by Pamela Clare
He was studying the map on his phone and kept his voice down as they passed through the crowded streets. “That last address should be up around the next corner.”
Whole dead ducks hung by their necks in windows. Pungent smells of meats and spices drifted out from the small grocery where she could see fresh fish displayed on ice.
It smelled of her childhood.
Not all bad memories.
Tanner put his hand on her back to guide her around the corner and she didn’t flinch this time. She’d fought off Pang after he’d cornered her late one night in the lab, and a soldier who’d caught her walking home alone when she was younger. An Amerasian was fair game. No one would come to her rescue. She’d used her defense skills both times, not touching their faces to give them proof to show to a superior that she’d attacked them for no reason. That would result in her receiving a beating.
No, she’d bruised their egos and family jewels with one strike.
As much as Pang wanted to hurt her back, he would never submit to having his genitals examined for proof of an attack, nor admit a woman had taken him down with one hit.
She still woke up at night fighting off phantom hands.
Not last night.
In only a few days, she’d become accustomed to Tanner’s hands.
No, that wasn’t it. She’d become accustomed to trusting his touch. She let Tanner leave his hand at her back and allowed herself this small pleasure of pretending to walk with someone who cared for her.
Now if she could only pretend she still carried hope that this next stop would be the one to give them a lead to Har. “Your friend could find no more doctors?”
Tanner stopped fiddling with his phone. “Four doctors fit your criteria of Korean and potentially other,” he said, referencing Orion Hunter as other. “There’s the place up ahead.”
The sign she’d been searching for came into view, but there was no indication this doctor was an Orion Hunter follower.
Jin wiped her damp palms on her pants. What would Tanner do if she did not find the doctor?
This had been the value she offered him.
In the routine manner of their earlier stops, Tanner paused so she could walk ahead and enter alone. He would step inside fifteen seconds later, because he clearly didn’t trust her to tell him the truth. But from what she’d gleaned, he only understood basic Korean words and phrases.
Inside the medical office, pansori music played at a low volume that suited the vocal and percussive melody. The building smelled very old, but most of this area had been rebuilt in 1938. This was the new Chinatown that had replaced the one torn down for Union Station.
A flat-faced woman with curly black-and-gray hair sat at a teak desk where she typed on a computer keyboard. She looked up when Jin walked in and waited with a placid look of interest.
Speaking in Korean, Jin asked, “Is the doctor here?”
The woman answered in the same native tongue. “He is busy.”
Jin was ready to admit defeat and walk away when her gaze wandered to the window, cloudy from age. Pieces of clear tape that had turned yellow with time had been left with bits of torn paper stuck beneath the adhesive. It looked as though someone had taped a flyer up then torn the paper away, except the tape had not been left in a square pattern anywhere.
When the image took shape in her mind, she realized she stared at an angular hourglass, the body of the star pattern for Orion.
Jin turned back to the woman and said in crisp Korean, “Tell him a Hunter requires his help.”
The woman paled and her fingers shook.
The assistant should be rushing to find the doctor, but she was paralyzed with fear.
Why? She had no reason to fear Jin.
But she might have reason to be terrified if the Orion Hunters had shown up last night with Har.
Jin just waited silently, hoping someone did not come tearing out of the back rooms with a weapon. If she acted the least bit afraid it would be a dead giveaway that something was wrong.
Tension mounted until she snapped out, “Find him. Now.”
“He … he is not here. Busy.”
She was clearly lying.
Jin leaned down, putting both hands on the desk to prop her weight. “You do not want me to report you.”
That was all it took for the woman to pick up a phone and punch numbers then say, “You have to come here, Dr. Wong.”
She had to repeat herself before a short, thin man emerged from the back. He had a stern face and eyes that criticized Jin for being difficult.
Or being Amerasian?
His gaze moved over to Tanner who was busy reading some pamphlet written in Chinese.
Turning pages in the wrong direction.
Dr. Wong said in biting Korean, “You would dare to talk in front of him?”
“Who?” Jin looked around as if she hadn’t noticed Tanner, then she swung back to the doctor and sharpened her tone. “Tourist? You waste my time discussing a round eye who is clueless about what we are saying?”
“How can you be sure?”
She sighed and spoke without turning around. “You watch the tourist to see if he shows any sign of understanding what I say.” She raised her voice, but kept speaking at the doctor in Korean. “Hey you, American man. Would you like to have sex with me tonight?”
Dr. Wong watched Tanner closely until he finally gave up.
Jin asked, “Convinced or will you waste more of my time?”
The doctor’s eyebrows drew tight at being chastised, but he nodded.
She crossed her arms to keep her hands from shaking. “I must know if you were able to cure Har’s illness. My Orion superiors back home want a report.”
Her words took a visible year off the doctor’s life from the wan look that came over him. His voice shook slightly as he answered in a whisper. “I know nothing about someone named Har.”
He was lying. This place was full of liars. She changed tactics. “If he did not come here last night, there must be another Orion doctor here. Who is it?”
