The Risk Agent

12

6:20 A.M.

ZHABEI AND PUDONG DISTRICTS

SHANGHAI

The first pass amounted to a surveillance run. Knox drove with Grace directing him from behind while holding the GPS. He replayed Danner’s voice notes in his head and relayed them to Grace. Afterward, they killed an hour in Jing An Park awaiting the sunrise.

“I want you to keep this,” he said, passing her his copy of Danner’s hard drive. “Insurance. Also, we’re going to need a laptop. We need to study the contents of that drive A-SAP.”

She looked somewhat confused.

“As soon as possible,” he said.

“Is not a problem. Laptops are for sale on every block in Shanghai. And cheap.”

Knox laughed, and she followed, covering her mouth as if ashamed. Knox wanted to tell her to show her smile; he said nothing.

“Do you love her?” she asked.

He considered the question thoughtfully, and how to answer. “Do you know particle physics? You accelerate a proton or neutron and smash it and it gives off energy and breaks into smaller particles, which you then capture? That’s how I see love. I’ve experienced the breaking up thing, the energy. I’m still waiting for the capture.” He added, “Back at my place…it wasn’t what you think,” he said.

“You do not know what I think,” she said.

“We don’t control these things,” he said. “Do you understand? Some things control us.”

“I understand perfectly well.”

“What controls you?” he asked.

She snorted.

“The connection to Lu Hao’s family,” he speculated, having tried before.

She flashed him a penetrating look. “Lu Hao’s older brother is called Lu Jian.”

He waited her out.

“I was responsible for Lu Hao’s placement with Berthold.”

“You feel responsible. Tell me about Lu Jian.”

It was more than that. His comment drove her to silence. “I do not think so.”

“A romance.”

She didn’t deny it.

“Current or past?”

No answer.

“Or both,” he said. “That’s part of this for you.”

“There are family obligations.”

“Face.”

“What would you know of face?”

“My brother. I told you about him. Perception and reality are two very different things. Maybe I know more about face than you might expect.”

“I doubt it.”

“You’re hoping for a second chance,” he speculated. “You save the little brother, maybe you save the romance.”

She shot him a vicious look. But she didn’t deny it.

Not long after, the sky lightened and they returned to the scooter. Street traffic was sparse, though the corner bao shops teemed. The smell of charcoal and grilled pork filled the air.

The routes and destinations were more familiar to them now. Knox slowed the scooter as they neared the first location. Danner’s voice told him it was a childless couple in their forties. He pulled the scooter to the curb.

Grace jumped off the back and threw her helmet to him.

“You need to stay here!” she said in Mandarin, for the sake of the people passing on the sidewalk.

Knox did not want to make a scene. He knew any waiguoren-any American accent, no matter how good-would stand out. But he had no intention of standing by and leaving Grace alone.

He slipped off his helmet, pulled on a ball cap and hurried across the street chasing her.

“Foolish!” she said, refusing to look at him.

“The way we talked about,” he said. “The way I laid it out.”

Together, they hurried up the darkened exterior staircase to a second-floor balcony and around the corner to the second door from the street side of the apartment building. Knox put his back to the wall, out of sight of the door.

She knocked and a moment later the door came partially open.

“Wei?” a woman’s voice speaking Mandarin. Yes?

“I have the delivery you’ve been expecting,” Grace said.

The door swung open farther as the woman called out, “Laogong!” Husband.

The sound of shuffling slippers announced the husband’s arrival.

Grace threw open the door. Knox stepped through, shoving the unsuspecting man back. Grace shut the door. Knox drove the husband onto a stool that overturned as he fell, and Knox followed him to the floor on one knee. The room was sparsely decorated but well kept, with a tile floor and a low coffee table surrounded by wooden stools.

Knox spoke an angry, unforgiving Shanghainese. “I will tear your sack off your body, my friend, and give it to your wife as a souvenir.”

A plastic ID and lanyard landed on the floor next to Knox. Grace had tossed it to him, from a hook by the door.

“Steel inspector,” she said.

“The man who paid you-” Knox said.

His victim shook his head frantically shouting, “No good! No good!”

“We have come for him.”

