Time of Attack

CHAPTER 29

“No doubt in my mind. I could do it.” Deputy U.S. Marshal August Bowen drummed strong fingers against the two extra Glock magazines on his ballistic vest and watched for a reaction from the tall blonde in the seat in front of him. He rubbed a dark goatee with the other hand, as if amused. Oakley Half Jacket shades covered his eyes in the backseat of the Ford SUV.

“I’m gonna call bullshit on that,” Deputy Mitch Lucas said from behind the wheel. He had a voice like a blender grinding ice. Overworking his upper body in the gym and neglecting his tiny legs had earned Lucas the nickname Chicken Hawk in the squad room. It was no secret that he didn’t care much for Bowen. “You’re saying you could proposition her on duty and not get arrested?”

Born and raised in Florida, Samantha “Sammy” Willson had come to seek her fortune in D.C. when she got out of college, and worked with the Metropolitan Police vice unit for a time before she’d joined the Marshals Service. Her previous life made her a perfect fit for the Sex Offender Investigations Coordinator, or SOIC, for the office. In particular U.S. Marshal fashion, SOICs hunted down unregistered sex offenders before they could offend again.

She pointed a knife-hand up the road as if calling in an airstrike. “It’s another half mile. Donaldson’s house is the gray clapboard on the right. He has dogs but the informant says the’re friendly.” She glanced over her shoulder at Bowen. “No way, Gus,” she said, her Florida drawl rolling off her tongue. “Cute turns creepy when you hit on me while I’m working vice. Oh, yeah, you’d go to jail.”

All three deputies were similarly dressed in khaki cargo pants, dark polos, and heavy ballistic vests that were outfitted with all manner of pouch and pocket to hold extra pistol magazines, Taser, radio, flashlight, and plastic flex cuffs. They were military-looking, olive-green things with more MOLLE webbing than any of them had gear to fill. In addition to their basic load of weapons and ammo, each carried an oblong trauma kit the size of a fat sub sandwich. A tab bearing the deputies’ blood type was affixed to each vest over the right shoulder.

“I’m telling you, I could do it, Sammy.” Bowen grinned. He was just under six feet tall and big enough the backseat felt cramped with all the tactical gear. Eight months trudging through the Hindu Kush with his Recon Scout team had hardened his physique and weathered his skin. The experience had also turned his muddy-river hair prematurely silver gray at the age of thirty-six.

“Okay,” Willson said. “Imagine I’m on the street wearing my spandex shorts and a halter top—”

“I do that all the time.” Lucas licked his lips.

“Shut up, Mitch,” she said, then focused on Bowen, fluttering her eyes to get into character. She popped her gum and heaved her chest. Her sex appeal was strong enough to punch straight through the heavy ballistic vest. “Hey, sugar,” she said. “You want a date?”

“You know,” Bowen said, “I think I would love a date.”

“Gotcha!” Lucas said, leering sideways at Willson. He had the eyes of a man who kept someone tied up in his basement.

“Hang on.” Bowen raised his hand. “We haven’t talked about anything illegal yet.”

“Okay, sugar.” Willson nodded, resuming her character. “I don’t date for free, you know.”

“I know.” Bowen peered over the top of his Oakleys, shrugging as if he was a little embarrassed. “To tell you the truth, I’m doing a series of figure drawings and I need a model for an hour or so—”

Willson’s mouth fell open.

“Wait, wait, wait.” Lucas tapped the steering wheel with the flat of his hand. “You want to draw her naked?”

“Come on, Sammy.” Bowen grinned. “What would you say?”

“In reality,” Willson said, nodding, “I’d say shove off, you weirdo.”

“And, you owe me lunch,” Bowen said, hand on the door as they neared the target house. “It’s a tried-and-true technique.”

“Seriously?” Willson turned half around in her seat to stare at Bowen. “You mean to tell me you’ve hired a hooker?”

Bowen nodded.

“Jeez Louise,” Willson scoffed, grabbing her seat belt. “I thought we did backgrounds to weed out guys like that.” The deep red of her fingernails stood out in stark contrast to her tactical gear.

Bowen grinned, as if such a thing made perfect sense. “Sitting on her butt eating bonbons while I did a few sketches was a heck of a lot better than her normal routine. An undercover cop would just tell me to get lost. They wouldn’t sit for a nude drawing.”

Willson looked at him for a long moment, then raised an eyebrow to make a face like she just might consider it. She shook away the thought and put her game face back on.

“Donaldson’s house is right up there before the intersection.” She faced forward in her seat again. “We got over ten thousand images of explicit child porn the last time — some of them of kids as young as four. But remember, he’s not only a pervert, he’s a runner — and a fast one at that.”

A haggard blond woman in a green Hawaiian muumuu stood by a group of mailboxes at the corner fifty meters ahead, watching the Ford approach.

Willson pointed at the driveway past the woman and on the other side of the road. “That’s Donaldson’s place there.”

“Keep driving.” Bowen tapped the headrest behind Lucas. His cell phone began to buzz in the pocket inside his vest. He ignored it.

“What?” Chicken Hawk Lucas shot a glance in the rearview mirror.

“Trust me,” Bowen said, looking intently at the road. “Just drive on by.”

“Go ahead, Mitch.” Willson shrugged as the SUV passed the row of mailboxes and the staring woman. “It can’t hur—”

Bowen flung open his door, smacking it into the haggard blond and sending her flying in a blossom of arms, hairy legs, and flowered Hawaiian patterns. He bailed out before the SUV came to a screeching stop.

Bowen grabbed a handful of dress and a flailing arm to haul Frank Donaldson to his feet. The bright green muumuu hung off a hairy shoulder. Blood poured from a gaping split in his forehead where the doorpost had impacted him.

“How’d you know?” the addled man asked, kicking at the ratty blond wig that lay like roadkill in the gravel.

Bowen ratcheted the handcuffs tight and pushed the prisoner against the side of the SUV to pat him down.

“Uncle Sam’s all-expense-paid trips to the Middle East,” he said. “I’ve seen a lot of guys in man-dresses.”

Bowen’s cell phone rang for the fourth time in as many minutes. Convinced Donaldson wasn’t hiding anything but a black bra and a pair of matching lacy panties, he handed him off to Lucas and Willson before answering. He recognized the number.

“Yes, Chief?”

“Bowen,” Chief James Ragsdale said, as if he was speaking around the stub of one of his favorite cigars. “Director wants to see you at fifteen hundred hours. Anything I should know about?”

Bowen shot a wary glance at the wounded prisoner. “No,” he said. “I don’t think she would be aware of anything.”

“Good,” Ragsdale barked. “Do me a favor and put on a suit before you head over.”

August Bowen snugged a red-and-blue-striped power tie against the top button of a starched white shirt and popped his neck from side to side.

Sammy Willson sat at her desk, situated so it butted up to his, and stared at him with a little more than awe. “The director of the United States Marshals Service doesn’t just call in PODs to chat,” Willson said.

They’d dropped Donaldson off at the jail and returned so Bowen could get changed for his meeting.

A POD was a plain old deputy—no rank, just a simple silver star. And that was just where Deputy Bowen wanted to be. His mother, who ran the Republican Party in Flathead County, had asked him if he wanted the presidential appointment so he could carry a gold badge as the U.S. Marshal of Montana rather than be a lowly deputy. He’d told her thanks but no thanks, giving the age-old reply of deputy marshals, content with their lot in life—“a gold badge is given, a silver badge is earned.” So, he’d gone to Glynco for training, done his time in Billings, and had recently transferred to the Eastern District of Virginia five months before to get a feel for life in a bigger office — and to be near his doctor girlfriend.

Bowen looked at his watch and sat down.

“Whatever it is,” he said, picking up the drawing pad on his desk. “She doesn’t want to see me until three. I have a few minutes to clear my head.”

Bowen’s pencil whispered across the paper as he put the finishing touches on a sketch of a court clerk named Roslyn. After his last Reserve deployment as a Scout to Afghanistan, the Army shrink had told him to use his art when he was working things out in his head. An audience with the director was certainly something he needed to work out.

“Maybe she’s giving you a Director’s Award for something you did overseas,” Willson said. Out of her tactical gear it was easier to see that she was not only tall but extremely fit, with a quick smile and curvy build that made prisoners turn flirty when she moved them to court. At first blush bad guys on the street thought she might be a pushover. Half a second into any confrontation and she showed them the error of such thinking. There was a no-nonsense air that Bowen found… comfortable — like a favorite kid sister.

“Pleeeease.” Mitch Lucas scoffed from three desks over, tucked into the back corner of the squad room, farthest from the supervisory deputy’s office door. “They don’t give you a Director’s Award for being a hero in the military. That’s the Army’s job.”

Bowen smiled, half-entertained, half-disgusted. The little Chicken Hawk was a decent enough deputy. He worked his shift in court, hooked and hauled prisoners without too much whining, and did a fair job of finding fugitives with his computer. But Lucas let it be known at every turn that he felt sidelined by Bowen’s presence. Bowen got the good details. Bowen got the good warrants. Bowen got the girls.

Everyone else suffered for not being Bowen.

Lucas turned back to his computer. “What exactly were you decorated for anyway?”

“You know, Mitch,” Bowen groaned, tossing his pencil on the desk. He leaned back in his chair in an effort to pop his back. “Heroic shit.”

“Who you drawing now?” Lucas pecked away, apparently feeling it was his duty to harass the new guy. “Another court clerk with big ti—”

“Hey now!” Bowen cut him off, eyes still closed in midstretch. “You’re about to cross the line, Mitch.”

Sammy Willson backed away. She turned to Lucas, shaking her head in warning. Lucas sat still, thinking things over. Both deputies had seen what Bowen did to people on the street when they, as he put it, “crossed the line.” It wasn’t pretty.

“How about you go f—”

“That’d be crossing the same line,” Bowen said, cutting him off.

Lucas’s hands slipped away from the keyboard. “Who gets to decide where this line is that you’re always talking about?”

“I do,” Bowen said. “And I draw it close so I don’t have to reach very far to slap the shit out of a bully.” He stood to leave, shrugged on a dark gray suit jacket, and winked at Willson. “And when, not if, I do, I might get days off, but I doubt they’d fire me. Hell, maybe they’d give me the Director’s Award. Apparently, being a half bubble off from the war earns me a fair bit of leeway.”

Sammy Willson frowned. “You’re an idiot, Mitch.”

“He thinks he’s God’s gift to the Marshals Service,” Lucas said.

“My daddy had a dog like you when I was little.” Willson sighed. “He was a pretty good dog, too, chasing away panthers and keeping snakes out of the yard. Trouble was, he kept trying to bite everybody that came to visit.”

“What happened?” Lucas smirked, but still half interested.

“He bit the wrong guy one day and got himself shot.” She nodded at Bowen as he disappeared through the front door of the office. “I’m tellin’ you, Mitchell. That’s the wrong guy.”

CHAPTER 30

Bowen swiped his pass card and drove his black government-issue Dodge Charger into the underground parking lot beneath the Crystal City mall off Jeff Davis Highway. He was old enough to realize he was at the top end of his physical prime but still young enough to try to maximize it. He knew his way around the gym and had boxed during ROTC in college. He’d lost only one fight that mattered and still flushed with anger at the judges and himself when he thought about it for too long.

His girlfriend was a doctor at GW University Hospital, which for all practical purposes meant he lived alone. Though he loved to cook, there was rarely any reason to do much but eat canned soup while he stood at his sink. He kept his prematurely gray hair on the longish side so he could be reminded every morning when he trimmed his goatee that he was no longer in the Army.

Bowen parked the Charger in a vacant visitor space against the concrete wall and checked his tie in the rearview mirror before he went upstairs. Since coming aboard with the agency it had always bugged him that the FBI had the Hoover Building, the ATF had their bunker-like fortress near Gallaudet College. ICE, Interior, DEA, all had their own buildings worthy of Washington, D.C., architecture. But the United States Marshals Service, the nation’s oldest federal law enforcement agency, rented space in a mall.

Bowen took the elevator up to the shopping level, then hung a right in the underground to work his way through the afternoon crowds of government employees and military brass from the nearby Pentagon. The guard beside the nondescript glass doors across from Morton’s Steakhouse checked his Headquarters ID and let him by.

Bowen nodded to a group of black women from Human Resources on their way out for lunch. Being stationed in Virginia meant he’d come to headquarters a few times, so he knew people by face if not by name. They smiled back, chatting happily among themselves, apparently not recognizing him. He jumped in the elevator they’d come out of and pushed the button to the twelfth floor.

Miles Nelson, the Assistant Director for Investigative Operations, was waiting for him in the common area of the director’s suite. A South Carolina native, Nelson gave him an earnest handshake and welcome.

“Thanks for coming,” he said.

“I didn’t know I had a choice, sir.” Bowen forced a grin.

Nelson laughed, his Southern charm coming through. “You didn’t. Come on. She’s waiting for you.” Accustomed to spending time in the lofty realms of the twelfth floor, the AD put a hand on Bowen’s back and ushered him into the director’s office.

The office was spacious, at least thirty feet across with a separate sitting area and centered coffee table that she must have decided was too intimate for this particular meeting. Rich blue and gold carpeting glowed in the light from the windows along the north wall that offered a panoramic view of Reagan National Airport, the Potomac River, and downtown Washington, D.C. He wondered if people like this had big offices to make visitors feel small. It was sure working with him, a POD with a cubicle and a gun locker.

Director Carroll stayed seated when they walked in, flanked by her chief of staff and the deputy director. She was in her mid-fifties, with a full mane of frosted blond hair that lay perfectly on her padded shoulders. A high-collared wool suit and fist-size gold brooch accented her stern demeanor. The pinched look on her face made Bowen think she might spring from her seat at any moment and shout “Off with his head!” He’d seen few Taliban fighters that looked as fierce.

The chief of staff, a female former chief deputy from somewhere in the Midwest — Bowen couldn’t remember where — smiled, as if to set his nerves at ease. The DD was busy talking on his cell. “Go ahead and have a seat, Deputy Bowen,” the director said, not sounding as ferocious as she looked. “You are wondering, no doubt, why I called you in.” Bowen started to answer but she kept talking.

“AD Nelson tells me you grew up in Montana,” she said, with more of a nasal tone than he would have guessed from her photograph that hung in the Alexandria squad room. “Am I right on that?”

“You are correct,” Bowen said. “Flathead County.”

“He says you’re an avid bow hunter.”

“I am,” the deputy said, eyes looking to Nelson for any sign of an explanation.

“I suppose,” the director went on, fiddling with the brooch on her shoulder as she spoke, “hunting with a bow and arrow requires a good deal of patience and skill… Good qualities to have in a deputy marshal.”

“I suppose so.” Bowen gave an obedient nod, wondering where this was going.

“Well.” The director looked him over one last time, as if she hadn’t quite made up her mind until that very moment. “Fairfax County has given us a remarkable opportunity in the form of a fugitive warrant for Officer Chin’s shooter.”

Everyone within five hundred miles of D.C. had heard about some nut job murdering the young police officer. Bowen was sure the D.C. Area Regional Fugitive Task Force had boots on the ground helping find the shooter, but he’d not been involved. So far, they’d kept the identity of the fugitive off the news.

The director went on. “The Bureau has been going round and round with Fairfax County and Main Justice trying to grab this one.” She leaned forward, staring, nodding as if only she held some great secret to the universe. “But I told the attorney general it had to be us.” She pounded the desk. “You want to know why?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Because we have you, Deputy August Bowen.” She smiled. “And the FBI, thankfully, does not.”

Bowen opened his mouth to speak, but an almost imperceptible headshake from the chief of staff stopped him.

“Does the name Jericho Quinn mean anything to you?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Bowen said. “We worked together a couple of times on some cases in Montana. I believe he’s still in OSI.”

“I understand you lost a boxing match to him in college.”

Bowen’s neck burned at the memory. He groaned. “Indeed I did, ma’ am.”

“So you know him pretty well.”

“I suppose so,” Bowen said. “He’s an Air Force Academy grad. I was Army ROTC, so there was always a certain amount of rivalry. But I’d have no trouble working with him again, if that’s what you mean. That fight thing was a long time ago.”

“I don’t want you to work with him.” Director Carroll leaned back in her chair. “I want you to hunt him down and arrest him.”

She didn’t say “off with his head,” but the nuance was crystal clear.

Dismissed with his marching orders, Bowen accompanied Nelson back to his division in the adjacent office tower, with the AD insisting they stop for coffee at a Starbucks across from the barbecue joint in the underground mall along the way.

“Can you tell me what we have on him, sir?” Bowen asked five minutes later when he sank down into Nelson’s plush leather couch. The notion of Jericho Quinn murdering a police officer popped back and forth inside his head, refusing to settle. Still, people did weird things. He knew that from experience.

The Assistant Director for Investigative Operations had a view similar to the director’s. Bowen would have thought the office was huge had he not just been to Carroll’s palatial digs.

Nelson slid an open Bible to one side of his desk and took a folder from the lap drawer. “Well, to tell the truth, we don’t have very much,” he said. “The Air Force seems to have misplaced Quinn’s entire file.”

“Family?” Bowen offered. “Friends?”

“There is that.” Nelson nodded. “Turns out somebody shot his ex-wife at a wedding in Colorado a couple of days ago. She lost her leg. Looks like the shooter may have been going for his daughter.”

That was too big a detail to be unrelated. “Anyone arrested?”

Nelson shook his head. “Nope. But at least OSI still had that incident report. There are a couple of names. One’s a Marine, I believe. That should get you started.”

Bowen took that as an indication he should get right to work.

“But wait.” Nelson grinned. “There’s more.” It was impossible not to like this guy. For one of the top managers in the Service, he was amazingly down to earth, kicked back at his desk and talking with a POD. Bowen couldn’t help thinking he’d like to work for the man someday, if only that didn’t mean being assigned to headquarters.

Nelson held up a clear plastic bag like a trophy. “We have his phone.”

That was good news. People kept all sorts of data on their phones, usually trusting a simple passcode to safeguard their secrets — appointments, e-mails, photographs, and most important to Bowen, friends and contacts. With the information from the phone, he should be able to build a pretty clear map of Jericho Quinn’s recent life.

“It’s encrypted,” Nelson said, sliding it across the desk and moving his Bible back to the center.

“No problem.” Bowen nodded. “I’ll take it to Geoff. He could get a call history off two tin cans and a string. We’ll find him, sir.”

“You’d better,” Nelson said. “Because the way I hear it, there are a lot of folks out there who don’t plan to work very hard to bring him in alive.”

CHAPTER 31

Quinn met Emiko Miyagi at an Exxon station east of Chantilly, not far from Dulles, where she gave him an envelope containing three fat rolls of twenty- and hundred- dollar bills, two credit cards, a passport, a Virginia driver’s license, and an airline ticket, all under the name of John Hackman. It was a fitting name, she pointed out, considering his penchant for using a blade.

Since Narita Airport’s entry procedures required a photograph and two fingerprints from each entering passenger, Quinn opted to take a less direct route into the country, flying out of Dulles to Seoul, then taking a domestic hop to Buson before boarding a ferry for the three-hour ride across the Sea of Japan to Fukuoka, where he was to meet Miyagi’s contact.

There were a great many variables, but the passport and other documents were genuine, so they, at least, would not trip him up. One-way plane reservations, purchased the same day of travel, triggered more scrutiny than Quinn wanted and would surely provide a red flag to anyone looking for him after the shooting. Miyagi purchased round-trip tickets and had been able to manipulate the system to make it appear as though she’d purchased them a month before.

“I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this,” Quinn said, taking the documents. “I realize you’re risking your career, and even your freedom. Palmer must be beside himself.”

Miyagi looked at the ground, looking almost girlish.

“He directed me to tell you to call in if I saw you,” she said when she handed over the envelope. “But I would advise against such a thing.”

“Thank you, Miyagi-san,” Quinn said, slipping the documents in his pockets.

“You know my secrets,” she said. “I believe you should call me Emiko. I should also mention something about your contact, my friend, Ayako-chan. She is… how should I say this? Given to the wild side.”

“Wild enough to help a wanted fugitive?”

Miyagi smiled, for the first time since before she’d told him her story. “Wild enough that she will likely try to become intimate with you moments after you meet. But I beg you not to judge her. She has been through much.”

“I’m not one to judge anybody.” Quinn scoffed.

“Thank you,” Miyagi said. “Now, I must warn you. If my daugh… if Ran continued to progress as she was when I left, she will be an incredibly strong adversary.”

“But I have had you as my teacher.” Quinn shrugged off the warning. “She has missed out on that.”

Miyagi held her breath for a moment, choosing her words carefully. “You are extremely good at what you do. But Oda is… very close to perfect in his fighting skill.”

“It’s been a long time.” Quinn shrugged. “He’s older. Maybe he’s slowed down.”

“Perhaps.” Miyagi nodded. “But he was always more skilled than me.” She rolled her lips. “And I am more skilled than you.”

CHAPTER 32

Deputy August Bowen read over what little information he had in the file while Geoff Barker tinkered with Quinn’s phone, which was now attached to his laptop computer.

Seating at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Academy in Glynco was alphabetical, and Barker had sat next to Bowen during Marshals Basic eight years earlier. He was generally quiet, strong as a bull, and had a tiny Superman curl that hung down across his forehead. All smiles and Georgia charm, he was the kind of kid Bowen would have wanted dating his daughter, if he had a daughter.

He was also one of the smartest people Bowen had ever come across. His small office was crammed with telephone lineman gear, maps of cell towers, and stacks of black plastic Pelican cases containing all sorts of sensitive and secret equipment Barker used to do his job. The screen on some kind of oscilloscope blipped on the table behind him, like something out of a science fiction movie.

“This wasn’t a random shooting.” Bowen shut the thin folder and closed his eyes to think out loud. “You gotta wonder why a sniper would go after somebody’s family. Witnesses say they think the shooter in Colorado was an Asian female. According to this OSI agent’s report, Quinn suspects her of being Japanese.”

“Maybe Quinn went after her,” Geoff said without looking up from his computer. A lifelong resident of Atlanta, his drawl could make him appear slow at first blush, but Bowen had never seen anyone who knew their way around phones and electronic surveillance as well as Geoff Barker. Even in Marshals Basic he’d shown a bent in that direction.

“That’s what I would do,” Bowen said. He tipped his head toward the phone. “So, what do you think? You gonna be able to get in?”

“Dude,” Barker said, still not looking up. “This is high-level government encryption.”

Bowen’s heart fell. “So, you can’t get in?”

“Of course I can.” Barker scoffed. “I write high-level government encryption.” He tapped a few more keys, waited a beat, then looked up with a wide grin. “I’m in,” he said.

“Why would an OSI agent need an encrypted phone?” Bowen mused, half to himself.

Barker’s eyes darted back and forth across the computer screen, studying the contents of the phone.

“The most frequently called number comes back to a V. Garcia…” He kept scanning. “Japanese shooter, you say?”

Bowen nodded. “That’s what Quinn thinks, at least.”

“Hmmm,” Barker mused, hitting PRINT so Bowen would have a copy of what he was looking at. “There’s an Emiko Miyagi in here. I’ll go up on her number and see what I can find. Meantime, I got contacts with Japan National Police. Work up a BOLO, and I’ll get it over to them.” BOLO was Be On the Look Out — a locater notice, like a wanted poster but with less need for controlled distribution.

“We should make it wide,” Bowen said. “Plaster his photo all over the news over there.” He got up from his seat with a long groan. This whole thing made him feel tired.

“Where you going first?” Barker asked, still futzing with the computer.

“I came here first,” Bowen said. “But now, I’m going to swing by and take a look at that crime scene, get a feel for it, so to speak. I got no love lost for the guy, but this just doesn’t sound like him.”

“Shitty deal, hunting someone who’s supposed to be one of the good guys,” Barker offered, handing Bowen the paper from his printer tray.

“Jericho Quinn’s not a bad guy,” Bowen said. “But I’m pretty sure good doesn’t describe him, either.”

CHAPTER 33

The Korea Air flight from Dulles to Seoul took fourteen hours. Miyagi had booked Quinn a seat in Business Class so he could lean back and try to get some sleep. He would, she’d reminded him, need all his wits about him if he wanted to locate Oda and her daughter while avoiding capture himself.

The brutal training regimen and long months of Air Force Special Operations training had taught Quinn to grab sleep when the opportunity arose. But being hunted by his own government was new territory, and he tossed and turned for most of the flight. At length, he gave up and found a Japanese channel on the video player at his seat. If he couldn’t sleep, at least he could get his brush-up on the language by watching inane comedy shows with lots of whipped cream and water gags.

An hour before they landed at Incheon International, the flight attendants went on high alert. There was a curt announcement in Korean and English asking everyone to stay in their seats. Quinn watched as one attendant, a slender Korean woman in her forties, hustled up the aisle to answer a call on the bulkhead phone. He couldn’t be certain, but it looked as though her eyes kept darting to him and then away, as if she was trying not to stare.

All the attendants, including the gray-haired Korean purser who had remained unflappable during the agonizingly long flight, bounced around the aircraft as if on ball bearings.

Quinn craned his head around to look behind him, but the aircraft was too big to see much without getting out of his seat. He thought about defying orders and getting up to go to the restroom, but the look on the purser’s animated face said that might get him sent out on the wing at thirty thousand feet.

There was another announcement as the plane squawked onto the tarmac at Incheon, asking… no, ordering, everyone to keep their seats for a few minutes after the plane arrived at the gate.

Whispers of indignation and curiosity spread among the passengers like paper burning. Some worried they would miss connecting flights. Others had to go to the bathroom. Quinn was in a center bank of seats so couldn’t see out the window, but the flashing strobes of approaching emergency vehicles were impossible to miss.

He unbuckled his seat belt and slid the leather satchel, his only baggage, from under the seat in front of him. There was a slim chance he could make it past them and disappear if he bolted. No one would expect that.

CHAPTER 34

Bowen parked the black Charger on the grassy shoulder a half block away from the spot where Officer Chin had been murdered. He’d heard someone on news radio say she’d been killed, but he couldn’t get his head wrapped around that term. Spiders were killed when you stepped on them. Cancer killed you. Soldiers killed the enemy in battle. But when someone looked a pretty young officer like Jenny Chin in the eye and then shot away most of her face, you couldn’t call that anything but murder.

Bowen had arrested a fair number of murderers in his career. Most were hopped up on something — drugs or emotions. It took a brazen killer to do this, and those were few and far between.

A ribbon of yellow crime scene tape still fluttered from the smooth bark of a slender redbud tree along the street ahead, muted in the early evening gray. Bowen sniffed the chilly air and walked toward it, unsure of what he might find, or what he was even looking for. Hunting — tracking of any kind — required an open mind. If you looked for one thing too hard, you skimmed over a half dozen more tidbits that were just as important, maybe more so.

Bowen found the tracks left by Quinn’s knobby-tired BMW and the divot in the grassy shoulder left by the bike’s side stand. Squatting low at the edge of the pavement, he studied the brown stains in the gravel that would be Officer Chin’s blood. He found a small, white fragment of bone in the stones, still shiny with a film of dried blood and fluid. Marshals were manhunters, not evidence gatherers, so he didn’t have any bags with him. He used his handkerchief to pick it up, then dropped it into an open latex glove. He tied a knot in the glove and stuffed it into his pocket. Every piece of Jenny Chin deserved a decent burial.

From the position of the blood, Chin had been standing by the motorcycle when she was shot. The case report said her partner, a veteran officer named Larsson, had been standing behind her while she made the approach. According to him, Quinn had been distraught and when he saw the officer was Asian, he just drew his gun and tried to kill both of them. That certainly wasn’t the Jericho Quinn that Bowen knew.

He could still see the man’s eyes from their fight all those years ago — focused, intense. There was a cold science in the way he fought, the precision of a fine machine — but no malice. Though Bowen liked to blame the judges, Quinn had knocked him down twice and handily won the fight. Afterward, he’d come up to shake hands, pointing out that Bowen had broken his nose. There was a grace in Quinn’s win, a certain humility that said he could do it again with no trouble at all, but he didn’t want to rub your face in it.

Bowen ran his fingertips across the surface of the road, thinking. From this close range, Jericho Quinn didn’t try to shoot anything. He shot it or he didn’t.

Bowen looked up to watch a woman about his age walk down a nearby driveway to join him. She wore tight jeans and a wool sweater with the design of a llama on the front. Her arms were folded, her chin to her chest as if she was praying.

