don’t I get a hug? I got shot!”
“A flesh wound,” Mary said. “A scratch.”
“Literally,” Chris admitted. He stretched his neck to see his shoulder. “I think it’s stopped bleeding already.”
I said, “Glad it’s not worse.”
“Can I get a hug anyway?”
I gave him one.
“What happened in there?” I asked. “What about Jackson Ting? And Tan? I didn’t see them come out.”
“We couldn’t find them.”
“Couldn’t—But they were in there when the shooting started, and by then you guys had the building surrounded. Where could they have gone?”
“Secret escape tunnels,” said Chris. “Bet they popped up on the other side of the East River.”
“We’ll sweep the building again,” Mary said. “But the initial sweep was pretty thorough, and they didn’t turn up. She’s really his mother?”
I shrugged. “What can I say?”
“Whatever it is, you’re going to come down to the station right now and say it.”
* * *
Which we did. The Fifth Precinct was buzzing when we got there, and its two holding cells were stuffed with tong members. Cops and white-shirted brass came and went. I didn’t see Johnny Gee or Ironman in either of the cells, which likely meant each was being accorded the honor of his own interview room.
Because Chris was the injured party, he dropped behind his own desk upstairs in the Squad Room. Mary perched on it. I sat in the chair in front of it, and Bill pulled another over. Chris picked up his empty NYPD mug with his good arm and eyed it pitifully.
“Seriously?” said Mary. “You’re going to play that?” He looked sad. She snorted. But she got up and got him coffee. “Bill? Lydia, you want tea? All we have is Lipton, so ta
ke it or leave it.”
“I’ll take it with gratitude. I really was worried about you, you know,” I said as she came back with two mugs in each hand, reminiscent of our high school waitress days.
“Fine. Then how about next time before you wave a red flag at a bullring full of gangsters, you think about me and Chris, since you’re obviously not bright enough to think about yourself?”
“That’s not fair. That’s not what happened.”
“Oh? Then tell me what did happen.”
“Johnny Gee kidnapped Natalie Wu.”
“Who’s Johnny Gee?”
“The tall gangster no one—”
“Oh, right, him. Okay, go on.”
I went on. As I silently praised the gods of tea, even Lipton, Bill and I together filled them in on the kidnapping and its gangster family summit aftermath. We included a side trip to the trouble trailing Jackson Ting’s construction projects, and one to Johnny Gee’s investment in Phoenix Towers.
When we were done Mary and Chris shared a long look, then both turned back to me. “You’re telling me,” Mary said, “that Tan killed that window guy? Broke that woman’s arm?”
“She just about admitted it.”
“Bill?” Mary raised her eyebrows, asking Bill for confirmation. Whether she really needed that or she was just trying to annoy me I didn’t know, but I chose to sip my Lipton in saintly silence as he nodded.
“And by herself, I’d think,” he said. “I mean, not farmed out. She wouldn’t have wanted anyone, even a hired gun, to wonder why she cared.”
“In Hong Kong, in the Black Shadows,” I said, “she was an enforcer. She said she liked it.”
Mary drank coffee and stared darkly into space. “When you got the kidnap video,” she said, “you didn’t think to call us?”
“Of course I did—”
“But they said ‘no cops,’ ” she interrupted wearily.
“It wasn’t that.”
“Oh? What was it?”
“First, I was sure it was Jackson. Until the light bulb went on that Tan was his mother. Then I thought it was Tan.”
“You were wrong both times.”
“Come on, Mary! This was no normal kidnapping with a ransom demand and all that. Would you guys going in have made things better?”
“We might have avoided a firefight.”
“The firefight wasn’t about the kidnapping! It was a coincidence!”
We all four stared at each other and then burst out laughing.
“ ‘A Coincidental Firefight,’ ” Chris said. “When I retire, I’m totally writing that book.”
“All right,” Mary said. “You two can go. I’m not even going to tell you to stay out of trouble, because you won’t do it, and then I’ll get mad.”
“Besides,” Chris stuck in, “I need the material.”
Mary gave him a glare and then said, “If I tell you to stay alive, do you think you can manage that?”
“We’ll try,” I said. “What about my brother? And Mel and Nat?”
“I’ll check.” Chris jumped up before Mary could answer me. He winced and then winked at me and left the room. We sat in silence surrounded by the police station bustle until he came back. “Mel and Tim have been questioned and released. They’re downstairs waiting for Nat. Detective Vivas says she’ll be done with her in another minute or two.”
“Great. Thanks, Chris. Hope you heal fast. Bye, Mary.” Bill said much the same, and we beat it.
At the bottom of the oak staircase, we found Tim and Mel on the deeply scratched but highly polished bench by the sergeant’s desk. Tim gave me a long glower. “So this is your life?” he said. “Even worse than I thought.”
“Come on, Tim,” said Mel, but gently. To me and Bill, “Are you all right?”
I noticed Tim glancing at me sideways, as though he was interested in my answer though he didn’t want me to know it. “Fine,” I said. “You?”
“Still shaken,” said Mel. “This isn’t the way I usually spend my days.”
“You may not believe it, but us, either.”
“And I never want to again!” Tim barked.
“You may not believe it,” Bill quoted me, “but us, either.”
Mel jumped up, looking past me. “Nat! Are you okay?”