“Bu xing!” The man backpedaled, trying to get Knox’s hand off his throat. Then: “I do not know!” Repeatedly. His face had gone the color of an old bruise; his eyes occupied a third of his face and were growing.

“You tell me now,” Knox said, reaching between the man’s legs, “or you piss blood for a week.”

The color in his face deepened.

“He paid you, my friend,” Knox said. “Do not lie to me!”

“I take the money! It is true. Each week, I take the money. For this I give favorable quality standard reports. May Buddha forgive me. I know nothing more than payment did not come this week. Nothing more, I tell you!”

“Enough!” Grace called out.

Knox released him and shot her a look that warned her not to interfere.

“And this week?” Knox asked the man. “Did you still give favorable report?”

The man flinched and recoiled as Knox lifted his hand toward him.

“I did not think so,” Knox said. He scooped up the man’s ID and pocketed it. “If you ever take so much as another fen for such a favor, your family will pay for generations.” Knox knew a threat to a man’s lineage was the most serious of all.

“I told you!” cried the wife. “I warned you nothing good came of such greed.” She, with both a new refrigerator and a dishwasher in her kitchen. Not even expats had dishwashers.

“Your phones,” Knox said to the man.

He glared back, puzzled.

“Both of your phones,” he said to the couple.

They produced them. Knox collected the SIM cards and crushed what remained.

He grabbed Grace by the arm and they backed out, pulling the door closed behind them.

“Walk calmly,” Knox said.

Grace was unfazed. Knox’s right hand was shaking.

“We might have handled that differently,” she said, accusingly.

“That’s how it’s going to be,” Knox said. “Exactly like that until we’re convinced the person’s telling the truth.”

“And if they know each other? If he should call ahead to warn the others?”

“That’s partly why I took the phones,” he said.

“I think you took the phones to look at who he calls, who he knows.”

Knox said nothing. She was too smart by half.

“But if he should call ahead,” she said, repeating herself, provoking him.

“What do you want me to say?”

She didn’t answer. Together, they climbed onto the scooter and drove off, Grace holding Knox around the waist. She read directions from the GPS while Knox recalled everything Danner had recorded as if it had been left for him personally.

They moved between districts and neighborhoods, honing their interrogation skills with each stop. Grace was forced into the fray twice, responding with a technical precision and efficiency to her movement and force. Together, they manhandled and subdued three more recipients of Lu Hao’s bribes, bringing the total to four, when they found themselves facing a cluster of impressive high-rise apartments overlooking the Huangpu River.

Danner’s voice notes had the floor and apartment numbers as well as comments about the lobby security.

Knox passed Grace a ball cap for the sake of security cameras.

“These buildings,” she said. “No expats. All Party officials, Chinese businessmen. Important people. Everyone in Shanghai knows this address.”

“Construction inspectors?”

“We do not know for certain, neh? Not until we find Lu Hao’s accounts.”

She pushed this on him, reminding him he had failed to secure the accounts. She couldn’t analyze what she hadn’t yet seen.

“Every kind of successful person lives in this compound,” she said. “Inspectors? Perhaps. Also city planners and regional supervisors. Architects. Engineers. Decision-makers.”

“It’s early yet,” Knox said. “Every reason to believe they will be at home.”

“Two are in the same tower,” she reminded him.

“Yes. The fifth floor and the twelfth.”

“Once we have visited the one, it is highly unlikely-not likely at all,” she emphasized, “that a second interview will be possible in the same building.”

Interview, he was thinking.

With each stop, Knox sunk into a darker place. He’d begun to enjoy the punishment he delivered, to transfer his anger over Danner’s situation into his fists. To look forward to the next stop. He’d failed to fully consider the conflict this building presented until he heard her voice it.

“That is a problem,” he said. “We can’t pick one over the other. People in power-the way you describe these people-these could be the people we’re looking for.”

“Yes. We must coordinate our efforts. Time this perfectly.”

“You’re suggesting we split up?” he said. She’d been complaining about his techniques.

“Is there a choice?”

He imagined her gloating. “There’s always a choice,” he said.

“Then I will take the fifth floor,” she said. “If they throw me out the window, it is shorter to fall.”

“You’re going to joke about this?”