Bowen didn’t get up but fished his badge out of his jacket pocket and held it up.

“U.S. Marshals,” he said.

“Hmm.” The woman scuffed the toe of a white tennis shoe on the dead grass.

“You see what happened?”

“Nope.” She nodded to the row of tightly spaced cottonwood trees growing like a giant hedge between her house and the road. “As far as I know, nobody did. This is the perfect spot to murder someone so nobody who lives along here could see it.”

“I noticed that,” Bowen said, tapping his credential case against his open hand.

“I have some coffee on if you need a place to write your report or anything.” She was flirting and cute enough, but he ignored her.

Bowen looked up and down the street, thinking. This was too perfect. If it had happened like Larsson said, Quinn hadn’t planned on shooting anyone until he saw Jenny Chin was Asian, after they’d pulled him over. It was too coincidental that he’d stopped in the perfect spot to commit a murder.

“U.S. Marshals? I didn’t know y’all solved homicides. I thought you chased bad guys. You know, Tommy Lee Jones and all.”

“You’re right.” Bowen smiled. “Sometimes, though, you have to do one before you can do the other.”

CHAPTER 35

Seconds before he jumped from his seat, Quinn heard the agonized scream of a woman in the back of the plane. The exit door hissed open and four Korean paramedics in blue jumpsuits poured onto the plane, rushing past Quinn with medical bags and a slender stretcher used to evacuate people from aircraft.

The paramedics rolled back by with the woman a few moments later. She was obviously in the final stages of labor and likely to have the baby before she left the airport.

Quinn let out a long breath, willing his body to calm. He’d not survive long on this kind of emotion. Sooner or later he’d overreact, make a mess of things. If he intended to find Ran and Oda, he had to calm down, get a good night’s sleep — or as close to one as he could — and start fresh. He’d not lied when he told Miyagi that he did not fear death. He did fear getting captured and stopped from doing his job. He feared failure above most other things in the world.

Breathing easier once he was off the plane and moving in a crowd again, Quinn bought a large SLR camera and the bulkiest telephoto lens he could find at the airport store, then hopped the subway to Seoul Station in order to make his connection.

Less than three hours after he’d arrived in Korea, Quinn was standing on the docks in Buson. The sun was going down over the hills behind him, casting long shadows over stacked containers, loading cranes, and superstructures of row after row of cargo vessels.

There were several fast ferries that made the trip to Fukuoka, Japan, in less than three hours. But those passengers would be required to undergo the same scrutiny they would at Narita Airport upon entering Japan: a photo and two index fingerprints.

Instead, Quinn opted to try for a slower, commercial ship that would cross during the night. He looped the camera and long telephoto lens around his neck and approached the captain of a car hauler, heading over with a shipment of new Daewoo sedans and likely picking up a load of high-mileage vehicles to bring back for resale in China or Russia.

Quinn stuck a wad of cash in his passport and held it up to the squat Korean man who smoked a cigarette along the flaking rail of his ship. He pointed to the east, held up the camera, and said “Japan.”

The captain spoke no English beyond “Hello,” which he said over and over again with a slight, ducking bow of his head and shoulders, but the cash spoke loudly enough to get the point across. He didn’t care about the passport, but the fact that Quinn had offered it to him was enough to show he wasn’t trying to hide anything. The bulky camera put a finishing touch on his cover. Standing out was often the best way to blend in.

The ship cast off a half hour later, and Quinn spent the next forty-five minutes walking up and down the deck, snapping photos of anything and everything. The captain said hello each time they passed.

Eventually, the sun set and the lights of Buson disappeared from view. Quinn found the captain again, returned his fiftieth “hello,” and made the universal sign for sleep by tilting his head against an open palm.

The captain lit another cigarette and gave a vigorous nod, ecstatic at being able to communicate with his new guest. He motioned for Quinn to follow him to the foredeck and the captain’s quarters. He gave a sweeping motion of his arms and pointed inside, repeating Quinn’s sleep gesture. Quinn said thank you and ducked inside.

Surely the nicest accommodations on the ship, they smelled of fishy mildew and whiskey — but Quinn didn’t care. He fell into the hard berth, pulling his jacket tight around his neck for warmth against the cold metal bulkhead inches from his back. Resting his face against the leather satchel to protect it from the greasy blanket, he let the rhythmic slap of waves against the hull push him into a welcome unconsciousness.

CHAPTER 36

Lee McKeon walked his Bichon Frise puppy in the backyard of the governor’s estate as he talked. His advisors had told him he needed a dog to help him look all-American. It seemed to him that a freakishly tall Pakistani man dragging a fluffy dog along the grass looked anything but American. But his approval rating had gone up when the photos were leaked to the press.

“I haven’t heard anything yet,” the governor said, trying not to trip over the leash as the stupid animal ran around him in circles. “There have been no reports.”

“Be patient, my friend,” Qasim Ranjhani said on the other end of the line. He paused as if checking a clock. “A few hours at the most. It will be in the news by then. I assure you.”

CHAPTER 37

August Bowen left the meeting with Veronica Garcia with more questions than he had answers. For starters, he couldn’t understand why a man with a woman like the strong and curvaceous Latina would still be bothering with his ex-wife.

There was little doubt that Garcia would have lied to protect Quinn if she’d had any information, he but felt pretty certain Quinn hadn’t contacted her since the shooting. She had an ache of betrayal in her eyes that was hard to fake, but Bowen recognized Quinn’s recent lack of communications was his way of shielding her.

Gunnery Sergeant Thibodaux had been tougher to read, answering most every question with another question. He was good natured and congenial enough but as impenetrable as a concrete wall.

By the time Bowen pulled off the quiet, tree-lined residential street into Emiko Miyagi’s long circular driveway, he knew only that Quinn’s friends cared little about what aiding a wanted fugitive would do to their respective careers. They had all, no doubt, spilled blood together. Bowen could see it in their eyes. It was a look he knew all too well.

He left the file in the car, keeping both hands free as he walked up to the front door of the colonial red brick home that was supposed to be Emiko Miyagi’s address. A chilly wind had kicked up from the north, swaying the high crowns of the big sycamores along the driveway and whistling through the boxwood shrubs that surrounded the house. Bowen shivered, as much from the feeling in his gut as from the cold.

Years in federal law enforcement and two deployments on active duty with the Army had given him the ability to smell spy games — and this whole deal reeked of it. So far, he had an unknown Asian sniper shooting at an OSI agent who had an encrypted phone — whose personnel file had vanished — teamed up with a decorated Marine and a beautiful Latina who had wanted to meet near the CIA’s training facility at Camp Peary. Oh, yeah, this was definitely spy games. He preferred head-on, out-in-the-open law enforcement to all the sneaking around and intrigue.

Bowen rang the doorbell, counted to ten, and listened for footsteps. He rang it again. Still nothing. The backyard, which looked to be the size of some British castle estate, had a ten-foot stone wall running all the way around it. He rattled the gate. Locked.

He was just about to give in to the thought of climbing over, when the BlackBerry buzzed in his pocket.

“This is August,” he said, stepping back to consider what it would take to leap up on the fence. He hadn’t quite given up on the idea.

“Gus,” Geoff Barker said. His voice was antsy, as if about to pop with news. “You’re not gonna believe what I’ve found.”

“Let me have it,” Bowen said, trying a nearby ash tree to see if it would bend enough to get him on top of the wall.

“Dude, this phone has some seriously good tech,” Barker said. “Real cutting-edge shit. They don’t just hand this out to everyone, if you know what I mean.”

“Funny,” Bowen said. “I’ve come to the same conclusion.”

“Well, considering that is the case,” Barker continued, “I figured if this Miyagi woman is involved in the same line of work, she’s too smart to leave much in the way of a call record on her number. I checked it out anyway and was right. There was nothing outgoing. I mean she doesn’t even order pizza unencrypted.”

Bowen peered through a tiny crack between the curtain and frame of a side window. The inside hall was bare polished pine, orderly and clean. There were few decorations but for a wooden stand on which sat a Japanese sword.

“This lady doesn’t seem like the pizza ordering kind,” Bowen mumbled into the phone, half to himself.

“You know she had to make some calls,” Barker said. “But she was smart enough, or at least had the right tech to wipe them.”

“Okay,” Bowen groaned. He paced the fence line, looking for some way through.

“But get this,” Barker said. “I figured her friends may not be so savvy in tradecraft so I went back three years. In all that time, there’s a record of only one incoming call from Japan.”

“Can you get subscriber info?”

“Dude.” Barker scoffed. “Have faith. I told you I had contacts with the Japanese National Police. It’s already done. Number comes back to Ayako Shimizu in Fukuoka, Japan. According to my buddy, Ms. Shimizu is a fairly successful hooker who plies her wares near Hakata Harbor.”

“That’s where he’s going,” Bowen said. “A prostitute would hear everything that was going on in her area. If Quinn’s looking for information in Japan, Shimizu would be a good place to start.”

“That’s where I’d be,” the other deputy said.

“You think you can get your friend to arrange a contact for me with the police over there? I’ll call AD Nelson and see if he’ll let me take a road trip.”

“Sure,” Baker said. “I’m on it. You speak Japanese?”

“Yeah, right.” Bowen laughed. “There’s a big need for Asian languages in Kalispell, Montana. I’ll do what I always do when I book someone in who doesn’t speak English. I’ll speak louder and slooowwwwer.” He matched his volume and speed to the words.

“Yeah,” Baker said. “Tell me how that works out for you.”

“Come on,” Bowen said, turning to go back to his car. “We’ll be brother lawmen. We should all speak the same language. Right?”

“Hmmm,” Baker groaned. “I’ll see if they can find you someone who speaks English.”

“We have a photo of Shimizu anywhere?”

“Coming your way, brother,” Baker said. “Be careful, though. She looks like she could carve out your liver and fry your cojones up as a side dish.”

CHAPTER 38

Quinn woke to the sound of feet running back and forth on deck. Large winches fore and aft groaned and squealed, playing out heavy line as big as a man’s wrist as they made ready to offload and load cargo. Gruff voices barked orders in Japanese and Korean.

Quinn swung his feet off the edge of the cramped berth and sat up, rubbing the effects of exhausted sleep from his eyes. He was angry with himself for sleeping so deeply for so long. His plan had been to be ready to step off the boat as it came even with the pier. There was no way to know when Customs might pay a visit — and he wanted to be gone when they did.

The sun was still a pink line below the clouds on the eastern horizon when he stuck his head out of the captain’s cabin. Land lay off the port side of the vessel, but Quinn realized they were coming around the long barrier peninsula that protected the port from the more open waters of the Korean Strait. It was still dark enough for a covert arrival.

Quinn stepped out of the cramped cabin and popped his neck from side to side, breathing in the moist sea air. Standing along the rail, he could just make out the red outline of Hakata Tower looming ghostlike through the heavy mist, still two miles away.

Japan. He could smell the mystery of the place.

Though he spoke flawless Arabic and excellent Chinese, Japan’s culture had bitten Jericho more deeply than any he’d ever experienced. He’d taken immersion language classes in junior high and high school in Alaska, surrounding himself with all things samurai from food to martial arts. The Anchorage Rotary Club had sponsored him for a semester of high school in the Roppongi area of Tokyo his sophomore year.

That had been well before Kim came into the picture, and he’d met a girl there. Her name was Sayuri, and at sixteen, she seemed to him to be the embodiment of all that was feminine. Wise beyond her years, she had warned him that Japan had a way of getting into a person’s blood. He would return to Alaska, and, though memories of her would surely fade, he would forever be tugged back toward her country.

He smiled when he thought about it, ocean spray stinging his face. He was on a mission, sure to be deadly for someone, but in truth, he couldn’t wait to step onto Japanese soil merely for the thrill of being back.

A shuddering rumble from deep within the Korean ship drew him out of his reminiscing. Deckhands moved to the rail opposite Quinn, standing ready with boat hooks. The captain came out of the wheelhouse carrying a plastic tote heavily wrapped in duct tape. He whistled Quinn over as another boat, much smaller than the Korean ship, materialized out of the mist and pulled up alongside. Rigged for squid fishing, a long, overhead line with dozens of clear glass lamps like basketball-size Christmas ornaments ran down the center length of the smaller boat. Neither vessel came to a full stop, but matched speed and course at what Quinn guessed to be less than five or six knots.

The captain dropped the plastic tote to the waiting hands of two men on the squid boat and then pantomimed for Quinn to climb over and jump down with it.

Quinn nodded, understanding immediately what the captain wanted. The Korean ship would dock at the commercial pier — behind what would surely be a very tall fence and subject to search by Japan Customs. The squid boat, being a local vessel, would simply dock in Fukuoka harbor with all the other fishing boats. Both Quinn and whatever was in the plastic tote could quietly enter Japan without notice from any authorities.

Quinn gave the smiling Korean captain five more twenty-dollar bills and slipped over the edge with his leather satchel to drop down next to the pilothouse on the spray-soaked deck of the smaller boat.

The squid boat skipper was a short man with a wide, unsmiling face weathered by the sea and tension of smuggling contraband. A blue bandanna, tied at all four corners, dropped over his head in a functional but comical hat to keep water from dripping in his eyes. He obviously spoke Japanese, but since he was now carrying an illegal immigrant and tote full of what was probably illicit Chinese Ecstasy, the man kept his thoughts to himself.

Quinn spent the next half hour while the boat slogged toward Fukuoka Harbor standing under a blue-tarp bimini soaking up the spindrift from the breaking waves and the uneasy stares of the three-man crew.

The wind picked up as they chugged up next to the pier. Heavy spray washed across the concrete docks, blown by a steady wind from the east and open water. The crew deployed bumper tires and threw ropes to two waiting dockhands. Two Japanese Coast Guard cutters bobbed with the tide at their berths. Across the quay, a man in a blue uniform braved the elements and scrubbed the deck of a forty-foot police boat.

Quinn softened the squid boat captain’s glare with a series of polite bows and a wad of twenties — a good sum for a quarter hour ride. Then, slinging the leather bag over his shoulder, he stepped over the gunnel and into Japan.

Apart from a handful of stevedores smoking cigarettes while they waited on the other side of the Customs fence for the early morning arrival of the Korean car hauler, the docks were all but deserted. Spotlights chased back the shadows around two ships already at berth, glinting off car glass and chrome. There were no agents to greet him, no swarm of police — and so far, no assassin’s bullet. Light poles bristled with surveillance cameras, but most were pointed toward the other direction. For the time being at least, Quinn’s only company as he walked toward the quiet parking lot seemed to be a lonely seagull wheeling above in the wind and spray.

A shrill whistle turned his attention toward the narrow byway that ran along the commercial docks, adjacent to the blocky white building that contained the Fukuoka Port government offices. Twenty yards away, in the parking lot on the far side of a well-groomed hedgerow, a woman straddled a small yellow motorbike. A cigarette hung from her lips, glowing brightly against the gray of early morning. She tossed her head when Quinn looked at her, letting him know she’d meant the whistle for him.

The woman wore a shorty helmet that left her chin exposed. Painted rally-style, it was canary yellow to match the bike with a white stripe down the center. Wide goggles protected her eyes from the rain. It was difficult to tell much about her face. It did not smile, but Quinn thought that might be a function of her lips holding the cigarette. Despite the wet weather she wore a stylish denim jacket, darkened by rain at the shoulders. A black dress that stopped at midthigh and gray tights revealed strong legs. Flat-heeled leather boots that came halfway up stout calves rounded out her outfit.

White cotton gloves on the handlebars, she tossed her head again, beckoning him to hurry before looking back and forth over her shoulder.

“Welcome to Japan, Mr. Quinn,” she said in English when he got close enough to hear.

“Hai,” he said in Japanese. Yes. He was surprised Miyagi hadn’t told her friend to use Hackman, the name on his passport.

“I am Ayako,” she said. “Get on.” Her voice held the honeyed purr of a heavy drinker. She handed him a battered black helmet and white cloth mask worn by so many in Asia during flu and hay fever season. “The police would certainly stop us if you do not wear the helmet,” she said. “With the mask, people will have to look closely to see you are not Japanese. Americans are usually too vain to wear them, even if it would keep them from getting sick.”

“Sounds reasonable.” Quinn slung the leather bag over his shoulder and fastened the helmet under his chin. He pulled the elastic straps of the mask over each ear, concealing his face.

“I don’t want to stay here longer than we have to.” Ayako craned her head around to look at him, revving the little engine. It sounded more like a lawnmower than a bike. Dark eyes stared from behind the large goggles, making her look at once adventurous and comical. As with Emiko, it was difficult to tell this one’s age. Her damp hair and amber skin softened in the diffuse light of early morning, she could have been a college coed. But if she was a friend from Miyagi’s childhood, Ayako had to be at least in her late thirties.

Quinn climbed on behind her, scooting as close as he dared to keep from falling off the back of the little bike.

“I am not a clay doll,” Ayako said over her shoulder. “Please hold on.”

Quinn situated the leather satchel so it hung behind him and wrapped his arms around the woman’s waist. After sleeping with his face next to the Korean captain’s greasy pillow, he found the smell of strawberry shampoo and cigarettes that clung to Ayako’s damp clothes pleasantly intoxicating.

Quinn couldn’t remember the last time he’d ridden as a passenger behind a female rider. Anatomy made for any number of problems in such an arrangement. Though far from fat, Ayako was a girl with plenty of roundness. It was difficult to know whether he should keep his arms high, under her heavy bust, or low and risk brushing the lap of her skirt. She was a short-coupled woman, leaving little margin for error. She planted both feet on the ground to steady the bike and solved the problem by positioning his arms high, around her ribs, so her breasts rested on his forearms.

She chuckled out loud, giving the bike gas. “I don’t meet many men who worry about where they touch me.”

“Nice scooter,” Quinn said as she got under way, hoping to move the conversation away from the subject of his manners.

Ayako slammed on the brakes, stopping so abruptly she threw Quinn’s weight forward, shoving her against the gas tank on the little bike. Her chest heaved against his arms.

“This is not a scooter,” she corrected, using informal, almost confrontational Japanese. He could hear her teeth grating as she spoke. “It is a motorbike.”

Quinn grimaced. “Sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“One straddles a motorbike. On a scooter, one keeps their legs together…” Softening immediately, she looked over her shoulder to give Quinn a coy wink. “I have never been so good at that.”

She laughed out loud at her own joke and gave the little motorbike enough gas that is sounded as if it might fly apart as they melded into the honk and grind of the morning traffic of Fukuoka City.

CHAPTER 39

Lieutenant Colonel Paul Hunt shut the screen to his laptop computer and leaned back in his chair with a long sigh. He still wore his surgical scrubs. They were more comfortable than anything else in the up-and-down heat and cold of this miserable country.

In a fit of patriotism, he’d signed up for military service after 9/11. That also happened to be after he’d accumulated what his wife called roughly a bajillion dollars in medical school debt. The Air Force was happy to get a qualified doctor and, though they paid him with some parity to what a doc made in the civilian world, the school debts were still his. Frankly, until he’d been trapped in Afghanistan by this quarantine, the money he owed caused him more stress than the possibility of mortar attack or getting his foot blown off by a land mine if he stepped off the pavement on base.

He’d come into the military with an adventurous heart, thinking there was nowhere on earth that he wouldn’t want to visit on some level. One could learn something from every culture in every land. He still believed that, though the things one learned might just be to stay the hell away. Russia, the British Empire, Hannibal, Alexander the Great, had all tried and failed to conquer Afghanistan. America hadn’t really tried to conquer the place, just drive the Taliban out and rebuild it. But you had to want progress. You had to allow yourself to be rebuilt.

Hunt often thought how impossible it was to bomb a place back to the Stone Age when they were already there. Still, he had a job while he was here, and he did it well.

Behind him, two senior airmen stood over their lab duties, sterilizing hospital instruments and making certain crash carts were stocked with necessary supplies at the end of their shift.

Hunt didn’t know if the Skype chats with his wife made the time away from her easier or more difficult. In truth, it didn’t matter. The months ticked by, the kids passed milestones he’d never get to see, and the war dragged on — whether he missed his wife or not.

And now, they were telling him and everyone else in the godforsaken place that they had to stay indefinitely, at least until someone could figure out what was causing this new plague of boils. The young troops who’d been raised on video games had taken to calling the disease Epic Egypt or Pharaoh 2.0 and chanting “Let my people go” as they walked between their basic duties and the chow hall.

There had been three deaths on base so far — one soldier and two Afghan nationals who helped with road maintenance. The boils had been horrific enough, causing a near panic among the Afghani workforce, who saw it as a sign from Allah of some great sin. They’d been extra pissed when local mullahs banished them from their communities and sent them packing back to Bagram at the pointy end of a Kalashnikov.

At the insistence of the Afghan government, the base commander had put a hiatus on all traffic going outside the wire, leaving frontline troops not only denied their rotation home, but without a job of patrol while stuck in theater. Boredom had always been an issue at Bagram, but now, with fuses shortened by the lack of relief and this surprise imprisonment, tensions bordered on deadly. It was only a matter of time before someone — military, contractor, or Afghan — broke under pressure. Even the Kyrgyz barbers and massage girls were beginning to show signs of stress, wearing less makeup and not bothering to flirt for business.

In a show of sheer genius, the base commander had ordered photographs of the infected men, complete with their terrifying boils, to be placed in strategic locations so they could be seen by the maximum number of people. Instead of causing panic, as some feared the posters would, the grisly photographs served as reminders of why the dire orders were in place.

Though the sight of the boils was enough to induce another plague of chronic diarrhea and stomach tension, in the end, the pustules were only a symptom. All the deaths had been from respiratory distress. So far, the remaining infected were soldiers. One was on a ventilator and another was attached to a full-blown ECMO for heart-lung bypass. The other three sounded as if they had pneumonia. He only had one more ECMO unit, meaning the next person to get sickest was the one most likely to live the longest. Unless the military did some magic and brought him more units, the others would simply drown as fluid filled their lungs.

Hunt had gone over each patient’s chart a dozen times. The infected who’d made it stateside had all come from the 405th Civil Affairs Battalion based at Nellis. There had to be a connection there — but the sick who remained in Afghanistan appeared to be a hodgepodge of random units.

“There has to be something you all have in common,” Hunt said out loud. “Some little thing you share.”

“Colonel,” the older of the two Senior Airmen said from behind him. “Everything is in place. With your permission, we’d like to knock off in time to get a haircut.”

“You’re free to go,” Hunt said, smiling. The kid reminded him of his oldest son. “But your hair looks fine.”

“I know. But the girls are pretty.” The senior airman shrugged. “And it gives us something to do.”

Hunt tossed the last file on his desk and ran a hand through his own hair. He could do with a trim as well.

CHAPTER 40

Todd Elton sat on the hood of his black Chevy Silverado at the edge of the runway and watched the gray-green C-130 Hercules from the Nevada Air Guard’s 152 Airlift Wing come in low across the east desert. It continued north as if the pilots might have decided against stopping in such a plague-infested land, then, at the last minute, executed a lumbering turn to final approach nearly over the top of the hospital at the north end of town.

The arrival of a military aircraft in a place cut off from society — if only for two days — tended to draw a crowd. By the time the C-130 had touched down and rolled to a stop, a convoy of twenty pickups and three motorcycles had arrived at the airport.

Colonel Huber with the Utah National Guard had his men dressed in black biohazard suits, standing ready to accept the new cargo — and keep anyone in the twenty pickups from stealing it.

Monte Young, Elton’s father-in-law and the only sheriff Kane County had known for twenty-four years, stood at the front of a white Dodge Durango with a six-pointed badge on the door.

The rear of the C-130 yawned open and the National Guardsmen began the work of unloading palletized food and medical supplies.

The crew on the arriving transport was careful not to go beyond the confines of the ramp. None of them would dare leave the plane. If they did, they would find themselves calling Kanab home for the foreseeable future.

Though most of the valley was predominately Mormon and taught to prepare for disasters with extra food, it was amazing how fast the shelves of the local grocery had been stripped bare once news of the quarantine was broadcast.

Neighbor stopped visiting neighbor and a personally enforced approach boundary of at least fifteen feet became the norm. If someone had a cold or sneezed, the nonapproach area was raised to a bubble of thirty feet or more. As a doctor, and one mandated to deal directly with those already infected, Elton was placed even farther out in what he called a yell-zone — where he had to raise his voice just to be heard in normal conversations.

The guy who’d brought pizza to the clinic the night before had left the food at the curb, yelling at him to leave his money on the sidewalk. Elton didn’t have the heart to tell the poor kid that if he was infected, his money would be the last thing anyone should touch.

Last to be unloaded were the sets of large Pelican hard cases that Elton knew contained ECMO units. His heart fell when only two were lowered onto the tarmac.

An armed soldier ordered him to halt when he tried to walk closer.

“I thought we were getting a dozen ventilators and at least six ECMO machines,” he yelled to the guy who looked like he might be in charge.

“Realigned,” the soldier said.

“What does that mean?”

“Means the hospitals need the units for themselves. New cases are popping up in Salt Lake City, Las Vegas, Seattle, and Los Angeles. Everyone’s holding on to what they have in case they need it.”

Elton’s shoulders fell, stunned.

“Sorry, Doc,” the soldier said. “There’s talk of bringing some over from the East Coast. Maybe next trip.”

Elton knew better. If the disease was spreading, no hospital administrator was going to give up a piece of equipment they might need for their own patients.

He looked at the two Pelican cases. They wouldn’t be enough — and with all the information and conspiracy theories flying around the Internet, everyone in town already knew it.

A barrel-chested man wearing jeans and a faded tan Carhartt jacket stood beside a KLR motorcycle off the side of the runway. A curly head of black hair moved in the noon breeze. Brody Teeples was a known hothead and sometimes drunk. A talented cabinetmaker, he was ever spoiling for a fight. He had a mouth like a sailor and the eye of an artist. And though he was quick to crack another man’s skull for looking at him wrong, one word from his wife would cow him immediately. He loved her more than life.

And she was one of the sick.

Teeples strode over to face Elton, not caring to keep the distance of any yell-zone. His eyes, red from crying, stared holes in the doc. He hadn’t shaved in days.

“My Stephanie better get every bit of the care your family gets.” Teeples’s hands clenched in tight fists at his side. His lip quivered as he spoke.

“We don’t even know what—”

“I’m not askin’ you what it is!” Brody screamed, showing his teeth. “I’m telling you my wife had better get the care she deserves. The way I see it, your brother-in-law, who happens to also be related to the sheriff, is getting the best treatment while the rest suffer.”

Elton clenched his teeth at the accusation. He knew it would only incite things, but he slid down from his pickup to face the fuming Teeples, who had him by two inches and at least sixty pounds.

“And I’m telling you that we’re doing all we can,” Elton said.

Monte Young’s jovial voice drew Teeples’s attention away and saved Elton from the imminent beat-down.

Though nearing sixty, the sheriff was a wide, squarely built man with a strong jaw. He had a bit of a belly, but big arms and shoulders to go with it. Certainly past his prime fighting days, Young gave the impression that he would have no qualms against throwing out his back while he used his last bit of good health to give a ne’erdo-well a whipping.

“You boys didn’t hear about the whole social distancing thing?”

“I don’t give a damn about me getting sick,” Teeples said. “I just want to make sure your son-in-law takes care of somebody besides people related to you.”

“And you know he will,” Young said.

“I don’t know shit anymore, Sheriff.” Teeples shook his head, sniffing back angry tears. “The news says everyone that gets this stuff dies. They’re saying the only chance anyone has is to be on a heart-lung machine — and any fool can see they didn’t bring enough of those on that plane.”

Elton took a deep breath. “I’m going to do everything I can—”

Teeples spun, cutting him off. “Don’t you go making promises you don’t intend to keep.”

Sheriff Young moved a half step closer. “And you might consider not making threats that will get you hurt.”

“Take it like you want, Sheriff,” Teeples snapped. “But if my wife dies because your family gets better treatment, there’s gonna be hell to pay. You can count on that. And I’m starting with the little doctor man here.”

Young nodded his head as if chewing over the words. “You know,” he said at length, “they’ve given these poor National Guard boys live ammo to enforce the orders of this quarantine — and protect the hospital.”

“I’m not scared of no National Guard troops.”

“I guess I wouldn’t be, either, if I was you.” The sheriff shrugged. “They might pause before they shoot you, thinking you’re just a poor, misguided soul who’s upset over his sick wife. But they don’t know you like I do, Brody.” Young’s eyes suddenly narrowed and his voice grew stern. “I won’t make that mistake.”

