Lau wedged his girth into the hatch and followed, though at a much slower pace. A thick, musty odor hung below decks, but at least the air was cooler than above.
The hold of the ship was empty, save for a single wooden pallet in the center of the dark interior. A white hot beam of sunlight cut through the open hatch, illuminating the shipping pallet and its contents.
The square platform was loaded with clear plastic bundles, held together by black cargo straps. The Filipino man whipped a utility knife from his belt, and slit one of the straps. An avalanche of the plastic bags fell to the floor, landing in a pile next to Lau’s feet.
The pudgy man bent over and picked one up. He tore open the plastic, and held the object inside up to the light.
It was a plush toy.
Lau laughed. The stuffed animal in his hands looked like a small blue cat with wide, leering pink eyes. The design was based on a popular cartoon character, though this doll was a counterfeit. It was one of thousands, churned out by third world sweatshops across the globe.
“Look just like cartoon,” Lau said, turning it over in his hands.
“Aren’t you a little old to play with dolls?” The voice called out from the darkness. Footsteps echoed towards them. The wiry man turned, and held his knife up.
“Who there?” he shouted. “What you doing on my ship?”
A man stepped out of the shadows. He was tall, and his lean body moved towards them with the grace of a natural athlete. He was dressed in brown canvas pants and a navy linen shirt. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing tan, muscular forearms.
His face was bronzed and youthful, but the skin around his eyes crinkled with the telltale signs of crow’s feet. As he stepped into the beam of sunlight, his piercing green irises sparkled like emeralds. He did not blink, despite the intensity of the harsh light.
Lau, and others around Pattaya, knew him as Mark Waters, a farang with a shady past. Expat, smuggler… And to Lau, a partner in crime.
His real name was Thomas Caine.
“We were supposed to meet this afternoon, weren’t we Lau?” His voice echoed through the empty cargo hold.
A shadow of anger flitted across Lau’s face. Then he flashed a smile, and turned to the Filipino man.
“Ramil, this my partner. Mark Waters.”
The spindly man lowered the knife. “So you did come. What do you want?”
Caine’s eyes darted from Lau to the other man.
“I like to know who I’m doing business with. Your name is Ramil… Ramil Ocampo, right?”
The man known as Ramil smiled. “Yes, you have heard of me, no?”
Caine nodded. “I’ve heard of you all right. You did business with Sunil. Running counterfeit toys, like these.”
Ramil clapped his hands together, nodding. “Yes, yes, they are beautiful, just like real thing.”
Caine’s voice hardened. “Not exactly like the real thing. Sunil got stopped by the Royal Police with one of your shipments. Turns out half the dolls were filled with meth-amphetamine.” Caine’s eyes burned into Lau with an angry glare. “Ramil here made a side deal with the buyer Sunil didn’t even know. But that quantity of meth? He’s looking at the death penalty for sure.”
Caine grabbed the doll from Lau. He twisted the blue fabric in his hands, until the stuffed creature’s head tore off. White stuffing fluttered to the ground.
Ramil laughed. “What you talking about, these just dolls. Kids love them! I make in factory. No drugs, no problem!”
Caine held the stuffing up to his nose and sniffed. He dropped the toy to the ground, and examined the other plastic bundles strapped to the pallet.
Lau shook his head. “What wrong with you man? We here to make money! Why you always worried? You supposed to be tough guy!”
Caine looked back at him over his shoulder. “We’ll see how tough you feel facing a death sentence in Bwang Kwang prison. How long you think you’d last in there?”
Ramil stepped back away from them. “Come on Lau, you said we good, you said you make deal!”
Lau raised his hands and smiled. “Everything fine, we good. Let me talk to my man, okay?”
Ramil cursed in Filipino, then paced away from them.
Caine felt Lau’s hot breath on his shoulder as he kneeled down next to the cargo pallet. He rapped his knuckles on one of the mottled, wooden beams. The sound it made was plastic and insubstantial.
“You embarrass me, farang,” Lau hissed. “So what if he smuggle drugs? We make fortune here!”
