Desert Jade

by C. J. Shane

  Jade watched Zhou as Maria looked at the book. He had so much grace and power. Jade found him fascinating. His moves were very elegant. She knew there was lethal power in those hands, and yet, he was so gentle with her nephews and nieces.

  Maria handed the book back to Jade and said quietly in her native tongue, "I know none of these people." She sighed, "Jade, mija, Carlos is with God. I feel it in my bones."

  Jade sighed sadly.

  “Time for you to live your life now,” Maria said comfortingly to Jade. "How about that one?" Maria gestured with her eyes toward Zhou. "El Chino is very handsome and good with the children. You like him?” Maria’s eyes twinkled. Jade blushed furiously and looked down at her hands. Maria laughed delightedly and said, "Remember, chica, you will always, always be a part of the Lopez family and El Chino will be, too, if you choose him to be yours."

  As they drove away from Maria's home an hour later, Jade said, "Hey, Zhou, you are really good with kids. You would be a good teacher of martial arts."

  "I think of this," Zhou agreed. “I am older now. It is maybe the time in my life to stop this work and teach others." He didn't have all the words to tell her how tired he was, how he longed for another life. He had been traveling for years. He frequently had been in dangerous situations, and his life had been threatened more than he cared to remember. He had no permanent home, not since he and Siu Lin were finished. The work was taking more out of him physically. He was thinking now of a home, a wife, children, and passing on his skills.

  “And just how old are you?”

  “I am thirty-five on my next birthday.”

  “Oh, you are such an old man,” Jade teased him.

  Zhou smiled. He had been told that Americans had a reputation for joking and teasing. He enjoyed Jade’s frequent teasing.

  They fell silent for a while.

  Zhou suddenly said, “Jade, show me the building where Carlos planned to create the after-school center for the children.”

  “Okay, but it’s not much to see now. They turned it into an auto body shop to repair and repaint damaged cars.” She directed him to the area south of downtown Tucson. Ten minutes later, they pulled up to the auto body shop.

  “What about the storage units next door?” He gestured to a commercial outfit with several rows of metal storage containers. The majority were about fifteen feet wide and ten feet tall. The front of each unit was a metal door that slid up to open and that could be locked when down.

  “Letty checked all that out after Carlos disappeared. She said no one working there had talked to Carlos. She said she talked to the owner, who is also the manager, and to a maintenance man on duty.”

  “Did she ask about any Chinese people?”

  “We didn’t know about the Chinese back then. Letty didn’t know to ask.”

  Zhou got out of the car and walked toward the storage units. Jade followed.

  In the open space between two of the long rows of metal storage units, they could see an older man with a broom sweeping the concrete drive.

  “Hello,” Zhou said to the man.

  “Hello,” the old man answered in heavily-accented English.

  “I am investigating the disappearance of the man who rented the building next door about one year ago.” Zhou gestured to the building.

  “I sorry. No speak English good.”

  Jade stepped up to translate between English and Spanish.

  They exchanged names and handshakes. The old man was known as Jesús Sánchez. Jade referred to him as Señor Sánchez after that.

  Zhou continued. “Did you work here one year ago?”

  “No, I went to my sister’s home in Hermosillo for about two months in the winter. When I returned, there was no job for me. I did other work, but then in May, the owner lost his new employee, and he hired me again.”

  “Did you know Carlos Lopez?”

  “Ah, yes. Carlos is a very friendly man. I have not seen him for a long time.”

  “I am his wife. He disappeared about one year ago,” Jade explained.

  No need to translate. Zhou could hear the sadness in her voice and the shocked and sad expression in the old man’s face.

  “Señor Sánchez, we hope to find Carlos. We have only one possible clue now,” Zhou looked directly into the eyes of the old man. “Did you see any Chinese people visiting Carlos?”

  “No, not visiting. But there was a group of them, maybe ten or twelve men. They rented a big storage unit here. The biggest unit. Then they rented a second unit. But they moved everything before I left for Mexico to visit my sister.”