“You threatening me?”

“Take it like you want,” Young said, hand on his sidearm.

A shout from the colonel drew everyone’s attention away and gave Elton a chance to move away from the stare-down and toward his truck. He drove away, leaving the sheriff and Brody Teeples posturing on the tarmac. His main concern was to lead the National Guardsmen back to the hospital with a truck full of medical supplies and the ECMO machines. There were fifteen people there with an unknown illness. No one knew how contagious it was, or how it even spread — but, for now, the hospital seemed to be the safest place in town.

CHAPTER 41

Quinn slipped out of his boots in the entry of Ayako’s studio apartment and watched as she used her fingers to fluff the moisture from her hair. Without the helmet and oversized goggles, it was easier to get a look at her. She hung the denim jacket on a hook along the wall and mopped her brow with her forearm. A white wooden bowling pin with a little black bow tie stood on the shelf just inside the door.

Quinn nearly knocked it over when he took off his jacket. “You are a bowler?” He pushed the heavy pin back a little, making sure it stayed upright.

“Not really.” Ayako gave a pensive sigh. “I once shared an apartment with another girl. If I came home and saw the bowling pin in the window I would know she was… busy with a client. It is all I have left to remind me of her.”

Quinn decided not to ask more about the girl. Instead, he took the time to study Ayako.

The short skirt, white blouse, and kneesocks were meant to replicate the look of a Japanese schoolgirl — a popular fantasy for Japanese men who hired prostitutes. Quinn couldn’t help noticing that the socks were a little too large for her tiny feet and the baggy heels hung out of the back of her slippers. She was still able to carry off the costume, but Quinn could make out the tiniest of lines around her smallish mouth. Wide, chocolate eyes, though attractive in their own way, held a weary look that liner and makeup could not hide.

“I am sure you are tired, Quinn-san,” she said in English. “Would you like something to drink?”

“Some water would be nice.”

She opened the fridge to give a look at what she could offer. “How about orange juice and toast? I doubt you got breakfast on your way across from Korea.”

“I would not turn down something to eat,” Quinn said.

Ayako moved two graphic novels and a pile of mail off the table so he’d have a place to sit. She made him toast and a poached egg to go with his juice, bantering about the Japanese intricacies of sorting recyclable trash while bustling around the small kitchen. A dishtowel hung cavalierly over her shoulder, and she spoke easily, as if she’d known Quinn all her life.

The TAG Aquaracer on Quinn’s wrist said it had been nearly twenty hours since he’d eaten anything — a long time for someone with his gaunt frame and high metabolism. Ayako sat across from him with her hands in her lap, watching intently while he ate.

“Emiko-chan says you have great skill at violent things.” Ayako rolled pink lips as if she should not have let that slip out. “She says you are the best.”

“There is no best.” Quinn smiled over the glass of juice. “Some are better on one day, others are better on the next.”

“Still,” Ayako said, fingering a little photo charm that hung from her cell phone. “I can see from the way you move that you are the man for this job.”

Quinn frowned. “What job?”

Ayako raised a penciled brow, surprised at his reaction. “Emi-chan said you were coming to help me.”

“Interesting,” Quinn said. “I was under the impression that you were going to help me.”

“She only told me you had some questions that I could answer.” Ayako shrugged. “And that you could help me sort out a problem with your particular skills.”

“She didn’t mention Oda or the girl with the foo dog tattoo?”

Ayako recoiled as if she’d been slapped. Standing quickly, she turned to a stack of dishes in the metal sink, throwing more around for effect than she actually washed.

“I am sorry if I have upset you,” Quinn said. “But I need to find this man, Oda. I believe he put this girl up to shooting someone.”

Ayako spun to face him, a dripping dishcloth in her hand. One dark kneesock puddled around a tiny ankle. Her chest heaved under the translucent cotton blouse, unbuttoned far enough to expose a little black bow at the center of her bra. Had it not been for the stricken look in her eyes, Quinn would have thought she was flirting. “Oda is…” She swallowed hard, then turned to vomit in the sink.

Quinn jumped out of his chair to steady her, but she put up her hand, shrugging him off.

“Do not touch me!”

He backed away. Emiko’s description hadn’t prepared him for this.

Slowly, her breathing calmed. She took a paper towel from a roll by the sink and dabbed at her mouth.

“I am sorry. It is only that… Oda has this effect on people. Emiko probably told you as much.” She closed her eyes as she spoke, swallowing, working to focus her thoughts.

“So you know where to find him?”

Ayako said nothing for a long time, her hands trembling as she tried to dry a clay teacup. At length, she looked up, leaning against the edge of the kitchen counter, batting her eyes. “I was never allowed to know exactly where he stays. Perhaps if you help me with my problem, you will find the answers you are after.”

“Okay…” Quinn groaned. He took his seat back at the table, skeptical. He needed this woman’s cooperation and hoped his particular skills would not get him in trouble.

Ayako folded her arms across her chest. “There are several yakuza families operating here in Fukuoka, the weakest of which is the Taniguchi clan. They are also the most dangerous, always trying to claw their way up the ladder. The second in command is a lieutenant named Sato. Emiko may have mentioned him.”

“No.” Quinn shook his head.

“That is interesting.” Ayako wrinkled her nose and pursed her lips, as if discussing the man made her want to spit. “Sato is the yakuza soldier who forced Emiko’s mother to be his concubine when her father died. Of course he tossed her to the side like a piece of trash when he was tired of her — as he does with all his women. Frankly, I believe he was more interested in Emiko, as his tastes run toward younger girls. A longtime client of mine who works for Sato told me the Taniguchi clan had some kind of issue with Oda recently. Such ‘issues’ usually mean someone has been killed in a particularly bad way. Sato will know more.”

“That’s all I can ask.” Quinn leaned back in his chair, ready to listen. “What’s this problem that you need sorted out?”

Visibly calmer now that Quinn had agreed to help, Ayako padded across the small apartment and plopped down on a love seat along the block wall. Her unmade bed was just a few feet away. Well practiced at playing an innocent schoolgirl, she draped her legs over the arm of the love seat and hugged a pillow to her chest while she stared at the ceiling. It took Quinn a moment to notice there was a poster of some Korean boy-toy heartthrob tacked up there, staring back down.

Quinn waited for her to think through her scheme. One of her kneesocks had a hole on the bottom. In fact, on closer inspection, all her clothes were frayed or worn in some way or another — just like her.

“My niece is missing,” Ayako said after a thoughtful silence. “I need you to help me get her back.”

“Kidnapped?”

“Without a doubt she is being held against her will, and I know by who,” Ayako said, still gazing up at the poster of the Korean singer who was no more than half her age.

“Sounds like a problem you should take to the police.”

“That would not turn out well.” Ayako gave a strained laugh. “The police are fully aware of what I do for a living. They would never believe any niece of mine is only an innocent university student. She would be judged by association.” Still on her back, Ayako turned her head to look at Quinn under heavy eyelids. “Do you know what they call prostitutes in Japan?”

“I know the Japanese word, if that’s what you mean.”

“There are lots of names for us,” Ayako said, giving a resigned shrug. She let her gaze return to the Korean teenager on the ceiling. “Iero kiyabu, for instance…”

Quinn shook his head, not recognizing the term. It sounded Japanese, but he’d never heard it.

“I-e-ro ki-ya-bu… yellow cab,” she said, sighing. “I supposed it is because we give rides to strangers… Miyu-chan is no iero kiyabu, no matter what they think, but since she came to visit me, the police would assume.”

“How long has she been missing and who has her?” Quinn cut to the chase, preferring not to dwell on the plight of girls in the yellow cab profession. Prostitutes made for perfect informants, and he’d dealt with many over the years in his own line of work. No two were exactly the same but most shared the common qualities of desperation and a sort of penned-up sadness that made Quinn want to beat to death the men who used them.

“Two days.” Ayako swung her legs to the floor and sat up, facing Quinn. “But she is still safe, if that’s what you are wondering. Sato is a pig but, luckily, he’s been away from the country. He prefers girls who are unsullied, so his men will keep her that way. He returns from Guam tonight. We must get to her before then. So, you see? We have a common cause.”

“And you have some idea of a plan?” Quinn asked.

“I do, now that you are here.” Ayako smiled, nodding as if it was all so clear to her. “That is the most excellent part. If Emiko says you are the best, then you are surely the best. I want you to walk into Sato’s office and say, ‘Mr. Yakuza Boss, Miyu-chan is not a prostitute. She is my friend. You must give her to me or I will cut off your genitals’… or something like that.”

It was Quinn’s turn to laugh. “And if he doesn’t give her to me?”

“Then you must keep your word and cut off his genitals.”

“Or something like that.”

“Emiko-chan would agree with me,” Ayako said. “This one deserves it.”

Quinn rubbed the stubble on his chin, thinking things through. Fatigue from the long flight and the ocean crossing was beginning to catch up with him. “Why not ask this longtime client of yours about Miyu?” He asked. “If he works for Sato, then he should know where she’s being held.”

“Watanabe stinks of urine.” Ayako scoffed. “He has moved up the ranks in the underworld, but he still acts like a chinpira.”

Quinn chuckled, almost feeling sorry for this Watanabe guy. For a woman to describe a man as Ayako had, she had to have a pretty low opinion of him. To “smell of urine” was another way of calling someone immature in Japanese. Chinpira were low-level yakuza thugs who bullied people when they thought they could get away with it but groveled to their senior bosses. Quinn had met with a few such young hoodlums during his visits to Japan. The three bozozoku thugs he’d killed in Virginia had been perfect examples of such punks. Unless they happened to be on business from a higher authority, one look that said he meant business was usually enough to send them walking the other direction — as long as they could do so with their honor intact.

“In any case,” Ayako said, “Watanabe pays me well because it makes him feel like a big man. He asks for my complete loyalty but has none for me — only his boss. Sometimes he cries in his rice wine over how sad and thankless his life is in the Japanese mafia — and then falls asleep in the hotel bed all night, keeping me from seeing other customers. It is a hazard of my chosen occupation, I suppose.” She shrugged. “No use in clenching the buttocks when the gas has already passed…”

Quinn smiled. It was the colorful Japanese equivalent to not crying over spilled milk.

“Exactly where would I find this Sato?”

“Watanabe let it slip he will attend a boxing match in Fukuoka tonight, shortly after his flight arrives from Guam.”

“So, Miyu will be with him?” Quinn asked, thinking through his options.

“I do not know,” Ayako said. “But if she is not, we can follow Sato from the fights. He is sure to go straight to her afterward. He will not want to put off partaking of such a young treasure.”

Ayako looked at her watch, suddenly springing to her feet. “Shimata!” she snapped. Dammit! “I am late. My client will be disappointed if I am not there before he leaves for work.”

She rummaged through a pile of clothes on her bed, snatching up a frilly pink blouse and matching lace apron. She put on the denim jacket and shoved the new clothes inside it, next to her body to protect them from the rain during her bike ride.

Ayako tipped her head toward the bed while she gazed in the small vanity mirror to apply pink gloss to puckered lips. “Please, get some sleep. I will be out for some time.”

Quinn looked at the pile of tangled sheets and pillows, nodding slowly.

“Do not worry,” Ayako smiled with her freshly glossed lips. “This apartment is my sanctuary. You will be the first man to ever sleep here. Now please, get some rest before we go and visit Sato tonight. You will need it if you are forced to cut off his genitals.”

CHAPTER 42

The five local doctors and the nine additional docs and nurses CDC had sent in had their hands full seeing the rapidly weakening patients. News reports said stores in virtually every city west of the Rocky Mountains had run out of food and flashlight batteries. At first, students were sent home from school if they sneezed more than once. By the second day, the schools closed altogether. Thriving communities turned into ghost towns overnight as residents opted to stay inside and fill their minds with the endless supply of conspiracy theories and fearmongering on radio, television, and social media.

The disease manifested itself in such a horrific way that the media began to show seemingly nonstop footage of boil-infested bodies, heaping on to the already hysterical fear. Grassroots groups who had once fought the government for the right not to vaccinate their children clamored for action, demanding that same government do something to stop the spread of this “biblical plague of boils.”

The number of plague victims in Kanab appeared to have leveled off at twenty-one with no new cases in the last few hours, but in a town of 4,500, half of them Mormons, there were bound to be births. Broken arms, an emergency appendectomy, and a thumb cut off in a fight with a table saw all kept hospital and clinic personnel hopping.

CDC personnel took over as soon as they were on the ground — and Elton was happy to let them. They set up a triage unit in the clinic, sealing off the connected hospital with sheets of clear plastic and duct tape. Anyone going in had to don an orange chem-bio suit complete with hood and filter. FEMA engineers had arrived shortly after the CDC, landing in a squadron of dark helicopters that were certain to raise the blood pressure of more than just the conspiracy theorists in the little southern Utah burg.

Todd Elton pulled on one of the hoods and made his way past a knot of CDC staff gathered around a quaking Mrs. Johnson as she sat on the edge of a gurney in the hallway. The poor old woman’s white hair was still in perfect order, though her frail body had been overwhelmed with red sores. She deserved her own room, but there just weren’t any left, so she joined the others in a row of rolling beds in the hallway beside the nurse’s station.

The CDC docs had consulted with him at first, but after they felt they had the lay of the land, all but pushed him to the side. He’d been in close contact with the infected, so they saw him as a potential patient. As a scientist, he couldn’t really disagree.

Elton reached the room he was looking for, knocked on the door, and pushed it open.

The man on the bed groaned, turning his head to look up. “Hey, Doc,” he whispered, licking cracked lips. His lungs rattled and wheezed. “How you holding up?”

Elton picked up the chart hanging beside the monitor. He had only known R. J. Howard a few days, but it was impossible not to like him.

“You’re a strong guy, R.J.,” he said. “If news reports are correct, you and several others in your unit picked this up overseas.”

“Yeah, the CCD guys had me answer a whole list of questions about what we did over there.” Howard grinned. “I think they figured we were running around with the massage girls or something and caught it that way. But Bedford was a hundred percent loyal.” He turned away, sighing. “I was too, a lotta good it did me…”

“I’m sure you were,” Elton said.

“Can I ask you something, Doc?” Howard kept his face toward the window, keeping the pressure off a scabby red boil behind his right ear.

“Sure.”

“I heard some of the CDC guys talking. They said that this stuff was one hundred percent fatal in Japan. Is that right?”

Elton made a mental note to talk to the lab rats about their bedside manner and patient outlook. Still, as a physician, he’d made it a policy to be direct and honest when someone asked him a question.

“I heard the same thing about the cases in Japan,” he said. “But I will tell you what I do know. Whatever this is, you and Bedford have had it longer than anyone here.”

“Hey,” Howard interrupted, licking his lips again. “How is Rick doing?”

“We’ve had to put him on a heart-lung bypass — but that’s keeping him alive. Your body is doing a much better job of fighting it than some people who have had it for less time.”

“I feel sorry for them, then, because this stuff is kicking my ass—” Howard broke into a violent coughing fit, his face dark as it struggled to get his breath before finally calming back down. He started to finish his thought, but Elton held up a hand to stop him.

“I get the picture, R.J.,” he said. “You just rest. I’ll be back to check on you in a little while.”

Elton forced a smile as he turned to leave. R. J. Howard was getting worse before his eyes. It wouldn’t be long before he’d need ECMO treatment just like Rick Bedford. And it was a sure bet the townspeople would revolt if he put the people who made them sick on the only two units available that had any chance of saving their lives.

CHAPTER 43

Quinn bought a ticket to the fights six rows from ringside for ten thousand yen — roughly the equivalent of a hundred dollars. He followed the flow of the crowd into the squat tan building known as the Kyuden Memorial Gymnasium. Aging posters from previous boxing matches, WWF wrestling, and long-ago concerts by Journey and Queen hung framed on corridor walls.

Tables set up just inside the lobby sold programs as well as bouquets of flowers fans could give the fighters. Vending machines along the wall sold Pocari Sweat and vitamin drinks. Beer, assorted brands of sake, hot dogs, and rice balls were available outside the door to the main hall.

Apart from the slight odor of seaweed from the rice balls, the smell was much like the fights Quinn went to in the States. The difference being that when he attended fights, he was usually the one wearing trunks and gloves. He had the crooked nose to prove it.

Inside the main hall, the buzz of the crowd and sight of the canvas itself flooded Quinn with a sense of nostalgia. There was a particular energy in a group that came to watch people hit each other that wasn’t found anywhere else. Boxing had a referee, judges, and plenty of rules — but it was a fight, and those who came to watch were not truly happy until they saw blood.

Quinn couldn’t blame them. He felt the same but was happiest when he was the one in the ring, drawing the blood and doing the bleeding. Still, it was a young man’s game. Every fight, in or out of the ring, took something from him — maybe not years, but definitely something. He wondered if he would have chosen to be a fighter if he had it to do over again — or if there had ever really been a choice at all. Maybe his life had chosen him.

Ayako was already in place. She ignored him when he walked by, looking for his seat number. She had gone in first and sat at the end of the bleachers, three rows up from where the scantily clad Filipina ring girls waited with their cards to number the individual rounds. The main event on this evening was an All-Asia lightweight title between a local favorite named Uta and a thick-necked boxer from the Philippines named Ortega. A sizable number of fans from the Philippines crowded the floor seating around their champion’s corner.

Ayako sat directly above them with a clear view of the ringside seating where Sato would sit. One of Uta’s major sponsors, the yakuza underboss of Taniguchi clan would get the best seats in the house, right beside the judges.

Quinn had just taken his seat beside an older Japanese man when Sato walked in surrounded by a cadre of younger subordinates. A stout man, he wore a camelhair sport coat over a black turtleneck and black slacks. His black hair was neatly trimmed and combed back to reveal a prominent widow’s peak. Wire-frame glasses gave him a studious look for a gangster.

When he reached his seat, Sato handed his overcoat to a skinny subordinate with wavy hair and a black turtleneck that matched his boss’s. From Ayako’s description, this one was likely Watanabe.

The younger man took the coat while another held the chair for Sato as he sat down. The crowd around him, including the judges already at ringside, gave the yakuza underboss deferential nods when he looked at them. He folded his arms across his belly and waited for the fight to start, apparently tired from his flight in from Guam.

Quinn studied the four subordinate gangsters. None of them was very tall, with Watanabe the tallest if not the biggest, at about five-nine. What they lacked in height, they all made up for in intensity. Each man scanned the crowd for signs of threat against their boss. All four carried themselves like bullies, men used to forcing their way in the world. They were all too happy to do the dirty work so Sato could keep his hands relatively clean.

The heaviest one — Quinn thought of him as Pig Face because of his wide, flat mug — was the apparent second in command. He stayed within arm’s reach of Sato and the others deferred to him when he spoke or even looked in their direction — especially Watanabe, who looked several times like he might wet himself when the bigger man said something to him. Pig Face weighed in at around 220, heavy for a man just over five and a half feet tall. The size of his belly caused him to have to hitch up his slacks every few seconds, exposing the slight bulge of a handgun against his black leather jacket each time.

The other two looked enough alike they could have been brothers. Both were in their mid-twenties, and while followers, had no problem staring down anyone who got near their boss. All of them, including — no, especially — Watanabe, would be armed. He didn’t look the type to do much fighting unless he had what he thought was a clear advantage.

When confronting multiple opponents, Quinn preferred to take on the toughest one first. Pig Face would earn that honor. The twins would be next. If they were brothers, they would fight for each other as much as for Sato. That would make them dangerous. Watanabe, last on the list, was not quite a pushover but definitely someone Quinn could handle — as long as he made it through all the others. One good pop in the nose would likely render the man inoperable.

Of course, there would be others where they were holding Miyu prisoner, but Quinn supposed Sato would want his best men with him and leave underlings to guard a mere girl.

A shout went up as the announcer introduced Ortega, a 134-pound bruiser at the heavy end of lightweight class. A crowd of women, some older grandma types and others busty, dark-complexioned women in tight jeans and T-shirts, shouted “Viva Philippines!” over and over as their favorite son climbed into the ring. He wore black shorts with a bright orange belt and matching boots.

A commotion arose on the near side of the ring. Drowning Pool’s “Let the Bodies Hit the Floor” began to build over the overhead loudspeaker, buzzing the cardboard program in Quinn’s hand. A small army of high school boys, still in their black uniforms, marched in from the dressing room carrying tall purple banners, like those a samurai army might have carried into battle. Each wore a white headband with the Japanese characters for Hisshou emblazoned on the front on either side of a rising sun—Must Win.

The entire gymnasium broke into raucous cheering as Uta strutted out with his entourage packed around him. He wore black shorts embroidered with a line of pink cherry blossoms.

Only in Japan, Quinn thought, would a boxer allow pink flowers on his trunks.

The crowd went wild after one of the high school boys stepped to the microphone and sang Kimigayo, Japan’s national anthem.

After a quick introduction of all the judges, the announcer stepped from the ring with his microphone, giving the exaggerated signal for the start as his feet hit ground level.

“Roundo One!”

The first four rounds of the eight-round fight easily went to Ortega. Uta, though a talented enough boxer, was badly outgunned by the taller Filipino and did a mighty job just not falling down.

Quinn let his eyes play around the crowd during the early rounds — scouting, planning. He paid special attention to Sato and the way he worked. A flick of the yakuza boss’s wrist sent Watanabe scuttling to a man who sat with his back to the wall, high in the bleachers. He was obviously a bookie. The skinny soldier handed over a long envelope, listened for a moment, then bowed deeply before scuttling back down the bleachers to whisper something to Pig Nose, who in turn whispered the information to Sato.

Up in the bleachers beside the bookie, an attractive middle-aged woman in designer jeans and a fuzzy white angora sweater leaned in to listen for instructions before standing to move ringside. She sat in a vacant seat behind the three judges. She waited for the bell, then leaned forward to whisper something to the man in the middle.

Though the yakuza underboss sat only three chairs away from the cooperative judge, by using a cutout, he was able to communicate his wishes — and thus control the outcome of the fight — without speaking to anyone directly.

By the eighth round Uta had landed some decent body blows, but all the smart money was on Ortega. Sato’s smile flickered only briefly during the last ninety seconds of the fight when Uta went down and it looked like he might have a hard time getting up. At the screaming insistence of his coach, the boy crawled to his feet and held up his gloves, nodding to the referee that he was okay to continue.

Sato’s smile returned. A minute and a half later, the fight was judged a draw. Even the Filipinos seemed resigned to the decision.

Sato and his men filed out with Watanabe bringing up the rear to collect Sato’s winnings from the bookie.

Ayako moved up beside Quinn as soon as they’d gone.

“A draw?” Quinn said, chuckling. “Does anyone really believe that?”

“Uta is Japanese.” She shrugged. “And we are in Japan. Come, they’re getting away.”

A heavy rain fell outside Kyuden Gymnasium. Car lights bounced off wet pavement, turning the streets into shining rivers of red and white light. Umbrellas blossomed everywhere like black flowers in the night.

Traffic was heavy, and it was a fairly easy task for Ayako’s Honda Super Cub to keep up with the two black yakuza Toyota sedans. At first, she insisted that she be the one to drive. It was her bike. Quinn suspected it was because she liked him grabbing her around the waist. The wet roads and Quinn’s added weight finally convinced her that she could have just as much fun holding on behind him.

Quinn stayed at least two cars back as the sedans cut through the narrow streets of a residential area, presumably watching for a tail. Looking for other yakuza families after revenge, they didn’t appear to notice the angry little prostitute and the American agent looking for answers on the yellow motorbike.

Or, Quinn thought, the yakuza underboss was drawing him into a trap.

“They’re going to Nakasu,” Ayako shouted over his shoulder, loud so he could hear her above the hissing spray of rain and din of traffic.

“Nakasu?” Quinn repeated. The word meant nothing to him.

“Have you been to Kabukicho?”

“I have,” Quinn said. Her helmet bumped against his as he stopped abruptly for traffic. “Crazy place.”

Kabukicho was the world-famous red light district of Tokyo, crammed full of hostess bars, massage parlors, prostitutes — and the criminal gangs that ran them. It was not an uncommon occurrence for a drunk salaryman to wake up without his wallet — or worse — after his drink had been spiked.

“Nakasu is like Kabukicho,” Ayako said, scrunching in close. “Only more dangerous…”

Ten minutes later, Quinn followed the black sedans across the Naka River and onto the island known as Nakasu. Pay-by-the-hour love hotels, clamoring Pachinko parlors, and brightly lit soap-bath establishments lined the twisting streets. Set apart from the rest of Fukuoka, Nakasu was exactly what its name implied, an island in the middle of two rivers.

Men in white tuxedo shirts and snappy black ties stood outside curtained storefronts, hawking the young and tender merchandise they had inside. Girls dressed in abbreviated schoolgirl uniforms stood under umbrellas. Petite costumed maids stood in open overcoats exposing short skirts and laced bustier tops while they handed out brochures among crowds of pedestrians. Flashing neon reflected off their smiling faces and heaving chests, giving the place the frenetic, strobe-light feeling of an entire neighborhood caught in a rave.

“You see something you like?” Ayako chuckled. Her chest bounced against his back as he maneuvered the little bike through the crowds.

“I guess maids are a big deal here in Nakasu,” Quinn said, shaking his head.

“Most of those girls will not actually touch you,” Ayako said. “Oh, they will call you master and charge you a great deal of money to serve you drinks. I, on the other hand, will touch all you want for a price, but I refuse to call anyone master.”

Quinn stopped suddenly, planting both feet to keep the bike upright. He watched as the sedans slowed, then turned to park in an alley behind a two-story wooden structure jammed in among a Lawson convenience store and a shop that sold graphic novels. Rainwater poured off the tile roof, splashing the grimy pavement. The sign out front said the place was a buckwheat noodle shop.

“Of course,” Ayoko said, her voice tense. “They would keep her here.”

“What is this place?” Quinn asked. He was pretty sure “noodle shop” only scratched the surface.

“If Sato catches any of his men using drugs he requires them to cut off a finger as penance,” Ayoko said. “But he has no problem selling such poison to make a profit. I have heard Watanabe talk of shipments from Korea — most likely things like yao tou.”

Chinese for “head shaking,” yao tou was the street name for Ecstasy in many parts of Asia.

Down the block, two yakuza wannabes wearing dark tracksuits hustled out with umbrellas to meet their boss and senior leaders in the arriving sedans. Both were boys, Quinn suspected high school dropouts in their late teens.

“This is sort of a middle place for the drugs,” Ayako said. “Sato will hold them here before they go out to the dealers.” Her eyes narrowed behind the round goggles. “We must be careful. If he keeps his drugs here, he will also have weapons.”

“That’s a good thing,” Quinn said. “I was starting to feel naked.”

CHAPTER 44

Five minutes later saw Quinn and Ayako standing beside the sliding wooden door in the alley alongside Sato’s noodle shop. The bike was parked safely behind a broken vending machine three buildings away.

“Once this door opens,” Quinn said, “we can’t slow down. Stay close, but not too close.”

The rain had abated some, falling now in a light mist. Ayako took a deep breath, amazingly calm for what they were about to do.

“Sato would have Miyu downstairs where he could keep her quiet,” she said. “They will surely send up an alarm as we pass through the noodle shop.”

Quinn nodded. “That is why we have to be fast. Your job is to go straight to your niece and protect her. I’ll take care of the others. Got that?”

“Got it,” Ayako said, her hand pausing at the door. Helmet and goggles abandoned with the bike, her round face shone with the rain. Wet hair clung to her skin. “I counted six plus Sato. That is a great many people to fight your way through.”

“It is.” Quinn nodded.

If there was a positive side of fighting a large group of people, it was that they tended to be overconfident. The younger, less experienced ones relied on others to look for threats, while the older hands focused on training their juniors rather than looking outbound as they should.

Pig Face, the man who had been closest to Sato at the fights, would be a different story. There was a reason a man like Sato had survived as long as he had — and Pig Face was in all likelihood that reason. Quinn would fight his way to that one. Incapacitate him and the rest would fall in place, particularly Sato.

“I need Sato alive,” Quinn said as Ayako began to slide the door open.

“For a time,” she whispered.

A bell tinkled as Quinn stepped through the door and shouldered his way past a set of hanging curtains. The sea-salt smell of warm fish stock and boiled noodles hung heavy on the humid air. A bald man wearing a white apron shouted the traditional Japanese greeting of “irashaimase!” Please come in!

