“Shut up, asshole,” Peter snarls in reply.
“Shhh,” Eva soothes. “That’s not helping. We need to stay calm. All of us.”
Time passes interminably slowly as the three of them wait. Eva’s eyes dart everywhere and nowhere. The fog plays tricks on her. She imagines sinister figures only to see them evaporate into harmless wisps as the light shifts.
There are so many questions, so many things left still unsaid with both of these men, all of which must remain unspoken until Ian is reunited with his father.
If he’s reunited with his father.
If we all survive past morning.
Eva hears their footsteps first. Three men emerge from the fog. The man in the middle she recognizes as the man who attacked her in Hong Kong Park. He carries a terrified-looking Ian in his arms. The other two men are Chinese, unknown to her. Both carry guns. Beside her, Peter and Alex stiffen.
“Hey, mate,” Alex says as he reaches for his son. “It’s okay. I’m here now. Everything’s gonna be okay.”
But the white man holds tight to the child. “Good of you to show up, Lombard,” he says congenially. “After all, you were supposed to be the collateral before you staged your ‘daring escape’ from the Golden Pheasant. We never would have had to go for young Blake here if you had just stayed put. Truth is, you all made this much more difficult than it had to be.”
“Let’s make it easy now then,” Peter says. “Here’s my wife’s camera. The card is still inside.”
“Give me my son,” Alex demands, stepping forward.
“What about copies?” the man demands, holding the little boy at arm’s length from his father.
“There are none.” Eva tries to keeps her gaze steady as the stranger’s eyes bore into hers. She desperately wants to look away. She’s never seen eyes so empty.
“Start walking. All of you,” the stranger commands. He gestures to a white panel van that had previously been obscured by the fog. Its back doors hang agape, revealing a shadowy interior promising only menace. “We’re going for a ride.”
Alex explodes. “No bloody way! Yes, there are copies! Copies that will be delivered to the authorities with instructions to investigate you in connection with our deaths!”
A soft laugh burbles from the man’s throat. It chills Eva to the core.
“I thought as much. Good to know who’s a liar and who speaks the truth. But no mind. I’ll be out of Hong Kong by the time your bodies are discovered. So let’s get a move on. I have a plane to catch.”
DIVIDE TO CONQUER
Peter Lombard,
Star Ferry Car Park, Kowloon
I am not dying here. This one burning thought consumes him.
I won’t let you die here either. Peter reaches for Eva’s hand, wanting to give her a squeeze of reassurance, but her attention is fixed on the sobbing child held in the stranger’s arms. Peter realizes he’s never seen her look so sad.
“It’s all right, mate,” Alex reassures his son. “I’m right here.”
“They’ve got nothing to do with us,” Eva implores the child’s captor. “He’s just a baby, for pity’s sake. Take the camera. Do what you want with us. But let this man and his son go.”
“It’s all about Alex, isn’t it, Eva?” Peter spits at her. “Has it always been about him? That why you were so hot to get back to Hong Kong?”
She wheels on him, her face white with fury. “That’s what you want to talk about now, you selfish prick? Your feelings are hurt? This whole stupid trip to Hong Kong was your idea in the first place!”
Ian starts to weep, a terrible hiccupping sound.
“I’ve had enough of this shit!” Peter yells at the top of his lungs. He throws his hands up in the air and strides rapidly away in the exact opposite direction of the panel van.
And in that instant, he remembers who it was who’d actually suggested Hong Kong when he’d been planning Paris. Derrick Cotter. Of course it was. Peter can see the moment it happened that night at the Holcombs’ dinner party, playing in his mind like a silent movie on a loop.
Will these be the last thoughts I have?
“Come back here!” orders the man holding Ian. “And shut up!” he yells at the boy. In response, Ian only sobs louder.
“Screw you!” Peter shouts as he stalks farther away. “My life may be over, but that doesn’t mean I have to make it easy for you!”
