Chin lifts the two birds, one in each hand and carries them over to the wide-eyed girl.
“They look like magic. And they are so beeyoutiful. Will I be beautiful when I am big?”
“No, Queenie. You are already beautiful. I brought these to show you who you are. You are a crane. To Chinese people, they are the symbols of strength, long life, and beauty.”
“I want to be beautiful, I want to be strong.”
“Don’t you want to live a long life?”
“Can I be rich instead?”
Chin smiles. “Maybe. Maybe you will be both.”
“As long as I’m rich. That’s what Mommy says is important.”
***
For Queenie, this encounter with her father was the beginning of her fascination and enchantment with cranes. As she grew, she discovered the birds were more than pretty playthings. At eight, she started using feathers in clothing. Feathers started showing up on her tops, her dresses and jeans. When she was ten, she found out the feathers could be used as writing instruments.
The entrepreneurial young girl saw opportunity. She began selling clothing using feathers and specialty pens from her pets. This was not only a most profitable enterprise, she started to learn to leverage the power of others. She started farming out some of the work to her classmates, who were happy to make a few bucks. It was the kind of initiative that Chin had hoped might happen. How many twelve-year-olds make three hundred bucks a week, tax free?
Like her father, Queenie had incredible muscle speed and strength. While being a hammer-thrower was not something that pretty little girls did, rigorous martial arts training would ensure fantastic body toning.
She got a most unusual present for her fifteenth birthday: a trip to Japan with her father. It was a life-defining and life-turning two weeks. First she met her half-brother King. At eighteen, King was already a bit of a thug. Like her, he was incredibly strong. Unlike her, he was not afraid to show off his strength, especially if somebody got in his way. She saw that King’s obsession with snakes was even greater than hers with cranes—but with a difference. He used his “pets” as weapons and he advised her that she was stupid in not finding another use for her birds. The last thing about King that affected her was his discipline to stay away from drugs and his ability to find a way to make them profitable for him. This of course King learned from his father. Queenie on the other hand was leading a wild life. Most of her profits from her cranes went either up her nose or into her arms, but seeing King changed her completely. She gave up all drugs cold turkey. She and King began scheming to make money together.
The other thing that turned Queenie’s head inside out when she went to Japan was a trip to a snow-covered reserve in Hokkaido. There were perhaps thirty red-crowned cranes engaging in a mating dance, ballet-like in its beauty and execution. Pairs of cranes bowed to each other, jumped in the air, then floated back to earth. Lustrous, elegant winged creatures making their way through the atmosphere.
This sight too would transform Queenie. When she got back to America, she added four sandhill cranes to her collection of Japanese red-crowned cranes. While they are from completely different geographies and their plumage in not at all similar, both of them have a red patch of skin on top of their head.
She started going crazy over the birds. She dyed a patch of her skin red just like the cranes. She stepped up selling the feathered clothing, boas, and quills to the general public but also kept the best of the plumage for herself. Already an attention getter, her amazing use of feathers just added to her allure. She didn’t have to do any marketing at all. In the very elite circles she traveled, she became known as “the crane lady.”
And then she started to breed them. Considering the rents in New York and the space needed to keep each five-foot tall twenty-pound adult bird, twenty was actually a pretty high number of ‘pets’ to maintain.
While she stopped using drugs herself, she spent more time immersing herself in drug culture. After all, if this was going to be an area where she would make money, she needed to know her stuff. She also dropped out of high school after Grade 9. Because the most valuable lesson she learned was not taught in a classroom – Queenie learned to use men. She knew just how far she could push before she might really have to deliver. She also had no qualms about delivering if it meant she could get something of value.
And if guys didn’t feel like giving her what she wanted? She had a little ace up her sleeve – the dance she learned from watching the cranes on the frozen lake in Japan drove men wild. Suddenly, closed doors would open, tight fists would unclench.
For her eighteenth birthday, Chin gave Queenie two presents. One was a Ferrari. The second was a million dollars in cash. He told her that was the last money he would ever give her because he expected her to “multiply it like rabbits.”
For a few years she did. Not big big money but a deal here, a deal there. A guy here, a guy there. You know the story. By the time she was twenty-three, she had grown that million dollars into 3.5 and rising.
With a few years head start on Queenie, King had converted his eighteenth birthday present into almost seven million dollars, and he wanted to expand. He needed not only a financial partner but a strategic partner, and Queenie was a good fit.
King started small at first, learning the basics of the trade from Chin’s cronies. Find illiterate unskilled people desperate to leave China, Thailand or Laos that they would give up years of pay for the hope of someday getting a green card or permanent resident status. Ship them over as cheaply as possible, most of the time in a rat-infested tramp steamer. A few extra bucks could also be made by sneaking in a kilo or two of Southeast Asian heroin and selling it once it got to its destination.
After a couple of years, King and Queenie wanted to expand, to control more of their own destiny. That’s when the rift started widening between them and their father. King and Queenie asked their father for twenty million dollars. That would have been enough to buy a decent ship, maybe even two, a few helicopters, and enough officials to look the other way to make things easy.