The two youngsters in tracksuits stood behind a long, waist-high wooden counter talking to the man in the apron. Trays in hand, they were getting Sato his dinner. Quinn vaulted the counter, hitting the nearest kid in the nose as he moved past. The kid yowled as an entire bowl of steaming noodle soup spilled onto his chest.

The second kid dropped his tray and went for a butcher knife on the counter. His strategy was good but his tactics were slow, and Quinn was able to trap his wrist before he could bring the knife into play.

Quinn had decided before he went in that there would be no talking to anyone but Sato. The overwhelming odds of seven against one made no room for error — or compassion.

He turned the boy’s wrist back on itself, snapping the bones and allowing him to grab the blade before it fell. Quinn’s attack was brutal, striking the young gangster repeatedly with the knife in the chest and neck, then letting him fall as he turned on his partner.

Half blinded by the pain from a bath in scalding soup, the other man didn’t notice Quinn had focused on him until it was too late.

Both men lay dead on the kitchen floor half a heartbeat later, their bodies facedown in a bloody mixture of noodle soup and gore. Quinn looked up at the cook and put a finger to his lips.

“Shhh,” he spoke in Japanese. “I will not waste words on men who would keep an innocent girl prisoner for someone else to rape.” He turned the knife so the long blade glinted in the stark light of the kitchen. “Are you such a man?”

The cook shook his head, lips clenched into a tight line. “No, no… I am but a noodle cook.”

“Where is Sato,” Quinn hissed, still turning the blade.

The cook glanced toward the back of the restaurant. “Downstairs.” He gulped. “There are four others with him.”

“And the girl?”

The cook clenched his eyes together, bowing his head. “Yes,” he whispered, gulping as if he knew the information would get him killed. “She is down there as well, in a small bedroom directly under the kitchen.” He blinked tearful eyes. “Please, show mercy, I beg you. Sato is a violent man. He makes me pay him a percentage of my income for the privilege of having him do business in my shop.”

“Leave,” Quinn hissed in guttural Japanese. “Leave now and don’t look back.”

The addled cook was moving before Quinn finished the sentence. He left the sliding door open, exposing the curtains to a torrent of wind and rain.

Ayako stood at the counter, staring down at the two dead teenagers on the floor. “They were bad boys,” she whispered. “And would have grown into evil men.”

Neither of the dead had a gun, so Quinn kept the butcher knife.

“You would go against four of Sato’s men with a kitchen blade?” Ayako gave a smiling nod of approval. “Emiko told me you were such a man.”

“It does the job.” Quinn shrugged as he made his way to the back of the restaurant. “Remember, your job is to find Miyu.”

The stairs leading down to the basement were made of dark, well-worn wood and likely dated back to before World War II. Quinn moved down them with purpose, knowing the creaking steps would take away any chance at surprise.

Years of hunting animals in Alaska had taught him that tentative movement drew attention to itself. Sato and, more important, Pig Face expected the two underlings to bring down noodle soup at any moment. Although they were sure to look up at the approach, they were not likely to arm themselves right away.

An impatient voice came from around the corner as the last stair creaked under Quinn’s weight. “Hurry up, you two,” the voice snapped, growing closer. It was low, as one might speak to a dog. “The boss is getting impatient—”

Quinn met one of the twins with the point of the butcher knife, driving it deep into the V of his collarbone at the base of the windpipe. He stepped past as the sputtering man sank to his knees. Unable to cry out or do anything more than gurgle, the man’s fingers clutched his neck, vainly trying to stanch the spray of blood.

The second twin drew his pistol and did enough shouting for himself and his downed partner. Quinn caught a flash of movement in the corner of his eye. He turned a fraction of a second too late to stop the crashing blow of a glass beer mug as it impacted the back of his head.

Stunned and reeling, he let the knife slip from his hand. He staggered forward, knowing he had to close the distance before the second twin brought the pistol into play. He hit the man with all his force, driving him backward and grabbing the wrist that held the pistol.

Someone hit him again, this time low in the kidney with a series of potent fists that sent waves of nausea through his gut and took him to his knees. The twin with the pistol wrenched away, cursing from nerves and disgust. Strong hands grabbed Quinn by either arm, hauling him to the desk where Sato sat smugly watching the encounter as if he was used to such things happening virtually in his lap. A trembling girl cowered on a cushion behind him, eyes red from nonstop crying. She wore a T-shirt and cutoff jeans, likely the same clothes she’d been wearing at the time she was abducted.

A fist thudded into Quinn’s kidney again to get his attention. Unseen hands bent him forward to rub his face against the desk as if trying to smear him into the polished wood. Quinn swallowed hard, trying not to vomit from the excruciating pain in his back.

“Who are you?” Sato said. An air of smug superiority hung over him like a dark cloud. “And more importantly, where are my noodles?”

The man to Quinn’s right cackled with laughter at his boss’s joke. This must have been the groveling Watanabe whom Ayako had told him about.

Sato gave him an amused grin.

“Really now. Who are you?” He nodded toward Ayako. The surviving twin had both her arms pulled behind her back. “You are with the whore, so I must suppose you have come for my young prize.” He wagged a bony finger back and forth. “An unwise move, I can assure you…”

A short dagger, not unlike Quinn’s blade, Gentle Hand, rested on a small maple stand to the yakuza boss’s right. It was mere inches from Quinn’s face.

“Trade…” Quinn mumbled. He eyed the dagger with his teeth pressed against the desk. His words were slurred, but he could tell from the half grin on Sato’s face that he’d gotten the point across.

“What did you say?” The yakuza lieutenant smirked at the fact that his prisoner would even speak, let alone try to bargain with him. He flicked his fingers at the two captors, motioning for them to ease up enough so that Quinn could be understood.

“You are correct, Sato-san.” Quinn moved his aching jaw back and forth. He bent in a modified half bow once he was allowed to stand, still wincing from the blows to his back. “We have come to retrieve Miyu-chan. She is not what you believe her to be.”

“Oh, I doubt that.” Sato smirked. “I believe her to be pure and unsullied by other men — nothing like her filthy tramp of an auntie.”

Quinn let out a long, panting sigh. “Then I suppose she is exactly what you believe her to be,” he said. “But that does not change the fact that I have come to get her back.”

Rough hands still held on tight to his arms. He’d been right about Pig Face; the man held his left arm like a vise. It threatened to cut off all circulation from the elbows down. Watanabe put on a good show but was without a doubt the weak link of Sato’s lackeys.

Quinn shot a quick glance at Ayako. She fluttered long lashes and gave him an almost imperceptible nod. He hoped it meant she had control of her own situation and was just waiting for his move.

“Shall we take him to the boat?” Watanabe offered. Quinn could feel a trembling surge of emotion run through the man’s hands each time he spoke directly to his boss.

“There is always time to resort to more violent measures,” Sato said. He peered at Quinn. “I find myself interested to hear exactly what you believe you have to trade.”

“This is a matter of honor.” Quinn stood up straighter. “You will return the girl unharmed — and I will cut off a little finger.”

CHAPTER 45

Sato leaned back in his chair, arms folded across his chest. On his left hand, he wore a gold ring with a milky white stone. It looked like a human tooth — likely that of some past enemy, Quinn thought. The yakuza underboss looked him up and down.

“Your Japanese is excellent,” he said. “Are you European?”

“I am serious,” Quinn said, earning another jab to the kidney. He swayed on his feet, waiting for the sickening waves to pass.

“The boss asked you a question,” Pig Face said, hitting him again for good measure.

Quinn sagged on his ankles, forcing the two men to work harder to hold him up in front of Sato. He was certain another punch like that would knock him out — and probably send him to the hospital.

“I… I… am not European,” he panted. “Forgive me… I knew it was a breach of etiquette to barge into your place, but please understand, Miyu-chan is the niece of my friend. I mean what I say. I will give you a little finger to atone.”

“That would be a very interesting thing to witness,” Sato mused. “You are aware that in my world, one has to make the finger fly himself.”

“I understand.” Quinn let his head hang down in humility.

“I must admit that we would all enjoy such entertainment.” Sato slid the maple stand along with the dagger across the desk. He nodded at Watanabe.

The yakuza soldier released his grip on Quinn and stepped tentatively away. Then, as if he’d done this many times before, he took a white handkerchief from the pocket of his jacket and placed it flat on the corner of the desk. He drew a pistol from his waistband, then slid the dagger so it lay against the edge of the cloth.

Quinn waited for the reassuring pressure of the gun’s muzzle against his neck as Watanabe stepped behind him. The closer the weapon was to the target, the easier it was for that target to move out of the line of fire. And, more important, if Watanabe was close enough to touch Quinn, he was close enough for Quinn to touch him back. It was a rookie mistake — and it would cost the man dearly.

Quinn placed his right hand flat on the cloth, fingers spread. He took a deep breath, settling his thoughts — and then slowly picked up the blade with his left. Pig Face followed his movement, continuing to hold his upper arm like he might fly away if released.

“I have seen this done before,” Sato said. “Take it from me, you cannot simply saw off a finger. The bone, though small, gets in the way. It must be more of a… chop.” He turned to Pig Face. “Did not Tanda-kun use a chisel?”

Quinn made his move while Pig Face was busy answering his boss.

Turning his head just enough to get out of the line of fire, he let Watanabe’s first round fly past. Quinn lowered his center, stepping back so Watanabe’s gun hand extended well over his shoulder before grabbing the wrist and bringing it down in an arm bar, using his own collarbone as a fulcrum. Trapping Watanabe’s pistol in his right hand, Quinn brought the dagger in his left hand backward, arcing the flashing blade across the tender flesh of Pig Face’s throat. Tendons at Watanabe’s elbow crunched. His finger convulsed on the trigger, firing a round into the wall just inches over Sato’s head. Pig Face’s grip fell away and he sagged to his knees, unable to believe the man he’d just pounded had killed him so quickly.

Quinn wrenched Watanabe’s wrist sideways. The pistol clattered to the floor and the man’s fingers splayed open. In the same breath, Quinn reached up and hacked off the screaming soldier’s extended little finger, letting it thud neatly to the white cloth. Blood arced from the wound, spraying the desk and Sato’s face along with it.

Still unsure of what was going on behind him, Quinn stepped under Watanabe’s outstretched arm, reversing his wrist and flipping the squalling man over on his head, all the while retaining his grip on the trapped, and now mutilated, hand.

Quinn ducked to grab the pistol before Sato could retrieve a weapon from his desk. A broad smile crossed his lips as he leveled the gun at the yakuza boss. “I never said the offer was for my finger.”

With both Sato and Ayako now in view, he was able to see that she had stabbed her captor in the side of his neck with a small blade she’d produced from her bra. The screaming man lay on the floor clutching himself and writhing in a rapidly growing pool of his own blood.

Miyu flung herself toward the safety of Ayako.

“Which one took you?” Ayako asked, brushing a lock of hair out of Miyu’s face.

The girl shot a frightened glance at Watanabe, nodding at him.

“You?” Ayako stared wide-eyed at the bleeding yakuza soldier. He leaned against the wall, leg’s splayed, clutching his mutilated hand. Without another word, she stepped over and kicked him twice in the groin before he could roll into a tight ball. Head hanging toward the floor in pain and shame, he alternated between whimpers and dry heaves.

Sato set his jaw and clapped his hands in mock applause. “Well played,” he said. “But surely a man of your skill did not just come for the girl.”

“Perceptive,” Quinn said, speaking low Japanese as if he was speaking to a dog, or worse yet, as Sato might speak to a woman. “It is easy to see why you are in charge.” Considering the man’s past history with Emiko’s mother, Quinn wondered what Emiko would do to him now, if she were there.

Ayako removed the thin leather belts from two of the dead yakuza and tied Sato’s hands to the arms of his heavy desk chair.

The gangster looked on with detached interest. He must have assumed that if they were going to kill him, they would have done so already. In truth, Quinn hadn’t made up his mind.

“I understand you have information about Oda.”

Sato blanched white as if his throat and not Pig Face’s had just been cut. Beads of sweat formed on his upper lip at the mention of the man’s name.

“You are the underboss of a powerful yakuza family,” Quinn said. “Surely you are not frightened of this man.”

Sato shook his head. Face was everything to a yakuza chief. Loss of it meant giving up control, and lack of control in his world meant certain death. He breathed deeply as he weighed his options.

Quinn kept the handgun pointed at Sato’s chest. “You know where he is?”

“I do not,” Sato said.

“Then you are no good to me.” Quinn’s finger tightened on the trigger.

“Wait!” Sato screamed. “Tanaka is the boss. He would know where Oda is.”

“I see.” Quinn nodded. “And where do I find this boss of yours?”

“I would have to set up the meeting.” Sato’s face twitched.

Quinn shot a glance at Ayako, who’d been whispering in the corner with her niece. She shook her head, then stood to stride purposefully to the desk.

Staring down at Sato with a molten hatred unique to tormented women, she leaned in, her lips brushing his ear.

“We saved Miyu,” she hissed. “But you will just find another girl and do the same thing to her.”

“I—”

“Shut up!” Ayako pressed the point of her dagger to his shoulder. “You take whatever you want with no thought to the suffering you cause. Let me tell you what it feels like to be on the receiving end of such treatment…”

Sato’s lips pulled back in a tight line, revealing his teeth.

“Such violation is a slow arrow through the heart,” Ayako whispered. “First there is a terror, then helplessness — then pain…” She pressed the blade home, slowly at first, using the flat of her hand to drive it deep into the fleshy part of Sato’s upper arm.

Sato jerked hard against the belts holding his wrists, arching his back as the blade severed nerve and muscle.

Quinn wondered how many helpless young women he’d terrorized, sending them into such spasms as they tried in vain to get away. He touched Ayako’s hand when she withdrew the knife and moved to stab Sato again. She wilted immediately. Hand trembling, she let the bloodstained blade clatter to the desk.

Killing a man was no small thing. She’d already done it once tonight, and Quinn wanted to save her from the added memory of another. Sato’s black eyes flicked back and forth as he watched the exchange, his body collapsing against the chair when he realized Ayako wasn’t going to end him right there.

He should not have relaxed so soon.

Quinn turned to a whimpering Watanabe, who had come to his senses enough to stare wide-eyed at his thrashing superior’s treatment at the hands of a woman he paid for sex. Up to now, he’d been so absorbed in his own injuries that he’d paid no attention to what was going on.

Quinn gave him a nod. “I’m assuming you can take us to Tanaka.”

“Yes, yes, yes!” Watanabe nodded his head so hard it looked as if he might break his own neck.

“I told you he smelled of urine,” Ayako said, looking up from where she comforted Miyu-chan.

Quinn rubbed his chin with the rear sight of the pistol. It was an H&K P30 and fit his hand perfectly.

“Here’s the deal,” he said. “Go tell Tanaka exactly what happened here. Make sure you tell him we killed six of his guys and whacked your pinkie off with relative ease. Then, tell him I’ve got his shipment of Ecstasy.”

Watanabe looked up, kneeling, both hands flat on the ground in front of him, subservient.

Quinn was tempted to prod him with a foot but didn’t want to make the mistake of getting too close unnecessarily. “You understand?”

“Yes, yes,” he said. Blood pooled on the floor around his mutilated hand. “I understand.”

“You have Ayako-chan’s cell number?”

“Yes.”

“Then get out of here.” Quinn pitched the man his severed finger. “And tell Tanaka he doesn’t have forever to get back in touch.”

Watanabe flailed to his feet and disappeared up the stairs as if being chased by a ghost.

Suddenly exhausted, Quinn looked around the room at the blood and devastation. The cloying smell of blood and urine filled the basement room.

“Take Miyu-chan ahead.” He waved Ayako out the door but kept his eyes focused on a quaking Sato. A picture of Emiko Miyagi as a motherless child flashed across his mind. “I have one more thing I have to do.”

CHAPTER 46

Dr. Todd Elton filled a syringe and set the glass ampule on the shelf. A commotion of voices drew him out to the hallway just as Brody Teeples pushed open the door and barged through the clinic like a snowplow. A look of barely contained anger boiled under a heavy, furrowed brow. Huge hands, calloused and used to working outside in the weather, clenched into white-knuckled fists.

Elton considered running, but there was nowhere to go. Three pregnant women took up all the exam rooms, and a guy with a compound fracture in his wrist was sacked out on the table in the X-ray lab. With all the rooms full, patients lined the hallway — a guy who’d been in a fight with a table saw held a piece of his thumb in a wadded paper towel, a man with the perfect imprint of a horse hoof over his collarbone, and a seventeen-year-old high school girl who’d stepped on a rusty nail while going out to bottle-feed her calf. A half dozen more Elton hadn’t spoken with yet sat, stood, and slumped up and down the narrow hall.

“I want to see my wife!” Teeples bellowed, ignoring all the other patients. “Where is she?”

Elton put up a hand, forcing himself not to backpedal. He swam, jogged, skipped rope, and even did a little CrossFit to stay in shape — all good, honest exercises that didn’t involve bashing his fists into other people’s faces. In a time like this, clean blood work and an excellent body mass index was bound to work against him.

Teeples outweighed him by at least eighty pounds and, judging from his nose, got in a knockdown drag-out fight at the bars nearby at least once a week just for the fun of it.

“I don’t even know if she’s still alive!” Teeples said, coming to a stop two feet away. “You are gonna take me to her right damn now!” He jabbed the doctor in the chest with a thick index finger at each word.

Elton took a reflexive step back, rubbing his chest. It occurred to him that he’d never really been hit in the face before. Judging by how painful the chest pokes were, he’d be lucky if a full-blown punch with a fist didn’t knock him out cold.

Brandy stepped out of one of the exam rooms and moved to help. Elton motioned her to stay back.

“Your wife’s over in the hospital, Brody.” He raised both hands, hoping it looked conciliatory. “I’m not going to lie to you. She’s very sick. It’s too dangerous for you to see her right now. Anyway, the CDC is in charge of who comes and goes. Not me.”

“I’m going to see for myself.” Teeples strode forward, raising his fist and brandishing it like a hammer to make a point. “I don’t give a shit what you or the CDC—”

Elton realized he was still holding the syringe. Without thinking, he jabbed it into the man’s bicep, giving him the full injection.

Teeples lashed out, but it was fearful instead of vindictive and more of a glancing blow. Still, it caught Elton on the chin and sent him staggering back against the wall. He had to catch himself to keep from falling on the guy holding the severed thumb.

“What the hell was in that?” Teeples bellowed.

“Okay.” Elton held up his hands again to ward off any further attack. He worked his jaw back and forth. It wasn’t as bad as he’d thought it would be. “Just stay calm. We can fix this.”

Teeples’s face darkened. “What are you talking about? What did you give me?”

“You’ll be fine,” Elton said. “As long as we get you treated right away.”

“What do you mean treated?” Teeples rubbed his arm. He’d knocked the syringe to the floor and now stared at the bent thing where it lay empty on the carpet. “Treated for what?”

Elton turned to Brandy, gambling that Teeples spent his time fighting in bars rather than watching reruns of House and Chicago Hope. “I need you to get me ten milligrams of midazolam right away.”

Brandy was a good PA and a smart lady, but the stress of the situation had her a little slow on the uptake. “But Doc—”

Elton cut her off. “Just do it before this man goes into anaphylactic shock.”

Teeples nodded his big head. “Just do it,” he parroted.

“I’m sorry, Brody,” Elton said. “You startled me, so I defended myself with what I had in my hand.”

“If you made me sick I’m gonna kick your ass!”

“Let’s get you treated first,” Elton said, struggling to keep his voice steady. “Then we can talk about ass kicking.”

“Here you go, Doctor,” Brandy said. She handed him the syringe. “This should do the trick.”

Ten minutes later, they had Brody Teeples strapped to a wheelchair in the waiting room with an oxygen mask over his face. His head lolled, but he was a big man and it would take a lot of any drug to put him under completely.

Sheriff Monte Young had come to take him into custody for criminal trespass once his breathing had stabilized.

“What’d you use to knock him out?” The sheriff asked.

“Versed.” Elton sighed. “We use it during colonoscopies…”

“Fittin’ ”—Young chuckled—“considering the patient.”

“I feel all weird,” Teeples said, blinking as if he couldn’t quite get anything to focus. “I think that doc gave me some bad stuff.”

“Hmmm.” The sheriff chuckled. “You know when your last tetanus shot was?”

Teeples shook his big head. “Nope,” he said.

“About fifteen minutes ago…”

CHAPTER 47

By one in the morning Quinn and Ayako had put an exhausted Miyu on the first train they could find going back to her parents north of Tokyo. Quinn was soaked with rain and limping badly by the time they returned to the apartment. A sickening ache crawled up his spine from his left kidney.

“I insist you take the bed,” Ayako said, using the screen of her cell phone to illuminate the door so she could find the lock with the key.

A familiar but almost imperceptible flutter hit Quinn low in the gut. Without taking time to process, he grabbed Emiko’s shoulder, stopping her in her tracks. Index finger to his lips, he forgot about the pain and stepped to the side of the door. He took Ayako’s hand and pointed the light from her phone at the threshold below. Flecks of mud and grime from the street formed the partial outline of a footprint on the scuffed metal. The yakuza boss had not wasted any time sending someone for his drugs once Watanabe had passed on the message. Ayako had thought no one knew where she lived, but there were too many eyes in a country as crowded as Japan. Information was easy to find, particularly for an organized crime boss with Tanaka’s reach.

Quinn eased the pistol out of his waistband, pulling Ayako away from the door as he spoke.

“No, I’ll take the couch,” he said, keeping up appearances. “I couldn’t sleep if I knew I’d kicked you out of your own bed.” He leaned in close to whisper something in Ayako’s ear. She nodded in the dim light, understanding. Behind her, over the rail of the balcony, a heavy rain fell through the blackness like silver bullets under the bright glow of a streetlamp.

Rather than walk straight into an ambush, Quinn pushed the door open and counted to three. He’d returned the pistol to his waistband so he’d have both hands free. Ayako stood beside him. On three, he gave her a pat on the small of her back.

“Something is wrong,” she said at the signal, loud enough anyone inside would be able to hear. Quinn nodded and she ran as fast as she could, passing in front of the open door with a scrambling shuffle of feet on wet concrete. Quinn stood fast, just outside in the darkness.

He didn’t have long to wait before three men poured out of the door like bees from a bothered hive, hot on Ayako’s trail. The first in line was an older, broad-shouldered man in a red leather blazer. Quinn had seen him earlier at the boxing match, sitting up beside the bookie. The other two were young heavies, probably from the same gym, in need of a little street cred with the local yakuza boss.

“Hey!” Quinn yelled, getting the men’s attention. Lightning flashed, illuminating his face for a split second before he ducked into the open apartment.

All three pulled up short, piling into each other like a Japanese version of Keystone Cops before turning back.

Once inside the door, Quinn grabbed Ayako’s bowling pin off the shelf — a tool of opportunity — and sidestepped like a matador. He gave the lead boxer a snoot full of the wooden pin as he barged in, dislocating his jaw and pulling him past to make room for his friends. Quinn caught the next man under the chin with the heavy pin, snapping his head up, then bringing the pin back down to drive him to the floor. It was a devastating blow, and the guy would be lucky if it didn’t kill him. Quinn didn’t have time to care. It was better than what the men had planned for him.

Finally, the older man with the red jacket charged through the door with his pistol out and ready to shoot. Quinn knocked the weapon to the side with a swipe of the bowling pin, but the man kept coming, shouldering his way inside Quinn’s swing before he could hit him again.

The man bellowed a bone-chilling cry. A wicked left hook came out of nowhere, sending a fountain of stars exploding behind Quinn’s eyes. His elbow ached from the police dog attack, and the earlier pounding to his kidneys slowed him down. He stumbled, crashing into the coatrack before he caught himself.

The guy in the red jacket hit him when he spun, this time with two straight jabs to the chin. Quinn let his head snap back, blocking the second jab and countering with a right uppercut to the guy’s jaw. It was a glancing blow and Quinn’s fist slid by with little effect. Not worried about any Marquess of Queensberry rules, Quinn brought his forearm across his opponent’s face on the backswing, snapping his head sideways and stunning the man long enough for Quinn to send an elbow strike into the bridge of the bad guy’s nose, pushing him toward the bed.

Rather than fight, the man pedaled backward, reaching behind him for what Quinn supposed was a second gun. Quinn rolled, grabbing the large pillow from Ayako’s love seat. He shoved it against the other man’s chest as he drew his own pistol, pressing it in tight and pulling the trigger twice in rapid succession. The shots were muffled by the thick foam of the pillow.

Ayako’s voice was breathless behind him.

“Oh my…” she said softly. “Tanaka-san will soon run out of men.”

Quinn let the dead man slump to the ground.

“We can’t stay here. He’s sure to send more thugs once these don’t report back.”

Ayako knelt beside her bed and began to stuff clothes into a small duffel. Satisfied she had what she needed, she stood and grabbed a soft-sided guitar case that leaned against the wall.

“A guitar?” Quinn looked at the case.

“You’ll see.” She slung the case over her shoulder.

Quinn nodded, gritting his teeth. The rush of the fight subsiding, he had to lean against the wall to steady himself amid waves of nausea and pain.

“Come.” Ayako touched his shoulder, helping him toward the door. “You need to stop fighting for a few hours. I know a place. It will be drafty, but it is safe.”

CHAPTER 48

An old and bent man with a shaved head and the dark robes of a Buddhist monk stood in the shadows under a black umbrella, framed by a heavy timber gate. It was the only apparent opening in a white stone wall that ran in either direction to disappear in the sheets of rain. Weak yellow light from a rusty oil lantern pooled at the old man’s feet. A game of Angry Birds on a smartphone illuminated his face as Ayako rode up with Quinn on the little yellow motorbike.

“Kobo-san,” Ayako called out. “Thank you for meeting us.”

The old man shook his head. He slipped the cell phone inside his robes as Ayako brought the little bike to a crunching stop on the gravel.

“I do not know about enlightenment.” Kobo chuckled. “But I feel certain I could achieve a sense of no-thought if I played that silly game long enough.” He bowed to Ayako and pulled the gate open, waving them inside.

The sharp odor of burning incense hung on the moist air, hitting Quinn’s nose and rousing his tired senses. Tall Japanese cedars stood close together like ranks of towering soldiers in the night. The thin sliver of orange light from the old monk’s lantern did little to push back the inky darkness. A steady rain dripped from the high branches in pattering staccato along the wood and stucco wall surrounding the grounds.

Bone-tired and stooped in pain, Quinn trudged behind Ayako as she pushed the little bike through the gate. They followed the crunch of the old man’s footfalls in the gravel, down the silver ribbon of gravel toward a small wooden house nestled among the shadowed trees.

“There are quilts and futons inside,” Kobo said, shining his lamp toward the dark cottage. Rain poured off the tile roof in a steady stream, hissing to the gravel below. “You may take your rest here.”

Ayako began to explain their situation, but Kobo put up his hand.

“Please,” he said. “Rest. Reasons do not matter to me, nor should they matter to you. Each of us is in need of a safe haven from time to time.”

The monk left the lantern with them and crunched away in the darkness under his umbrella, his path lit only by the Angry Birds launching across his phone.

The cottage, originally meant for itinerant monks, was set well off the main path behind the small Buddhist temple and surrounded by drooping cedars. Towering obelisks of black granite, situated on either side, looked like tall black holes cut out of the night. There was no electricity, and the lamp cast only a hazy orange shadow on the heavy ceiling beams and rough-hewn floor. The place was seldom used, and dust puffed up at every movement. Even Quinn, who was frightened by little in the world, found it impossible not to think of spiders.

Ayako dragged the futon mats from a closet at the far side of the fifteen-by-fifteen room.

“Quinn-san, please,” she said, unfolding the futons and situating two hard buckwheat pillows side by side. “You do not look well. I think you should get off your feet.”

In truth, Quinn felt as though he might pass out at any moment. The constant optempo since Kim’s shooting, coupled with a steady stream of adrenaline, the dog bite, and one savage beating after another, had stacked up to drive him to his knees.

A soft rapping at the door caused him to draw the H&K pistol. Kobo said something Quinn couldn’t hear, and Ayako opened the door to retrieve two small sandwich bags of crushed ice.

She closed the door and turned the flimsy lock.

“He saw you are hurt,” she said, “and thought some ice might help with the pain.”

Quinn stripped off his leather jacket and set the pistol on top of it next to the pillow.

“Ice is probably a good idea.”

