“Blest be the tie that binds
Our hearts in Christian love;
The fellowship of kindred minds
Is like to that above.”
“Nothing connects. Who is doing the tying, and who is doing the binding? Anything out of the ordinary?” asked Chad.
Olivia offered, “What if there’s a different kind of connection other than the Christian one?”
“My father was mainly Taoist,” said Abby. “He would never even dream of using a Christian reference.”
“Chin, Tommy, Garret. What do they all have in common?” puzzled Noah. He tapped thoughtfully on his leg as he drove. “I got it. It’s Master Wu. Try Master Wu, Chad.”
Moments later, Chad replied. “Sorry. I tried every possible combination. What was his real name or full name?”
Noah sighed. “As long as I’ve known him, he was always Master Wu or Sifu.”
Noah glimpsed at the dashboard as the Range Rover pulled into Tommy’s driveway. The head of the dead crane seemed to stare at him, inviting him, questioning him... Noah’s eyes lit up. “The tie that binds is not a people; it’s a system, it’s the philosophy, it’s the school. What binds Garret, Tommy, Chin and Master Wu is the Tiger and Crane. Try Hung Gar.”
The Range Rover pulled into the circular driveway of Tommy’s home.
Chad typed in Hung Gar. The password worked! He shouted, “Bingo!” but there was no opportunity to celebrate.
Duke was patiently hiding in a closet in the adjacent room. Abby and Olivia were totally unaware that he slipped into the house with the huge intruder who had brought the animal parts.
Before Chad could utter a word, Duke grabbed him. He covered his mouth with his giant pudgy hand, muffling all sounds Chad tried to make. “God, it took you long enough to figure that out.” He entered a number into his cell. “The code is Hung Gar.”
In Chin’s theater room, Marco typed Hung Gar into the computer. “It worked!”
Chin gritted his teeth. “Of course. See what’s in the file.”
“That’s where we need some time.” Marco shook his head. “I got in, but it’s going to take a while to figure out what the hell is in here. There are over five thousand files with very little description.”
Stella sidled up to Chin and purred. “Since we have some time, why don’t I make it pass away a little more pleasantly?”
Chin emotionlessly lifted her up by the throat with one hand.
“You found nothing.”
“Because there was nothing to be found,” gurgled Stella as she floundered in the air.
“You wasted my time. If you had been monitoring my accounts properly, you would have known that.”
“I just assumed...”
“You assumed wrong. You also assumed that because you threw yourself at me like a nymphomaniac cat in heat that I would be swayed by something I can get from anyone, anywhere, male, female or animal.”
“No, no. You are the best. You are the best sex I’ve ever had,” spluttered Stella, trying desperately to say something to assuage Chin.
“Unfortunately, I cannot say the same about you. But, even if you were, I have no room for incompetent amateurs.”
Chin began squeezing. Stella battled for her life, kicking and clawing, but her efforts were futile as Chin stared blankly, watching her life ebb away. He tossed her still body aside.
He punched in Terry’s cell number and barked, “Bring me Garret!”
“Sorry, Chin, Terry ain’t available,” taunted Garret on the other end of the line. In his best Arnold Schwarzenegger voice, Garret growled, “Hasta la vista, baby.”
The phone went to a dial tone. Chin raged, “Bring me Olivia!”
When he arrived at Tommy’s home, Noah had barely put the luxury SUV into park when a group of thugs descended upon them. One opened the passenger door and yanked a kicking and screaming Olivia out. Another hood jammed a screwdriver into the door lock, making it impossible to open.
Three others readied arrows in the barrels of crossbows. When Noah opened his door, he was greeted by speeding arrows destined for his heart. He slammed the door shut. Good thing Tommy had bulletproof glass put in. The arrows splintered when they hit the window but this gave the bowmen enough time to rush to the SUV and jam arrows into the door locks, making it impossible for Noah and Abby to get out.
They helplessly watched Olivia get shoved into a black Mercedes.