Chin said no. He didn’t want them muscling in on his territory, he didn’t want them to have things handed to them on a silver platter, but most of all he really didn’t love them that much and figured he’d already done his fatherly duties. Besides, he wanted to use all his funds to build his own empire.
This setback didn’t stop King and Queenie and they vowed to forge their own path.
King was ready to handle the Asian side of things. He had been building contacts and could source the drugs, the “clients,” and the muscle to get them all to America at minimal cost.
Queenie was to run the North American operation. She would set up the illegals in jobs they couldn’t run from—which was about everybody because she’d hang the sword of deportation over the illegals’ heads. Queenie would collect her cut directly from their employers. She would also set up the distribution network for drugs. Recognizing this would take a few years to establish, she would network with reputable buyers.
That’s why Queenie is crazy worried.
She never dreamt for a moment that King wouldn’t be there. Now that he isn’t, she’s got to do everything on her own and make it up as she goes. Queenie had no alternate plans, no Plan 1A and definitely no Plan B.
That’s what makes her father’s suggestion appealing. Especially when the alternative is to whore herself to Alexei and his piss-vodka-stinking mob associates. She’d rather die.
How much less than three billion? Less. A lot less. But more than a million. Twenty-five million sounds good.
Now if she can only make it happen in a week.
CHAPTER THREE
“What are Olivia and Abby doing in New York?” asks Queenie.
“Running after a dream. Abby thinks she’s a jazz singer and Olivia thinks she’s a jazz pianist. They want to make it big in the only city that counts.”
Queenie smiles. “I know exactly what I’m going to do.”
“I’m sure you do.”
Click.
She punches a number into her cell phone.
There’s an almost immediate response. “Queenie, how good to hear from you. What’s happening with my favorite-piece-of-ass-that-I-still-have-yet-to-taste?”
“I need a favor, Benjamin.”
“Am I doing you or are you doing me?”
Queenie shakes her head and puts the cell phone away from her ear for a moment. Benjamin has been coming on to her since she was fifteen. Ten years later, he’s still the same uncouth horny bastard. “It will be mutually beneficial. I’m coming to discuss the details.”
“I like the sound of that.”
“Get your head out of the gutter, Benjamin.”
“You came on to me you know.”
“How?”
“By wanting to see me in person. Anything but sex we can do over the phone, and we can even try that if you like. One of these days you’re going to surprise me and say yes.”
That’s the same day hell freezes over. Queenie sighs. “One hour.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
I know. Click.
Queenie grimaces. There’s one problem with being young and foolish. Sometimes it just turns around and bites you in the ass. A few years ago when she was stoned out of her gourd, she made a sex video with a couple of hockey players from Russia.
It went viral and now everybody thinks they own a little piece of her tail.
That’s the problem with sex. She can use it to her advantage but most of the time people just want to use her.
I’ll show you.
CHAPTER FOUR
Talk about crowded. There’s a double bed, one table, two chairs, and a baby grand piano in this third floor New York studio apartment. $5000 per month is a lot of rent to pay for six hundred square feet, even in the Village, but then again, places that will allow a grand piano and singer to practice are not exactly common, even in arts-minded New York.
The rental agent Abby and Olivia hired was reluctant to take them on as clients when he found out they were musicians, so Olivia ponied up another fifteen hundred in cash as an incentive for the weasel. It took him three weeks of phone calls and nagging what seemed like every apartment manager in the city to find places that would even allow Abby and Olivia in through the door. There was something about the words “piano” and “singer” that were like poison to potential landlords, so when the metrosexual Asian agent found a “great place” for Abby and Olivia to look at, they dropped everything to go see it.
Ten minutes on the subway, another eight to walk there, two minutes on the elevator, five minutes to check it out and ten seconds to sign the deal. Another eight minutes to do a credit check, thirty seconds to hand the apartment manager a thousand bucks cash, and Abby and Olivia had a New York apartment just about all to themselves, save for a few hopefully tone deaf cockroaches.
“Those bandits. I should have been in the real estate business,” grumbles Olivia as she stands looking out the window onto the bustling New York street.
“My dear, you were in the real estate business, and you hated it,” reminds Abby. She is referring to the very brief period of time when Olivia and Noah were new lawyers in the real estate division of Golden Asia Properties.
“No, I hated working for my father, but ...” Better not speak ill of the dead, especially if you managed to reconcile just before he saved your life by sacrificing his.
“But you liked Noah?” teases Abby.
“Liked, as in past tense, is the operative word. How about you? I saw that rental agent looking at you.”
“Ugh. No Asian men,” says Abby as she starts cruising the net on her iPad.
“That’s discrimination,” chastises Olivia.
“Did you see him trying to show off his Rolex? As if that meant anything.”
“He found us a place. No one else even wanted to take us on as clients. That’s all that counts.”
Ignoring Olivia, Abby looks up from her iPad. “Hey, check out this new listing. ‘Established jazz lounge looking for female musicians to showcase on Monday night. No pay but great exposure.’”