He sank to the mattress with a long, low groan. The futon was clammy, laden with dust, and filled with lumpy cotton stuffing. Each mattress was roughly six feet long and three feet wide. Barely a few inches thick, they were meant for a springy tatami-mat floor instead of the hard wood of the temple house. Quinn was too exhausted to care.

Ayako knelt beside him. “Please,” she said softly, “roll over on your stomach.”

The old lamp’s tiny orange flame did little to light the room, and Quinn blinked up at her in the darkness.

“What?”

“You are skilled at killing,” she whispered. “I am skilled at taking care of the pains of a man. Besides, do you not know the saying ‘cold as the heart of a whore’?”

“Your back is badly bruised.” She held up the plastic bags, smiling softly. “Kobo has brought us two bags of ice and I offer my cold heart to help heal you.”

The intense cold of the ice over his kidney pushed back the worst of the pain almost as soon as Ayako put the bag on Quinn’s back. She moved it expertly every few minutes, never allowing any one place to get uncomfortably cold, yet still allowing for the ice to do its job.

“You spoke of a girl who works for Oda,” she said, the flat of her hand gently on the bare skin over his kidney, warming it slightly between applications of ice.

“She is supposed to have a tattoo,” Quinn said. “A foo dog… a komainu, like Oda.”

Quinn didn’t know how much Ayako knew, so he didn’t mention anything about Ran being Emiko Miyagi’s daughter.

“I see,” Ayako said, her hand trembling at the talk of Oda. Quinn thought of probing a little deeper but decided he didn’t have the energy at the moment for such a discussion.

She leaned back, kicking her legs out to one side so her knees were only inches from Quinn’s face where he lay against the buckwheat pillow.

She held her ankle with one hand as she spoke. “I believe we each have a moment that we live for. Something very important toward which our entire life is aimed.”

Quinn nodded, fighting sleep.

“I am convinced that this is but a detour in your life, Quinn-san.” She bit her lip as if she did not want to continue, but felt she must. “My meeting you, to help you in what you and I are doing… I believe this may be my one moment…”

Quinn reached out to touch the back of her hand that held her ankle. It seemed cruel to leave her sitting there alone in the dark. A tear fell from above and landed on his wrist.

“We have a saying here in Japan,” she whispered. “All married women are not wives.”

Quinn nodded but said nothing.

“If I had not decided to become a prostitute… do you think I would have made a good wife?”

“Of course,” Quinn said, blinking back sleep.

She rubbed away the tear on his hand. “I do as well,” she said.

Exhaustion crept in like a drug as the ice and Ayako’s touch chased away more pain. Quinn jerked, catching himself as he fell asleep.

He was vaguely aware of the warmth of Ayako’s body as she crawled in beside him and pulled the musty quilt over them both. His last memory before he drifted off was the smell of cigarettes and the candy scent of her strawberry shampoo. She said something to him, her voice soft and whiskeyed, but he was asleep before it registered as tender.

Quinn woke six hours later to the sound of the sliding door rattling in the wooden track. Hand on the H&K, he sat up, blinking, working to clear his head. A sickening ache low in his back brought the memories of the night before flooding back to him. Still, the ice and sleep had helped and he was feeling somewhat better.

The door clacked open and Ayako appeared, carrying a pink cloth grocery bag in one hand and her striped helmet in the other. She dropped her keys on the rough timber table and ducked her head toward Quinn in a polite bow.

“You are awake,” she said. “I have had no calls yet from that devil Watanabe.”

“Tanaka is zero for nine.” Quinn yawned, trying to work the kinks out of his spine. “He can’t let us continue to kill his men without addressing the problem.

Besides, he’ll want his tao tou back.” Quinn returned the pistol to the Transit jacket and fell back onto the futon to stare up at a cobweb on the ceiling beams. “He’ll call.”

“In any case,” Ayako said, “you need to eat. The kitchen here is rudimentary at best. But please forgive my clumsiness. Before you arrived, it was many years since I prepared anything more than a mixed drink for a man.” She held up a small wooden box containing four pink skeins of tiny fish eggs. Each skein was about six inches long and the diameter of a small squash. “Emiko said you like Japanese food.”

“I do.” Quinn nodded, his mouth suddenly watering at the thought of a meal.

“I got mentaiko,” she said. “Spiced cod roe. We are known for it here in Fukuoka.”

“Sounds delicious.” Quinn couldn’t help smiling as he watched Ayako putter around the simple wooden counter that served as a kitchen in the small cottage. Her hair still hung in damp locks from her shopping trip in the morning rain. She’d slipped off her wet sweatpants and jacket to reveal a pink Hello Kitty T-shirt and loose violet gym shorts that matched the slippers she’d brought in the duffel from her apartment.

The softness of the colors reminded Quinn of an Easter egg. He wondered if she realized that though she worked each day to make herself alluring with costumes and makeup, it was now, fresh from the rain and dressed in plain T-shirt and shorts, that her natural beauty shone through.

Perhaps, Quinn thought, she knew exactly what she was doing and had expertly dialed in on what Quinn found attractive.

“There is a tub in the room behind that screen there.” She pointed to the back wall of the cottage, beside the closet where the mattresses had been stored. “I lit the heater earlier, so the water should be hot. Please, go ahead and have a bath. Breakfast will be ready by the time you are finished.”

The comforting smell of miso soup filled the cottage as Quinn removed the planks that covered the wooden tub and lowered himself into the water. It was small, thankfully with only room for one, but deep enough to soak all the way to his shoulders. Like most Japanese he’d met, Ayako apparently liked her baths somewhere just south of a rolling boil. Quinn knew he really needed more ice but hurt too bad to care. He kept his movement to a minimum and was soon used to the heat. His ribs were certainly cracked from the boot treatment he’d received from the Fairfax County officer. The beer mug at Sato’s had given him a knot the size of a golf ball behind his ear, and his left kidney felt swollen to twice its normal size.

Breathing in the heady aroma of miso and the hint of Ayako, who must have already bathed, Quinn leaned his head back and marveled that he’d lived through yet another day. He was stiff, bruised, and pissing blood, but he was alive. He took a quick look at the H&K pistol within easy reach on the folded towel, then closed his eyes to consider his situation.

He’d been in Japan for less than forty-eight hours and was already beginning to lose count of the casualties he’d left in his wake. Some were a blur, some stood out in vibrant detail. It had taken him five full minutes of scrubbing to get the blood from the night before out from under his fingernails. Someday, there would be a mental reckoning for the things he’d done, the way he lived. Even with good intentions and the weight of the government behind him, repeated violence came with a high price, and he was living on credit. But he’d decided long ago to do his job and let the shrinks worry over him when the time came.

For now, he had bigger things to fret about than any mental collapse on the horizon. He was a fugitive, wanted for murder and escape. They’d probably pile kidnapping on since he’d handcuffed the officers to the signpost. He was hiding out with a Japanese prostitute he hardly knew, was in possession of a pistol he’d stolen from an organized crime boss who wanted him dead, and sitting on a shipment of illicit Korean Ecstasy — not to mention a couple of other items that would be sure to get him five days in the electric chair if the Fukuoka police happened to walk in.

“Ahhh, Veronica,” he said under his breath. “If you could see me now.” He chuckled and felt the searing heat of the water from even that small movement. Of course Ronnie would be the first person to his mind. He fretted over Kim and agonized over Mattie’s safety — but thoughts of Ronnie Garcia were always in front of all else.

Thibodaux was right. It would be a woman that did him in. Thibodaux was right about a lot of things.

Ayako set out a simple spread of rice balls wrapped in seaweed and pickled radish to go with the miso soup and spicy cod roe. Had it not been for the hot bath, Quinn wouldn’t have been able to fold himself into position on the cushion at the low wooden table. As it was, he had to move the table to one side of the room so he could lean his back against the wall.

Ayako used the points of her chopsticks to tear a bite-size piece of the red, pepper-flecked mentaiko and popped it into her mouth. Quinn followed her example and found it delicious — like the eggs on the outside of a California roll but with more substance.

“I cannot remember the last time I had breakfast with a nice man,” she said, waving her chopsticks in small circles as she spoke around a mouthful of food. “Or any man at all for that matter. The men I am with rarely take time with me for the simple pleasures of eating a good meal.”

“Maybe you’re looking in the wrong places,” Quinn said. He was still exhausted, and probably shouldn’t have been so forward, but Ayako seemed to appreciate such direct talk.

“Maybe so.” She ate another bite of rice, chewing while she thought. “How about you?”

Quinn took a sip of miso soup, then peered at her over the raised bowl. “What do you mean?”

“Do you ever have breakfast with any nice girls, or just other killers?”

At first, Quinn thought she was joking, or maybe trying to get back at him for what he’d said. But she continued to look at him, eating her rice and blinking dark lashes in earnest curiosity.

“I guess,” he said. “Yes, of course I do.”

Ayako raised her eyebrows as if she didn’t quite believe him. “You and I are a little bit the same, I think.” She popped another bite of cod roe into her mouth. “Perhaps we do what we do because we are not much good at anything else.”

Quinn laughed. “That could be it.”

He supposed Ayako spent a lot of time on her back, pondering the mystery and vagaries of life. Positional prostitutional philosophy, Jacques would have called it.

Ayako pushed away from the small table, rising quickly as if an idea had just occurred to her. She retrieved the canvas guitar case from her side of the sleeping mats and carried it reverently to the table.

She cleared away the dishes and carefully unzipped the case.

“This was my father’s,” she said, pulling back the lid to reveal a wakizashi—the shorter companion sword to a traditional Japanese katana. “And his father’s before him.” She lifted it out, one hand on the black-lacquered sheath, the other cradling the cotton-wrapped ray skin of the handle. “According to the inscription on the handle, this sword was crafted by Mitsunokami Tameyasu over three hundred years ago.” She nodded toward the hilt. “The writing on the guard says ‘Fujin’—the Japanese god of the wind.”

“Please.” She offered the weapon to Quinn, humbly bowing her head when he took it in both hands. “It is somewhat plain. Not as beautifully decorated as more modern wakizashi. I suppose my ancestors were austere men.”

Quinn grasped the handle and unsheathed the shining blade. Eighteen inches from tip to iron handguard, it sang in his hand as living steel should. There was something about a three-centuries-old weapon that pierced the soul as surely as it cut flesh and bone.

“I wish you to have it, Quinn-san,” Ayako said, her head still bowed.

“Oh, no.” Quinn slid it back in the sheath with a solid click. He pushed it toward her with both hands. “I couldn’t.”

“I have no husband,” Ayako said. “Who else would take it? The fool Watanabe?” She sniffed. A tear fell on her thigh and she brushed it away with the heel of her hand. “Please. I would like it to go to a good man.”

Her cell phone rang, playing a snippet of the pop song by her Korean heartthrob and rescuing Quinn for the moment.

Ayako listened intently, making “emm” and “ehh” noises every few seconds to let the person on the other end know she was still on the line. She’d regained her composure by the time she hung up.

“That was Watanabe,” she said. “You were right. Tanaka has agreed to meet us. He has a warehouse on the harbor, near the commercial docks. We are to meet him there in an hour.” Ayako brushed a lock of black hair out of her eyes that were still red from crying. “Something is not quite right. Watanabe sounded too happy. They must be planning something.”

“Of course they are,” Quinn said. “But so are we.”

He moved to return the sword, but she turned away.

“It is yours now.” She raised an open hand, showing her palm and refusing any further discussion. Moving to her duffel at the head of her futon, she peeled the pink T-shirt over her head and stepped out of her shorts as if Quinn wasn’t leaning against the wall ten feet away. He didn’t have time to look away before he caught the telltale shadow of a scar. White against the honey color of her skin, it ran diagonally across her belly, canted from the right of her navel to her panty line. Quinn had plenty of scars of his own and recognized this one as old and too jagged to have been made during a surgery. Turning, he couldn’t help wondering if the story behind that scar had something to do with her visceral reaction toward the mere mention of Oda’s name.

“I am dressed,” she said softly. He heard the sound of creaking wood as she sat back on the futon to put on her socks.

She looked fresh and beautiful in a pair of faded jeans and a loose, gray turtleneck sweater.

“Less… whore-like?” She shrugged.

“Stop that,” he chided.

“Do you know what a woman wants, Quinn-san?”

“I’m not the man to ask.” He wished Thibodaux was there. The big Cajun had barrels of philosophy about women.

“I think most men believe we want to be ravished — swept off our feet.” She sat on the end of the bed, one sock on, the other in her hand. “And perhaps some of us do when we are young. But what we really want is to feel safe. Every day I feel excitement, fear, sadness, anger, and sometimes, believe it or not, even desire… but safety is something I have not felt in a very long time — until now.”

Quinn did not know what to say, so he said nothing.

Tears ran down her cheeks. She sat on the futon and hugged her knees to her chest, giving a tiny nod toward Quinn’s hands. “Please, I beg you to accept the sword. Its value is far less than the gift you have given me.”

Quinn held it up in both hands, bowing at the waist, thanking her.

“In fact”—she leaned over to tug her other sock over a tiny foot—“bring it with us. Where we are going, the ferocious god of wind may be welcome assistance.”

CHAPTER 49

Quinn was surprised to see a metallic red Honda Blackbird parked on the gravel pad in front of the temple cottage beside Ayako’s yellow bike.

“We would never have been able to get away from Tanaka on my little bike.” She smiled. “And this is more suited to your riding style.”

Quinn stepped up to the motorcycle. It was enough to make him momentarily forget how bad he hurt. “Where did you get this so early in the morning?”

“I stopped to see a client before he left for work,” she said. “He has allowed us to borrow it for a while.”

“Now we’re talkin’,” Quinn said in English.

Ayako gave him a quizzical look.

“My brother had one of these when we were younger.” Quinn fell back into Japanese. “It brings back memories.”

“I thought you would approve,” Ayako said.

He ran a hand down the Honda’s aggressive fairing and across the smooth arc of the fuel tank. If his BMW GSA was the Hummer of motorcycles, the Honda Blackbird was the stealth fighter. He didn’t care for the two side luggage cases on this particular bike, thinking they detracted from the sinister look. But they served a purpose and made a good hiding spot for the two pink shopping bags he’d borrowed from Ayako’s kitchen cupboard when they’d cleared out after the altercation with Tanaka’s men.

Carrying the short sword in the soft-sided guitar case would keep them from getting stopped by any curious patrol officers. For a country steeped in a history of warfare and weaponry, Japanese police got twitchy if they thought someone was riding around with a sword slung over their back.

Once everything was stowed, Quinn swung a leg over the big bike and planted both feet to steady it. He wore the borrowed helmet and his leather jacket against the weather and any possible crash.

Ayako climbed on behind him and scrunched up closer than she probably had to. Her thighs ran tight alongside his, arms wrapped around him, body pressed flat to his back.

“All set?” he asked over his shoulder.

“All set.” She gave his belly a playful pat.

Quinn pushed the ignition button and brought the Blackbird’s 110 °CC engine to growling life. The throaty purr begged him to roll on the throttle.

“You know what I love about this bike?” he asked.

“I do not.” She shook her head, letting her helmet bump the back of his.

“It runs as good as it looks,” he said.

“The same could be said of you, Quinn-san.” Ayako gave him another squeeze.

Quinn groaned within himself. She might very well feel safe, but this girl was as dangerous as any yakuza gangster.

Tanaka’s dockside warehouse was a perfect location to be chopped into pieces and carried out to sea in a fishing vessel. To avoid a soupy end, Quinn made a short detour to a small Shinto shrine on a wooded hill a little over two miles away. He left one of the pink grocery bags there, tucked safely behind a flat granite monolith in a thick stand of bamboo.

The last thing he planned to do was meet Tanaka in his space, on his terms. Instead, he used a favorite technique he’d learned from an old salt when he’d first joined OSI and was assigned to the Crim unit — criminal investigations.

Thieves stuck with thieves, drug dealers hung with other drug dealers. Informants were, more often than not, steeped in the criminal culture. Good guys rarely had information on bad guys. That was the nature of the beast. Meetings with people on the other side of the law were ticklish at best and could turn deadly in the blink of an eye.

It was an inviolable rule that Quinn would pick the location of any meet with an informant. If a snitch called him for a meeting, Quinn would send him to a second location. Then, if things didn’t smell right on his arrival, Quinn might drive by and have the snitch follow him to a third — in a sort of rolling meet.

Quinn’s only chance of finding the woman who shot Kim appeared to be a heart-to-heart with Tanaka. Aborting this meeting was out of the question. It might get tricky, but he could move the location to make it more likely they would survive.

A flock of gulls fought over trash among a flotilla of boats to Quinn’s right as the red sport bike thumped along the heavy timber pier and onto the frontage road that led along the water’s edge. The smell of salted fish, diesel, and a hint of soy from some galley blew in on a stiff sea breeze. It was the smell of the Orient, and Quinn imagined that on some days it would be possible to smell Korea on that wind — or even China.

Ayako gave him a nervous squeeze when they neared a boxy metal warehouse bearing Tanaka’s name and his lotus leaf insignia. Quinn felt her squirm behind him, as if she had to go to the bathroom. Two Toyota Crown sedans, glossy black against the gray mist, sat outside the yawning bay doors of the huge building.

Ayako’s grip grew tighter. Quinn flinched, gritting his teeth as she squeezed his ribs and kidneys. Thankfully, the nausea ebbed quickly. He imagined broken blood vessels leaking inside his body in tiny spurts each time he breathed or took a step. He needed to see a doctor, but calling in sick wasn’t really an option at the moment — so he rode on.

Ten of Tanaka’s men lined the short driveway in front of the Toyota Crowns. Five on either side, they stood shoulder to shoulder, roughly three feet apart, in a modified parade rest. Their hands were clasped in front of dark business suits. Watanabe stood far back, nearest to the warehouse doors. He had apparently delivered the message just as Quinn had directed. Tanaka had put his heavy hitters out front to set the tone. Every man was fit and thickly built, like tree trunks and boulders in neckties. Pistols bulged under their coats. All wore dark glasses, despite the overcast sky.

Quinn passed the yakuza soldier nearest the road at the mouth of the driveway, then leaned the Blackbird into a quick U-turn — so he ended up facing the way he’d come. He toed the transmission into first gear on the way down, planting both feet on the rain-slick pavement. He flipped up the visor on his helmet. Ayako carried the H&K, and he could feel the gun’s comforting imprint where she held it sideways between them against his spine, tucked out of sight.

“You have Tanaka-san’s property?” the nearest man barked. He looked to be a cardboard cutout of what a yakuza gangster was supposed to be. Short hair, stern, slender with an impeccable dark suit. Raindrops spattered his sunglasses. His face hardly moved as he spoke.

“Of course not,” Quinn answered in the same, rough Japanese. “I am not foolish.”

The yakuza grunted as if he’d thought as much, then motioned toward the open twin doors of the warehouse, beyond the gauntlet of toughs.

“Tanaka-san is expecting you.”

Quinn reached over his shoulder with his right hand to grab the remaining pink shopping bag from Ayako.

“Give him this.” Quinn extended his hand.

The yakuza soldier took a half step back, then caught himself. All the men along the drive perked up at the unknown contents of the bag. Hand grenade attacks among warring families were not unheard of in this part of Japan.

“Relax,” Quinn said. “I want to talk to him, not kill him. But I don’t want him to kill us, either, so I’m not meeting him here.”

“What then?” The man gave a worried frown. It would be his fault if something happened to mess up the meeting at his post.

“Have him meet me at the shrine two miles up this road,” Quinn said. “He has five minutes to get there or I’m gone.”

“Tanaka-san does not take orders!”

“Consider it an invitation, then.” Quinn shrugged.

“Tell him he can bring two of you with him for protection if he wants.”

“Ha!” The gangster scoffed. “Protection from who?” Stifled laughter went up and down the lines of suited men.

“Me.” Quinn dumped Sato’s severed head out of the pink bag. It hit the wet asphalt, thudding like a green melon. The nearest yakuza soldier retched as the awful thing rolled across his shoe, wrinkled mouth open in a dead man’s yawn.

“He has five minutes.” Quinn snapped his visor shut and revved the throttle.

Before any of Tanaka’s men could react, he poured on the gas. One hundred and forty horses spun the Blackbird’s rear tire on the pavement, sending up a plume of white smoke. He leaned forward to keep the bike from rising into a wheelie as it shot down the road like a low-flying jet.

She was surely aware of the danger, but Ayako snuggled in tight behind him, squealing in his ear like a child on a carnival ride.

CHAPTER 50

Deputy Bowen woke up to the scream of landing gear on the tarmac and a three-year-old Vietnamese boy kicking the back of his seat like he was trying to stomp a snake.

Bowen rubbed the sleep from his eyes and moved his neck from side to side in a vain attempt to work out the inevitable kinks brought on by the fourteen-hour flight between Dulles and Tokyo. He was still astounded that he’d been allowed to even make the trip. Normal protocol was to send a written lead to investigators in the country where a fugitive was suspected to be. But evidently, Director Carroll realized someone like Jericho Quinn required measures beyond normal protocol if they intended to capture him.

Bowen opened the sketch pad in the seat pocket and looked it over while the plane taxied to the gate. There was a pencil study of Quinn, boxing, the way Bowen remembered him. A quick figure study of Ronnie Garcia — he couldn’t help that — and a faceless sniper hiding in some weeds. Drawing helped him work through things — and the good Lord knew he had plenty to work through.

Bowen grabbed his tan BLACKHAWK! daypack — his only luggage — from the overhead compartment and shuffled off the plane with the other passengers.

A willow-thin Delta attendant he’d chatted with during the flight met him at the door. She’d ducked into the bathroom just before landing to straighten her hair and apply a fresh coat of lipstick that matched a bright red uniform dress. Extending her hand, she passed him a cocktail napkin with her cell number, thanking him sweetly as she did all the passengers when they walked by.

She’d invited him over to try his hand at drawing her, but she was far too needy to be his type. He smiled though, knowing the chances of her being on the return flight were good enough that he didn’t want to make her mad.

He had plenty of other things to worry about without getting tangled up with some flight attendant first rattle out of the box — like navigating his way in a country that didn’t use the alphabet.

Thankfully, all the signs leading him through the arrival process were in English as well as the unintelligible chicken scratches that were Japanese. With all the fearmongering in the news lately about plagues and zombie viruses, the medical screening queue was the first obstacle for entry.

What looked like a large tripod-mounted camera faced newcomers as they passed through a small turnstile just outside the jetway. A sign above advised that authorities were checking the temperature of all arrivals and apologized for the intrusion.

Immigration was next, where a fatigued-looking but overly polite woman with a Buster Brown haircut checked Bowen’s passport and inserted an entry visa stamp. She took a photo and he had both index fingers printed before the lady dismissed him to move on toward baggage claim.

Since all he had was a carry-on, Bowen made it to the Customs counter quickly. He gave the most innocent smile he could muster and handed over the declaration form he’d filled out on the plane, promising he wasn’t a drug mule or an international money launderer.

An express train from Narita took him on the one-hour ride to yet another airport in downtown Tokyo, where he stood with his ticket long enough a half dozen people came up to offer him help. He came to the conclusion that navigating in Japan wasn’t that difficult if you didn’t mind standing around a few minutes looking hopelessly lost.

Roughly twenty-four hours after he’d left his home in Alexandria and three hours after touching down in Japan, Bowen walked through the exit gates at Fukuoka-Hakata Airport. He’d never seen a photograph of the man he was supposed to meet but recognized him instantly by the unwavering look of challenge, common to those who carried a badge for a living. I’m a cop, the look said. And you’re not.

“Agent Bowen?” the Japanese policeman said, cocking his head to one side. He wore dark slacks, a white shirt and tie, and a light tan golf jacket. His hair was cut in a longish flattop, as if Bowen had commandeered him on his normal day to go to the barber.

“Deputy Bowen,” he said, remembering to bow like Geoff Barker had taught him. “U.S. Marshals, Eastern District of Virginia.”

“I am Hase,” the man said. He pronounced it Hah-say.

“Pleased to meet you,” Bowen said. Barker had tried to teach him some phrases, but languages had never been his thing so he didn’t hazard a try. He’d been told there were long drawn-out meeting rituals in Japan. If that was the case, Detective Hase must have taken pity on him.

“You have no other bags?”

Bowen held the daypack aloft. “Nope,” he said. “This is it.”

Detective Hase gave another deep bow, then extended a hand toward the door. “Very good. I understand you want to speak with Shimizu Ayako.”

“I do,” Bowen said, stifling a yawn.

Hase looked at the Seiko dive watch on his wrist. “It is five past nine. It will be somewhat difficult to check into your hotel this early, but if you would like to stop by—”

Just then, a woman shoved her way past, marching toward the automatic doors. She looked to be in her late twenties and wore tight, stylish jeans, a flimsy chiffon blouse that hung off one shoulder, and black stiletto heels. A crying boy who looked no older than six tromped along behind her, tears streaming down a pudgy face. He wore little blue short pants and a white polo shirt. A black leather school pack, weighed down with books, hung over his back.

Bowen had no idea what she was saying, but the woman, presumably the kid’s mother, berated him at every step. She flung her arms for effect, oblivious to the embarrassed looks and sidelong glances of everyone else in the terminal at such un-Japanese behavior.

The boy tried to make his case through his tears. Whatever he said infuriated his mother, causing her to turn on him like an angry bear. She marched back to where he stood, jabbing him in the heaving chest with a manicured finger.

Bowen’s chest tightened. “What’s her problem?”

“I do not know.” Hase shook his head. “She is a very rude woman.”

“What is she saying?” Bowen’s eyes locked on to her. So far, she’d not noticed.

“The boy missed his train for school, making her late to meet someone here,” Hase said. “He says it wasn’t his fault but she doesn’t believe him. I’d like to intervene, but she has not struck the child so my superiors would not approve…”

Bowen stepped deliberately between the ranting woman and the boy while Hase was still talking, stooping to rub away the tears with his thumb. The kid’s eyes flew wide at the sight of a big American with a goatee. His lips trembled until Bowen handed him a little silver lapel pin shaped like a Marshal badge.

“Tell him I’m a policeman from the United States,” Bowen said.

Hase translated, obviously happy to do something to stop the woman’s tirade.

The little boy spoke through his sniffles.

“He says thank you,” Hase translated.

“You tell him that his mother will probably whip him because we stepped in,” Bowen said. “But he will always know that there were two people here today who knew the way she was treating him was wrong.” He looked up at Hase. “Can you translate that exactly?”

The detective grinned. “If she complains to my bosses, I’m blaming this on the crazy marshal, you know.”

“Fine by me,” Bowen said. “Just tell him.”

By now a crowd of Japanese women had gathered to publicly chastise the woman. Hase spoke to her for some time, even raising his own voice before sending her on her way. The boy turned to wave at Bowen as he walked out the terminal doors. He had already pinned the little badge to the collar of his shirt.

“That is the most fun I have had in some time,” Detective Hase said, following the woman with a hard gaze. “I think I like you, Deputy Marshal August Bowen. Are you this way at all times?”

“Pretty much.” Bowen shrugged. “It’s a problem I have.”

“How do you ever get anything done if you stop to help everyone you see?”

“Like I said,” Bowen said with a sigh, “it’s a problem.”

“It is a good problem, I think,” Hase said. “So, we were speaking of your hotel.”

“I’m fine,” Bowen said. “My brain’s just not sure what time it is. If you know where Shimizu is right now, I’d rather go see her. To tell you the truth, I haven’t even gotten reservations at a hotel yet.”

“I can assist you with that.” Detective Hase smiled. “Please.” He bowed again, looking at Bowen as if he was still trying to figure the deputy out. “My car is outside. Ayako Shimizu’s apartment is nearby.”

CHAPTER 51

Quinn was off the bike and running moments after the side stand hit the ground, the H&K pistol in one hand, the guitar case containing the short sword in the other. Ayako followed close behind, bounding up the wide gravel path.

Rising on square terraces of rough-hewn timber filled with gravel that were spaced just far enough apart to keep them from reaching a full sprint, the path ran from the small parking lot through the Shinto torii gates that resembled a red wooden pi symbol with two horizontals, then wound through the thick cypress woods and bamboo forests that protected the temple itself from the hubbub of the nearby city.

Ground fog flowed like bony fingers between moss-covered logs and boulders the size of small cars, reaching out from the tumbledown forest. Rain dripped from every tree and bush. Engraved stone monoliths, some over fifteen feet tall, rose on either side of the path, shining in the wet air as if polished. Pungent smoke from burning incense hung in a hazy layer among the trees.