With every question, the doctor became more agitated. “I know of no other here.”
Jin took an exaggerated deep breath and released it slowly to indicate how out of patience she was growing. The action actually helped calm her nerves. “I must also locate Orion Patty Smith. Do you have the network list?”
The little doctor’s eyes bulged behind his glasses. “What?”
Intimidating him was not working so she played on his emotions and prayed he had a conscience. “It is urgent that I locate her. Please.”
Sweat ran down his face. His voice went up an octave as if she squeezed his balls. “I’m sorry. I can not help you … now.”
His eyes pleaded with her to understand. Why had he said now with so much emphasis?
She kept her voice light. “I was exposed to Har last night and think I’m coming down with something. When are you available to see me?”
He swallowed and shook his head, then his eyes brightened with a thought. “Let me check.” He looked down at his assistant’s desk and slid an appointment book over where Jin could see it. She watched as he moved his finger to tomorrow’s date and stopped at a space for ten in the morning.
Clearing his throat, he said, “I’m afraid I have no openings before Monday. Can you come back at nine o’clock?”
But his finger was pressing so hard into the slot for 10:00 AM tomorrow that his fingernail was cutting the paper.
She nodded at him. “Pencil me in for—” She looked down pointedly at his finger. “—that slot. I will return then.”
He nodded, and his finger trembled when he moved it. “Thank you for understanding. There is only so much one man can do.”
It all sank in at once. This doctor feared for his life and his wife’s.
“May Orion Hunters watch over you,” Jin said, using a common signature at the end of communications, then thanked him and walked past Tanner without looking his way.
A
s she swung the door open, Tanner asked, “Ya’ll do that needle healing? Acupuncture …”
He caught up to her in ten steps. “Well?”
Jin considered all that had been said and shared only, “He says he knows nothing about Har.”
“That wasn’t an Orion Hunter doctor?” Tanner whispered.
She walked fast, her heart pounding with each step because she’d asked about her sister and the doctor agreed to tell her tomorrow at ten. Something Tanner did not need to know. “Dr. Wong is with the Hunters. He’s just afraid and lying.”
“That’s good news.” Tanner had his phone out, reading something.
She didn’t understand his reaction. “Why do you think so?”
“When I saw you staring at the window, it took a minute for me to realize the pattern of the tape meant something, right?”
“Yes.” She shielded her mouth with her hand when she said, “That is the hourglass shape that is part of the Orion star pattern.”
“Got it. I sent Dingo a text to let him know we might be in the right place. He’s been shadowing us. He slipped inside while you talked to the doctor and just texted me back. He said the patient rooms were empty and he put a tap on the phones.”
That could not be good for her. “What are you going to do?”
“If Har is still in the area, Dr. Wong will probably sit tight until he thinks it’s safe to go to him. The minute he does, we’ll catch him and the rest of this bunch. If not and Har is already gone, we’ll bring the doctor in and make him talk. He was sweatin’ as bad as a whore in church on Sunday. He knows something.”
She fought down the panic.
Dr. Wong would tell her nothing about Patty if he was arrested.
Chapter Thirty
Hot damn, this was going to go down faster than Tanner had anticipated.
He should have a text any minute now from Dingo, who was using his source here in Los Angeles to have the audio translated. Tanner had recorded Jin and the doctor’s conversation.
Call him suspicious all you want, but he’d been duped once already by this Orion group. Jin had been pretty tightlipped all the way to the café a block away from the doctor’s office, where Tanner had decided to wait on word that the doctor had left.
A tiny Asian waitress who had to be in her fifties took his order for a cola and Jin’s for hot tea. Lunch hour had this place hopping.
Once the waitress left, Tanner leaned on the forearm he’d propped on the table and kept his voice low. “Did the doctor say anything else? Like where we could find another Orion doctor?”
“No. He just said he was busy and I was taking up his valuable time.” Her gaze never caught up to his when she shared that.
Tanner’s instinct was screaming liar even if it was lying by omission. Didn’t she realize her deal with him hung by a thread right now?
His phone buzzed with an incoming text. He sat back and pulled it off the table to read the transcript of her dialogue with the doctor.
Son of a bitch.
Who the hell was Orion Patty Smith?
He shot a questioning look at Jin, who froze. Yep, you’re caught, darlin’. Patty Smith had to be her sister. Jin hadn’t mentioned asking about an Orion or that she’d agreed to come back to see the doctor.
You are so busted.
“What is wrong?” she asked.
He closed the text and placed his phone face down on the plastic tablecloth. “Why would you think something was wrong?”
“That look on your face.”
“You mean a look of disappointment?”
She said nothing. He rubbed his chin, considering how much to reveal then figured there was no point in hiding what he knew. “I’m sticking my neck out to keep you from being locked up, but your word is obviously not worth anything.”
Déjà vu all over again. Hadn’t letting Allie screw him over been enough?
“I have kept my word.”
“I don’t think so, Jin.”
“Suspicion always haunts a guilty mind.”
“Who’re you quoting?”
“Shakespeare.”