Caine ignored him and pulled a small vial of liquid from his pocket. He uncapped the tiny glass vial, and spilled its contents onto the beam of wood.
“What the hell you doing?” his partner asked in a whisper. “What is that?”
The two men watched as the wood sizzled and bubbled. The area touched by the liquid dissolved into a thick gray paste.
Caine stood up. “Special type of acid. It only dissolves plastics and resins. This pallet isn’t real wood, is it Ramil?”
Ramil stopped pacing and shook his fist at Lau, a loud stream of Tagalog curses exploding from his mouth.
“Spare me the bullshit!” Caine snapped. “It’s cocaine. Mixed with some kind of glue or plastic. You poured it into a mold, and painted it to look like wood.”
“It look just like real thing… Royal Police never see the difference!” Ramil shouted in English. Then he turned back to Lau and continued cursing in his own tongue. The pudgy man’s face flushed red with anger and he screamed back a reply in rapid-fire Thai.
Caine grabbed Lau and slammed him against the side of the boat.
“What the fuck, Waters? You crazy?”
Caine twisted the fabric of Lau’s colorful shirt in his fists. “I told you before, Lau. No guns, no people, no drugs. Did you know?”
“He is the one with drugs! I your partner, why you no trust me?”
Caine’s eyes burned with inner fire, his lips twisted into a snarl. “Answer me! Did you know?”
Lau shook his head, his eyes wide with fear. “No, I swear, I not know!”
“You bunch of pussies!” Ramil shouted. “What the hell wrong with you? We all make big money here!”
Caine let go of Lau. He ran his fingers through his sweat soaked hair and exhaled.
“Not interested. Find someone else.”
Ramil shook his head. He sneered at Caine as Lau picked himself up and straightened his rumpled shirt.
“It just like they said. Lau the one with balls. Next time, I deal only with him!”
Caine tilted his head and glared at Ramil. “Just like who said?”
Before Ramil could answer, Caine’s cellphone rang.
He ignored it and stared into Ramil’s eyes. The Filipino rubbed his scalp, and turned away, muttering something unintelligible.
The phone kept ringing. He slipped it out his pocket and glanced at the screen.
The number was familiar.
Naiyana…
Before he could answer the call, the ringing stopped.
Caine turned to Lau. “You know my rules. So does your boss. This…” he pointed at the pile of stuffed animals stacked on the fake pallet. “This is not happening.”
He climbed the ladder to the upper deck, and slammed the hatch shut behind him.
“Luke gah-ree,” Lau muttered.
“You said this was no problem,” Ramil shouted. “What he mean, rules? He talk to your boss? What boss?”
Lau shot the man a dirty look. “Anna.”
Ramil sucked in a gasp of breath between his teeth. “He has the ear of the godmother… the Chao Mae?”
Lau looked up at the closed hatch. A bitter smile crossed puffy lips. He turned and spat on the floor.
“For now. But things change. Someday, I no longer need partner. Someday, I show Mark Waters who boss really is.”
Chapter Three
Caine pressed the phone to his ear. It rang and rang, but no one picked up. He raised a hand and whistled,
signaling one of the yellow and blue taxicabs that sped past the port entrance. The tiny van swerved out of traffic, and screeched to a halt in front of the gates to Bali Hai pier.
Caine climbed into the rear seat, glancing left and right at the crowd. His reading of Ramil told him the man was too spineless to try anything stupid, but it couldn’t hurt to keep an eye out.
The driver slid the door shut behind him, then hopped back into the driver's seat. “Sthan thi thi ca? Where to, mister?”
Caine ignored him, and listened as the phone continued to ring.
Naiyana… he hadn’t seen her since his encounter with the man known as Pisac. The Devil. The Burmese gangster was a high-ranking member of the Red Wa, a criminal organization operating on the northern Thai border. Naiyana was a bar girl. Pisac, along with his Russian Mafia contacts, had targeted her in a human trafficking operation: girls kidnapped to order, auctioned off on a fake dating website.