Bill, Tim, and I turned to see Nat coming down the stairs. She hugged Mel and said, “I’m fine. Are you?”
Another round of reassurances and then I said, “Let’s get out of here before Mary comes down and arrests us all for loitering.”
46
I expected we’d all split up on the sidewalk outside the station house, but because the Earth was passing through some sort of radiation cloud that caused bizarro events, Tim said, “Listen, I bet we’re all exhausted. Let’s go to Tai Pan for tea and sweets. What do you say?”
I wanted to say, You’re shaken up, you want company, and you’re including me and Bill? Who are you and what have you done with Tim Chin? Instead I answered, “Sure.”
Mel did too. Bill and Nat fell in behind us, and we headed for Canal Street.
It was getting close to the end of the day, not a crowded time in a Chinatown bakery, so we snagged a table at Tai Pan easily. Bill went to the counter with our tea orders while Tim took a tray and a pair of tongs and hit the display cases.
“Nat,” Mel said, “I’m really sorry.”
“About what?”
“That that crazy guy kidnapped you! I’m sorry you got caught up in anything to do with the building. The stupid thing isn’t your problem, it’s mine.”
Nat, bad liar that she was, shot me a look. I was tempted give her away just for worrying that I would, but instead I kept my eyes on Bill’s progress back toward us. Bill distributed the paper cups from his tray, and then Tim arrived and put down a baker’s half-dozen pastries, tarts, and buns, which meant seven for the five of us. When everyone’s eyebrows went up at the sugar glut he said, “I didn’t know what people liked.” A strange sensation: My brother was trying to be nice.
And a familiar one: I hadn’t actually been in a fight, but I was ravenous anyway.
Arms crisscrossed as people cut gooey, sticky, crumbly, or powdery things in half or in quarters or in thirds and took this or that to sample as they sipped. Everyone started talking at once.
“How did Johnny Gee know where to find you?”
“Did Tan Lu-Lien really not know about the kidnapping?”
“Did Ting really not know she was his mother?”
“Were you saying she killed someone for him?”
“I can’t believe that SOB claimed he hadn’t shot at me. I mean, why bother, if he admitted shooting at Ironman?”
That last, of course, was Tim, who always has more words than anyone else.
I was enjoying the companionable chaos, especially watching my brother actually trying to be civil to Bill, when “Bad Boys” rang from the phone in my pocket. I took it out and said, “Hey, Linus.”
“Where are you? Are you okay?” He sounded breathless.
“I’m in Tai Pan having mango cheesecake. Sure I’m okay.”
“We just turned on the news! Big police action on Bayard Street. SWAT teams and hostage negotiators and everything. Me and Trella were worried.”
“So you’re saying every time there’s a violent incident in Chinatown, you think I’m in the middle of it?”
“Well, no, I didn’t mean—”
“Never mind. I was. Me, Bill, the clients, and Tim. But we’re all fine.”
“Uncle Tim? In a police action?”
“It’s a world full of wonders, Linus.”
“I guess. Hey, Trell, they’re okay. But they were there, for real. What was it about, cuz?”
“Long story. I’ll tell you guys later.”
“ ‘Woke up in a bad place / Should probably get up so I’m not late / Stared at my phone for the past eight / Minutes at nothing, my head aches!’ ‘Story,’ great rap! And it’s long. Will you bring mango cheesecake?�
��
“Uh, sure.”
“Okay then. Trella, mango cheesecake incoming! Listen, cuz, I was going to call you anyway, just before the news came on, because we do have one more kinda interesting fact we found, but maybe you want that later, too?”
“No, go ahead.” Though, I reflected, if Jackson Ting—wherever he was—was really pulling the plug on Phoenix Towers, we might be done with this whole thing any minute now.
“Well. You remember how we told you about Gold Coast? The IVF place Natalie Wu and her husband went to?”
“I hadn’t, but I do now.” I looked across the table at Nat, who was listening to my brother elucidate something while she finished off a red bean bun. “What about it?”
“It wasn’t only them. It was the other one, too.”
“The other what?”
“Sister. Mel Wu. She went there, too.”
“She… what?” I stopped as a whole Christmas tree string of light bulbs lit up in my head. “Linus, thank you very much. I’ll call you back.”
I slipped the phone away and waited for a lull in the conversation. When it came I stood. “Nat,” I said, “would you come outside with me for a minute?”
Nat gave me a confused look and glanced at Mel. Mel gave me one also, and the sisters had never looked more alike than at that moment. Tim said, “Lyd? What’s up?” Bill didn’t say anything and didn’t look confused—though I’m sure he was—but put his hands on the table, prepared to rise and help me however I wanted.
I gave Bill a quick tiny headshake and kept my eyes on Nat.
Shrugging, Nat stood and followed me out of Tai Pan.
I walked a few steps down the sidewalk so we couldn’t be seen from the table where I’d marooned Mel between Tim and Bill. Though if anyone could handle it, she could. I stopped and turned to face Nat. “I might have left it alone if it weren’t my brother,” I said. “But you crossed the line.”
“What are you talking about?” Nat’s impatient tone and puzzled brow-crease were way overdone. You’d think someone used to pulling stunts would have learned to put on a better act over the years, but if your older sister has your back all the time, I guess you don’t need to. Me, I had no sisters.
