by Amelia Autin
“You never told me what you do for a living.”
Guilt stabbed through Jason at the ongoing deception he still wasn’t quite ready to end, and he considered what he could say without outright lying to Alana. “I work for a multinational electronics firm, Wing Wah Enterprises. Nothing exciting, but it pays the bills.” RMM’s bills, too, he considered adding, but didn’t.
He wandered into his bedroom as he spoke, then collapsed on top of the king-size bed and dragged a corner of the coverlet over him, still holding his phone to his ear.
“Engineering? Finance? Sales?” she asked with the air of someone who really wanted to know and wasn’t going to let him off the hook.
“Management.” He quickly reviewed his scholastic history and figured there wasn’t anything there he couldn’t reveal. “I have dual management and engineering degrees from Oxford.”
“A double major? Wow, impressive. I just have a major in history and a minor in communications.”
“I knew when I graduated I’d be working for the electronics company I still work for,” he explained. “So it seemed appropriate.” He yawned a third time, and this time she heard him.
“You’re exhausted, poor baby. You’re the one who needs sleep.”
He could barely keep his eyes open now, and his words were starting to slur together. “You were right, lang loi. Talking did help. Thank you.”
“You’re very welcome. Good night and sweet dreams, Jason.”
“Lang jai,” he corrected.
“Right,” she said, and he could almost see her smile. “Good night and sweet dreams...lang jai.”
Chapter 11
Jason woke at his normal time. No matter how late he was up the night before, his circadian clock was staunchly set for 6:00 a.m. And once he was awake, he was awake. He couldn’t turn over and go back to sleep again.
Coffee and breakfast he’d grab on the way to work, as usual, and he’d showered the night before, so all he needed to do was dress, pack up his laptop in its leather briefcase, pick up his keys from the credenza in the foyer—a creature of habit, he always left his keys there—and find his smartphone. But it wasn’t on his bedroom nightstand. And it wasn’t in his office next to his laptop, the only other place he could imagine it might be. He stood staring for a moment, his brow furrowed. Then he remembered.
He strode back into his bedroom, impatiently tossed the top sheet to one side and there it was...still in his bed. Where apparently he’d fallen asleep with it pressed to his ear, something he’d never done before in his life. He checked, but the phone was off. So either he’d disconnected at the very end of his conversation with Alana last night, or the phone had shut itself off after an extended period of time with no usage.
He pocketed it with a soft smile of remembrance, a smile he refused to glance at in the dresser mirror because he figured it made him look sappy—although he didn’t care—and headed down to the basement and his Jag.
It was raining, which wasn’t uncommon for this time of year. Because it was a more scenic drive and he wasn’t pressed for time, he took the Stubbs Road route to the Wing Wah Enterprises office tower, the gleaming steel-and-glass monolith the company had occupied for the last five years. He wanted the scenic route because thinking of Alana, who’d occupied his thoughts almost constantly since he’d woken this morning, filled him with an almost euphoric sense of well-being. And the lovely vistas—even in the rain—seemed apropos.
Alana. He couldn’t relegate her to the back of his mind the way he’d relegated all the other women he’d been involved with over the years...and he didn’t want to. She’d become the most important person in his world in less than a month, and he loved it.
The Jag’s Bluetooth system rang for an incoming call on his cell phone, and after a glance at the display, he hit the button on the steering wheel. “Good morning, David. You’re up with the birds. Since when do you—”
His best friend cut him off. “I don’t suppose you’ve seen the news this morning.”
The grim way this was delivered was a huge red flag something had gone down between last night and this morning. Something which David suspected involved RMM...and him, so he answered cautiously. “No, I haven’t.”
“Ten men were found murdered this morning, in various districts of the SAR,” David said.
“That’s rather a lot for one day.” As soon as the words left his mouth the number ten took on special significance. Weren’t there that many involved in the RMM raid last night? He counted them up in his mind and nodded to himself. Yes, ten. Producer, director, two cameramen, a pair of actors and four others, who he’d figured were makeup, wardrobe and a couple of grips. But they’d been alive when RMM had left. Humiliated. Naked. But alive. This couldn’t have anything to do with—
“The SAR doesn’t get that many murders in a quarter, much less one day.” David let that statement hang there for a moment before adding, “And preliminary reports indicate they could be connected. One of the men was a notorious purveyor of pornography, with unsubstantiated rumors surrounding him about even less savory pursuits. The others were part of a film crew he often used, including the director and a couple of male porn stars.”
Jason’s mouth tightened. They were alive the last time I saw them, he reiterated in his mind. Then the name the producer had threatened him with in anger last night materialized, and he knew he had to share this with David. “The Eight Tigers.”
“What makes you think it was them?” Jason said nothing. “You wouldn’t know anything about a vigilante raid that took place in a warehouse in Hong Hum last night, would you? From all accounts a movie was being shot there. The doors were blown off, movie cameras wrecked and the place was trashed.” Jason didn’t answer, knowing David would take his silence as a tacit admission. “Damn it, Jason...”