“I am learning,” she said.

Knox laughed aloud.

“You understand-” he began.

Grace put her fingers to his lips, stopping him. “Much more than you can possibly convince yourself of.”

She removed her hand just as fast as she’d used it to silence him. There was no hidden meaning to be read into her touching him. There was nothing suggestive implied by it. Yet Knox felt his lips tingle well after her fingers were gone, reminded for the first time since the cocktail party of her femininity, and the power women wielded over him, intentionally or otherwise.

He said, “We have two choices for gaining entry-subterfuge or power.”

“You leave this to me,” she said. “We will go to the twelfth-floor apartment together. From there, I will leave you and take care of the fifth.”

They made it past two doormen in the lobby by Grace holding on to Knox’s arm and acting incredibly sexy. She turned it on so quickly it surprised him, which was her intention. She ran her hands all over him, while giggling and purring. She pulled his hand onto her backside and he held it there. The boys-for that’s all they were: boys in gray suits-couldn’t keep their eyes off her and weren’t about to interrupt such a woman with a waiguoren involved.

They rode the elevator to the twelfth floor with Grace continuing to act her part, well aware the security boys would be attempting to follow them using security video.

Grace gambled correctly that a maid-the ayi-would answer the door. Taking a cue from Danner’s voice note, she mentioned a teenage boy to the Chinese woman at the door, saying she had important information that could keep the family from embarrassment. The door came open.

Knox swept inside. Grace pulled the door shut, leaving Knox cupping the unsuspecting maid’s mouth as he dragged her to the telephone and pulled the phone off-hook, engaging the line and ensuring an outgoing call could not be made. The maid went limp, having passed out from fright. He left her on the floor and hurried down the hall. Grace stayed behind to tie her up.

The first bedroom belonged to a sleeping teenager who didn’t move-wouldn’t move. “Only child, male,” he recalled Danner saying. Next door was an empty guest room, and finally the master suite.

He moved for the bed, but was jumped from behind-a stupid mistake! he realized. He’d made too much noise with the ayi. A male with a knife, and he knew how to use it. Knox turned, but too slowly. The knife punched for him. Knox blocked the second lunge. He was a fat Chinese man in checkered pajamas, sweating from nerves in the glow of a green nightlight.

Knox wrestled the knife free and kicked it across the floor. The man kidney-punched him. Knox slumped, surprised by how much it hurt.

He recovered to block another attempt and then, with an opening, he kneed the man in the groin, and a fist to below the ribcage. The man sank to the floor. The wife came screaming out of bed carrying a sheet. She tripped on the sheet, exposing her nudity, tripped again and fell.

Knox, now in full control of the man, punished him with a flurry of fists.

“You have taken money on the Xuan Tower project,” Knox said in steady Mandarin. “Do you deny it?” He clenched the man by the throat.

“You are wrong!” the man wheezed.

Knox leaned his weight into the man’s throat.

The wife tried to hide herself with the sheet, failing miserably. She skidded back on her bottom toward the wall, sobbing.

“I seek information about the one delivering your money,” Knox said.

“Fuck you.”

Knox dragged him toward the French doors. “All men fall at the same speed,” Knox said, “as you are about to find out.”

“Husband!” the wife called out.

He heard Grace before he saw her. She was craning over the cowering woman.

“You keep your tongue in your hole, or I will tear it out,” Grace said. She moved across the room and opened the French doors for Knox.

Knox’s victim saw he was outnumbered, saw the doors swing open.

“Shi de!” he cried. Yes! “It is true. All true!”

Knox squatted and questioned him. Grace crossed the room to gag and tie up the wife. She then took off down the hall.

The man confessed to accepting the bribes in exchange for “harmony on the construction site,” but claimed to know nothing of Lu Hao’s disappearance or whereabouts.

Knox told him if he reported their visit, even to security within the building, it would result in news of the bribes going public.

By arrangement, Knox did not go to the fifth floor, just as Grace would not return to the twelfth. Instead, he left by a stairway door and returned to the scooter, awaiting her. She met him less than five minutes later, her face flushed and shining with perspiration.

“Anything?” he said.

“Nothing,” she said.