Noah started pounding on the window when he saw Duke coming out the front door, carrying Chad by the throat. Standing in full view of Noah in front of the Range Rover, Duke lifted the struggling Chad with his left hand. He cocked his right arm and, with one super punch from the mass of two hundred and fifty pounds, he completely mashed Chad’s face, breaking through his skull. Reaching in through the bloody skull, he grabbed the cerebral arteries and yanked them out.
“Chad! Chad!” screamed Noah.
Duke tossed Chad’s bleeding corpse onto the front windshield of the Range Rover. Then the gangsters calmly poured gasoline over the vehicular prison. Duke lit a match and tossed it onto the car. The car ignited as the gangsters boarded the Mercedes and drove away.
“What are we going to do, Noah? It’s bulletproof glass. We can’t get out,” whimpered Abby frantically.
“I’ve got an idea and we have five seconds to find out if my theory is right. Hang tight, Abby.” Noah started the car and aimed it directly at the stone wall surrounding the property. He put the pedal to the metal, and the flaming vehicle crashed hard into the wall.
The impact of the crash scrunched the car, but what Noah hoped for happened. The doors sprung open. “Run!” yelled Noah.
He and Abby jumped out of the car and raced away. BOOM! The car exploded. The force threw the two to the ground. They crawled gingerly to Chad’s remains.
Noah kneeled over his deceased friend. “No, Chad. You can’t leave. It’s not right.”
Abby gently tapped his shoulder. “We’ve got to go, Noah.”
“I just need a minute, Abby,” lamented Noah.
“We don’t have the time, Noah.”
“But, even if we leave now,” Noah said, “I have no idea where to go. Olivia could be anywhere.”
“I think I can help with that answer,” called a familiar voice.
Noah and Abby looked up to see a disheveled, beaten, and bleeding Garret getting out of a black Mercedes.
“You’re one tough mother,” said Noah in admiration.
Even though his body was wracked in pain, Garret felt cocky because of the compliment from a fellow martial arts master. “You should have seen the other guy.” He took another two steps, but stumbled and collapsed. He began shivering.
Noah wrapped his body around the convulsing man. He called to Abby, “Are there any acupuncture needles here?”
“Of course. My father didn’t trust Western medicine, but why?”
“I need to stem his pain. If we use morphine, it will dull his senses and we need Garret to stay sharp.”
Chapter 40
Garret lay unconscious on the circular parking lot, resembling an oversized voodoo doll with a hundred needles stuck in the top of his head, his cheeks, his wrists, his stomach, his ankles and his toes. Noah hovered over the senior lawyer, constantly tapping the needles, moving from body part to body part.
Abby looked askance at Noah. “Do you know what you’re doing?”
Noah confidently replied, “When massaged, the needles create a kind of electric current in the body that allows it to heal faster. I’ve had Dr. Tang do this to me and Master Wu a thousand times.”
“That’s supposed to be reassuring?” gaped Abby. “I’ve watched a thousand hours of Lady Gaga, but I still can’t sing like her.”
Garret’s body started trembling and he bolted upright. “What the hell are you trying to do to me, Reid?” he croaked.
Noah gasped with relief. “You’re alive!”
“Isn’t that stating the blatantly obvious?” asked the irritate
d Garret as he started pulling the thin needles out of his body. “Let’s get Olivia. And, Reid, you put most of these damned things in the wrong place.”
“It was my first time,” admitted Noah.
“You don’t get points for losing your virginity. You could have killed me.”
“But you’re not in pain. Right?”
Garret glared at Noah. Are you stupid or something? “Next time, just give me a handful of Tylenol. Let’s go.”
“But where?” shot Noah. “They just grabbed her and took off.”
“You’d know if you joined us for dinner that first night. We’re going to the Tiger Palace in Macau.”
Garret jerked—he saw Chad’s body. “It never ends,” he said softly. Sensing Noah’s loss, he added, “And it won’t end unless we make it.”
Garret stood tall. “We will make them pay, Reid. All of them,” he said painfully but confidently.
Noah nodded and seethed, “I’m going to kill the bastard that did this to Chad. And if Chin hurts Olivia... I will make sure he pays, too.”
Garret looked at Noah―there had been a change. A toughness, a determination that wasn’t there just hours ago. Maybe Master Wu was right. “Let’s go.”