  “Do you know where they went?” Zhou felt that tingle in his spine that came when he was making progress on a case.

  “They gave me a big tip of money which made me very happy. I asked where they were going, and I asked if they could use me to work at the new location. They said they were moving to a bigger place, a warehouse in northwest Tucson near a dog rescue organization. They said maybe they would hire me later. They also were friendly. But their Spanish…not so good.”

  Zhou nodded. He looked again into Señor Sánchez’s eyes.

  “Thank you very much for the help.”

  Señor Sánchez looked at Jade. “Can you find Carlos? He is a good man.”

  Jade smiled faintly. “Everyone seems to think he is dead.”

  Señor Sánchez crossed himself in the Catholic way. “If this is true, then may he go with God.”

  Jade was quiet on the drive back to her house. Suddenly she squealed delightedly.

  “Look!”

  “Shénme?” She had startled Zhou.

  Jade pointed to a lot on the corner filled with conifer trees. “Christmas trees! Let’s stop and buy one.”

  She had such a childlike look of happiness on her face. He pulled the car into the lot. For the next twenty minutes, Jade led him on the search for a Christmas tree. Finally they found one which Jade pronounced “perfect.” With the help of the vendor, they roped it to the roof of Jade’s little sedan.

  Off they went again. Half an hour later they were back at Jade's house.

  Before they exited the car, Jade turned to Zhou and said, “What does “shénme” mean?”

  Zhou smiled. “It is the same as ‘what?’ in English. If you don’t understand something, you ask ‘what?’ I did not understand when you said, ‘Look!’”

  “Ah,” said Jade. “Maybe you can teach me some Chinese.”

  The words “pillow talk” popped into Zhou’s head. He smiled and said, “With pleasure.”

  They unloaded the tree and placed it in a bucket of water on Jade’s patio.

  “Later we’ll decorate this,” she said with satisfaction.

  “Now let’s look at your computer and find the warehouse next to the dog rescue place,” Zhou reminded her.

  The search didn’t take long at all, thanks to Google, Google Maps, and Google Earth. They found the dog rescue organization on Marigold Street in northwest Tucson but still east of the interstate highway. Using the Earth function, they were able to follow the view on the street in a 360-degree circle. A large building was under construction across the street from the dog rescue organization. Zhou could see more than one building that might be a warehouse.

  “Tomorrow we will go to visit this street and find the warehouse. Perhaps the triad gang is still renting it.” He paused. “Maybe I will go with Miss Letty. Too dangerous for you.”

  Jade sighed. “I’m not a precious little thing. I think it will be okay. You can take me with you. If we see any Chinese people, we’ll run the other way.”

  Zhou shook his head. She was precious as far as he was concerned. And it wasn’t so easy to run away from the triad gangsters.

  “Let’s eat now. I’m going to fix us some supper.” Jade left for the kitchen.

  Later after supper, Jade invited Zhou to go up on the roof with her.

  Zhou refused the offer of a beer but agreed to climb up on the roof. He understood immediately why she liked i
t there. It was quiet and they could see the stars beginning to appear in the night sky. He thought maybe the roof would be a good place to hide Jade if Chong Ma or one of his 49ers showed up.

  They were soon joined by Zorro and Don Diego, Jade’s cats. The four sat in silence for a while.

  "What do neighbors think of Jade and cats on roof?"

  "I doubt if they've ever noticed. From the street, it’s not that easy to see what’s going on up here."

  Good, Zhou thought. The gangsters would be less likely to see Jade if she were on the roof.

  More gentle silence rested between them.

  Finally, Zhou spoke again, "Tell me about the one called Ricardo."

  "You mean at Maria's house? Ricardo is Carlos's little brother. Carlos has three older sisters. They are Mercedes, Sylvia, and Maria. They are the mothers of most of those kids you were playing with. They are my nieces and nephews. Then came Carlos, then Ricardo, then Daniela, the baby. Daniela wasn't there today. She's seventeen, a very pretty girl and very sweet. She's with her boyfriend a lot."