He keeps his pace steady and his back turned on the gunmen, knowing any second he’ll hear an unmistakable bang, followed by the feeling of the burning sear of a bullet in his back.
Instead, he hears rapid footsteps. His arms are seized in a manner identical to when he was beaten in the alley.
He struggles against the viselike grips, but he’s dragged to the van kicking and yelling. It’s only when one of the men trains his weapon on Eva that he finally gives in to their commands to shut up. But his calm is momentary. As soon as he’s shoved in the back of the van, he dives for Alex. “You motherfucker!” Peter shouts as he aims blows at his rival’s head.
Eva gathers up little Ian and shields him with her body. “Peter! Stop it!” she yells.
The two Chinese men pull Peter from the back of the van and roughly escort him to the front passenger seat. The white guy is at the wheel. He turns to Peter with a sickly smile. “Really, man, that’s how you want to go out? Whining over some bitch? Man up.”
One of the Chinese men pushes Peter into the front seat and squeezes in next to him. The other disappears from view. Peter hears the back doors of the van slam shut.
The driver turns the ignition. Starts to drive. Peter sneaks a glance at the gun held casually in his guard’s lap. The driver notices. “Don’t get any stupid ideas,” he admonishes. “You know, Lombard, sometimes it’s just better to accept—”
Thud! A slight dark-haired figure collides with the front end of the van and flies across the windshield. Tumbles to the ground where she lies ominously still.
“Holy shit!” Peter cries.
The driver brakes. Swears. Drums his fingers on the steering wheel for a moment and then reapplies pressure to the gas pedal.
“You can’t just leave her there!” Peter grabs for the wheel. The van swerves. He feels the pressure of the gun muzzle in his right side. He lifts his hands away from the wheel and raises them in surrender.
“You’re right actually,” the driver says softly, braking to a stop. “She might be a witness. If she’s alive. If she’s dead, there’ll just be questions. Put her in the back with the others,” he orders his companion.
This man has zero regard for life. None. Peter’s stomach churns. He thinks of Eva’s face, how she recoiled from him when he went after Alex Blake. This can’t be how it ends.
Peter exhales as the barrel of the gun pulls away from his ribs. His guard climbs out and disappears from Peter’s view.
He hears a muffled shout.
“What’s happening?” the driver barks out the window. There’s no reply. “Get out of the van,” he orders Peter, who hesitates. “Now!” The driver pulls a gun and Peter obeys.
The dark-haired girl lies splayed facedown on the asphalt. But curiously, the Chinese man lies curled and inert right next to her. The driver gives him a nudge with the toe of his shoe, but he remains motionless. “What the hell?” he exclaims as he kneels to check his fallen man’s pulse.
The driver is rising up, an annoyed sneer on his face, when Peter sees John Bernake come up behind him and plunge a hypodermic needle into his neck.
As he does, the woman on the ground leaps to her feet: Stevie.
Apparently she’s perfectly fine.
THE PLAY
Jake Burrows, aka John Bernake,
Star Ferry Car Park, Kowloon
Jake drives the needle into the Target’s neck and depresses the plunger. The gunman flail
s and his weapon fires, the crack of the shot echoing hollowly.
“Fuck me!” Stevie yelps, clutching her right calf. It’s streaming blood.
The Target struggles to get off a second shot. Then the fentanyl hits, and he goes limp. Jake makes sure he’s out before taking possession of his gun.
Jake signals that Peter should stay put but isn’t sure he needed to bother. Lombard’s white as a ghost, his eyes fixed on the blood pouring down Stevie’s leg. He puts a hand on the van to steady himself.
Stevie, god love her, is hobbling over to the back of the van just like they planned, her would-be attacker’s gun firmly in hand. She took a car hit and a bullet and is still going. My own little Energizer Bunny.
Jake’s in position flanking her when Stevie flings open the back door of the van. But the gunshot that winged Stevie also killed any element of surprise.