The throttled anger and frustration in his friend’s voice made him say, “They were alive when we left. That’s all I can tell you.”
“Damn it, Jason,” David repeated. This was followed by a weighty silence. Then, “Where are they?”
He knew David wasn’t referring to the dead men; he was referring to the women who had to have been there last night, the subjects of the film. The police obviously wanted to question them about the dead men and everything that had led up to last night. Not that David thought the women might be responsible, but it was always possible the murders were the work of an enraged boyfriend or relative.
“They’re safe. And they’re not involved, not in any way.”
“How do you know?”
“Trafficked from Russia, both of them. No family here. No boyfriends. Lured away from their homes with promises of modeling careers, then ‘sold’ to the highest bidder—you know how that business operates.”
“I want to hear it from them.” A demand, not a request.
Jason sighed softly. “I’ll see what I can do.”
He was about to disconnect when David said, “If the Eight Tigers are involved, I have to ask. Is this related to the abducted women?”
“We haven’t made a definite connection between the two, if that’s what you’re asking. Not yet anyway.”
“That’s what I’m asking.”
“But you know as well as I do, word on the street is the Eight Tigers are involved in both abductions. They have brothels in Macau, which is where we’re fairly confident the women are being transported.”
His friend’s voice was hard and implacable. “I need to know what you know, Jason. I need whatever evidence you have. And I need it now.”
“We don’t have any evidence you don’t have. All we have is hearsay. Nothing that can be used in court.”
“Would you tell me if you did?” That was a bow drawn at a venture, but it found its target. In essence, David was calling him a liar.
“My word as a
gentleman,” he said evenly. “This is too important for me to give a damn who shuts this triad down, you or us.”
* * *
Alana’s alarm woke her at seven. She considered hitting the snooze button and going back to sleep for five minutes, then decided against it. She made quick work of dressing before heading downstairs to breakfast. It was eight on the dot when she walked into Dirk’s office and checked on the threshold because Dirk was there at his desk, scrolling through something on his computer.
“Hi,” she said. “I thought you were filming this morning.”
He flashed her the smile that had won him millions of female fans, including her before she’d come to work for him. Not that she wasn’t still affected by his brilliant smile; she was. But things were somehow different now that she knew him personally. Now that she knew what a...a normal guy he was. Down to earth. And an utterly devoted family man.
“Change of plans. Supposed to be an outside shoot today, but this rain means they’re scrambling to rearrange the schedule and shoot some indoor scenes instead. They won’t need me on the set until this afternoon, so I thought I’d try to make a dent in the emails you flagged for me.” A guilty expression reminiscent of a little boy crossed his face. “I know I said I’d do it yesterday, but Mei-li and I took the twins to Stanley Market instead.”
Alana seated herself behind her desk and turned on her computer. “That sounds like fun. Did they enjoy it?”
“Did they ever. I’m a sucker where the girls are concerned, and they know it. They’ve got me wrapped around their little fingers.” He chuckled. “Good thing Mei-li knows how to rein me in. Otherwise I’d spoil them rotten.”
“It’s hard to say no when you can afford to buy just about anything,” she commiserated. Her parents had done their best to spoil her by giving her everything her heart desired, she remembered. Thank goodness I had Uncle Julian to keep my feet planted firmly on the ground. To realize my privileged life wasn’t the way most people live.
“Yeah,” Dirk said in response to her statement. “I try not to spoil them, but it’s difficult. So how was your day on the water?” he asked, changing the subject. And when she raised her eyebrows, questioning how he knew, he added, “Mei-li happened to mention you had another date with her brother, this time to take a trip around the island.”
Alana pretended to be distracted by something on her computer so she wouldn’t have to look at Dirk until the betraying flush had time to subside. Then, in as casual a voice as she could muster, she said, “Lovely. Absolutely lovely, from start to finish.”
Dirk hesitated as if he was of two minds about what he was about to say next, but something decided him. “Please don’t take this the wrong way. And if I’m crossing some kind of employer-employee line, I’ll apologize up front. But Juliana is the best friend I have in the world. She entrusted you to Mei-li and me, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t speak up to warn you.”
That sounded ominous. “Please don’t say anything against Jason.”
He shook his head. “Not my intention. Jason is...well, I’m sure you’ve already discovered for yourself, but he’s just about the best man I know. I admire him tremendously. But he’s an extremely complicated man with a lot of emotional baggage. A hell of a lot more than he’s ever let on to Mei-li or me.”
“She said...” Alana searched her mind for Mei-li’s exact words yesterday. “She said Jason has been hurt more than I know. More than he’d ever tell me. Then she practically begged me not to break his heart.” She glanced down at her hands for a moment, remembering yesterday and the love she’d shown Jason with her hands, her lips. Her heart. Then she looked up at Dirk. “I would never do that, you know. Break Jason’s heart.”