Naiyana was the closest thing Caine had to a friend. She was one of the few people he’d confided in since his betrayal at the hands of his CIA masters. When she was taken, he went after her. And in doing so, he unleashed the bloodshed that always seemed to follow in his wake. When it was over — when she was safe — she left Pattaya, and returned to her small town.
It was better that way, he told himself. Safer.
Safer for her to stay away from him. Safer for him to stay alone.
Suddenly, the phone picked up. Caine heard breathing. Without waiting, he spoke. “Naiyana! I thought you left town, I thought—”
“Not Naiyana!” The voice belonged to a young boy. He sounded like he was running, huffing for breath. “This is Taavi!”
Naiyana’s brother Taavi was a local pickpocket and street hustler. His antics had landed him on the local gangs’ shit list. Saving the fourteen-year-old boy from a beating was how Caine had met Naiyana in the first place.
“Taavi? What are you doing on this number?”
“Naiyana give me her phone before she leave. She tell me to call you if I get in trouble!”
“Let me guess… You’re in trouble?”
“Men are following me. First I think they just perverts, looking for ladyboy tail. I lost them on Walking Street, but now they back!”
“Taavi, where are you?”
“I hide in old building, the flop house behind Ruby’s, where the drug mules used to crash.”
“No, Taavi, listen to me. Stay on the street! You’re safer out in the open—”
“Too late!” The boy’s voice dropped to a hushed whisper. “They follow inside! I know hiding place upstairs. Hurry, please!”
There was a click, and the line went dead.
Caine looked up. The driver was staring at him in the rearview mirror. “Khuṇ phrxm? You ready to go now?”
“You know the backstreet that runs behind Ruby’s bar?”
The driver nodded.
“Then step on it.”
Caine knew something was wrong, even before he saw the crowds blocking the narrow backstreet. A plume of smoke, rising from a decrepit abandoned building, was visible for miles. The cab slowed to a crawl. The driver turned back to face him.
“Too many people, have to stop. You get out here.”
Caine shoved a wad of crumpled baht notes into the driver’s outstretched hand. “Keep the change,” he muttered as he threw open the door and slid off the seat.
He pushed his way through the throng of sweating bodies, as a wave of intense heat rippled from the end of the alley. Caine heard people gasping, and the crackling sound of burning wood.
Finally, he made his way to the end of the cramped, narrow street and stood facing the rear of the abandoned hovel. Somewhere inside, Taavi was hiding.
The building was on fire.
Flickering tongues of orange flame crept up the warped frames of the structure’s windows. Thick black smoke hung over the alley, trapping the heat in a cloud of dry, stinging air. The smoke stank of burning rubber and gasoline.
Napalm, Caine thought. This fire was no accident. This is arson.
He froze for a moment, his eyes darting around the crowd. They were locals, mostly… bar girls on their way to work, street vendors pushing their carts towards the walking street. It was still too early for the tourists to have crawled from their cozy air-conditioned hotel rooms.
Caine grabbed the arm of a young woman staring up at the blaze. “Where are the police? The fire department? Is anyone coming?”
The woman narrowed her eyes and jerked away her arm. “He! Tea mux xxk pi, farang!”
Caine let go, and held up his hands. He took a step back. “I’m sorry. My friend is inside.”
The woman looked him up and down, then shook her head. “Your friend is drug dealer?”
She gestured towards the building. “Police no come. Gangs live in there. No one care about this place.”
As she hurried away from him, Caine ran his hands through his hair, wiping away beads of sweat from his forehead. Something about her tone, her nervous glance as she walked away, made the meaning of her words clear. After years of hiding in Pattaya, Caine knew how the system worked.
Money changed hands. The police, the fire department… they were paid to stay away. They’re going to let this place burn to the ground.
With Taavi inside.
Caine remembered the last time he had seen Naiyana. The look of concern in her eyes. Her kind voice, and soothing words.
You good man. Good friend to me…
Now, Taavi was back. Strange men chasing him, arson… It all felt wrong. It felt like a trap. The hairs on the back of his neck bristled in the super-heated air surrounding the blaze.
