Lucky the Hard Way

by Deborah Coonts

  “That I cannot restore.” He actually looked a little hangdog when he said it. Either he was an exceptional manipulator or he was sincere. Unfortunately, I had no idea which.

  For no good reason, I went with sincere, and I prayed to the Great Goddess that I wasn’t making one more bad choice when it came to a handsome man. This one could get us killed or worse. “I’m not sorry for hitting you.” I tried not to pout when I said it.

  “I’m not sorry for taking the young detective.”

  “Hey,” Romeo started to object.

  Sinjin and I both shot him the same look, shutting him down.

  He raised his hands in a defensive gesture. “Okay, never mind. Just forget about me, a hapless pawn in a larger game.”

  “Well, look at you.” I copied Mona’s superior look. “All grown up and becoming a regular junior smart-ass.”

  The kid actually winked at me. I lost my bearings for a moment.

  Time was short, and I didn’t have the ego to carry this any further with the pirate. “Means to an end,” I said, refocusing on Sinjin and trying for a bit of understanding as I tried to take his measure, sadly, without much luck. I couldn’t get past the dark-haired, younger Fabio thing he had going on. The personification of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. For some odd reason, clichés weren’t providing the entertainment they used to. “We are more alike than makes me comfortable,” I admitted, more to myself than him.

  He graced me with a smile—it took my breath. I may have left my heart in Vegas, but I still could appreciate a gorgeous man oozing dangerous.

  “I had it coming,” he agreed. “After what Minnie told me, I should’ve known you wouldn’t give up without a fight.”

  “Minnie?” It was my turn to be surprised. “When did you talk with her?”

  “Before you went to see her.”

  “She set this up?”

  “Set it in motion would be more accurate.” Sinjin looked around—the day was brightening fast. “We are exposed. We need to move to a safe place.”

  “I’m here illegally, and I’m hanging with a wanted man. I’m running low on bargaining chips so, you won’t get any objection from me.” I let him herd me toward the road, with Romeo bringing up the rear. “I hope we don’t have to walk far. I don’t have much time.”

  In the shadows ahead of us, an engine started. Lights flicked on, and a car emerged from its sheltered position at the side of a building then eased to a stop in front of us. A large black SUV. So much for subtle. With an unnecessary flourish, Sinjin opened the rear door for me.

  His act was getting a bit old. With one foot on the floorboard, I paused in the door. “If we’re the good guys, why do we have to break the law and hide in the shadows while the bad guys operate in plain sight?”

  His face closed into a frown, then he shrugged. “It is China.”

  Romeo rode shotgun next to the driver, who appeared not to have any interest in his passengers. Sinjin took the spot next to me in the back.

  I didn’t give him time to relax. “Tell me about Minnie.”

  “Mr. Cho, he is not her husband. Even though pimping is illegal here in Macau, prostitution is not. Minnie…” his voice broke. He swallowed hard and took a moment to regain his composure. “Minnie had no choice. She did what she had to do to survive.”

  “And Cho?”

  Sinjin shot me a sideways look—it wasn’t hard to read the hate in it. “Mr. Cho took advantage.”

  An old story, but it still inflamed every shred of righteous indignation I had. “How’d she get out?”

  “She didn’t, not for a while anyway. Minnie’s one smart lady, though. She convinced Cho to move her to Vegas, let her be the conduit through which his laundered money is invested in real estate. It’s an old story and a gambit the bad guys have been running for a long time.” He swiveled to look at me. “Did you know the U.S. is one of the few countries that allow foreign investment above 49%? Every other country worth investing in won’t give a foreign person or entity majority control. It is wise to withhold this, don’t you think?”

  “You and I are singing the same song. But, another problem for another day.”

  “It is actually worse, but Minnie made it work for her. It is possible to get a U.S. visa by investing in real estate.”

  “Buy your way in.” I sighed, somehow a bit defeated. In our desire for largess, we Americans could be so stupid.

  “But, as you say, another day.” He shifted back to look straight ahead, his eyes constantly flicking between the mirrors.