“One left.”

“Getting late.”

“Or early,” he said. “Yes. But worth a try. Is it okay with you?”

She looked surprised he would ask. “Yes. Okay.”

The final stop came with an ominous note from Danner: “Recent addition to route. Extremely narrow alley. Ground floor, second or third door. Choke point.”

No mention of an individual. No exact apartment. Of greater concern, and explaining Danner’s lack of specificity, was his categorizing it as a choke point-a funnel with limited access, making anyone who entered vulnerable.

“This one is not good,” Knox said at a stoplight as they followed the GPS track. “Not enough information. Danner didn’t like it.”

“Latest addition to Lu Hao’s stops,” she said, reminding him of Danner’s voice memo. “If we had an exact date this could help me with the Berthold financials.”

“If I ever get you Lu’s books.”

“We will get them.”

The Muslim neighborhood was small but heavily populated. Dress changed, as did the smells of the street food.

Once again, Knox studied the entrance to the narrow alley off Ping Wang Jie Road. Once again, from a distance. Danner’s description was accurate: a choke point.

“Let me walk it,” she said. “Alone.”

“No.”

“I will not stop, will not ask questions. Just a walk-through.” She handed him the GPS indicating the lane, which appeared on the virtual map as a shortcut between two parallel streets. “A waiguoren cannot do this, Knox.”

At that moment Knox spotted an expressionless man coming out of the alley and looking toward them. Civi guard took off, he recalled Danner saying. A lane guard, a Party employee assigned to a neighborhood as a security detail. Not police, but someone gaining experience ahead of the application process; typically, a person eager to prove himself. Knox knew Grace was right.

“Go,” he said. “I’ll meet you around the other side. But if I don’t see you in five, I’m coming in after you.”

“Please. I will be fine.”

She slid off the scooter, handed him her helmet and disappeared through the traffic.

Grace noticed the lane guard turning to follow her. She kept up a brisk but unhurried pace. She would not give him anything to feed on. Behind her, she heard the scooter head off.

The lane was nearly narrow enough to touch walls with her arms extended. Stucco walls raised three stories overhead, interrupted by rusted wrought-iron balconies. It felt cloistered; the air smelled stale. She passed a series of doorways on her right and then caught herself staring at a green motorcycle. It was the combination of the unusual deep green color and the basket on the back fender. She’d seen it in the lane outside the Sherpa’s apartment. The Mongolians had been watching him. That, in turn, meant they’d seen her and Knox enter the residence.

The guard followed down the lane behind her.

A choke point, she recalled.

She walked past the motorcycle, committing its tag to memory. Stole a glance toward the small window by the door to her right: curtained shut. Passing the next apartment, its door hung open. She absorbed the layout: a single room of perhaps nine square meters. In this case, limited furnishings-a pair of bamboo mats on the floor and some stacked aluminum bowls. A slightly larger window in the back wall.

The footfalls of the guard suggested he’d closed the distance with her, now only a few meters behind. She continued walking, neither fast nor slow, knowing that had it been Knox in this lane the guard would have confronted him.

Two doors down, she saw another open door. Despite what she’d told Knox, she stopped and called inside, in part as an act for the security man. A Muslim woman met her. Grace lowered her voice, taking a chance.

“Hello,” she said in Mandarin. “You are familiar with the northerner two doors down?”

The woman nodded. “A Mongolian. And not the only one!”

Grace nearly cried out with the confirmation.

“One of his friends owes me money,” Grace said.

The woman’s eyes hardened. “I would forgive the debt, cousin.”

“Do you see his friends often?”

Another slight nod. “Yes,” the resident said, in an even softer voice than Grace was using. Her voice brought chills up Grace’s arms.

“Do they live with him, these other men?”

“Down the lane,” the woman answered. “Two to a room.”

A choke point.

“How many?”

“Five, all told.”

That left three in good health. “The reason I ask,” Grace said, “is that I would rather not be seen by the one that owes me. He is not pleasant.”

“All rough men.”

“Yes,” Grace said. “Mongolians are rough.”

The woman did not contradict her. “In pairs,” she said. “Roommates. The leader lives by himself.”

“Leader?”

“They travel like a pack of dogs.”