“Oh wow. Let’s expose ourselves. That sounds sketchy. Why would they specify ‘female’? Maybe it’s a gender thing or maybe it’s some lech trying to trick girls with stars in their eyes into bed. I am so not into being a musical porn star. Pay me and play me. Ugh.”
“Or maybe there is some astute club owner or record executive that recognizes that women are a fast growing demographic that are under-represented. Don’t be so skeptical, Olivia.”
“It’s my nature to be skeptical. And another question, if this place is so ‘established’, then why do they need to advertise? And why isn’t there any pay?”
“It doesn’t have to pay, Olivia. This is New York. We’ve never made a cent here any time we’ve managed to get a gig anywhere.”
“Abby, something smells. No ‘established’ jazz club in New York advertises like this. You’ve got to play the ‘B’ circuit, the small places, before you can play the bigger places.”
“We have been paying our dues for years, Olivia. We’ve been playing all the dives, attic clubs, and after-hours jazz places. We’re on a first name basis with every bouncer in town ... At any rate, it doesn’t hurt to give a call.”
“Be my guest.”
“Why don’t you call? After all, you’re the lawyer.”
“I am officially an ex-lawyer.” Olivia grimaces as she dials the number.
“Hello. Café du Music,” answers a brusque male voice.
“Hi, I’m asking about being one of the female acts for showcasing.”
“Sure. What is it you do?”
“I play the piano and my girlfriend sings.”
“Girlfriend as in ...”
“No, nothing like that. Girlfriend as in two friends that just blew into town and want to make an impression.”
“Where you from?”
“Does it make a difference?”
“Listen, there are more than eight million people in New York City and every one of them is either a writer, actress or musician. I need to find an angle that I can promote.”
“We’re from Hong Kong. You want an angle? I’m Caucasian. My friend’s Chinese. East meets West. Yin meets Yang. Angle enough for you?”
There are a few moments of unbearable silence. “Can you come in three hours for an audition?”
“Audition for a job that doesn’t pay?”
“Hey, you called me.”
Abby grabs the phone from Olivia. “We’ll be there. Who should we ask for?”
“Queenie. You get five minutes to impress me.”
“Okay, we’ll be there.”
CLICK.
Olivia turns to Abby with disdain. “Café du Music? What kind of random made-up name is that?”
Abby shakes her head. “No. No. No. This is so totally fine. That’s the latest name of the old Café Jazz that’s been around for almost a hundred years. Same family of owners the whole time. They just open, then close. Open under a new name, run it for a while, then close again.”
“They close because they don’t pay their bills. Right?” says Olivia.
“At least they’re honest. They’re already telling us they’re not going to pay.”
***
Benjamin makes a call. “Queenie, next time you ask for a favor, I’m going to say ‘no.’ I had like ten thousand chicks wanting to come in, and I didn’t even have it posted for half an hour. Most of them weren’t even musicians. And they would do anything. Even over the phone.”
“Everyone wants to be a star. Thought you’d like that.”
“Very funny. But I got thirty acts for you to listen to. All with Asian combinations of some kind or another.”
“Anybody sound promising?”
“They all sound promising. Why else would I book them? At any rate, auditions start in half an hour.”
“See you in half an hour, Benjamin.”
/> CHAPTER FIVE
Abby’s right. Café du Music is one of those New York City jazz clubs that refuses to die. In its various incarnations over the decades, it’s survived recessions, wars, and changes in musical taste. It remains true to the original vision of Benjamin’s great grandfather Abraham when he opened “Le Chat Noir” back in the 1920’s. Café du Music is a place for acoustic jazz lovers. No electronic pianos, no synth drums, no computer-driven instruments. To play at Café du Music you have to be human and you have to be natural. Everyone who’s anyone in jazz loves playing here. Might be a visiting musician from Japan, a prof from Julliard or a member of the touring Ellington tribute band ... the jazz at Café du Music is always bona fide authentic. When you get up on that time-honored stage, you’d better be ready to play because this is where jazz greats for almost a century have performed. It is Mecca for music.
With competition so fierce, you gotta be crazy to be a musician and you gotta be even crazier to own a jazz club in New York. Crazy, or smart. Benjamin’s great grandfather was both. He was crazy about music and smart enough to have bought the building that Café du Music is housed in during the Depression, when property was cheap like borscht. Of course, the various clubs that inhabited the space were under separate legal entities so that when not if they went broke, the prime asset—the building—was protected. This way, Abraham’s desire to keep jazz alive in New York remains fulfilled long after he’s gone. Great grandson Benjamin is no real jazz lover but the rents in the rest of the building are so profitable, he happily keeps the cycle of jazz clubs as that’s part of the deal of having the building.
That being said, Benjamin’s always trying to minimize his losses, hence his deal with Queenie.
Abby and Olivia walk in through the front doors to the lobby. It’s kind of discouraging as there are at least thirty other women milling around. Some are as young as thirteen, some are seniors. Some look like they’ve stepped out of Vogue Magazine, some look like they’ve stepped out of the food kitchen. All have the look of eagerness in their eye, that this may be their ticket to stardom.
The Noah Reid Series: Books 1-3: The Noah Reid Action Thriller Series Boxset Page 43
