The Girls He Adored

48

The office of the Sleep-Tite was empty, but Pender could hear voices in the back room. He rang the push-bell on the counter, and Wong bustled out.

“FBI, hunh?” He waggled his finger. “You no tell Wong truth.”

“Mr. Wong, why do I have the feeling that you speak English better than I do?”

“Ha ha, very funny, wha' c'I do fah you now, you wan' money back? I give you money back fah room.”

“Keep it-I need to speak with Mr. Ng.”

“Don' know, never heard.” But although Wong's eyes hadn't flickered, his body shifted almost imperceptibly toward the door he'd just come through.

“Big Nig, I believe you call him,” said Pender, strolling around the counter and heading for the back room.

“Not me, I don' call him that.” Wong hurried in front of Pender, not to block him but to precede him. Dropping in unexpectedly to Wong's nightly pai gow game was a good way to get yourself killed. “You bettah not either, you know what's good fah you.”

The door opened, Pender followed Wong inside. His first impression was one of disorientation, dislocation-it was not the sort of gathering Pender had expected to stumble upon in Dallas, Texas. He didn't know there were any Chinese in Dallas.

And the six Chinese gentlemen seated around the green baize poker table seemed equally surprised to see Pender materializing in the smoky haze. A seventh man, a mountainous, dark-skinned Afro-Asian in a jungle-print Hawaiian shirt, who'd been slouching on a stool in the back of the room, sprang up and was reaching behind him for his weapon when Wong gave him the chill-out sign, pushing down with his palms on an invisible table.

Pender waited in the doorway while Wong and Ng conferred, then Wong went back to his game while Ng followed Pender into the office, where Pender showed him Casey's mug shot.

Ng, who was nearly as tall and broad as Pender, shrugged. “Don't know him.”

Pender sighed. “Very good. I'll be sure to pass the word along to my numerous underworld contacts that Ng is a real stand-up guy. Now tell me everything you know about this murdering sack of shit before I open up a can of soup on you.”

Not exactly your textbook affective interview, but Pender's head was starting to throb again.

“Soup? What're you talking about, soup?”

“Alphabet soup. You know: FBI, ATF, DEA, IRS, INS…”

Ng weighed his options. It didn't take him long-the Fed seemed serious as a heart attack, and the murdering sack of shit was only a one-time casual acquaintance. “He said his name was Lee. He gave one of our gir-He gave a friend of mine a hard time. I kicked his ass. We had a drink, talked about martial arts. I don't remember much-it was like a year ago.”

“I already know you didn't kick his ass,” said Pender. “He kicked yours. Next thing you tell me that doesn't jibe with everything else I already know, you're going to find out how much trouble an FBI man with a hard-on can make for you.”

The roll of muscle above Ng's massive supraorbital ridge lowered in concentration. “I asked him how he whipped me. He said speed plus surprise equals power.”

“What else?”

“Said he coulda had a black belt only he wouldn't kiss the sensei 's ass.”

“Black belt where? In what?”

“Karate. Said he also wrestled in high school, boxed in Juvie.”

Juvie, thought Pender. Juvenile Hall. An institutional past-pure gold. “Where? Did he say where?”

“I don't… Wait, hold on,… Someplace in Oregon? Yeah, that's it-Oregon. I remember he said it like ‘Organ.’ a ranch. Said he learned a move there. He even pulled it on me, this move. We're sitting at the bar. He says, tell me when you're ready, I'm gonna bust a move on you and you won't be able to stop me, even if you know it's coming.

“So I'm looking right at him, no way somebody's gonna get to me, I'm ready for him. But sure 'nough, next thing I know- shoop!” Ng's hand, stiff as a trowel, shot toward Pender's throat, stopped just short of his Adam's apple.

Pender's head jerked back ineffectually-he understood that if Ng had meant to kill him, he'd be drowning in his own blood by now.

“He wouldn't tell me how he did it. Said this kid called Buckley taught him in Juvie.”

Oh-ho, thought Pender. “Buckley-would that be a first name or a last name?”

“Dunno. Only reason I remember, back in school I used to date a sistah named Chaniqua Buckley.”

It didn't matter, for Pender's purposes. Databases could be searched either way. First thing in the morning, he decided, he'd put a call in to Thom Davies, the database whiz. Then he remembered that tomorrow would be Sunday. Not that it made any difference-he'd just have to wake up early enough to catch Thom before he left for the golf course.