“Yes.” Grace assembled the data, wondering how far to push it. “Two rooms,” she proposed.

The woman’s icy stare was difficult to read.

Grace sensed she’d overstayed her welcome. “You have been generous with me, dear lady.”

“Not at all,” the woman said.

Grace backed away. The woman stopped her.

“Again. My advice? Forgive the debt. Do not deal with these dogs. We-those of us in the lane-leave them to themselves.”

Grace nodded. “Peace be with you.”

“And you.”

The woman pushed the door shut.

The lane guard had lit a cigarette and sat himself down on a stool by a pair of potted plants and smoked. He’d been watching, but out of earshot.

Grace moved on, a moment later leaving the lane and entering onto a busy street. She walked a block before crossing and joining Knox on the scooter.

“Well?” Knox said.

“Drive,” she ordered. “I’ll tell you as we go.”

Knox pulled out into traffic and Grace wrapped her arms around him. She let go, jerked back and cried out softly.

“Knox! Knox!” Her left hand was smeared with his blood. She held it out to his side on display for him.

“I’ll be damned!” he said.

“You are bleeding.”

“I know that.”

“You did not tell me!” She shouted to be heard over the engine.

“Adrenaline,” he said, as if that explained anything.

“We go to your place at once.”

“We can’t,” he said. “Our visitors. Remember? In the lane? They know that location now. Eight-oh-eight is out. I cannot return. And we can’t go to your place either. You were compromised when we fought them. They followed you, possibly from the party, but you went back to your place.” She didn’t contradict him. “So they have your apartment. They have the guesthouse. They want us, or they wouldn’t have come after us like that. Neither of us is going home.”

She considered what he said for several long seconds. “I know a place,” she said. “We can go there and decide what to do later.”

“It can’t be a friend.”

“It’s a service apartment rental. But not with the best reputation.”

“But you know it, first hand?”

“I know it. I have stayed there.” She thought back to Lu Jian.

Service apartments, with kitchens and maid service, were used for long-term stays by traveling businessmen in lieu of more expensive hotel rooms.

“That could work,” he said.

“We must hurry,” she said, panic rising in her voice. “You are bleeding badly.”

He had her trigger now: the sight of blood. Everyone had one. His was abuse: the strong taking advantage of the weak. It left him sick.

“Honestly,” he said, leaning back to call out to her, “I didn’t even know it was there. I’m fine.”

“You are bleeding, John. Bleeding badly. Pull over. I will make a call. Then I drive.”

She’d called him by his given name for the first time. He smiled through an unexpected wince of pain as she held to him tightly while he pulled the scooter to the side of the road.

8:00 A.M.

JING AN TEMPLE

JING AN DISTRICT

SHANGHAI

Melschoi paid a sorry-looking vendor seven yuan for a bundle of incense, cursing the amount under his breath, and entered the dimly lit temple. The cross-legged, gold-leafed Buddha rose thirty feet high, surrounded at the knees by pomelo fruit and fresh flowers. The fragrant smoke hung heavily in the air, wrapping the idol’s shoulders like a scarf.

Melschoi was not there to worship, but because one of his two remaining uninjured men was assigned to survey Yang Construction’s security man, No Nuts Feng. His man had followed Feng into an alley behind Quintet and had watched as a woman and an American had pummeled both Feng and another man.

Melschoi’s spy had held back but had subsequently lost the two in traffic-in Melschoi’s mind a punishable offense. That left him Quintet, and the night watchman Melschoi had just followed to the temple.

There was probably a Chinese proverb about there being more than one way to skin a cat, but Melschoi didn’t want to hear it.

His Beijing boss was so well connected that he had ears in every keyhole. How long until he learned of the compounded mistakes Melschoi and his men were making? How long until he cut bait? And what then? A bone crusher sent for him in the night? Police? Arrest? Melschoi had no leverage over his Beijing employer-knew nothing but that the money was good and it kept coming.

Despite his agnosticism, Melschoi took a moment to pray for the opportunity and funds to return to his homeland and make things right for his family.

The subsequent talk with the night watchman came down to what everything in this city came down to: money. Melschoi offered five hundred yuan and the man was ready to give him his first-born.