Their remaining Target may be outnumbered and outgunned, but he has the mouth of his weapon pressed firmly against Ian’s pulsing temple. Alex and Eva flank this grim tableau, matching looks of horror on their faces. The little boy is frozen in terror.
Oh shit.
“There’s no upside to that move,” Jake assures the gunman softly. “Hurt the boy and we have no reason to let you take another step. But if you get out of the van and give us the boy, we’ll let you go.” The man drags the boy toward the doors, gun still in place against the tender skin of his temple. As the gunman reaches the lip of the cargo space, he peers out cautiously, eyes darting.
“If you’re looking for your colleagues, I’m afraid they’re out cold. Take your chance, friend. Give us the boy and go while you still can.” Jake lowers his weapon and gestures that Stevie should do the same. The gunman thrusts Ian into Alex’s arms and leaps from the van.
Both Jake and Stevie raise their weapons. He backs away from them, his gun trained on Jake, his eyes searching, trying to make sense of the whereabouts of his accomplices. He never sees Peter Lombard coming. Lombard jams a needle in the Target’s neck with a conviction and precision that Jake can only admire. Damn. And first time out.
The Target crumples. Lombard looks like he might not be far behind.
It’s a miracle, but Stevie’s play worked. Fuck, that was close.
Nobody dead. That’s the real miracle.
Peter Lombard releases an amazed “Holy shit,” as if he’s parroting Jake’s thoughts.
“Nice work, partner,” Stevie praises, offering her fist to Jake for a bump.
“You too. Keep pressure on that,” he adds, looking at her bleeding leg.
“What now?” Eva asks in a shaky voice.
“We pile them into the back of the van. Lock it and take the keys. Then a call to your friend Yuan is in order, I think. So let’s get them locked and loaded and us out of here,” Jake says. “Before anyone else shows up.”
VICTORY
Stephanie Regaldo, aka Stevie Nichols,
Hong Kong
Stephanie can’t wait to file a report with the boss. That was effing amazing! Things got dicey for a minute there, sure, but Catherine is the first one to tell you that the unexpected is always to be expected. Stephanie feels tremendous pride in having been the major architect of the Victory at Star Ferry, as she’s named the adventure in her own mind. (She’s not yet sure about sharing that title in a report.)
Her assumptions behind the play were reasoned: at least three men, men who were likely expecting to be in full control of the situation, banking on fear about the boy to keep their victims’ toes to the line. Probably armed.
Therefore, Stephanie proposed, they needed to rely on their wits, including her assortment of essential and proven con artist techniques, the element of surprise, and whatever tools they could conceivably muster up in the few short hours before dawn. They had planned for multiple scenarios.
In the end they employed the revered “act crazy ploy” (building on the obvious antipathy between Peter Lombard and Alex Blake), as a means of utilizing the classic “divide and conquer maneuver.” A fortuitous use of the time-honored “car flop” sealed the deal.
It was Alex who knew of the twenty-four-hour drugstore where anything can be purchased for the right price, Jake who’d hastily refined Stephanie’s plan to make sure all of them were armed with loaded hypodermics as a precaution. Both Lombards played their roles well when it all ultimately came down, with Peter Lombard in particular rising to the occasion. Even Alex Blake handled himself admirably considering the stress the man was under. Good teamwork all around.
What happened with the kid (or what nearly happened, thank you Jesus, Mary, and Joseph), that is something to learn from. She’d hoped they wouldn’t bring him to the meet, after all. Made some of her calculations based on that hope.
And there’s the problem with relying on hope right there.
Something else to talk over with the boss. What could have been done differently? Were there things they missed along the way? Stephanie laughs a little at herself; she used to hate school and now she is such an eager pupil.
She takes a last look around the tiny apartment she’s shared with John Bernake these last few days. She’s going home with at least one souvenir, a throbbing bullet wound in her calf. She kind of likes it. It’s badass and makes her feel worldly.
Oh yes, darling, I get all my bullet wounds in Hong Kong.