  Jade paused for a moment, "Ricardo is, I guess, about twenty-two or twenty-three now. He really idolized Carlos. I don't know what he’s doing these days. I don’t know if he has a job. He's not in school. He seems to sort of drift around. That was him playing the guitar. Why do you ask about him?"

  As each person took the book of photos in their hands that afternoon, Zhou carefully watched their faces. There was no response from any of them until Ricardo took the book. He looked very uncomfortable and turned the pages as if there might be a scorpion under the next leaf.

  “I think Ricardo recognized someone in the book, maybe Bao or Chong Ma."

  Jade was shocked.

  "You see that he has a shirt with long sleeves buttoned.” Zhou continued.

  "Yes. Why is that important?"

  “Ricardo may be a drug addict. Maybe he hides needle marks on his arm. I want to talk to him.”

  They fell silent again.

  Finally Jade said, “Want to go decorate the Christmas tree?”

  “Yes. This is my first time to do this holiday task.”

  Jade laughed. “It’s not hard work. I’ll show you.”

  They descended and went directly to the garage. Zhou helped Jade bring in a stand for the tree and a box of decorations.

  As they worked, Jade explained the meaning of each ornament. There were the shining balls in different colors and a long string of electric lights. They started with the lights. What surprised him were the religious-themed ornaments. Wise Men. Angels. The Manger and the Baby Jesus. Shepherds. Sheep. Snowflakes. Tinsel. Zhou came to understand that religion was an important part of Christmas for Jade. He had learned when living in France that religion was more important in America than in many other countries. In China and in France, Christmas was a time to visit friends, eat, and exchange gifts. Not all Frenchmen went to Catholic Mass on a regular basis or at all. Most Chinese had no idea that Christmas had its origin in religious beliefs, or that many of the symbols were religious. In China, Christmas was an intensely-commercial holiday only recently adopted, mostly by urban Chinese.

  Zhou placed the angel on top of the tree and said casually, “Jade, your beautiful hair is a problem. Everyone can see you first."

  "Tell me about it," she said ruefully. "I've hated this hair since I was a kid." She pulled at the curls. "I mean, I like it okay...it's just that it attracts so much attention! It's kind of hard to blend into a crowd with this carrot top. When Seri and I were in China, everyone stared at me."

  "Carrot top," he repeated with a smile. Good words to describe her. He had not heard this phrase before now.

  “Perhaps it is time now to cover your head with a hat or scarf when we go out.”

  “I could cut my hair short and dye it black,” Jade said agreeably. "I have got some of that black hair dye left over from Halloween. I was a witch at the Halloween party. My students loved my costume! I dyed my hair black. I could do it again."

  “Change hair to black!" Zhou was dismayed. "No!"

  "It's that wash-out kind of dye. It won't last. I have some purple dye, too.”

  “Purple hair!” Zhou laughed.

  They fell into a companionable silence again.

  “Tell me about your wife…I mean your ex-wife.”

  "Chen Siu Lin is an administrator in a big business. Initially, she found me interesting and exciting. She thought my job was romantic. The idea of fighting crime and of traveling around the world was very romantic to her. She wanted to live in the West. She discovered later that her husband’s investigator job is not so romantic. My work is hard work and dangerous, and it does not pay well. She came to be unhappy. She became very disappointed with me. She thought I had little ambition. No desire to be wealthy. She wanted a divorce so I gave it to her. No gun necessary,” Zhou grinned at Jade. “She married a rich entrepreneur soon after.”

  “I still think you dodged a bullet, Zhou.”

  “Thank you. I came to understand later that I married her because it was time to marry, not because I felt strong love. The next time I marry, I marry for love.”

  Jade beamed and nodded.

  They were almost finished now.

  “Tomorrow we talk to Miss Letty and tell her what we have learned,” Zhou said.

  “Yes, let’s invite Letty here and we’ll tell her everything. I bet she has some things to tell us, too.”

  As with the previous night, Zhou slept on the living room couch, and Jade went to her room.