Suddenly, one of the rear windows exploded, sending shards of glowing glass into the alley. The crowd gasped again, and shuffled back as a column of flame leapt from the opening and crawled up the exterior wall.
Trap or not, Naiyana’s brother is inside…
Caine scanned the crowd again. He spotted a rotund man in a sweat-stained shirt pushing a metal cart loaded with sliced fruit and bottled drinks. He cut through the alley, heading to the walking street, where hordes of tourists would soon gather.
Caine darted through the crowd, moving towards the cart at a quick jog. “Water! Hey, do you have water?”
The man stopped and smiled. He fished into the ice, pulled out a clear plastic bottle, and wiped off the droplets of moisture with a dirty white rag.
“Chi na,” the man chanted. “Water, yes. Five baht.”
Caine grabbed the bottle and tore the rag from the vendor’s hands. “Sorry, no time!”
He gave the man a shove, sending him reeling backwards. Then he pushed back through the crowd, fighting his way towards the blaze. He doused the cloth with water, and tied it over his mouth like a bandana.
He charged up to the building and kicked open the door, sending a shower of glowing ash into the air. He took a deep breath through the cool damp cloth, and closed his eyes for a second.
Then he plunged into the inferno.
Chapter Four
“Taavi!” Caine’s voice was hoarse and ragged. The air inside the burning structure hit him like a blast from a furnace. The heat battered him, sapping his strength as smoke and soot swirled around him. Combined with the rippling waves of super-heated air, the haze cut his visibility down to a few feet.
He coughed and stumbled forward, taking shallow breaths through the soaked cloth.
The fire was growing in intensity. The flames would soon devour the old, rickety building. He had to find Taavi and get out before the blaze consumed them both.
“Taavi!” he shouted again. There was no response.
He pushed his way forward. The fire singed his shirt and pants. He ignored the flame’s burning kiss against his exposed skin.
Deeper in the building, a section of the roof collapsed. Caine saw a flash of sparks as the charred debris crumbled to the ground. A breeze wafted through the room. It cleared the smoke for a few second
s, but the fresh oxygen fueled the fire. The flames surrounding him raged higher.
He found himself standing in front of a narrow staircase that led up to the second floor. He grabbed the railing parallel to the stairs. The flesh on his palms sizzled, and the stench of charred skin assaulted his nostrils. He cried out, and yanked his hand away. The metal railing was almost red hot. He felt a delayed reaction, a throbbing lance of pain coursing through the nerves of his hand.
“Mr. Waters!” The voice was faint, distant. At first, Caine thought he was imagining things, that the heat and smoke were playing tricks with his mind. Then he heard it again.
“Mr. Waters, up here!”
He gritted his teeth and climbed the stairs. A swirling vortex of heat and flame consumed the second floor. As he approached the middle of the staircase, the wood gave way with a splintering crack. A cloud of glowing embers flew into his face as the stairs collapsed beneath him.
Caine grabbed at the railing mounted to the wall. Again he roared in pain as the heated metal seared into his flesh, but he forced himself to hold tight. The stairs collapsed into a smoking pile of rubble, and his feet dangled inches above the flames.
His hands, now numb and tingling from multiple burns, grasped the railing in a white knuckled grip. He shifted his weight, pulling himself up the metal bar, moving hand over hand until his flailing feet finally reached the landing on the next floor.
He pulled himself onto the solid platform, gasping for breath in the smoky air.
“Taavi," he called out. “Where are you?”
“End of hall… I can not open door!
Caine waded through the acrid smoke, moving towards the sound of the boy's voice. He darted down a hallway, as curtains of hungry flame devoured the walls on either side of him. The narrow passage ended at a closed door. He pounded on it with his fist.
“Taavi?” he shouted.
“I’m in here,” the boy cried out. “I hide in closet, but now I can’t get out!”
Caine whipped off his bandana and wrapped it around the doorknob. The wet scrap of fabric sizzled as it made contact with the scalding metal. He turned the knob, and slowly opened the door. In a fire of this size, he knew an explosive backdraft was always possible if a sudden rush of oxygen entered the area.
Cold Kill Page 2