WINGS
Eva Lombard,
Hong Kong Island
She’d lied to Peter, of course. But telling him the truth just seemed like too much damn trouble and trouble’s one thing Eva’s had quite enough of lately, thank you very much.
She and Peter are headed to the airport in just about an hour. She said she was taking a quick walk. He’d offered to come with her, but she’d shaken her head and watched the resentment flare in his eyes. The very air between them is thick with doubt and mistrust. Peter wants to talk, finally, but she’s just not ready.
So here she is, sneaking off to meet Alex at the aviary in Hong Kong Park.
Birdsong fills the air as a glorious variety of winged creatures flit from perch to perch, rendered captive by the netting that surrounds the entire complex. Bird feeders hang strategically, offering up a variety of treats: sunflower seeds amassed in one; fresh fruits skewered onto the carved wooden spikes of another.
Eva shudders, thinking about the last time she was in this park. She looks down at her bandaged hand. When she looks up, Alex’s shining gray eyes meet hers.
“So you’re off then?” he asks.
“Yes. Today. Alex, again, I’m so sorry….”
“Stop it, Eva Bean. All’s well. I’m going to take my kid to Surrey for a bit to see his grandparents just to be on the safe side, but Yuan tells me I don’t need to worry. Kind of afraid to ask exactly what she meant by that, so I didn’t.”
“She’s something, isn’t she?”
“She’s definitely grown on me.” Alex smiles at her, that same sweet smile that always made her weak in the knees. “But hey, I trust if I ever find myself on the run in London, I can count on you to return the favor?”
“You can count on me to return the favor wherever you are,” Eva says and means it. “I literally owe you my life.”
A pair of bright green parrots with navy and red feathered heads squawk and squabble as they quarrel over a suspended chunk of pineapple.
“Could have been different for us, you know. If you’d stayed.” His tone is wistful.
“Oh, Alex, don’t think I haven’t played that game.” Eva sighs.
She looks away from him, pretending interest in the flight of a snowy white bird with a scarlet head and perky yellow beak. Alex cups her chin in his hand and tilts her face back to look at his.
“Hey, Eva Bean. We are where we are. You had a scholarship waiting and a career planned in New York. I understood then and I understand now.”
“And yet I followed a man to London.” She says it bitterly.
Alex lifts her wounded hand to his lips and kisses that sweet little crescent of skin between her thumb and forefinger just above the bandage. A jolt runs through Eva. “Maybe just follow yourself for a bit,” he advises softly. “And if that brings you back to Hong Kong? Even better.”
“You’re kind of too good to be true.” Her eyes sting with tears.
“Oh, I doubt that,” he replies. “Let’s be realistic. We had a summer fling ten years ago. And then shared a life-or-death adventure. If it was just me with my usual late work nights, custody battles, and dirty socks, you’d see right away just how not good it is.”
He kisses her, lightly, sweetly, this time on the lips. “Stay in touch, Eva Bean. Don’t take a decade to come back next time.”
FLIGHT
Peter Lombard,
Hong Kong Island
He burns to ask, even though he’s sure he won’t like any answer she provides. He’s pretty sure he knows the answer already. Peter swallows the question and steals a glance at Eva’s profile. Her eyes are closed, her face upturned to receive the warm sunshine streaming in through the taxi’s streaky window.
They’re headed to the airport. They’ve spoken little since she returned from her walk. They agreed to trash their shredded clothes. Packed what was salvageable. Peter arranged recompense to the hotel for the damage to the room and reserved the taxi to the airport. That just seemed simplest, given that Eva was crystal clear she wanted to get out of Hong Kong as soon as possible.
Not that he’s longing to stay here himself. And what’s he going to do when he gets back to London? Go to the authorities? Confront Derrick Cotter? Confront Forrest? And say what exactly?
He longs to talk things over with Eva, but the gap between them seems monstrous and insurmountable.
The Empty Bed Page 21