Abby led them to the ten-car garage. Noah’s eyes widened—every vehicle had a sticker price of over $100,000, especially the $2,000,000 Bugatti Veyron.
Garret saw Noah ogling the Italian vehicle. “Sorry, Noah. The Bugatti won’t fit the three of us.” He pointed to a Porsche Panamera Turbo. “Zero to sixty in four seconds.”
Noah tried to get into the driver’s seat, but Garret pushed him aside.
“I drive a sports car. I think I can get us there,” protested Noah.
Ever the lawyer, Garret presented a convincing argument. “Your bucket of bolts is hardly a performance vehicle. My other cars are a Lamborghini and a Ferrari. And I know how to get to the Tiger Palace Complex. And you are used to left-side driving in LA. We need someone who can drive a vehicle at two hundred miles an hour from the right side.”
Garret got into the driver’s seat, Noah rode shotgun and Abby climbed into the back.
Adrenaline energized everyone, and forgotten were deaths, beatings and attacks. As Garret started the car, he proclaimed, “Prepare yourselves, children. There’s a wild ride ahead.”
Chapter 41
Olivia, hands tied behind her back, was led by Duke into the theater room. She withheld the gasp in her throat when she spotted Stella’s corpse at her feet.
Chin strode up to her and shoved her into a chair. “The bold are free from fear. Are you afraid, Miss Southam?”
Olivia tried a brave front. “No.”
Chin grabbed Olivia’s hair and forced her to look at Stella’s body. “You recognize Miss Wei, do you not? She was momentarily useful, but then she disappointed me. Just as Tommy did. Now where is my money hidden?”
Chin slapped her so hard that Olivia almost toppled from her chair. Her cheek burning from the blow, Olivia forced out, “I don’t know anything. I just got back from New York. I have no idea what is going on with you, my father or Golden Asia.”
“Maybe that’s true; maybe it’s not. But your father will definitely know.”
Chin released his viselike grip on Olivia’s hair, then twirled a lock of it around his finger. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a throwing star and used its razor edge to cut the tress off. Chin noted her trembling and slid the star across Olivia’s neck, barely touching the skin. There was no blood, but there was now a thin scarlet line on her skin.
“You have no reason to fear... unless your father continues his refusal to cooperate. I did want to scare you, though, at the restaurant last night.”
“Killing my father would have accomplished nothing,” muttered Olivia.
“You’re right. Garret was not the target.” Chin stooped to face Olivia. Although her fear welled to a rapid boil, Olivia instinctively knew that control of her emotions was mandatory if she wanted to stay alive.
“You were. Not to kill you but to blind you in one eye. It would have been painful beyond comprehension as the arrow embedded itself close to your brain. But you would have lived. And Garret would do whatever I asked to make sure I didn’t do the other eye or any other part of your body.”
Olivia could no longer control herself. She shot out a kick with her leg, which affected Chin not a whit. She tried to leap up but Chin clamped her head down hard. “I like you. I enjoy a challenge.”
“Having me tied up like this is hardly a challenge. But you’ll get one when my father shows up,” hissed Olivia.
Chin’s arrogant eyes pitied her. “Your father has not been a challenge to me for many years. Not since fifteen years ago, when I arranged for a certain plane accident, which I believe you also witnessed.” Chin’s voice turned to ice. “After that, Garret was mine. Just as you will be.”
Chin slowly unbuttoned Olivia’s blouse. He took a martial arts star and ground one of the points dangerously close to her navel.
Olivia’s expression went blank. She wanted to scream again but realized that would only feed into Chin’s control of her. These kind of men fed off fear. She chanted inwardly. You will not win. I will not lose. You will not win. I will not lose.
Chad was not the only one who had trouble trying to figure what the heck the King of Kentucky was all about.
Super-geek Marco was equally stymied, until... “Yes!”
Chin spun his attention away from Olivia. “You’ve got it?”
Marco nodded vigorously. “I’ve gone through file after file after file. Most are dead ends or put there as a smokescreen to throw someone off track. The average hacker would never find those but I...”