  His posture remained relaxed, so I did, too—relaxed being a relative term.

  “What about her sons?”

  “Frank and Sam?” Sinjin found something about that amusing.

  “What?”

  “They are not her sons. They could be Mr. Cho’s sons. He claims them, but nobody knows for sure. Hell, Stanley Ho has seventeen children that he claims, but many suspect he has more. Mr. Cho could be the same.”

  “Easy to sire, hard to parent.”

  “No doubt.”

  “Tell me about Ming.” I shot him a raised eyebrow. “I know you know her.”

  “Yes, but I did not know you did.”

  “There’s a lot you don’t know,” I bluffed, trying to raise myself in his estimation. This wasn’t personal; this was professional. I was aiming for partner, not pawn.

  “Apparently.”

  “Ming seems to hold Frank and Sam in high esteem. If they’re such good guys, can you explain what they were doing in Vegas shooting at people and getting tossed in jail?”

  “Frank went to save Minnie, then got crossed up with your legal system somehow. Sam went to get Frank. Nobody knew Gittings would get to Sam, and then try to take Minnie out so he could angle to be her replacement for Cho.”

  “That’s what happened?”

  “According to Frank.”

  It sorta made sense. Sorta. “Why did Gittings want to be Cho’s guy? Ol’ Irv is more of a lone wolf.”

  “Frank thinks Gittings killed somebody. After that big singer went tits up, Gittings got all freaked. Told Sam he needed to get out of the country. Cho was a great way out. And I’m sure Gittings figured having his protection while he figured out the local game wouldn’t be bad either.”

  “And he promised to deliver Frank in return?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Which I guess he did.” Another thought derailed me as my heart hammered. “He admitted to killing someone.”

  “Well, not exactly, only that he was involved. Tried to pin it on a friend of yours, I believe.”

  “I was sure Sam Cho killed Holt Box.”

  “Possible. It depends on how hard Gittings sat on him. Sam was a little slow. He’d do anything for Frank.”

  “Sam’s dead. So how do I prove Gittings did it?”

  “Sam lived for a bit after Gittings shot him.”

  “I didn’t know. Did he talk to anybody?”

  “Minnie.”

  “You know what he said?”

  “No. She didn’t tell me; she told me to protect you. That if you live, and you bring down Cho, for the girls, she said, then she’ll give you what you want.”

  Okay, so much for partner—I’d been a pawn from the get-go.

  The more I railed against playing games it seemed, the further I got drawn into them. I wondered what would happen if we all refused to play and dealt with each other directly. Probably homicide, not that that was ruled out at this point anyway.

  “I want to talk to Frank.”

  “In time, but he won’t go over Minnie’s head. He wants Cho gone more than most, especially now.” Sinjin shifted from looking at me to looking out the front window—never a good sign. “Kim really was Miss Minnie’s daughter, the daughter Mr. Cho kept as collateral when he sent Minnie to the U.S. Frank was in love with her. They were to be married.”

  “Oh.” My heart fell. Minnie had pretended to not have any interest in Kim to protect her. My heart broke for all of the
m. Anger filtered in through the cracks—anger and revenge. “So Frank and Kim couldn’t have been brother and sister.”

  “No, Minnie was Kim’s mother. Mr. Cho was not her father. Frank and Sam, nobody really knows where they came from. Minnie isn’t their mother, though, not blood mother anyway, but she feels strongly about those two boys.”

  “So Kim really was Minnie’s daughter?”

  “Yes, and she was my sister.”

  “What?” At a loss, I squeezed his arm, offering a connection; that was the best I had. Words failing had happened to me a lot lately. Maybe I was getting older and a bit softer. Maybe with perspective came a heightened awareness of the pain in the world. Life could be cruel, but people often more so.

  Terrific. Life was giving me insight rather than solutions.

  “I’d warned her. We all had. And then they got Jhonny Vu, a warning she chose to ignore. She wanted Frank, and she wanted Cho taken down.” He gave me a sad half-smile. “Perhaps, with your help, she will get one wish in the afterlife.”