Quinn had always thought Japan took on an ancient look when wet with rain. It was a surreal and beautiful place, but thankfully, the weather was inclement enough that the grounds were deserted.

Quinn sent Ayako with the pistol to stand at the edge of the bamboo thicket twenty feet away from where he would make his stand. She assured him that she knew how to shoot, so he took her at her word. It calmed him some when she grabbed the slide and press-checked the chamber, assuring herself a round was in the tube. Finger alongside the trigger guard, she trotted away toward the bamboo holding the pistol as if she’d been born with it in her hand.

Quinn leaned the unzipped guitar case against the monolith and positioned the short sword so it would be easy to retrieve, then took a position with his back to the flat surface. The weatherworn inscription on the smooth stone was fitting.

Duty is heavy as a mountain — death, light as a feather.

Tanaka Isanagi arrived three and a half minutes later.

The yakuza boss didn’t so much walk up the gravel path as he materialized through the swirling fog and incense smoke. Well into his sixties, he was slender with a long face and wild, untrimmed black eyebrows that stood in stark contrast to the gleaming skin of his bald head. He’d removed his suit coat, demonstrating to Quinn that he was unarmed — and unafraid.

Two of the gangsters from the warehouse walked a few steps behind, spread out to make themselves more difficult targets. Both wore dark Ray-Ban sunglasses, despite the overcast sky. Watanabe slouched along behind the trio, limping along in the rear as he nursed a bandaged hand.

“I told your man you could bring two bodyguards,” Quinn said as the yakuza boss drew closer.

“Surely you do not count Watanabe-kun?” Tanaka scoffed. “If he is a burden I will order him to kill himself immediately.”

Watanabe stopped in his tracks, eyes terror-stricken.

“That won’t be necessary,” Quinn said.

Tanaka stopped, but the two guards kept walking toward Quinn, closing the distance fast.

Quinn shot a glance at Ayako, shaking his head. It was important to keep the upper hand, but he didn’t want to kill anyone until he had some answers.

“Seriously,” he said. “These are the best two you have?” One of the men was the hulking bruiser he’d already met when Sato’s head rolled across his shoe. The other was a taller man with dark, seventies-style sideburns and a thick, black mustache. Quinn guessed he probably had some Russian in his ancestry.

“They need to search you,” Tanaka said. “For my safety.”

Quinn raised his hands as if to comply, then kicked the big bruiser in the crotch. The two men were close, and Quinn was able to pivot slightly and slam the arch of his foot against Sideburns’s knee, driving him into a screaming heap on the ground. Quinn crouched to avoid a flailing roundhouse from the bruiser, snatching the sheathed short sword from the case.

Quinn brought the tip of the lacquer scabbard straight up, letting it slam against the bruiser’s chin, driving his gaping mouth shut with a satisfying crack of tooth and jaw.

The man’s eyes rolled back in his skull, showing their whites.

Sideburns reached under his suit for a pistol, but Quinn ripped the scabbard from the sword and stepped in, letting the razor-sharp point hover just above the knot of the man’s tie.

Quinn glanced up at Tanaka. “How about if I just tell you what weapons I have?”

Tanaka flicked his hands toward his defeated men, motioning them back behind him. A bemused look crossed his long face.

“Do you know why I came to see you,” the gangster said, looking Quinn up and down.

“Because I have your shipment of yao tou?”

Tanaka flicked his hand again, dismissing the notion. “Though I will appreciate the safe return of my property, there is plenty more where that came from. I did not follow you here for that. I came because you are the most interesting thing that has happened to me in twenty years. You Americans say the pen is mightier than the sword. We Japanese say bunbu ichi — pen and sword in accord. When I began this life it was filled with acts of courage and violence. Now, my world has become that of a common businessman.” Tanaka leaned in as if to confide a secret. “Too much pen and not nearly enough sword for me — until now.”

“I’m glad I could help you out.”

“Oh, make no mistake”—Tanaka wagged his finger back and forth—“we are not friends. Much of what will make my life interesting will be deciding how I am to kill you without losing too many more men. I do not, of course, count Watanabe as any loss.”

The yakuza underling hung his head in shame.

“Too bad for your men,” Quinn said, smiling sweetly.

“Your Japanese is excellent,” Tanaka said.

Quinn glared at the man, losing patience. “How about we get this over with? You tell me what I need to know and I tell you where to find your drugs.”

“Very well.” Tanaka opened both hands in front of him, book-like, ready to talk.

“I am looking for the woman who shot my wife.”

Tanaka scoffed. “A high-minded endeavor for a husband who keeps company with this whore…”

Quinn let the comment slide off. He had more important things to do than bandy words with an organized crime boss.

“I believe her name is Ran,” Quinn said.

Tanaka’s eyes flashed momentarily, then settled again, a dark pool disturbed by a stone. He knew her.

“Long hair,” Quinn added. “Attractive, but very dangerous. Probably tattooed—”

“I know that girl!” Watanabe nodded vigorously. “She punched me in the throat.”

“Somehow”—Tanaka shook his head in disgust as he glared at his quivering thug—“I find such a thing easy to believe.” He turned to Quinn. “I was informed you are looking for Oda.”

“I believe this woman works for him,” Quinn said. “I find one, I find the other.”

“Perhaps.” Tanaka sniffed, quickly, lips pursed and pointed on his long face, like a bald rat. “But perhaps it is not so easy. Do you know anything about this man?”

“Not enough, I’m afraid,” Quinn said. He was looking for information, so he might as well be honest.

“He leads an organization he calls Kuroi Kiri.” Tanaka raised a bushy eyebrow. “Do you know the term?”

“Black Mist,” Quinn said. “Dark deeds…”

“Precisely,” Tanaka said. “Extremely dark deeds. He is like something out of an old samurai movie. The men and women who work for him are ronin, hired blades who sell their services to the highest bidder. Few people know exactly where Oda lays his head. Otherwise, he would not have kept it on his shoulders for so long.”

“But you know?”

Tanaka shook his head. “I would tell you if I did. A short time ago, he murdered one of my men during some business dealings. At that time he had taken the position on the governing board of Yanagi Chemical here in Fukuoka—”

“What?” Watanabe’s mouth hung open. “That is the man you are looking for? I could have told you this and saved us much trouble.”

Tanaka shot a withering stare toward the interruption. “I have a suspicion that trouble would find you no matter what.” He half turned, looking directly at Quinn and conspicuously ignoring the whimpering stooge. “I must tell you, Oda is like lightning — rarely in the same place twice, and surely not for very long. But perhaps Yanagi Chemical would be a good place to begin.”

Quinn nodded slowly. “And how do I know you have not set up a trap for me at Yanagi?”

“I suppose you do not.” Tanaka clasped his hands in front of him. “But, I have no great love for Oda. As you can imagine, my organization might often find itself at odds with such a man. I would consider it a great favor indeed if you would kill him for me. If not, then he will kill you for me.”

CHAPTER 52

Oda shoved the trembling girl aside at the interruption of the ringing telephone. Barely thirteen, she was a new addition to his stable. She was attractive in her own way — sturdy shoulders and strong cheekbones — but looks had deceived him. He remembered when females didn’t melt to mush at a little physical pain. There was a time when girls like this were tough, able to withstand a bit of correction and stand up to the rigors of the life he demanded. Such a young and vibrant woman would have been putty in his hands, moldable into whatever he wanted her to be. Now, it seemed, the entire gender were no more than chalk, crumbling to dust at the slightest cuff or kick. This one had wept like a baby at the mere sight of his tattoo.

“Get out!” he growled before picking up the phone. Naked, the whelp whimpered pathetically as she opened the sliding paper door and limped out, dragging her robes with her.

Oda snatched up the phone, looking at the number.

“What is it?” He kept his voice dismissive. With the idiot Tanaka it was important to set a standard from the beginning of any conversation. He had no time for second-rate gangsters who held to old ways that were fast getting them marginalized by virtually ever facet of Japanese society.

“Ah, Oda-san,” Tanaka said, “thank you for taking my call.”

“You are either calling to apologize or to threaten me. I am interested to hear which, for it will dictate what I do once we are finished.”

“It is neither, I’m afraid.”

“Very well,” Oda said, “that may also dictate certain actions.”

“I only wish to be of assistance.” Tanaka spoke quickly, risking interruption in order to keep Oda from giving any edicts he’d feel obliged to keep. “A man came to see me looking for you. I believe he will pay you a visit as well.”

“And how would he know where to look?”

There was a long silence — a liar’s pause — before Tanaka answered. “I fear one of my men may have given him some information before this man killed him.”

“How very convenient that the man who betrayed me is dead,” Oda said, his voice cold, snakelike.

“As soon as it came to my attention, I called to warn you,” Tanaka said.

“Describe this man.” Oda knew who it was before the yakuza boss told him.

“An American, I think,” Tanaka said. “Dark — both in features and demeanor. He has killed before. I am certain of that.”

“Thank you for the notice, Tanaka-san,” Oda said. “I will look forward to his visit with much pleasure.”

Oda ended the call and tossed the phone on his desk. He was not frightened of Jericho Quinn. But it was a mark of failure in his organization that the man was still alive and had gotten this far.

Certainly as head of the organization it was his fault that Quinn had been left alive for so long. His fault because he had left the job to others. Failure was one thing he would not tolerate. Someone would have to atone for this — and since he did not feel like punishing himself, he knew exactly where to begin.

CHAPTER 53

Governor Lee McKeon paced in front of the window of the cheap motel. It was impossible to sit still while he discussed weighty matters.

Qasim Ranjhani sat on the bed, leaning against the far wall. In contrast to McKeon’s nerves, Ranjhani’s hands were folded serenely in his lap. The governor had big ideas and the will to see them through, but for the most part, it was Ranjhani who worked the trenches. It was he who got his hands dirty while McKeon played the concerned politician. Years before, and under another name, McKeon had gotten his hands dirty as well.

The motel was located on Portland’s east side, off 82nd Avenue, well off the beaten path. The desk clerk stunk of cheap bourbon and was unlikely to even know there was a governor of Oregon, let alone what he looked like. McKeon was fairly certain someone from his Oregon State Police protective detail had followed him discreetly, but that could not be helped. This particular motel was known as a place for illicit affairs, particularly with other men. All the entries were from an inside hall, and several people had arrived at roughly the same time as McKeon. Unless they booted his door, anyone who had defied his order and followed him anyway would have no idea who he happened to be meeting with. Rumors of an affair he could weather, even an affair with another man — but if they’d known what he was actually planning, the men protecting him would have shot him on the spot.

“So,” McKeon said, fairly giddy with the possibilities. “We are actually going to do this?”

“So it seems, my friend. So it seems.” Ranjhani was cool and matter-of-fact. To talk of killing thousands to this man was to talk of killing a common fly.

“Do you believe they will all leave at once?”

“That depends on U.S. military response,” Ranjhani said. “The illness takes a week or so to develop. Most will think any initial symptoms are merely a reaction to the live virus vaccine.”

“Brilliant.” McKeon nodded.

“Oda has forty thousand units of vaccine for the American soldiers in Afghanistan and another fifteen thousand for Kuwait.” Ranjhani paused. “At your request, we have orchestrated a small outbreak to stir up emotion in South Korea. Roughly a hundred ninety-five thousand units are waiting in cold storage for shipment to the United States, but I suspect officials will rob some of those for their twenty-eight thousand troops in Seoul.”

Ranjhani was quiet for a time, allowing the governor to do the math.

“And what of Oda?” McKeon gave a long, thoughtful sigh. “I was under the impression he undertook this task in order to get American troops out of Japan.”

“There is a particular beauty in the domino effect of all this,” Ranjhani said. “When thousands of their emergency personnel begin to sicken and die, the U.S. government will have no choice but to recall overseas troops. It is difficult to be the world’s policeman if your own home is on fire.”

McKeon smiled. In a matter of hours, eighty thousand U.S. soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines and over 160,000 Americans — mainly medical and law enforcement personnel — would be vaccinated as “first responders.” Soon afterward, they would find that they were dying. South Korea would be left alone. American citizens would realize that their own government had spread the deadly virus. Conspiracy theorists would, at long last, be proven correct. The Middle East would be purged of infidel invaders as remaining troops rushed home to take care of a collapsing nation.

The governor held his breath, thinking through the details.

“It hinges on the tests.” McKeon’s voice clicked with tension.

“It does.” Ranjhani shrugged. “But the American officials are under tremendous pressure to approve a cure. The woman the CDC sent to Japan has already received two calls Oda believes came from the White House. Photographs of the sick flood the Internet, but just to push things along we have seeded several forums with the idea that the U.S. administration is conspiring with Japan to hold back the new vaccine in order to tamp down population growth.”

“Brilliant,” McKeon said, laughing, running a hand over his long face.

“Oda has given me assurances,” Ranjhani went on. “The tests will go as we have planned. Japan, after all, is no enemy. Why would they produce anything to hurt the United States?”

McKeon took a deep breath, addressing the elephant neither man had mentioned. “And what of our American agent? It sounds to me as though he could still pose a major problem.”

“Ah.” Ranjhani sighed. “I suppose Quinn proved useful in establishing Drake’s credibility. He is apparently in Japan looking for Oda and the girl who shot his ex-wife. He knows nothing of the vaccine, and, in any case, Oda assures me Quinn will be sorted out within hours.”

“That is welcome news.” An infectious grin spread across McKeon’s face. “It is all happening as my father predicted. Allah willing, in a very short time, the world we live in will be a very different place.”

“Ahh,” Ranjhani said. “That it will, my friend, insh’Allah.” He popped the latches on a scuffed aluminum briefcase that sat on the table before him. Inside were two simple boxes of polished wood, each a little smaller than a brick. “And that brings me to my real reason for coming to this country of infidels.”

CHAPTER 54

Bowen and Hase were greeted by two men carrying a heavy roll of carpet down the stairs from Ayako Shimizu’s apartment. Each wore a light blue tracksuit and Ray-Ban sunglasses. The lead man, slightly older than his partner, had a ponderous belly, and the sagging load caused him to grunt and sweat as he shuffled along. When he saw Detective Hase, he dropped his end and ran. Unsupported, the carpet fell out of the second man’s hands and unfurled on the damp pavement, revealing the body of a man in a red leather jacket.

“You want me to go after the runner?” Bowen asked. There was no hurry. The fat guy was running slow enough Bowen could have stopped for a cheeseburger and still caught him before he got out of sight.

“Do not bother.” Hase sighed. “I know him. I am much more interested in what is upstairs.”

Hase ordered the second man, a young yakuza soldier named Kono, to sit on the curb. Amazingly, he complied, hanging his head between his knees, waiting obediently to be carted off to jail.

There was another body in the apartment, another yakuza soldier, according to Hase. This one displayed a cracked skull, apparently caused by a sudden collision with the bloody bowling pin that lay on the floor beside the body.

Three distinct pools of blood stained the wooden floor. One next to the dead man’s ear, another beside a pillow with the stuffing blown out of it, and third, just inside the door. Either there had been a third body or someone had survived.

Bowen looked around the apartment — a neatly folded towel next to a pile of crumpled laundry, a blanket and sheet in perfect order amid a chaos of bedclothes, a set of dishes sorted and stacked beside the sink full of crusted bowls and pots — all but screamed the obsessive-compulsive behavior of an Air Force Academy cadet.

“He was here all right,” Bowen said. “We find the woman, we’ll find Quinn.”

Detective Hase looked up from his cell phone. “I concur,” he said. “Crime scene investigators will be here any moment. Ayako-san has a certain client who, I believe, will tell us where to find her.”

CHAPTER 55

Shimoyama Takako sensed his presence as she approached her front door. She was dressed traditionally as she always was in a lavender kimono with a foam green belt and a darker green coat. The neighbors in her upscale suburban neighborhood believed she dressed this way because she taught flower arrangement or the tea ceremony. They could never know it was because her employer — the man she loved and so desperately wanted to please — required it.

She knew she should turn and run. But what good would that do? He would only catch her and she would look a mess. One did not run from Oda any more than a bee flew away from honey. Though he was surely there to chastise her — or even worse — Takako’s heart swelled at the fact that he waited for her inside. She longed for his presence, the sight and smell of him close to her. Even if he was angry, he was there, in her home, and that was something.

She closed the door behind her and set her keys in a red lacquer tray on the stained pine shelf to the right of the entryway. A pair of black shoes, his shoes, sat neatly below the shelf, toes facing outward as if ready for a quick exit. She touched them, feeling the warmth of his body lingering in the rich leather. He hadn’t been here long.

A flight of stairs, deeply stained to match the exposed ceiling beams, rose up in front of her toward the second floor — where she kept her pistol.

Her toilet was to her immediate right, but the door was open. One look told her he wasn’t there. Her bedroom lay to the left. It was too much to hope that he waited for her there, ready to forgive her imperfections.

The ceiling creaked as someone walked on the floor above.

“I am up here, my darling.” Oda’s voice rolled down the stairs like a gentle breeze.

Shimoyama kicked off her shoes. She padded quickly up the stairs, holding up the hem of her kimono with both hands. Her socks were startlingly white and split at the toe — traditional, as Oda liked everything to be.

She stopped cold when she reached the top.

Oda stood at the far corner of the room, naked but for a twisted white loincloth. A long sword, her father’s, hung loosely in his right hand. The black sheath lay on the floor, discarded as he surely intended to discard her.

Shimoyama knew there could be only one reason he’d removed his clothes. He didn’t want to soil them with her blood.

Diffuse light sifted in from the paper window shade behind him, framing the garish red of the two long-nosed mountain demons tattooed on either side of his hairless chest. Riots of black and green swirled on the sinewed muscles of his thighs and arms. Ink melded with dark wood and shadow, giving the impression that he sprang from the walls of the house.

“You look lovely as ever.” Oda turned the blade back and forth as he spoke so it caught the scant light from the stairwell.

“Thank you,” she said. “It is good to see you, Oda-san.”

“Is it?”

Shimoyama’s eyes flashed around her room. She could not just let him kill her. He would lose what little respect he had for her if she merely gave up. Perhaps, if she put up a good fight, he would remember their past, the tender moments they’d shared together, and show some mercy.

Her Beretta pistol was still on the low table, where she’d left it. She licked her lips. Her mouth had gone dry and it was difficult to swallow. Perhaps this was a test. Perhaps he did not intend to kill her after all. Oda would never leave a weapon like that in the open if he intended to cut her down. He was too good at what he did.

He spoke, drawing her from thoughts of possible salvation. “I suppose you know why I am here.”

She bowed her head. She and Oda had killed many men while fighting side by side, stripped of their clothing in order to escape the bloody consequences of using a sword for such intimate work.

“Because Quinn is still alive.”

“Because he is in Japan.”

“We will find him.”

Oda all but exploded in a furious scream. He stomped forward, planting his leading foot as he struck downward with the katana.

Shimoyama rolled out of instinct. She felt the whisper of wind as the blade hissed past her face. The foam green obi fell away, cut neatly into two pieces on the tatami floor, leaving her kimono hanging open to reveal her white undergarment. He was toying with her. She had seen him use the same cut to cleave a man from shoulder to hip.

The Beretta was still two meters away.

“I want him dead today!” Spittle flew from Oda’s lips. He had never been able to control himself for long with Shimoyama, not when she was young and beautiful, and certainly not now that she was old. “I want him dead before nightfall. Within the hour.”

“I understand.” Shimoyama took a step backward, angling closer to the table — and the pistol.

“I am quite certain that you do not understand,” Oda snapped. “If you truly knew what it means for this American agent to be here in Japan you would have followed through and killed him before.”

“I will see to—”

“I fully expected you would see to it before he left the United States.”

“I understand.” There was little more she could say.

“There will be no atonement for you if he discovers our project. Do you understand that?”

“I do.” Shimoyama’s lips trembled. “I have no excuse—”

“Shut up,” Oda said, his voice dropped to a whisper. “Foolish, foolish woman. I will handle this myself. But that leaves me the problem of what I should do with you…” He turned the sword back and forth, admiring it in the light. “Do you know how many men your father killed with this sword?”

“I do not,” she said, turning her head slightly and stepping back again. Three feet from the table, she rolled again, coming up with the pistol in both hands. She pointed it directly at Oda.

He sighed softly, the way he’d done so many times in the past when she’d performed in an extraordinary way. Could it be that he was proud of her? She beamed, thinking she’d done well. A lock of hair had come loose from a lacquer comb and fallen across her eyes during her aerobatics. She pushed it back, not wanting him to see her unkempt.

Suddenly dizzy, she held the Beretta in one hand and attempted to steady herself with the other. She winced when her palm touched the table. It burned as if on fire.

Oda stooped to pick up the polished sheath and slid the blade in before setting it gently on the table in front of her. He stepped away and methodically began to put on his clothes.

Shimoyama swayed, feeling a white heat crawl up her arms. The heat turned to unbearable pain as it moved past her elbows as if she was being attacked by a swarm of wasps. Her mouth hung open, too confused to even scream.

“What… is… happening?” Her words came in breathy gasps.

Oda fastened the buttons of his starched white shirt one by one, head tilted, eyes now glued to her.

“None of this is actually your fault, you know.” He looped a red necktie around his upturned collar. “I do not blame you for Jericho Quinn.”

The Beretta fell from Shimoyama’s hand, thudding to the wooden floor. Red blisters bulged with fluid on her palms wherever she had touched the pistol — as if she’d been branded. He’d put something on the grips before she’d arrived, then driven her to pick it up with the threat of her own sword.

“I… I…” The pain enveloped her shoulders. Tendons in her neck tightened and cramped like steel cables, jerking open her jaw. An enormous pressure began to build in her chest. It seemed her heart would break out of her ribs.

“It is a form of fungus.” Oda smiled as he continued to dress. “A mycotoxin — grown from bat guano I think — but somewhat similar to the Yellow Rain used in Laos. My friends have been able to make this even more potent. A lethal dose can be absorbed through minimal skin contact. Can you imagine the uses for such an incredible poison?”

“You cared for me once…” Shimoyama pitched forward, destroying the harmony of her ivory pen and papers. Cheek pressed against the open pages of her journal, she blinked up at him. “If I am not to blame… why do this to me?”

“I needed to conduct a test, my darling.” Oda pulled the silk tie snug against his collar and shrugged. “And, because you remind me that I am growing old.”

He took his coat from the kitchen chair and disappeared down the stairs without looking back.

Shimoyama felt her throat constrict, like a sob she couldn’t quite finish or control. Unable to move her head from where it lay against the book, she flailed with her right hand, the only part of her that she still felt under her will. Searching blindly, her fingers brushed the cell phone. She gritted her teeth through the acid pain and punched in a number by feel alone — a number that she had not called for a very long time. A trembling finger pressed SEND.

Her heart raced wildly, out of control. Her body tensed, racked with spasms that felt as though they would break her back. A moment later, she fell slack, splayed across the table, completely still. A drop of blood trickled from her nose, creasing the white powder of her cheek to fall with a tiny plop against the pages of the open book.

CHAPTER 56

Each week, with few exceptions, the tattooed woman had at least one new wound. The newest one, a thin scar that ran in a diagonal line from the base of her perfect chin through her lower lip, was just one of many.

Goro had seen them all.

The wound that caused it had bisected her pouting lower lip, leaving it almost, but not quite, aligned. Much like the woman’s soul, Goro thought. It had likely been caused by a sword. He had seen many such wounds tattooing young yakuza soldiers. They grew too familiar with the blade of their forefathers and hit something that sent the weapon bouncing back to bite them. To some, the scars were disfiguring. The woman’s only added a dangerous layer to her beauty.

Some of her wounds were tiny nicks on her otherwise perfect skin. Others were deeper and should have been stitched — but they rarely were. Some were in places that must have been excruciatingly painful, the sort of injury that went well beyond physical wounds.

The stooped old man known as Horiguchi Goro III peered at the young woman’s hip through thick glasses. He sat cross-legged on a flat cushion, leaning over her body in rapt, Zen-like concentration.

Goro was small and bent, with the tiniest wisp of a mustache that was white as an egret feather. Horiguchi had not been his name at birth, but it had been his master’s name, and the master of his master before that. After years of apprenticeship, he was able to take the name himself.

Goro’s thumb and forefinger of his left hand stretched the almost translucent flesh just below the fall of the waist where the body rose again over the wing of the pelvis. The skin was close to the bone here, thin, with little muscle and full of nerves. It was an extremely painful area of the body in which to receive a traditional tattoo, but the woman remained motionless. Their sessions lasted for two hours with Goro piercing her tender skin over and over again with the bundled needles. Never, in the five years since he’d started her tattoo, had the woman flinched or even made a sound.

Goro had placed a small white towel over the young woman’s nakedness. She didn’t care to bother with it, content to lay back on the tatami mats staring up at the ceiling, completely nude while he worked.

He supposed that since he was an old man, she believed him to be immune to such things, but a man too old to be affected by this would be a dead man indeed. She was exceptional in her beauty, and the intricacies of her tattoo required a depth of concentration such a full and inviting vision would not allow. So he covered her when he could, and when he could not because of the tattoo’s location, he thought of each little inch of skin as if it were not connected to any other part of this lovely creature. Had he done otherwise, he was certain she would have killed him.

The traditional Japanese art of hand tattooing was known as tebori—from te, meaning hand, and hori, meaning to carve. In his left hand, Goro held the bamboo tebori stick, twenty centimeters long and roughly the diameter of a wooden pencil. At the end of this stick he had tied a bundle of seven stainless-steel needles in which to hold the ink. They were fanned slightly so the middle three points stuck out a tiny bit farther than the two on either side.

Resting the bamboo tebori over his left thumb, the tattoo master held it with his right hand like a small pool cue, controlling the application by angling the needles this way and that as he inserted them over and over with expert precision. After every centimeter of work, he dipped them again in black ink, a mixture of soot and cooking oil. Lost in the artistic moment, he worked the rich tint under the skin. It did not portray, as much as it became, the gnarled black branches of a blossom-laden cherry tree, snaking down the young woman’s ribs and over the flare of her hip.

His method was the same, whether he was shading a broad area or drawing a thin line — dipping the bundle of needles in thick black ink, working a centimeter of the design, then dipping again. He used a cotton cloth to wipe the flesh free of ink and blood every few seconds so he could check his work.

The needles whispered softly as they always did when he found his rhythm, piercing and pulling out of the skin with a soft sha, sha, sha, sha.

Goro knew that to be a great tattoo artist one not only had to possess an artistic heart, but a deep knowledge of the canvas where that art appeared — the human body. He had been tattooing for nearly forty years and had the nasty black practice scars on his thighs and ankles to prove it. He was very good at what he did, known for allowing the subject’s skin to dictate the form and flow of the design.

If someone wanted a mountain goblin, that was their business. He would do as they wished. But the customer was told from the beginning that the way that particular goblin would look was up to Goro and the intricacies of the wearer’s body, not the subject’s personal whim.

The young woman had been specific in her wishes for the subject and general style of her tattoo but had left the artistic license of application and background to him. As long as the primary image on her lithe back was that of a foo dog that resembled one in a photograph she had brought with her, the supporting art and shading was left to him.

Goro stopped the bamboo tebori in midstroke at the chime of the young woman’s cell phone. It was the mournful sound of Buddhist temple bells. He peered down at her over the top of his thick glasses, waiting to see if she wanted to answer. She came up on one elbow, head thrown back so tresses of long hair fell across her neck and shoulders in an exquisite black cascade that complemented the vibrant pink and green hues of cherry blossom. The cotton cloth fell away as she rolled across the tatami mats toward the impatient phone.

In the five years since she’d been coming to see him, the young woman had remained completely silent during the horribly painful tattooing process. But the sound of temple bells on her ringtone caused her to groan, deeply and with a sorrow that Goro could feel in his bones.

CHAPTER 57

Todd Elton lay on his cot and stared up at his iPad watching tiny airplanes zip around a world map. The red planes carried infected passengers. Blue planes transported medical teams researching a cure. The game was called Plague Inc. One of the CDC docs had told him about it. The macabre goal was to kill off everyone in the world with an illness you invented before a cure could be developed. It was brilliant really, with options for using garnered points to mutate the plague and make it more resistant to cold or easier to spread.

He’d learned to beat the game by making his virus, which he called “Teeples Brodiosis,” extremely contagious but with few symptoms at first. After he had much of the world infected, he used his garnered points to evolve the symptoms and make them more fatal. In the beginning stages, the stuff had to be contagious or it didn’t spread fast enough. But, if there were too many symptoms people freaked, working on a cure too quickly and even shutting down their borders before he could infect every country.