  Chapter 14

  Monday morning. Letty hadn’t slept well because of worrying about everything she’d learned from her Tío Miguel at the café in Nogales, Sonora. She forced herself to leave her warm bed and quickly dress. She tiptoed past Will’s room where he was sleeping peacefully. Millie went out the back door, and Letty quietly made herself a cup of coffee. Sitting at the kitchen table, she reviewed her next steps. She wanted to talk to Zhou, of course, and tell him what she’d learned in Nogales about the Chinese activities there and on the O’odham reservation.

  She also wanted to talk to Marv Iverson. Even though he was retired, he liked knowing what was going on, and Letty considered his insights and contacts invaluable. She and Zhou must bring federal law enforcement into this now, and she wanted to know if Marv could recommend someone to contact first, preferably in the Border Patrol or ICE. Maybe Marv knew someone in ICE who could connect her to the Shadow Wolves. She wanted someone who would be sensitive to the fact that several innocent people could get hurt if the feds were too heavy-handed.

  Both ICE and the Border Patrol eventually had to answer to the Department of Homeland Security. That meant Sam Lambert, who worked for Homeland Security, could and would take control of this investigation if he found out about it first. If Letty could avoid dealing with Sam Lambert, she would. He wasn’t that knowledgeable about local affairs, he wasn’t directly involved in what was going on day-by-day on the border, plus he had told her to stay out of this. Handing the investigation over to Lambert seemed to Letty like jumping to the top when she preferred to start at the ground level. She figured that Border Patrol and ICE agents who were out in the desert every day, boots on the ground, would be the best people to bring into this dicey situation. Letty didn’t want to antagonize Lambert because she considered him unpredictable. Avoidance was the best route. Letty knew, too, that her real problem was with Lambert’s arrogant attitude. He could screw everything up.

  Beyond the overriding concern for the safety of her two brothers, Letty’s attention now was on the location and status of the two missing young women. She thought it quite likely that the gangsters had hidden the kidnapped Hong Kong official’s daughter as well as the peasant migrant Esperanza whom Eduardo so wanted to find. Her gut feeling was that if she could find where the Chinese were headquartered and figure out what they were up to, she might very well find the two girls. Lambert would not prioritize them or her brothers’ safety. He would simply be looking to b
ring down the triad gangsters’ smuggling operations and enhance his own reputation in the process. If innocents got caught in the crossfire, it would be of secondary concern to him.

  Then there was José Gomez, the nephew of Sylvia Baird. Letty was fully aware of her responsibility to Mrs. Baird. She intended to give full attention to José’s arrest for the murder of Barbara Lyle. Again, her gut feeling was that there was a connection to the Chinese. She could think of no other reason that Gomez had blurted out his anger about those Chinese girls to Barbara Lyle’s son. She had to find what that connection might be. Letty would meet with the lawyer, Jessica Cameron, in just a couple of hours. She also wanted to talk to her Tucson detective pal, Adelita García.

  But first, something had been nagging at Letty since Friday. Her first call of the day was to her little sister, Elena. She wanted to make sure Elena was safe and that she stayed that way.

  “Hello, Elena. Did I wake you up?”

  “No, Letty. I’m going out now with some co-workers to collect samples in Sabino Creek.”

  “Samples of what?”

  “I’m not exactly sure. Our prof said he’d explain it to us in detail later. Something about the water quality of snowmelt flowing into the creek from Mt. Lemmon. Microbial life now may be different than at other times of the year.”

  “Sounds like fun.”

  Elena laughed. “Hey, I’m glad you called. I have some great news!”

  “Good. What is it?”

  “My professor won a grant to take his lab assistants and students to attend a conference in Washington, D.C. We’re leaving Wednesday for a week. I’m sorry I haven’t told you about this, but we just found out yesterday that we won the grant. We’ll go to the conference and do some sightseeing, too. They are paying for everything – our plane tickets and our hotel rooms, and even our meals.”

  Letty breathed a sigh of relief. Elena in Washington, D.C., out of the reach of Chinese gangsters was just about the best news she’d received in days.