Jackpot

40

Li Feng thought she knew Macau. She realized quickly that she held the naïve perspective of the pampered daughter of a wealthy family and an executive of a powerful company. Being driven around in a car and escorted by security was different from navigating in the shadows on her own. Still, she’d managed not only to find Billy Barnett, the film producer who had given Arrow Donaldson so much headache, but to follow him undetected.

She first found him by accident when she went looking for Kwok Lin, an old fool who imagined himself as some kind of movie industry strong man, but who also was known to hoard street gossip, especially related to out-of-towners and tourists. Luckily, she didn’t have to listen to him sing karaoke at the bar he’d adopted as his office. As she arrived, she saw an American leaving with a Chinese woman she recognized as a security assistant from Arrow Donaldson’s casino.

Suspecting this man was Billy Barnett, she followed him to be certain. Her suspicion was confirmed when he went from the karaoke bar to an office that turned out to be a film production office. When Billy Barnett left the office and went back to the casino, she had planned to approach him to ask for help. She stopped herself because of the security assistant from the casino. Why were they together? Maybe Billy Barnett wasn’t the right person to help protect her from Arrow after all. She needed more time to think.

With nowhere to sleep or shelter that night, she broke back into the secure bunker with the code the driver had given her, then left the security pad disabled so she could come and go as she pleased. The next morning, her course of action was decided. She would confront Sonny Ma on her own, and kill him instead of having others do it for her. Sneaking around in the shadows, hiding and trying to disguise herself, had reignited her dormant criminal instincts. She craved more. There was no way she could get to Sonny Ma on Arrow Donaldson’s turf, so she stayed in the shadows and watched for a moment of weakness she could exploit.