As it turned out, it took a certain amount of finesse to kill off the entire human race.

Brandy poked her head in the half-open door.

“You should be getting some rest while you can,” she said. “Mrs. Christenson is going to pop by midnight.”

Elton rubbed his face. “Glad I paid attention during my OB GYN rotation in med school…” He looked at the iPad again, then back up at Brandy. “You wonder why we’re not getting sick?”

“A lot of prayer and hand sanitizer?”

“Think about it,” Elton said. “If Bedford and R.J. got back into town on Sunday and made everyone else sick by Tuesday, that means someone else inside the hospital or clinic should be showing symptoms by now. You and I were up close and personal with every one of these patients before we knew it was bad enough we should use more than regular precautions. No other spouses besides my sister-in-law…”

Brandy frowned. “You sound like you want someone else to get sick.”

“It just doesn’t make sense, that’s all.” Elton rubbed his face. He really should have been sleeping instead of playing that stupid game.

“Well,” Brandy said, turning to leave. “If you’re not going to get some rest before Mrs. Christenson has her baby, you should probably go up and see your brother-in-law’s friend. The ventilator isn’t doing much for him. I understand he’s failing fast.”

Elton got up and staggered down the hall to the hospital wing. He pulled on the bulky orange biohazard suit and hood before the FEMA guard — who was similarly dressed but for his submachine gun — allowed him through the door.

One of the CDC docs, a big-boned guy with a kind eye and quiet demeanor, turned and shook his head inside his clear hood when Elton walked into R. J. Howard’s room.

“Hey, Doc,” R.J. whispered, already struggling for breath behind a clear oxygen mask. His face was so swollen with boils that if his name hadn’t been taped at the foot of his bed, Elton never would have recognized him. The ventilator hissed and droned beside the bed, forcing oxygen into his lungs. It wasn’t enough. “Glad… you… stopped by,” he said into the mask.

“Shhh,” Elton said, panic rising in his chest. The man was dying before his eyes, and there was little he could do about it. “We already have Rick Bedford on ECMO treatment. We’ll get you on a machine right away.”

Howard’s head moved back and forth on the pillow. He pulled the mask away with trembling fingers so he could be heard. “No,” he groaned, croaking out each word. “Ms. Teeples… is over… there… right?”

“She is,” Elton said, looking at the poor young woman across the room. She wasn’t much better than Howard.

“You should… put her on… the machine,” he said. “She deserves it… for being… married… to that guy…”

Considering the man’s vitals, he was unlikely to survive even with a heart-lung bypass.

“I don’t see a number listed for your wife in Cedar City.” Elton said.

“Don’t… know it,” he whispered.

“Maybe we can send someone else from your unit by to talk to her.”

“Nobody else… in my unit… from there,” Howard groaned. “Anyway… she… left me… before I came… home,” he whispered.

Elton stood closer so he could be certain he heard correctly. “Did you say you were the only member of the 405th from Cedar City?”

Exhausted, Howard could do nothing but nod. “And you stopped off here before you ever made it back there when you came home from Afghanistan?”

“Right,” Howard said, eyes fluttering closed.

“Get some rest,” Elton said, all but jumping to his feet.

Ten minutes later Elton had peeled off the clammy suit and, after passing through two negative pressure barriers, was allowed into the trailer that served as the CDC inner sanctum.

The lead CDC physician was a short Indian man with thick glasses and wavy black hair. His name was Krishnamurti but rather than making everyone pronounce it each time they addressed him, he went by Doctor K.

“Tell me what you are trying to say,” Krishnamurti said from behind his Ikea wooden desk.

Elton ran a hand over a map of the United States projected on the office wall.

“Look at this,” he said. “The 405th returned home from Afghanistan last Sunday.” Elton consulted a list Doctor K had just given him. “Specialist Dean Fortuna is from Afton, Wyoming, where his wife is among the ill. First Sergeant Richard Bedford is from here in Kanab. His wife is also infected. Sergeant R. J. Howard is from Cedar City.”

“That is correct,” Krishnamurti said. “So what is your point?”

“Sergeant Howard never made it to Cedar City.” Elton stabbed his finger at the map for effect. “He’s been here in Kanab since he out-processed. If he’s the vector from Afghanistan, how come people in Cedar City are getting sick?”

“Another soldier perhaps,” Doctor K said, flicking his hand as if to ward off a mosquito.

“No one else from the 405th lists Cedar City as their home. But here’s the kicker.” Elton leaned in closer, both hands on Doctor K’s desk. “Howard just told me his wife left him before he even got home from Afghanistan.”

Krishnamurti shrugged. “What difference does that make?”

“She’s on the infected list in Cedar City.” Elton slapped the flat of his hand against the clipboard. “Something else is making these people sick. I say you get on the horn to your people in… wherever your people are… and have them get to the bottom of this.”

CHAPTER 58

The tattooed woman flicked her fingers dismissively at Goro, ignoring the cotton towel that had fallen away when she’d rolled toward her cell phone. The little man sat leering at her over his ugly glasses. He jumped as if he’d been shot when he realized she’d caught him looking and scuttled out of the room, tripping over his own feet. She was certain he covered her with small towels while he worked in order to get a better look. It did not matter. If he wanted to ogle, she didn’t care. He was small and ugly and probably never got within ten meters of a woman unless he had a tattoo needle in his hand. To be such a gifted artist, she would have thought he’d be more at ease with the sight of a female body.

Sitting naked on the cool tatami mat, she clutched her knees to her chest and let the phone chime in her hand. The doleful temple bells stopped for a moment. She held her breath, waiting, hoping, but it started again almost immediately.

Oda knew she had failed. Not once, but twice. There would be consequences for that.

She reached down to touch the warmth of blood that oozed from the tender skin over her hipbone. It was barely visible against the shining black ink. She wiped it away with the palm of her free hand, oblivious to the fact that her flesh was raw from thousands of jabs with Goro’s inked needles. Pain, she’d learned, was a most natural thing. It was something she could feed on, whether it was someone else’s or her own.

The temple chimes began again. She transferred the phone to her blood-smeared hand and pressed it to her ear.

“Hello, Father,” she said. “You have a job for me?”

CHAPTER 59

Deputy Bowen still knew very little about Detective Susumu Hase of the Fukuoka Police Organized Crime Squad. He was a careful driver, consistently keeping his hands at ten and two o’clock on the wheel of his unmarked blue Nissan sedan as if he were taking a driving test. He seemed content to travel in silence, staring intently ahead as he drove, keeping any thoughts to himself and happy to let the miles roll by without a word.

Bowen was no lover of mindless chatter, but he liked to learn a little about the people he worked with, especially if that person would be watching his back when he went up against a killer with Jericho Quinn’s skill set. Whatever his reasons, there was a substantial body count piling up in Quinn’s wake.

“How long have you been on the job?” Bowen asked, looking out the passenger window at the needle-like Fukuoka Tower building as they passed through the city.

“On the job?” Hase mused, trying to work out the translation in his mind.

“Sorry,” Bowen said. “How long have you been with the police department?”

“Ah,” Hase said, understanding. “Fourteen years. I was at Munakata Precinct before I became a detective. It is a little to the northeast of here, on the water.” He took his eyes off traffic long enough to shoot a glance at Bowen. “And you? How long have you been… on the job?”

“I was in the Army for four years after college. I’ve been with the Marshals Service for ten years now.”

Hase nodded slowly, looking at least informed if not impressed.

“I wasn’t allowed to bring my sidearm into Japan,” Bowen said, making sure Hase knew he wouldn’t be much help in a gunfight.

“Guns are not as much of an issue in Japan.” Detective Hase shrugged. “Our society is much less violent than America, I suppose.”

“Mind if I ask what you carry?”

“Guns are not as prominent here in Japan as they are in the U.S.” The detective shoulder-checked as he spoke, then took a left lane. “On patrol I carried a New Nambu five-shot revolver. As a detective who deals with yakuza and other organized crime groups on a regular basis I am allowed to carry a Sig Sauer.”

“Good weapon,” Bowen said. “Which one?”

“The P230 in .32 ACP.” Hase shot a glance toward the passenger seat, gauging the American lawman’s reaction. “As I said, guns are not as prevalent in this country.”

“Ah.” Bowen smiled politely, but he couldn’t help thinking that with that tiny caliber, for all practical purposes they were both unarmed.

He grabbed the edge of his seat when Hase made a right-hand turn into what looked to be oncoming traffic, then remembered they drove on the left in Japan. Hase took the on-ramp to some sort of expressway, then crossed a bridge to exit among a tumble of mismatched buildings and random shops that looked like concrete blocks dumped out of a sack. Streets ran at odd angles and disappeared into blind alleys with no apparent reason or order.

Hase had apparently spent plenty of time in the area and knew exactly where he was going. He parked the Nissan in an open space at the end of a narrow block, backing in over some sort of fold-up barrier underneath.

Bowen raised an eyebrow. “The police have to pay to park?”

“Why should we not pay to park?” Detective Hase dropped his keys in his jacket pocket. “I am a policeman, not the emperor.”

Bowen took a quick look around, trying to memorize where they’d left the vehicle, but the tangled streets and chicken scratches that comprised Japanese signage provided him little to go by. The sounds, the sights, everything was as foreign as if it had been from another planet. It was like trying to navigate using a map drawn by some impressionist painter. If anything happened to Hase, Bowen realized he would have no idea where they were, or how to contact the cavalry.

By the time he turned around from trying to orient himself, Hase was halfway down the block.

“You know Ayako Shimizu very well?” Bowen asked after trotting to catch up.

“I do,” Hase said. “She is my…” He turned his head, brow creased. “I am not sure of the word.”

“Informant?”

“That is it.” Hase nodded, working through the vocabulary. “Informant… because she informs me about criminal actions.”

“She’s supposed to have a place around here?”

“In a manner of speaking,” Hase said. “She works at several of the hotels in this area. One in particular is her favorite. We will try there first.”

“I see,” Bowen said. A girl in a short skirt and tall heels rode by on a bicycle, reminding Bowen of an album cover from his youth. She parked the bike in front of a white tile building called the Excalibur and shuffled inside, looking like Bambi on ice in the tall stiletto heels. Bowen nodded at the sign out front as they walked by. REST: 4400 YEN, STAY: 7900 YEN. “These are that kind of hotel. Rooms by the hour?”

“Something like that,” Hase answered. “They are used by prostitutes like Shimizu to be sure, but these love hotels also fill a certain need. In this country many generations of families often live under the same small roof with very thin walls. Sometimes a couple needs to get away.”

“Have you ever been to one?”

Hase gave a noncommittal grin. “I am not married.”

Bowen smiled back. “And that’s not what I asked.”

“Come,” Hase said, still avoiding the question. “That is the one, down the street.” He pointed to a red brick hotel with a matching privacy wall out front at the end of the crooked block. A life-size statue of Cleopatra reigned in naked glory beside the entrance. The sign above her said this love hotel was called THE LUXOR.

“My sister came to this one once when she was younger,” Hase said, his face pensive. “So I have a special relationship with the proprietors. College girls often wear fancy kimono to their graduation ceremony. My sister’s boyfriend convinced her to accompany him here… and, of course, remove her kimono. She did, but when their three hours of ‘rest’ was up she realized she did not have the necessary skill to dress herself back in the kimono. The entire process is quite intricate. Lucky for her, the old auntie at the front desk knew how to tie kimono and was able to help her get dressed before she returned home to our family.” He looked at Bowen through the narrow eyes of an elder brother. “But I could tell.”

“What happened?” Bowen asked as he stopped in front of the Luxor, waiting for Hase to finish his story before they went inside.

The detective winked. “I had a talk with my sister’s boyfriend and he is now my brother-in-law. We laugh about it now because I come here for work and talk to that same old lady that helped her out. My sister does not think it is very funny.”

He motioned Bowen through the door ahead of him. “Please,” he said. “After you. Japanese people are very polite. If someone is going to kill us, it will be in the back.”

Bowen stopped to look at him.

The detective grinned, showing a playful side brought out by the family story. “I am joking, Bowen-san.”

A bell chimed when they opened the glass door and entered a dim, but surprisingly clean, tile foyer. More nude statuary greeted them beside the front desk. These were plaster renditions of the goddesses Athena and Aphrodite, Greek not Egyptian, but Bowen doubted any of the Luxor’s patrons cared even if they happened to know.

“Irashaimase,” the granny behind the front desk window said. Please come in. A curtain with a print of a beautiful geisha hung down so the clerk would have to stoop to see anyone who was checking in. It was an illusion of privacy because there were two cameras facing the door that presumably fed monitors in the back office.

The clerk buzzed a side door open and waved Hase out of the main foyer with a flick of her liver-spotted hand. Bowen didn’t understand her words, but it was apparent that having a police officer loitering around check-in would be bad for business.

They were taken to a cramped back room, stacked to waist level with bins full of clean towels, bottles of shampoo, assorted lotions, and complimentary cans of beer. A plastic laundry basket sat just inside the door, filled to the brim with adult magazines and toys Bowen expected to find at such an establishment. If Hase and the old woman were embarrassed, they didn’t show it.

The two spoke for a short time, with the detective doing the lion’s share of listening while the old woman rattled on about something that Bowen thought was probably her bursitis, the way she kept holding up her elbow.

Finally, Hase turned to explain. “First,” he said, “you should know that Mrs. Mori thinks you are very handsome.”

Bowen looked at the grinning old woman. She was seventy if she was a day. “You’re talking about this woman here?”

“Yes,” Hase said. “She said is a shame that all the rooms are full and wonders if all American law enforcement officers are as good looking as you.”

“Not sure I know how to answer that.”

“That’s okay.” Hase laughed. “You don’t have to.” He nodded at a television monitor mounted on the back wall. A baseball game was playing, but the old woman picked up a remote and began to move through the channels. She clicked through five adult movies, pausing on one that was apparently a favorite of hers, before finally clicking through to a color-coded grid.

She studied the list of room numbers for a moment, then spoke rapidly to Hase.

“He’s still here, in Room four-oh-two — the Caesar Suite.” The detective pointed to the television screen. “That picture of a small lock below the room number means the door is shut. It will show unlocked if he opens the door to let someone in or leaves his room for any reason. They cannot allow people to walk freely around the halls in a place like this. Men can use one of the free papers from the lobby to pick out a girl and then call and place his order from the room.”

“The girl on the bicycle.” Bowen mused.

“Yes.” Hase nodded. “I am sure she was from one of the free paper advertisements. The man in Room four-oh-two has called to order such a girl, but Mrs. Mori said she has not yet arrived.”

“I see.” Bowen marveled over the differences between the Japanese and American versions of no-tell motels. “High tech.”

“High… tekku?”

“Tech,” Bowen said. “Technology.”

“Ah, yes,” Hase said, translating for the woman who smiled at the compliment regarding her system.

“So anyway.” Bowen nodded toward the flat screen. “Who is this man waiting in the Caesar Suite and why are we interested in him?”

“His name is Watanabe,” Hase said. “A yakuza soldier I have arrested numerous times. He is a regular client of Ayako Shimizu and will know how to find her if we ask the right questions.”

“And what type of questions are those?”

Hase turned to walk toward the elevator. “The same type of questions that turned my sister’s boyfriend into my brother-in-law.”

CHAPTER 60

Quinn and Ayako waited beside a vending machine that sold vitamin drinks in a shadowed alley across the busy four-lane thoroughfare of Sumiyoshi Street. A conservative black sign in large block characters ran between the uppermost row of windows and the flat roofline of the fifteen-story building. It read YANAGI PHARMACEUTICAL.

A steady wind howled, cold enough that periodic raindrops stung when they hit exposed skin. The motorcycle leaned on its side stand a few feet away, hot engine ticking as it cooled.

Ayako sniffed, brushing a wisp of hair out of her cold-pinked cheek. The wind blew it back again, so she gave up after two tries. She hunched over a small notebook, scribbling something while Quinn kept his eyes focused across the street. Whatever it was, she brooded about it for a moment, before tucking the book inside her bra, next to her heart.

Sighing heavily — as if she’d come to some grave decision — she took her phone out of her jacket.

“The website says this pharmaceutical company is a subsidiary of Yanagi Chemical Corporation…” She used her thumb to scroll down the page as she read. “What would Oda want with a company that manufactures antibiotics and tetanus vaccine?”

“I don’t know,” Quinn said, leaning against the bike. “But it can’t be good.”

He’d watched four women and a man who all looked to be American or European leave together shortly after he’d parked the bike a little before 11:00. Now they walked back up the street, returning with cups of takeout coffee from a nearby café, chattering happily among themselves. Two of the women gave each other a high five as they crossed the street at the end of the block. They were celebrating something.

Quinn fought the urge to strong-arm his way to Oda. He’d come this far looking for answers. It would do little good to blow it all because of impatience. Still, they had to start somewhere — and of all Quinn’s good qualities, quietly waiting was not chief among them.

Emiko Miyagi had pointed out this fault early on. She told him of a poem that described the three most prominent shoguns in feudal Japan and their methods of dealing with a bird that refused to sing.

If it doesn’t sing, kill it, the first said.

If it doesn’t sing, make it sing, was the second’s philosophy.

The third, and most successful shogun, Lord Tokugawa had said: If it doesn’t sing, wait for it. It will.

Quinn had pointed out that Lord Tokugawa was also one of the most ruthless men who ever ruled Japan. “Balance, Quinn-san,” Miyagi had said. “It is always about balance.”

He smiled at the memory. The man behind the attempted murder of his little girl was very likely across the street. Balance was one thing, but at this point, the scales tipped toward going inside and making someone sing.

The American visitors were nearly to the front door.

Quinn turned to Ayako. Strands of black hair plastered across her face. “How about we get you out of this wind?”

She gave him a little bow. Grinning enough to show the delicate crow’s-feet at the corner of her eyes.

“That is an excellent—”

Ayako gave a little jump when the cell phone in her hand began to ring. She looked at the caller ID, frowning.

“Moshi moshi,” she answered. “Emm… Yes… yes, of course.” She looked up at Quinn, eyes wide. “It is for you. A man named Winfield Palmer.”

CHAPTER 61

Mrs. Mori was able to watch Bowen and Hase on the closed-circuit monitors in her office off the lobby of the Luxor love hotel. The detective waved at the hallway camera when they reached Room 402. The door gave a faint click as she opened it remotely.

The king-size bed was turned down, but empty. A pixilated adult movie played on the big-screen television. A single pair of well-worn but highly polished black shoes had been placed in the alcove just inside the door.

Bowen was hit immediately with a face full of steam and the heady odor of scented bath soap. The sound of dripping water to their right said Watanabe was in the bathroom.

Thinking it was his date, the yakuza soldier yelled something through the door.

Hase grinned, putting a finger to his lips. “He says he has the oil,” the detective whispered. “He wants us to come in and… apply it… In so many words.”

“This should be rich,” Bowen said, and pushed open the door.

He was greeted by the unpleasant sight of the heavily tattooed Isamu Watanabe, who was facedown and naked on a large plastic air mattress that took up all the usable space of the bathroom floor below the tub. The gangster’s right hand was wrapped in a bloodstained bandage. He kept it tucked in close to his side to protect it, but that hadn’t stopped him from using his other hand to douse himself with cooking oil. It puddled in the small of his back and ran down into the creases of the air mattress.

Facing away, with his cheek pressed against the plastic, he barked a command to who he thought was the girl he’d ordered from the free paper.

“He wants us to rub his back,” Hase said out loud. He stomped the end of the mattress, sending the startled yakuza rolling. “I don’t think I would care for that, would you?”

Watanabe spun at the male voice, drawing into a ball to cover himself and cowering against the far wall.

Body ink was nothing new to Bowen. Many of his friends in the military had tats. He’d heard of the Japanese mafia’s culture of tattooing their entire body, but he’d never actually seen one. Even on this sniveling runt it was an impressive thing to behold — blues, greens, and oranges flowing in surreal lines to form dragons and fire-breathing demons.

In a sudden gust of bravado, the surprised yakuza sprang for a pistol that lay on the counter beside the bathroom sink. He might as well have been reaching for the moon.

Hase gave the air mattress another stomp and sent the yakuza flying backward to bounce off the tile wall. By the time Watanabe could rebound, the detective produced an expandable metal baton from under his golf jacket and opened it with a flick of his wrist. Swinging the telescoping club with startling accuracy, the detective struck Watanabe twice in the injured hand and knocked out a front tooth before the man even knew he was being hit.

Bowen, who stood closer to the sink, snatched up the pistol and tucked it into his waistband, hoping Hase might forget he had it.

Though he’d appeared all mild manners and good sense from the time they’d met at the airport, Bowen was pleased to note that Detective Hase had an “on” switch. Evidently, Watanabe flipped it.

The yakuza soldier put both hands to his face and sank to his knees on the deflated air mattress. He sobbed as if he was choking to death.

Still clutching the expandable baton, the detective leaned in, launching into a series of spit-filled, rapid-fire questions. He hardly gave the cowering Watanabe time to answer before starting in on the next.

Bowen imagined it would be difficult for anyone to withstand a long interrogation by the screaming Hase, but enduring it with a mutilated hand while naked, slathered with cooking oil, and missing a tooth only added to the humiliation.

A look of amused surprise spread across Hase’s face. He turned to Bowen.

“Watanabe tells me that your fugitive cut off his finger last night and killed five members of his yakuza family. Ayako Shimizu killed a sixth.”

“So we were right that he is running with Shimizu?”

“Six dead.” Hase patted the metal club against an open palm. “And that is not taking into account those we found at Shimizu’s apartment. According to Watanabe, this American with a dark beard and cruel eyes cut the head off the gangster underboss and gave it to the top boss — a man called Tanaka.”

Bowen whistled. Quinn had really gone into the deep end of the pool.

“Does he say where we can find them?”

Hase began to shout again. The naked man groveled, still kneeling in the pool of oil. The peony flowers surrounding the fanged demons of his tattooed back appeared to ripple as his glistening skin twitched in pain and fear.

“He says he cannot seem to go two days in a row without someone beating him up.” Detective Hase half turned, trying to suppress a grin. “I told him you were an American police officer and your rules for interrogation were probably much more lax than ours.”

Bowen looked at the froth of blood streaming between Watanabe’s broken teeth. “Somehow I doubt that,” he said.

“He swears he hasn’t seen Ayako Shimizu since she stomped him in the groin…”

Watanabe broke in, bowing as he rattled off what sounded like a long excuse for something.

“Wait,” Detective Hase said. “He’s making a correction. Ayako Shimizu and the American were on a motorcycle the last he saw them, leaving a shrine near Tanaka’s warehouse.”

Watanabe chattered on, fearful he might leave something out.

“Apparently,” Hase said, rolling his eyes, “Watanabe has decided he hates being in the yakuza now.”

“Did he say where Shimizu and the American were headed?”

“He did,” Hase said. “I know the place. It is not too far from here. Yanagi Pharmaceutical.”

CHAPTER 62

Quinn turned his back to the wind that whipped down the alley as he spoke, eyes still glued to the front of Yanagi Pharmaceutical.

“How did you find me?”

On the other end of the phone, Winfield Palmer gave a long, deliberate sigh. Quinn could picture him sitting behind his broad mahogany desk, perusing a computerized map of Japan with a red blip that signified Quinn’s location.

“Don’t blame Emiko,” the national security advisor said. “She would have helped you escape even if I’d not told her to.”

“Seriously?” Quinn scoffed. “You have known all the time where I was?”

“Pretty much,” Palmer said. “That leather satchel your IDs came with keeps us pretty up to date.”

“Can I ask why?” Quinn slowed his breathing, letting this new reality sink in.

“You’ve proven yourself too many times for me to think you shot Officer Chin.” Palmer paused as if he wanted to get his words just right. Such self-awareness was a rarity for him. “You were correct when we talked after Kim was shot. There is definitely something global in the works. That hit team in Vegas was just too neat and tidy. And then someone tries to frame you for the murder. If Oda is behind all this, as Emiko suspects, then there is a larger game in play. Oda is a big gun. It would be overkill to use his organization just to kill a member of someone’s family.”

“You have a theory?”

“Wish I did,” Palmer said. “But I do have another problem. Have you been watching the news?”

“I’ve been a little busy running from the law,” Quinn said.

“But you know about this pandemic?”

“I do,” Quinn said. “Looks awful.”

“For a time it looked like there might have been a bit of bright news on the horizon. Japan was hit with this same virus months ago. They were able to contain it but started work on a vaccine anyway. Our folks on the ground there say they have developed a live virus vaccine that produces antibodies in humans. The president wants it pushed through ASAP.” Palmer groaned. “A couple of wrinkles over here though have made me second-guess our celebrations.”

“Let me guess,” Quinn said, still watching the building across the street. “Yanagi Pharmaceutical is involved.”

“That’s correct.” Palmer sighed. “How did you know?”

“I’m sitting across from their front doors right now, waiting for Oda to show up.”

“Dammit!” Palmer hissed. “I knew a vaccine this soon was a fantasy. Can you get inside?”

“I can now,” Quinn said. “Has anyone tested the vaccine?”

“Supposedly,” Palmer groaned. “We have CDC and HHS personnel there now, but they’re under tremendous pressure to stop this virus.”

“Yeah,” Quinn said. “I just saw them come back from a break. Looks like the tests went well. They may as well have been toasting each other with champagne.”

“It wouldn’t be that difficult for someone to doctor the results enough for them to accept a bogus test.”

“Okay,” Quinn said. “I’ll go check it out. But do me a favor and tell Miyagi I forgive her.”

“She’ll be glad to hear that,” Palmer said. “Don’t quote me, but for some reason, I think she has a little teacher crush on you…” He chuckled. “Anyway, wish me luck. I have to go tell the president I’m taking away the good news for his State of the Union address tonight.”

Quinn ended the call and peered over at Ayako, who stood so the vending machine blocked some of the wind.

“Did you know about this?”

She shook her head. “I am beginning to believe Emiko-chan does not tell me anything. I can guess from your half of the conversation that the authorities know where you are?”

“They do,” Quinn said, dark eyes narrowing as an idea formed in his head. “Would you mind if I make another quick call?”

///

Veronica Garcia answered on the second ring.

“Hello?”

Her honey-soft voice caused Quinn to catch his breath.

“It’s me,” he said, feeling a little dizzy at the sound of her.

“Jericho?”

“Yep.”

“Oh… a… hi.” Her voice was hollow, distant.

“I’m sorry I didn’t call before I left.”

“Okay,” she said, her voice noncommittal. “Jacques gave me your message.”

“Yeah,” Quinn said, picturing her. “But I still should have called.”

“That’s true,” she said. “Turns out you were right about the feds. A deputy U.S. marshal came by looking for you. I was able to tell him you were too big a jerk to call me before you ran.”

“You’ll probably be mad at me for asking this,” Quinn said. “But do you know how Kim is doing?”

There was silence on the line. Quinn felt like an idiot. You didn’t ask your girlfriend to check on the status of your ex-wife.

Garcia rescued him. “She’s doing better every day. OSI still has her under protection. Mattie, too.”

“Thanks.” He wanted to say more, but Ayako stood too close, arms crossed and a jealous pout pinching her face. “Listen, I have to go. I’ll call you again soon. I…”

“I know,” Garcia said, and hung up.

Garcia slipped the cell phone into the pocket of a black Massif Nomex jacket, then looked up at Thibodaux and Miyagi with a tear in her eye.

The big Cajun gave her shoulder a squeeze in an attempt to console her.

“You okay, cher?”

She sniffed. “I’m fine.”

Thibodaux turned so he could see her with his good eye. “He asked you about Kim?”

“He did.” A broad smile spread over Ronnie’s full lips as a realization dawned on her. “But do you know what that means? It means he called me first.”

Quinn handed the phone back to Ayako and grabbed the helmet from where it hung on the handlebar of the Blackbird.

“Was that your girlfriend?” Ayako frowned.

Quinn pulled on the helmet and fastened the strap. “She is.” He threw a leg over the bike and pushed the starter. “Or she was. To tell you the truth, I’m not sure anymore.”

“Hmmm,” Ayako said, climbing on behind him. She snaked her arms around him as if she didn’t want him to get away.