Chin interrupted. “Just tell me.”
“Okay, okay. I have found half a dozen Swiss bank accounts. I’ve been breaking into those ever since I was in grade six. This will take me no time at all. Fifteen minutes tops.”
“Excellent.” Chin made a call. “Eliminate them all.”
Garret’s driving had two speeds—fast and faster. Noah and Abby gritted their teeth in excitement and fear.
“Mr. Southam?”
“Yes, Abby?”
“Who are you and my father, really?”
“We are two men who love their families, two men who made a mistake. We will do whatever is necessary to protect the living and avenge the dead. And, if we can’t, we will die trying because you and Olivia cannot live in the shadows the way your father and I did.
A monster of a pick-up truck, a Dodge Ram 3500, pulled alongside the Porsche on one side. Another of the seemingly ubiquitous black Mercedes zoomed in and flanked the other side, sandwiching the Porsche in the middle.
Garret said with uncompromising strength. “Hold on. Things are going to get nasty.”
That was an understatement. The Ram and Mercedes took turns sideswiping the Panamera. It was one hell of a rocky ride. Garret gripped the wheel tightly, refusing to allow the car to swerve out of control—the direction kept shifting abruptly as the assault on the vehicles escalated as they accelerated.
Garret sped up to one-forty miles per hour, but the opposition’s vehicles had no difficulty keeping pace.
The Ram and Mercedes converged on the Porsche’s sides, trying to squeeze it like an accordion. However, the Panamera was built like a tank; they had little to show for it other than burning rubber and flying sparks.
Suddenly, Garret slammed on the brakes, allowing the other cars to shoot ahead. He did a one-hundred-eighty degree turn. With a burst of speed and tires spinning furiously until smoke came out, he put German engineering to the test by hitting one hundred sixty miles per hour in under six seconds.
The other vehicles screeched to a halt, spun around and hurtled forward, but Garret had too much of a head start for them to make much headway.
The windows of the Mercedes opened up, and a marksman leaned out with a crossbow and arrow. It wasn’t the easiest target to hit at breakneck speed, and the
marksman shot and hit the Porsche’s window, shattering the glass.
The arrow grazed Noah’s ear. “Ow!” His ear started bleeding.
Pissed, Noah saw an arrow coming for Garret. He grabbed the steering wheel to steady himself and head butted the speeding missile out of harm’s way.
Even in the midst of war, Garret had to admire that move. “Did Master Wu teach you that?”
“I made it up two seconds ago,” called Noah, releasing his hold on the steering wheel.
The fractions-of-a-second loss allowed the Ram and Mercedes to catch up. With deadly aim, the Ram accelerated into the rear left side of the Porsche, destroying its equilibrium. The passenger side wheels lifted into the air, and it took every bit of driving prowess Garret had to make sure the car didn’t tip.
Noah dove out of the passenger side and hung onto the car door frame. The crazy move was enough to put enough weight on the passenger side so that the car righted.
“Did you just think of that, too?” yelled Garret.
“No, that came from watching Captain America movies,” quipped the smartass.
Now the Mercedes took its turn, inching ahead of the Porsche and trying to muscle its way to the front.
“Not on my watch, soldier.” Garret put the pedal to the metal and shoved the Mercedes out of the way. “Got you.”
It was a precarious, bone-chilling, thrilling ride powered by sheer adrenaline. Now at one-hundred-seventy-five miles an hour, Garret knew it was only a matter of time before either the Ram or the Mercedes would inflict a lethal blow.
Noah jumped into the back seat and opened the rear window. “Slam on the brakes when I count to three,” he ordered.
“You got to be kidding me,” Garret couldn’t believe what Noah would be thinking of next.
“Can you stop questioning me?” Noah asked. “Just do as I say. One. Two. Three.”
Garret obediently slammed on the brakes. Noah took out a throwing star and leaned out the window as the Ram screeched alongside. He propelled the metal star with full force and accuracy. It shattered the Ram’s window, and a following star hit the driver in the jugular.
The Noah Reid Action Thriller Series: Books 1-3 (plus special bonuses) Page 21