  My resolve solidified. “If I have to shoot him myself.”

  “Another would step into his place. We need to get them all.”

  “All? You want me to get all of them?” My voice screeched like a sour violin note. “You can’t even take care of Cho.”

  “We can come up with a plan.”

  I felt my eyes grow round, and, once again, words fled.

  Where was Peter Pan to fly me off to Neverland?

  I watched the scenery outside the window roll by. A simple life, a simple land—so far from the glitz and ugliness on Macau and the wealth and opulence of Hong Kong—both so close, yet light years away from the small houses, the bicycles resting on their sides in the yards, the lights shining in the windows as folks started their day.

  No wonder the Chinese loved the whole yin and yang thing—they personified it. Of course, I guess we all did, as it was some sort of Newtonian Law, equal and opposite reaction and all of that, but right now I felt like blaming it on the Chinese.

  I couldn’t talk about a plan right now; my brain was whirling from what I’d been told and what I didn’t know. At this point, I wasn’t sure which was more terrifying. “Tell me about Minnie. How did your mother escape Mr. Cho’s…influence? Even in Vegas, I’m sure he kept her on a short leash.”

  “He had a rope around her neck, yes.” His eyes shifted back to mine. “Your father.”

  Of course. My father had a hero complex of epic proportions. He’d saved my mother…sort of. He’d saved Minnie. And so many others that I would lose count if I tried to tally his scorecard. There was a special place in heaven for him, despite what he may have done that he didn’t want me to know about.

  “Do you know a Vito Morgenstern?”

  “Of course.”

  “What does he do?”

  “He is the Governor of Macau. Why?”

  Was Sinjin playing me for a chump? “There is no more Governor of Macau. That office went out with the Portuguese.”

  “You want to tell that to Vito Morgenstern?”

  From the look on his face, I knew the answer to be no. “Which team does he play for?”

  “His own. But he is a man of honor.” Sinjin seemed to understand that there was a debt to be paid somewhere, somehow.

  “My father…” I started to tell him then thought better of it. Some secrets shouldn’t be told.

  “A friend if you need him, then.” Sinjin was smarter than he looked. Of course, any man dressed in pirate garb looked about as smart as a woman wearing short shorts to a board meeting. “Your father. My family could never repay his kindness.”

  “That’s never the deal. No repayment necessary.” I shifted in my seat, a bit anxious. “So, what’s your skin in this game? What do you want?”

  “I want my country back. I want to finish my sister’s fight.” He waived my next question away. “Not political autonomy, but personal. Greed and corruption are endemic. The Triad assaults people in the daylight, flaunting their power. We are afraid.”

  “But everyone who wants a job has one. And crime is low.”

  “But at what cost?” The look in his eyes turned hard.

  Clean it up or let it ride? Vegas had faced the same choice in the Fifties.

  “The cash pipeline out of China has slowed to a trickle,” Sinjin continued, his voice stronger now. “The mainland government is making a big show of cracking down on money laundering and the purchase of high-end goods from real estate to fashion.”

  “I know the bribery hasn’t slowed down—the ghost cities that nobody wants built in the middle of nowhere are totems to greed and corruption.”

  Sinjin pursed his lips as if he was impressed. “Public money converted to private.”

  “It still needs to be laundered to be of any use,” I said, starting to see more of how the game was played. “Cho has essentially usurped our casino as if he’d bought it. A cash business, a casino is the perfect venue for cleaning dirty money.”

  Sinjin looked out the window. The angry look on his face betrayed his thoughts. “He’s got a sweet deal.”

  “Until the authorities finally grow too greedy and take all his profit to allow him to continue.” I was picking up some of Sinjin’s anger. “Then they shut us down and jerk our gaming commission. Any idea how we can shut Cho and his cronies down, without losing our ass…ets?”

  “Maybe.” His eyes had turned dark and serious as he turned to look at me.

  “I’m ready for your plan.” I braced myself. “I think. The goal is ambitious, so I’ve no doubt the price will be high.”