The foreigner had had a lady visitor at the guesthouse that same night. The woman had waited for him and had engaged in typical bar conversation with the barmaid. The conversation had centered on jewelry because the guest owned a pearl shop in International Pearl City in Hongqiao.

Melschoi would have words with this woman. He would know all she knew about this American and what the man wanted with Lu Hao. She was all he had. She, not this gold idol, was to be his savior.

And everyone knew the fate of all saviors. They were sacrificed.

9:00 A.M.

CHANGNING DISTRICT

SHANGHAI

“Wo de tian!” Grace led the way into the furnished service apartment, having secured it as easily and nearly as quickly as a hotel room. The biggest threat came from having to show identification; Grace had gotten around this by implying she and Knox were having an affair. For a negotiated price, the landlord had supplied the ID. She carried several shopping bags with her, having made stops along the way.

The floor was a hideous marble tile; the furniture, black leather and aluminum; the lighting, recessed halogen. The view was of another tower across a lane.

Grace pulled the drapes and blinds.

Blood caked his hand as Knox slipped out of the ScotteVest, his shirt damp with it. “I could use your help, if you have the stomach for it.”

She backed up a step, repelled by the sight of his bloody shirt.

He pulled off his sticky T-shirt with some difficulty. Grace stepped up to help him. She turned away at sight of the wound.

“It looks worse than it is.”

“You’ve been stabbed.”

“Yes,” Knox said, fingering it. Two older scars, one on his chest, one across his ribs, looked much worse. “The guy jumped me. He landed one before I reacted. My bad. Can you help?”

Knox moved into the bathroom and she followed, carrying one of the bags. With her looking on, he washed the wound and dried it. He grimaced as he stabbed an antibacterial pad deep into the wound and left it there for a count of thirty. Squeezed a bead of gel into the edges of the wound and turned to Grace. Her color had returned; she didn’t look the least put off.

She snipped the applicator on the end of a tube of Super Glue.

“You hold it closed for me,” he suggested.

“I will apply the glue,” she said. “You hold it closed. You need stitches.”

“This will work.” He pointed out his two scars. “Stitches. No stitches, only glue.” The glued scar was gnarly and thick.

He pinched the skin together as tight as he could get it. “Go.” He held it as still as possible for five minutes. Some of the two-inch wound held shut; some pulled back open. Three applications later, he was sealed shut.

“How did you get these scars?” she asked.

“Most are shrapnel. Dulwich and I…we were in convoy when an IED, a bomb, took out the road. Sarge’s vehicle took the brunt of it. I caught some metal.”

“You went after him.” She made it a statement.

“Those two years…that’s most of my scars. You start out that kind of work thinking you’re bulletproof. You end up waiting for your contract to expire.”

“So Mr. Dulwich owes you.”

“It doesn’t work like that. Americans don’t think like that.”

“Everyone thinks like that.”

“Tell me about the Mongolians,” he said.

She seemed tempted not to change the subject, but relented. “Five, all living in the lane.”

“And Lu Hao paid a visit to one of them.”

“So it would seem,” she said.

“For a large payoff, according to Danny.”

“No way around needing Lu Hao’s books,” she said. “We must not lose focus.”

“It’s a work in progress. Danny’s hard drive may help us there. But the Mongolians mean something. Are they just after their share? Could it be that simple?”

“Why not?”

“Or are they working for the police? Or State Security? Someone who could obtain the proper documents for them.”

“Freelance? It is possible. In that case, for what you’ve done to them…”

“It would explain their watching Lu’s apartment,” Knox said. “They’re keeping tabs on you and me because we showed up there. Maybe they think you’re the next Lu Hao and they want to make sure you know they’re due their share.”

“It would be easier to speak with me. No need to follow.”

“Yeah, I know,” Knox said. He didn’t like it either.

She’d already told him about the green motorcycle.

“So they beat the crap out of the Sherpa.”

“Hoping to find Lu Hao.”

“But like us, it’s just an empty warehouse. So they keep an eye on the Sherpa and we come along. By now they know an American has taken out two of them. That makes us persons of interest to them.”

“Or targets.”