Ah, now he remembered. On the boat when she’d said, Hell is empty and all the devils are here, he’d recognized it, but between the fatigue and the pressure his brain hadn’t clicked. So his little Korean troublemaker had studied English literature. Damn, she just kept getting more interesting.
And more questionable with everything she held back.
“Well,” he said, “I’m not the one with the guilty mind here.” He leaned in again so that only she heard his words. “You asked that doctor about your sister and agreed to go back to see him again.”
Her cinnamon lips parted in shock. “I … uh …”
“Don’t make this worse by denying it.”
“I told you I was looking for my sister.”
“What about agreeing to come back to see him? You didn’t mention that to me. What’d you think would happen? I’m just going to let you go off on your own to hunt your sister?”
“No. I thought if he knew where my sister was that I would find her and you would find Pang and Har.”
“But you didn’t plan to tell me that you were going back to see the doctor, right?”
She was tapping her fingers on the table with angry strokes, but she stopped suddenly and speared him with fury that had clearly been building for a while. “I thought if you did not find Har tonight I would tell you I believed the doctor would share more tomorrow. I was afraid to tell you now because you would arrest the doctor and he would say nothing then.”
“Nice try. I don’t believe you.” Tanner sat back. “If he doesn’t lead us to anyone tonight, he is coming in first thing in the morning. He’ll talk.”
She curled her fingers into tight fists. “Please, do not do that. He will talk to me. I will find out much more than you can. I will tell you everything he says.”
“I guess you would, now that you know I can have anything you say translated.”
“I would have told you as soon as I found out where my sister is. Think about it. I need you to take me to her.”
Tanner wanted to believe her. The worry in her voice was real, but her sister was her only priority, where Tanner’s was trying to protect this country. His phone hummed with a call.
He answered, “What’s up?”
Dingo rushed to share what he had. “The doctor made a call to someone who didn’t identify himself and spoke for less than thirty seconds. I had it translated. He said ‘Wait ten minutes, then the woman delivers the message I gave you and you come to treat my man.’ I’ve been watching and, right as I got that translation, they both just exited, moving in opposite directions. I’ll have to take the woman. The doctor is headed your way, same street but on the other side from you. He’s moving in a hurry.”
That meant neither he nor Dingo had backup. “Got it.”
He couldn’t leave Jin here, not when she could disappear in this place with little trouble. Plus, she could handle herself.
The waitress had just delivered their drinks and walked away as Tanner ended the call and stood up. He tossed plenty of cash on the table. “Let’s go.”
Jin stood. “Where?”
“Where I tell you to go.” He caught her up close to him. “Do not make a sound to alert anyone, because I don’t want to have to hurt you.”
“You insult me. I am not here to help the Orions. And you think too much of your skills if you believe you could physically harm me.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Once Tanner had them at the front door, he waited until he caught sight of the doctor. Wong hurried along the other side of the road, tossing nervous glances all around him.
Tanner told Jin, “Stay close. If you do anything or go anywhere I haven’t approved, I’ll put you and your sister away forever.”
That was cold, but he had to give her a threat that she’d believe and respect. If not, she’d risk her slender neck just to find information on her sister.
“I had begun to expect better from you.”
His conscience took a hit at the reminder of her words from when they’d first met. He was not the kind of man who would have left her mother with a child, but if allowing her to think that would support his threat and keep her close where he could protect her, then so be it.
She warned, “You must not harm the doctor.”
“Because he’s a Hunter,” Tanner said, dodging his way through clusters of a crowd, most of which reached his shoulder in height. He hung close to the wall to keep from standing out so much.
Jin kept pace with him and when they stopped at a street crossing, she waited until people were moving again to threaten, “If you cause the doctor to not tell me where my sister is—”
“Let me guess. Our deal is off.”
Shaking her head, she let out a disgusted sound. “I should say that, but no. Our deal will continue even though you have deceived me as well.”
“Didn’t like that translation trick, huh?”
She ignored his comment. “What I had intended to say was that the doctor is going to give me more information than the location of my sister.”
A stoplight up ahead changed and Dr. Wong had to wait on the traffic to pass.
Tanner slowed and slashed his gaze in her direction. “What kind of information? Like what role your sister is playing in all this?”
Jin’s gaze moved from Tanner to the doctor at the same moment Tanner checked his target. The doctor was turning to look around him.
“Shit.”
Jin launched herself upward into Tanner’s arms and kissed him.
He barely caught her, but the minute her lips hit his, he was wholly onboard. What a mouth. He could spend days getting to know these lips better. She had her arms wrapped around his neck and turned her head to the side, allowing him to deepen the kiss. That fresh scent from the hotel soap was doing crazy things to his brain.
Big John came alive and if she rubbed herself up and down his front one more time, Tanner was going to shove her up against the nearest wall and unleash all his pent up frustration on her.
She broke the kiss, huffing short breaths.
Tanner’s brain swung back around into gear. He kept an eye on Dr. Wong who stood patiently waiting for the light to change. Not much of a rule breaker, huh?