  “One hundred million U.S.”

  Oh, that figure sounded awful familiar. He couldn’t mean…could he? Not yet willing to shoulder the enormity of what I thought he had in mind, I let him unwind the story at his own pace…as I thought about how to pull it off.

  “With the added scrutiny of the mainland government, the men like Cho have been forced underground. They still have the money coming in, but where to put it has become an issue. A huge black market has burgeoned. Men who will smuggle money out of China.”

  “But what then if they can’t use banks?” I fed him the hanging curveball, even though I already knew the answer.

  “They use someone like me.”

  “A pirate?”

  “Of course not. That is only a game. I actually work in Hong Kong; I’m a legitimate businessman.”

  “Really? What do you do?” I had him pegged as a thief, a jewel thief most likely.

  “I run an international hedge fund.”

  That wiped the smug right off my face. He was not only a thief; he was a thief of epic proportions. “Really?”

  “Quite.” He proffered a hand. “Sinjin Smythe-Gordon at your service. Cho forced Minnie to give me up, as he made her do with Kim, although he kept her. My adoptive parents left Hong Kong before the changeover. I was educated in the U.K., then decided to return. There is more…opportunity here.”

  “Do you accept investments from Mr. Cho and his cronies?”

  He pressed a hand to his chest in mock indignation. “That would be illegal. The Chinese are rather strict about the source of funds.”

  “Right. I’m sure you’ve figured a way around that.”

  He didn’t confirm or deny.

  “So, what’s the angle? How do we get them?”

  “On the side—” he plucked at his shirt as if saying it was a costume, “—I am in procurement.” He actually said that with a straight face. “I acquire expensive things the bad men want.”

  Ah, a common thief on the side. “How?”

  “I steal them.”

  Feeling pretty proud of myself, I resisted showing any of my hand. Like I said, he wore danger like an intoxicating cologne.

  International crime folks had long speculated that famous stolen works of art disappeared into private collections in the Far East, but nobody had proven it…nor had admitted to it.

  “It is a place for the me
n to put their money where it will at least retain its value and most likely appreciate.”

  “But they can’t bring the pieces to market.”

  “You are thinking too small. You are thinking only of the public market.”

  “I see.” I shifted again—I couldn’t get comfortable. At some point, knowing his secrets would make me an accomplice. “So you place stolen goods in the mansions of the corrupt men, for lack of a better term?”

  He nodded.

  “Like what?”

  “Famous pieces.”

  As I feared. “So you know where…”

  “Everything is.”

  “Holy shit.” I settled back and let out a long breath. “You’re like a time bomb.”

  “Isn’t it great?” he said without a smile.

  “How does the game go down exactly?”

  “A man chooses his item. I am notified. I decide when and how, or even if I will steal it for him.” Sinjin gave me a look I couldn’t read. Was there a warning in there? “I am very good, but I am expensive.”

  “How are you paid?”

  “The gentleman in question must open a special account. It is for the purpose of a specific transaction. He makes arrangements to transfer the amount into the account.”

  “Are you a signatory on the account?”

  “I have access. Remember, this is not the United States. Banking is rarely as regulated in other countries as it is in yours.”

  “And we have the last economic recession to show for it. Oh, and the Savings and Loan debacle.” I don’t know what my point was—I was stalling for time as I thought.

  Romeo watched my face. Then he grinned and said to Sinjin, “Lucky’s hatching something. I can see it.”

  “Is this a good thing?” Sinjin asked my young accomplice.

  Romeo looked like a kid anticipating Christmas. “Well, it’s usually scary as hell, but it works out okay in the end.”

  Both men turned to look at me, waiting. Sinjin crossed his arms. Romeo practically drooled. And the three of us were going to wrest the Vegas of the Far East from the clutches of the Evil Empire all by ourselves.

  A plan started to take shape. I pushed myself higher in the seat. “If we want to get rid of the vermin, we have to exterminate them all, as you said. If the prize is large enough, we can lure them all in.”