Knox moved only slightly and winced with the pain.

“The incentive budget would have increased to account for the Mongolian payment. Your Mr. Danner said it was a recent addition. That money must be accounted for. The Berthold EOY records should account for it.”

“There’s always just asking Marquardt about it.”

“He would not know such details. He is insulated from the particulars. Preston Song, perhaps.”

“Can you talk to Song?”

“I would prefer to see the company financials first. The more I know, the more hard information I have, the more leverage.”

He heard the frustration in her voice.

“Lu’s books,” Knox said.

“Yes. His accounting of the incentives should answer many of our questions. His accounting is currency. Whoever has that information, whoever controls it, has the real power.”

“So, if nothing else, we get it for that reason: to protect it.”

“To keep it from others,” Grace said.

“Works for me.”

“Mr. Marquardt has yet to provide me the end-of-year accounting. I do not know if this is intentional or simply neglect. Perhaps it is significant. Perhaps not.”

“Above my pay grade,” he said, feeling his wound. He wanted sleep. “If I had to bet, Danny got himself a copy of Lu’s payouts within the first week of his covering Lu. It’s how he rolls.”

“So it makes sense for me to do a thorough study of the hard drive’s contents,” Grace said. “I am an expert with such data. But, unfortunately, I’m not finding the data on the hard drive in the first place.”

“We can find somebody to help.”

“Your friend,” she said, disgustedly.

Knox remained motionless to allow the Super Glue to set.

“Did you get beer?”

She returned with two open beers. They drank together.

“I must attempt to engage Preston Song. Also, Mr. Marquardt, if possible.”

“You must take every precaution,” he said.

“Yes. Of course. Off site, if I can manage.”

“We have three known groups we’re dealing with: the Mongolians; Yang’s boys; and this government cop, Shen. That’s a lot of possible eyeballs on you.”

“Understood.”

He liked the way her throat moved as she drank.

He said, “And only one of me watching your entrance and exit. Our best and only real shot at identifying your surveillants.”

“I will arrange off site,” she repeated. “Away from the office. I arrive early, leave late.”

He was going to point out that her earlier mistake had led to the attack in the alley, but she didn’t strike him as a person who wanted or needed such reminders. Still, as he pieced it together, he couldn’t help himself.

“Yang’s men must have overheard your ranting about me taking the GPS from you,” he said.

She looked struck. “I had not considered.”

“Nor I. But that’s why they hit us with force: they knew we had Danny’s GPS.”

“My apartment,” she said.

“There’s something I haven’t mentioned,” he said. “A guy thing. The way Yang Cheng and his bodyguard looked at you at the cocktail party. It wasn’t casual. It was…all-knowing.”

She stared at him. “I do not understand.”

“There’s checking out a woman, and then there’s the X-ray vision thing. The full body scan. The snicker. Boys in the treehouse. These two had seen you.”

“Of course. They were looking at me.”

“Had seen you in…private. Your apartment, I’m thinking.”

She pursed her lips.

“Listen. They were ogling you.”

He saw her shiver.

“We might be able to use that,” Knox said.

Her eyes pleaded for him to stop.

“I need to call Sarge and let him know we’re blown,” Knox said.

“And injured.”

“He can inform Marquardt.”

“I will take care of that when I see him and Preston Song. John, I am sorry for this. It is my fault.”

He didn’t disagree with her. “The assault. After the hurt we put on Yang Cheng’s guys…even though they won’t report it to the police, there’s a good chance the police will hear about it. Way too many eyes in this city. So we can add the police to the list of people to avoid.”

He chugged down half his beer. “Face recognition.” He burped. “Sarge warned me. We need to take care.”

She sipped from the bottle. “When he hears of your injury, Mr. Dulwich will order you back to Hong Kong.”

“So he won’t hear. Besides, I don’t answer to Sarge.”

“We both answer to Mr. Dulwich,” she corrected. “He is our immediate superior.”

“It’s a cultural thing,” he said.

“I believe we will be recalled.”

He scoffed. “Let me ask you this: if they ‘recall’ us, are you going to leave Lu Hao behind?”

She nursed the beer, eyes probing over the curve of the bottle.

“Me neither,” Knox said.