“He’s her brother, so of course she’d look at it from his perspective. But you’re Juliana’s cousin, and my first loyalty is to you. I’m less concerned with you breaking Jason’s heart than I am with him breaking yours. Not that I think he’d do it deliberately,” he quickly interjected when she opened her mouth to leap to Jason’s defense. “But any woman who gets involved with him has to know up front it could happen.”
She didn’t respond at first. Then said quietly, “Because he’s a very complicated man with a lot of emotional baggage, right?”
“Right.”
“Are you saying this because of his involvement with RMM, or because he founded it after his best friend was killed?”
Dirk looked thunderstruck. “He told you?”
Alana shook her head, a faint smile touching her lips. “Of course not. He confided in me about Sean’s murder, but that’s all. I figured it out, and when I told him I knew, he didn’t deny it.”
“It’s more than just that. More than just RMM. There’s something riding him he’ll never tell a soul, but I know it’s there. So does Mei-li.”
“Do you mean the man he killed? He has an extremely stern conscience, and I know that still weighs on him, even though it was completely justified.”
If anything, Dirk’s expression turned even more thunderstruck. “He told you about that, too?”
“Just the bare facts, but I extrapolated from there.”
Dirk shook his head. “It’s something deeper and more basic than that. There’s a gaping hole in Jason’s psyche, and I don’t know if the woman exists who could fill that void. Who could love him enough to heal him.”
She’d known. Hadn’t she known there was a darkness in Jason, secrets he’d never confide? But Dirk didn’t understand. That knowledge just made her love Jason more because she knew he needed her in some elemental way, more than anyone else would ever need her.
“You don’t have to worry about me.” She smiled to reassure him. “I know what I’m doing.” Despite her confident words, however, a sliver of self-doubt refused to be quelled.
* * *
As soon as Jason arrived at the office he called the safe house where the women RMM had rescued had spent the night. He got a full report from Soo-Ying Kwan, the social worker who ran it, after asking, “Other than the little they told us last night through the interpreter, have they said anything at all?”
He listened to the response, closing his eyes momentarily as a pang struck in the region of his heart. When Soo-Ying finished, he asked, “In your professional opinion, are they in any condition to be questioned by the police?”
“That depends, laoban,” she said, using the Cantonese word for boss.
“On?”
“Not alone. I’ll consent to it only if I can be there and if I can immediately stop any line of questioning I feel is inappropriate. And not at the police station. Not here, of course—we don’t want the police knowing our location—but somewhere neutral.”
He thought about this. “I’ll make those nonnegotiable terms. And I’ll arrange to have a barrister there representing the women. They’re victims, not criminals, and I won’t let the police treat them as such.”
As soon as he hung up he called David. After some heated debate, his friend conceded to his terms, and Jason said, “I’ll make the arrangements and get back to you when everything’s lined up.”
He then called an acquaintance who agreed to legally represent both women as well as to hold the interrogation at his offices that afternoon. Two more phone calls, to the social worker at the safe house and to David, and everything was set.
The rest of Jason’s day passed in a blur of meetings, overseas conference calls and a not-totally-unexpected decision to shut down an unprofitable venture in Egypt. They’d take a loss, but it would barely register as a blip on the bottom line. And the company’s name hadn’t been on that venture, so the media fallout would be minimal.
In between times, whenever he had a moment, he texted Alana.
Thank you again, lang loi.
She texted back, My pleasure, lang jai. Did you sleep well?
&
nbsp; Like a baby, thanks to you.
And this.
Are you free tonight?
For you, yes of course. What did you have in mind?
A wicked chuckle escaped him when he read that, because she had to know what he had in mind. She’d offered him a gift yesterday, one he had every intention of accepting at the earliest opportunity.
But that wasn’t the only reason he wanted to see her tonight. In fact, it wasn’t even tops on his list. Okay, it was second, but it wasn’t first. So he texted.
Dinner, and...?
Then he laughed out loud when he read her response, and he was glad he was alone in his office at that moment.
As long as there’s an “and” on the agenda, I don’t mind dinner.
His office intercom buzzed. “Your two o’clock appointment is here, sir.”
He glanced at his watch and saw it still lacked five minutes to the hour. He toggled the switch and said, “Give me two minutes, then send them in.” Then he texted Alana.
“And” is definitely on the agenda. 6:00? Dressy?
As soon as he hit Send, he realized he still had no place to take her for “and.” It wasn’t that he didn’t want to take Alana where he’d made love to other women, because he’d never taken a woman to his condo. Too dangerous. He didn’t want his secret life to become known, and there was always a risk the woman might see or hear something she shouldn’t. So he’d always maneuvered things so they spent the night elsewhere.
No, his condo was out because it would be a dead giveaway. He hadn’t lied to Alana; he just hadn’t been completely forthcoming. His reasons had been compelling at the time, and they still were to a certain extent. But would she understand? She might walk out if she thought he’d been deceiving her. Or worse, that he was playing her for a fool.
No, he couldn’t risk it. Not yet. He had to bind her to him first. Mentally. Physically. Emotionally. Then, when it no longer mattered, he’d tell her the truth.