Quinn released the clutch and pulled out of the alley to wait at the curb for traffic. Remembering he was in Japan and not the United States, he looked right first, then left for oncoming traffic. Jetting across when he had an opening, he leaned the Blackbird into a tight U-turn on the narrow street that ran alongside the Yanagi building. Ayako scrambled off and he kicked the side stand down next to the curb, facing the main thoroughfare again but from the opposite direction.

Still straddling the bike, he watched as a silver gray Suzuki Hayabusa roared down Sumiyoshi to park directly in front of the building. The big motorcycle dwarfed the rider, but she handled it as if she’d been born on the back of one.

Quinn’s gut tightened as she shook her long black hair free of a matte black helmet. It was the woman from the gondola canals at the Venetian — the woman who shot Kim.

If Miyagi had been right, this was her daughter, Ran.

Ayako gave a pitiful groan.

The young woman glanced up and down the street, paying particular attention to the way she’d come and the roofline of the buildings above her. An assassin herself, she knew where she would hide and considered those the danger areas she needed to watch.

The Blackbird was parked behind a concrete pillar and difficult to see from her vantage point.

Apparently satisfied that she hadn’t been followed and wasn’t about to be shot by a sniper, the woman bounded up the long stairway to the Yanagi building and opened the front door.

Without thinking, Quinn abandoned his helmet on the handlebar of the Blackbird, breaking into a trot for the door. He’d been focused on finding Oda so he would lead him to this girl. Now, he could go straight to her. Oda may have ordered the hit, but she had pulled the trigger and deserved a little something extra for that.

He was vaguely aware of Ayako running beside him with the guitar case strapped over her shoulder as he jerked open the glass door.

He caught a glimpse of the young woman’s gray motorcycle jacket starting up an open flight of stairs at the far end of the expansive lobby, across fifty feet of pink granite tile. The entire ground floor was a perfect example of minimalist style with little more than a few simple calligraphies, an oval reception desk, and a half a dozen uniformed security guards.

The nearest guard called out in challenge as soon as Quinn entered the lobby. The young woman turned, saw Quinn coming for her, and ran for the cover of the stairs. All six guards converged on Quinn as he closed the distance.

He was vaguely aware of hitting the first one under the chin, snapping the man’s head back and driving him to the tile like he was spiking a volleyball. He swatted the next two out of his way like spiderwebs on a trail — annoyance more than anything. Ayako met one, grabbing the poor man around the neck and pulling him to her to give him three rapid-fire knees to the groin before shoving him to the side.

The next two were in the process of a coordinated attack when gunfire opened up from the stairs above. Nothing more than hired security, these two fled toward the front doors, realizing that Quinn was the target and wanting to get as far away from him as they could.

Quinn drew the H&K and sent the young assassin scuttling with two well-placed shots. He raced up the stairs after her, pistol trained on the balcony where she’d disappeared. A set of wooden doors, like those found in a hospital, were still swinging when he rounded the corner.

Not wanting to give the woman time to set up an ambush, Quinn pressed on with Ayako right behind.

Ahead, a Japanese lab tech in a long white coat pushed a metal rack taller than his head across the hallway intersection, blocking the young woman’s escape. Quinn paused to take a shot, but Ayako slid into him from behind, spoiling his aim and allowing his target to slip away. The fleeing woman yanked the rack sideways as she went around, sending twenty-four hundred eggs crashing to the polished laboratory floor.

Quinn ducked as two more rounds zinged off a stainless-steel lab shelf behind him. Struggling to keep his feet in the slippery mess of eggs and crushed shell, he shoved the surprised lab tech out of the way and moved to the corner where the woman had disappeared.

Two men in suits met him head-on as he did a quick-peek around the corner. These were much more devoted to their jobs than the uniformed guards downstairs.

“Kill them,” the young woman yelled from the far end of the hall, twenty feet away.

The lead man, a bruiser built for power over speed, hit Quinn hard between the eyes.

The blow felt like a brick, but Quinn had been hit before and rolled with it, stepping back against the wall. He was not in the habit of shooting innocent security guards who were just doing their jobs, but this guy went for a pistol, apparently happy to carry out the kill order. Quinn beat him to the punch, firing the H&K from tight against his waist. His first round connected — there was nowhere else for it to go with the wide man standing in front of him — but to little effect.

Quinn swatted the guard’s pistol out of the way, then angled the barrel of the H&K upward, firing again as the man battered him with left hooks, trying to bring his gun into play. He was amazingly agile to be as big as he was and carrying two bullets. Quinn’s third shot took him under the chin, stopping him in his tracks. He swayed, falling forward, dead weight smearing Quinn into the wall on his way to the floor.

When he finally shook himself free, Quinn looked up in time to see Ayako withdraw the blade of her father’s short sword from the belly of the second security man. He’d seen this one before, even snapped a photo when he’d caught the guy following him at Reagan National Airport two months earlier.

Before he could move again, two pistol rounds slapped Quinn in the chest. The ballistic armor under his leather Transit jacket stopped them from penetrating, but the blunt trauma felt like he’d been kicked by a horse. He stepped sideways, returning fire as he pulled Ayako out of the way.

The young woman shot again, then ducked around a corner where the hall jogged to the right.

Quinn dropped the magazine on the H&K during the momentary lull.

“Four rounds plus one in the tube,” he whispered.

Ayako nodded, bloody sword at her side.

Quinn advanced quickly down the hall behind the pistol, hugging the wall so he could use any doorway for cover. Ayako stayed behind him. Well back from the corner he began to step sideways, inch by inch, to broaden his field of view. It was called cutting the pie.

The hallway was empty and footfalls echoed down the stairs at the far end.

She was running, circling back to the lobby, probably aiming for the front door.

CHAPTER 63

Quinn and Ayako shoved their way through two more sets of uniformed Yanagi security before making it back to the exit.

Already straddling her bike, the woman began to shoot as they ran for the Blackbird. They were only twenty yards apart. She’d been half again that far away when she shot the Pakistani in Vegas. This time, with the possibility of Quinn shooting back, her shots went wide.

Quinn jumped aboard the waiting bike and hit the start button. “Get on!” he yelled at Ayako.

She stood frozen, a few paces ahead of the Blackbird’s front wheel, staring at the shooter as if in a trance.

He gunned the throttle, scooting the bike up adjacent to Ayako, bumping her with his elbow to get her attention.

“I said get on!” he barked, passing the pistol back behind him. “I can’t ride and shoot at the same time.”

She snapped out of the trance as pistol rounds zinged past their heads and slapped the concrete pillar behind them. A window shattered in the convenience store across the street. Passersby screamed and ran for cover.

Facing the silver Hayabusa, Quinn rolled on the throttle as soon as he felt Ayako take the H&K and jump aboard behind him. Tugging upward on the handlebars, he brought the bike into a low wheelie to put as much of it as possible between them and oncoming gunfire.

The woman kept shooting as the Blackbird sped past. Thankfully, she was unable to hit anything vital on the rapidly approaching target. They were thirty meters down the road when Quinn heard the Hayabusa roar to life behind him. The last thing he wanted was for this woman to be on his tail.

He slowed just enough to keep from pitching them both off the bike in a high-side crash, locking up the Honda’s rear brake so it lost traction. Looking back over his shoulder, he leaned, dumping the clutch and pouring on the throttle to turn the bike into a smooth 180 in a near perfect foot-down drift. He and his brother both had the scars to prove they’d practiced such moves hundreds of times in the high school parking lot growing up.

Smoke poured from the Hayabusa’s rear tire as it grabbed for traction on the chilly pavement. Firing the pistol left-handed, she was unable to shift gears. The bike screamed to redline, still in second as she sped by against traffic. Cabs and delivery vans peeled off in either direction to avoid the oncoming motorcycle. Horns blared. A black sedan careened into a fire hydrant, sending a geyser of spray into the winter air.

Quinn slowed again, drifting the back tire through another 180-degree turn. Ayako craned her head around to keep her eye on the fleeing Suzuki. Centrifugal force threw her sideways on the tiny passenger seat. Flailing, she clutched at Quinn’s jacket in mid-lean. The rear tire bucked as it caught traction. Quinn poured on more throttle, breaking the tire loose and narrowly avoiding a wreck.

“Sorry,” Ayako screamed over the sound of wind and whining gears — so Japanese to apologize in the middle of a bike chase and shoot-out.

Thankfully, the Hayabusa took care of splitting the lion’s share of oncoming traffic, so Quinn could just keep the Blackbird pointing down the centerline. Ten seconds after turning around, he passed a blue Nissan with the slender antennas of an undercover police car. The American riding in the passenger seat caught his eye, head snapping around as they shot by.

Quinn could hardly believe it. August Bowen had come all the way to Japan to find him. The thought of a deputy U.S. Marshal always getting his man sounded all well and good — until you happened to be that man.

A near miss with two uniformed high school girls on bicycles pushed thoughts of manhunters and felony arrest out of Quinn’s mind. There was nothing he could do about it now. This woman had shot Kim and tried to kill his little girl. She would not get away again.

Bitter cold wind whipped at Quinn’s face as he dipped in and out of traffic. Blocky buildings rose up on either side of the street, making it seem as though they were riding through a canyon of concrete and glass. White lines, metal poles, and slippery steel manhole covers flew by in a deadly blur. Both he and Ayako had dropped their helmets when the chase began. She rode with her body tucked in tight against his back, pressed against his leather jacket. Leaning forward over the handlebars of the bike, Quinn had no such protection.

There was always the chance that he’d spill, and offer up his brains to the asphalt gods — but the main problem with riding at such speeds with no helmet or goggles was the inability to see. An amazing amount of debris floated in the city air. Bits of trash, flecks of dust, gravel thrown up by passing trucks — all scoured his face like a sandblaster, putting grit in his teeth and threatening to blind him. Squinting through it, he took the Blackbird to its limits. He waited to shift until the tach touched redline, and let off the gas only when absolutely necessary to keep from crashing the bike or running off the road.

Hayabusa was the Japanese word for peregrine falcon. Capable of speeds over two hundred miles an hour, one of this sleek raptor’s favorite meals happened to be blackbirds. Suzuki had purpose-built the Hayabusa to chase down and eat Honda’s sport bike. There was no question that the Busa was a faster motorcycle. But city streets didn’t give the woman space to really open it up, and Quinn stayed tucked in behind her as if tied on with a cable, rarely falling back more than fifty meters.

A bright red concrete truck changed lanes without warning. The woman was able to steer out of it, leaning the Busa into a knee-dragging turn worthy of any racetrack as she followed the curve of Sumiyoshi Street through its arc in front of the main train station.

“She’s running toward the docks!” Ayako yelled in Quinn’s ear as he took the Blackbird into the same turn. Quinn gave her thigh a pat with his clutch hand, a warning to hang on as he leaned into the same corner. The fiberglass fairing groaned, scraping against the asphalt, but he rolled on speed smoothly, popping back up on the straightaway.

Ignoring every red light, the Hayabusa shot through the intersections as if she didn’t care if she lived or died. Quinn stayed close, but slowed enough to keep from being eaten by any oncoming trucks. Thankfully, most of the lights were green and in their favor.

The Busa took a hard left where the road T’d in front of the sweeping white architecture of the Fukuoka Sun Palace Hotel. The woman missed her lane, shooting again into oncoming traffic. So far, she’d not looked back once. If she knew Quinn was gaining on her, now less than fifteen meters behind, it did not change the way she rode.

Ayako squeezed so tightly Quinn thought she might crack one of his remaining good ribs.

Almost close enough to reach out and touch now, the silver Busa cut right. The red metal girders of the Hakata Port Tower rose up in the distance.

“There is nowhere else to go,” Ayako whispered in his ear. “She is trapped.” The words were torn away by speed and wind, but Quinn heard them — and they sounded a little sad.

“Get the pistol ready,” he yelled over his shoulder.

“I am sorry, Quinn-san,” Ayako yelled. “I must have dropped it when we sped away so quickly.”

Quinn clenched his jaw. He’d been chasing an armed assassin for the last five minutes with little more than good intentions. A new plan began to take shape in his mind.

“I am truly sorry,” she yelled again, wanting to be sure he heard her over the wind and engine noise. “I do not know what happened—”

“Can’t be helped,” Quinn said as the end of the road loomed in front of them. “Be ready to hand me the sword.”

CHAPTER 64

Though plenty fast, Detective Hase’s Nissan Skyline was no match for two of the fastest street motorcycles in the world. It wasn’t long before the bikes were nearly out of sight.

Bowen was astonished at the detective’s unflappable nature. He kept his hands on the wheel at ten and two o’clock, even during a pursuit, weaving in and out of traffic so hard the deputy had to brace himself to keep from falling over on top of him during the slide-over-baby turns.

Several times in the middle of a sharp corner, Bowen was certain they were both about to be killed by an oncoming truck or bus, only to remember at the last minute that Japanese people drove on the left side of the road.

Hase’s unmarked car had lights in the dash and the rear window. The siren blared, but few drivers recognized it as a police vehicle.

Police chatter in unintelligible Japanese poured out of the radio. Bowen hung on to the side handle with one hand while he banged on the dash with the other, urging him around a goggled old man in flip-flops putting down the middle of the road on a smoking scooter.

The ring of a phone over the radio speaker interrupted the chatter and the deputy’s rant.

Hase moved his hands long enough to tap the hands-free button on his steering wheel, then moved them back to ten and two, machinelike.

“Hase desu,” he answered with an abrupt grunt. His head swiveled right, then left before crossing an intersection choked with cars, piled in a hopelessly tangled wreck from avoiding the fleeing motorcycles.

“Hmm… Hmmm… Ehhh…” Hase said, in between what sounded to Bowen to be long strings of clicky, garbled nonsense.

Hase tapped the wheel again and ended the call. Eyes on the road, he translated for Bowen. The corners of his normally pensive mouth turned up in a tight smile.

“There is a police helicopter ahead. It looks like your fugitive will not be a fugitive for long. They are heading for the docks beside Hakata Tower. They have nowhere else to go.”

CHAPTER 65

Abus full of Korean tourists pulled out of the ferry terminal parking lot and directly into the Hayabusa’s path as the woman shot past the red steel latticework of the Hakata Port Tower. Fresh from the trip across the sea, the Koreans pressed animated faces against the window as the woman horsed the big bike to the right in an attempt to avoid a collision.

They were too close and the streets were too wet.

Rather than slam into the side of the bus, the woman laid down the bike, throwing herself into a low-side skid so that it slid in front of her. Metal groaned and ground against pavement, sending up a shower of sparks. The bus driver slammed on his brakes, throwing the faces in the windows forward in their seats. The woman skidded on her back, body tense to keep from tumbling until she bled off speed. Like Quinn, she’d dropped her helmet before the chase began, so she kept her neck up to protect her head.

Flat on her back, the woman was able to slide directly under the bus as her bike struck a tire and jumped through the air, slamming into the fender with a horrific, shattering crunch.

Quinn watched her pistol fall and saw it spinning like a top on the sidewalk. The slide was locked to the rear, empty. It would do him little good, but at least she wouldn’t have it to reload.

He goosed the gas to squirt the Blackbird up a delivery ramp at the end of the dockside storefront, working through a crowd of over a hundred junior high students in dark, conservative uniforms who appeared to be on a field trip to the port. When he finally made it around the bus, he saw the woman running toward a group of schoolgirls. She held a short blade of her own and hacked her way through the terrified children. Two girls, neither over twelve, fell before the flashing blade. The others scattered, screaming at the sight of so much blood.

Quinn longed for a gun. Ayako, who’d been looking over his shoulder, shrank at the sight of such cruelty, pressing her face to his back.

The woman kept moving toward the water, a curtain of black hair hanging down over her eyes, swishing back and forth in her frenzied hacking.

Quinn crouched low over the handlebars, urging the bike through the milling crowd on the broad promenade along the pier. His first thought was to run into the murderous woman, but he realized he’d likely kill more kids with the heavy bike than she would with the blade. Five meters away, he abandoned the Blackbird and jumped to the ground, taking the short sword with him. Ayako fell in behind, close, but giving him enough space to work.

First attack was a tricky thing. It was all too easy to give up too much strategy by showing your hand early in the game. If the woman knew how badly he was injured, she’d know exactly where to attack him. But the adrenaline of the chase smoothed the ache in his bones and masked the pain in his back.

He gave a vicious war cry as he crashed in, extending the short sword over his head. Unlike the longer katana, the wakizashi was generally a one-handed weapon. What it lost in power, it gained in maneuverability.

Quinn brought the blade down almost, but not quite on top of the woman’s head. She countered, blocking his sword and bringing her own in a tight arc, slicing the air where his arms would have been had he fully committed to the strike.

The fighters parted as if pushed away from each other by some unseen force, circled slowly, and then came together in a clash of blades, repeating the action over and over in an attempt to gain the upper hand.

At length, their blades locked at the guards at belt level between the two fighters. It was an odd thing, Quinn thought, to look into the face of this young woman who had come so close to killing his little girl, to smell the odor of peppermint on her breath, and to see the map of practice scars that nicked her face and hands. Had he not been locked in battle, it would have been easy to feel pity for this girl who was barely old enough to be called a woman. He’d often feel pity for those he’d killed — after the fact.

Locked together, each pushed against the other, standing their ground. The first to pull away would be exposed to a rapid and surely fatal cut.

Grunting, the woman gave a toss of her head to get the hair out of her eyes. “You are better than I expected you to be.”

“I watched a lot of The Princess Bride.” Quinn smiled.

“What?”

Never in his life had he wanted so badly to cut someone down. In order to do that, he had to stay alive. In an unspoken, mutually agreed momentary truce, the fighters pushed apart, circling again for another attack.

Feinting, the woman drew Quinn out to block a blow from his left, forcing him to twist toward his injured kidney. He blocked the attack but stumbled slightly, allowing her blade to slice through the shoulder of his leather jacket.

A smile perked the corners of the woman’s lips. She circled, moving easily like a shark at the scent of blood.

“You are hurt.” She tipped her head toward his waist.

Quinn brushed the words aside as he would a blade, changing the subject while he caught his breath. In truth, the intense pain brought on by that simple twisting movement had nearly taken him to his knees.

He kept the tip of his sword high. “You’ve been after me since Colorado.”

The woman’s lips pulled back into a scornful laugh. Black eyes glared. “I watched you long before that, Jericho Quinn.”

“Did your father send you after me… Ran?” He used her given name, the one Miyagi had told him. It sounded more like Lon when he said it in Japanese.

The girl laughed, wagging her head derisively in spite of the situation. “Ohhh, you think you know so much.”

“I know your mother is named Emiko.” He circled, letting the tip of his blade drop so it pointed at her cold heart.

She rolled her eyes, stomping forward in a flurry of cuts that opened a flap of thick leather along his arm.

She stepped back to survey the damage. “You know nothing.”

“If your father is so great and powerful, why does he send females to do his heavy work?” Quinn’s words dripped with scorn but dizziness tugged at his brain. At any moment he would stumble an inch in the wrong direction. When he did, she would cut him down without a second thought.

“Do not flatter yourself.” The woman eyed him as if she had already won. “You are a passable warrior, Jericho Quinn.” She feinted right, then left, drawing him out again before her blade flashed in a diagonal line across the front of his jacket. The blade cut all the way through, slicing leather, armor, and then skin. Quinn felt the acid burn as the razor edge scraped a rib, but the jacket took the worst of the attack and he was able to step offline, keeping his feet — for the moment.

She backed up a half step, circling, preparing to strike again. “To you, the blade is only a pastime. The way of the sword has been my life.”

Badly wounded now, Quinn was vaguely aware of a flashing blur to his right. Knocked violently sideways, he heard Ayako’s anguished scream as she rushed past him, impaling her belly on the startled woman’s blade.

Ayako drove forward, grabbing the hilt with both hands and pushing the woman backward. Gasping, she whispered something that Quinn couldn’t make out before falling to the concrete, the stingray skin handle of the short sword sticking from her bleeding stomach.

The young woman’s face went pale at the sudden attack. Stunned by Ayako’s heroics, she backpedaled, scowling and cursing under her breath. Quinn raised his sword and advanced, but she turned and ran toward the pier to dive over the edge and disappear with a splash below.

Quinn fell to his knees beside a gasping Ayako. She lay on her side. Blood seeped through clenched fingers where they closed around the hilt. The blade had pierced her all the way through and the tip protruded out her back, tenting the cloth of her jacket.

“I am sorry, Quinn-san,” she whispered. A sheen of pink blood covered her teeth. Her lungs rattled with each labored breath.

“Shhh.” Quinn put a finger to her lips. “Listen,” he said. “Hear the sirens? Help is on the way.”

Tears pressed through the heavy makeup of Ayako’s clenched lashes. Wincing, she reached inside her shirt and retrieved the pink notebook. “Please,” she gasped, her voice barely audible. “Take… this.”

Her fingers left a red trail on the cover as she pressed it into his hand.

“I would have made a good wife,” she whispered.

“Yes, you would have,” Quinn said.

“I think this was my moment.” She coughed, beginning to shiver from shock and blood loss. She nodded toward the water. “Be careful of that one…” Ayako swallowed hard, gasping for air. “She is fierce, like her mother. .”

Her face went slack and her hands fell away from her belly.

Police and medical support squealed onto the scene. Quinn returned Fujin to the scabbard and shoved it down the back of the collar of his jacket so it ran along his spine. There were already people tending to the wounded children, so Quinn got on the Blackbird and rode to the edge of the pier, scanning for any sign of the woman.

“Hey!” A voice called out in English behind him.

Quinn looked over his shoulder and felt his heart sink as he saw a familiar man approach.

“What brings you to Japan, Gus Bowen?”

“You know, looking for killers,” the deputy said, a raw edge to his voice. “Shit like that.” His hand was under his sport coat. If he had a gun, he didn’t show it.

“Maybe you came for a rematch on that fight.” Quinn turned, ignoring Bowen to keep his eyes on the line of squid boats that bobbed in the mist along the two sets of docks nearest the pier.

“No sport in that.” Bowen whistled. “You can barely stand up. We need to get you to a hospital.”

“I got things to do,” Quinn said.

“I saw what your friend did to save you.” Bowen’s voice was full of reverence. “Incredibly brave.”

Quinn shook his head, preferring not to discuss someone like Ayako Shimizu with anyone who didn’t know her.

“Come on, Jericho. You’re hurt. What do you say we let the Japanese deal with their own mess?”

“That’s the problem, Gus,” Quinn said. “This is my mess.”

Two piers over, the engine of a speedboat burbled to life. There had been an escape plan all along.

Bowen finally showed the pistol but he let it hang down by his side instead of aiming in. He stood, staring, mulling something over in his mind.

“Let’s go sort this all out,” he finally said, sounding flat and fatigued.

Quinn kept a hand on the throttle, ready to move. He’d seen Bowen shoot and didn’t want to try his hand at being a target. “Can you remember a telephone number?”

Bowen nodded, drilling holes with his eyes.

Quinn gave him Win Palmer’s personal line.

“Jericho.” Bowen frowned. “Don’t make me chase you. You know I will if I have to.”

“I’m not making you do anything.” Quinn revved the engine. “In fact, I’d just as soon you didn’t. Don’t forget that number.”

Quinn sped down the dock on the Blackbird, leaving Bowen, Hase, and the other responding law enforcement to take care of the wounded and terrified children.

August Bowen was about justice — not just the law. Had it been otherwise, he would have never let Quinn leave alive.

Sticky blood from the wound across his ribs matted his shirt to his chest. His head and back throbbed with a sickening ache that went well beyond his bones. But above all the cuts, breaks, and bruises, the deepest wound came from watching Ayako die.

Quinn poured on the gas, weaving in and out of traffic. With all the local authorities at the port, there was no one to try to stop him. He had no idea where he was going. It didn’t matter as long as it was far away. He’d never considered himself an emotional man. But now, physically broken and mentally exhausted to the point he could hardly keep the bike going in a straight line, he thought of what Ayako had done for him and sniffed back a tear. Never before had he felt so hopeless. Never had he been so close to giving up.

And then, he remembered her book.

CHAPTER 66

Marta Bedford coughed. It took Herculean effort to lift her leg and try to move it so it didn’t press on the worst of her boils along the back of her knee. Grunting and hacking like an invalid woman twice her age, she grabbed the metal railing on the narrow hospital bed and maneuvered onto her right side.

Kane County Hospital had never been intended to house this many patients. Green military beds like something out of M*A*S*H crammed each room and lined the halls. Todd had made certain that the Bedfords had a room together, but Mrs. Johnson’s bed ran along the wall inside the door so there were three in a row, leaving just enough room between each of the patients for medical staff to tend them.

Had Rick not been so heavily sedated for the ECMO heart-lung bypass, Marta could have held his hand. As it was, every few minutes she rolled up on her side and bore the pressure on her boils as long as she could so she could watch him sleep.

Todd had told her there was still a chance the bypass would save Rick’s life. That he might be able to fight off whatever caused the boils as long as they could keep his lungs functioning.

From the time she was a little girl, tears had come easy to Marta Bedford. Her father could simply look sternly at her and bring what he called a geyser of repentance. But now, since Rick had gotten sick, she had long since cried herself out. First, she was angry with God for letting such an illness fall on her good husband. Then, she cried from the horrible pain caused by her own boils. Finally, her tears had been from the despair of knowing that she would not live to see her daughters graduate from high school, go to college, marry, or have children of their own.

In the end, she had forgiven God and come to grips with the fact that she’d never see her grandbabies. Though the pain never slackened, and was barely dented by medication, at least it reminded Marta that she was alive. In a macabre sense of competition, she and Mrs. Johnson had taken to counting the number of new boils on their arms. So far, Marta was “winning” but, as Mrs. Johnson pointed out between phlegm-laced bouts of her hacking cough, it wasn’t really fair because Marta was taller and thus had longer arms and more opportunities for boils to grow.

Gripping the bed rail to watch Rick, Marta found a new sore on the inside of her wrist. It was red and swollen with a translucent white dot in the center. They could not be counted until the white appeared.

“Got a new one, Mrs. Johnson,” Marta said. Her voice rattled when she spoke.

She got no response.

Marta began the laborious process of rolling back over to her left side so she could look at her competition.

“That’s twenty-seven to twenty,” Bedford said as she lifted the sheet and worked her way over. “Mrs. Johnson…?”

Snow-white hair lay across the old woman’s pillow. Wrinkled hands folded across her chest. Her jaw hung open, lifeless.

Marta Bedford collapsed back against her sheets. She had a few tears left after all.

CHAPTER 67

Quinn needed a doctor, but he didn’t care. He pointed the Blackbird east. Fifteen miles out of Fukuoka he found a small side road in the mountains that took him another half mile back to a secluded gravel pullout. Giant cryptomeria stood like sentries around the gravel pad. The earth underneath their broad evergreen canopies was at once landscaped and pristine, as if it had been swept by a scouring wind and not by human hands.

Quinn all but collapsed under the tent-like awning of one of the Japanese cedars. He leaned against rough bark and closed his eyes. He tried not to think — to clear his mind and let it rest. Ayako deserved more than a passing thought crammed somewhere in between strategy and battle plan. Though she’d ended up in a vocation that put her at odds with social and even moral norms, there was no way for anyone else to know what had driven her there. She’d said it herself — she wanted to be someone’s wife and feel safe. Prostitute, whore, yellow cab, woman of the floating world… just a woman, pushed by some secret demons — demons that led back to Oda.

Quinn sat in the shadow of the big tree and thought about her for a long time, regretting the lost opportunities and the things he might have said to give her just a little bit more happiness. He wished Thibodaux were there so he could listen to the big Cajun philosophize about womanhood and the fragility of life.

Pressing his injured back against the tree as if the pain might focus his tattered thoughts, Quinn opened his eyes and began to read Ayako’s book.

The first two pages contained the lyrics to some Korean pop song — likely by the young boy band from the poster in her apartment. They were written phonetically and decorated with hearts and flower doodles. Over the next several pages, Ayako had noted various appointments using a sort of code to describe her clients with names like Mr. Octopus, The Jelly Fish, and Sir Badger Dog. Grocery lists, more doodle drawings of kittens, and an incredibly realistic pencil study of a young geisha took up the first third of the little book.

Then, in bold ink was the entry—“Pick up Emiko’s’s friend at Hakata Port.” Followed by “He would do nicely” on a rain-spattered page.

Quinn turned the page and found a letter, written in her artistic, girlish hand. It was addressed to him.

Quinn sniffed back a tear in spite of himself, wondering what lies she’d told to cause her such a heavy burden. She must have written the letter while they were in the temple cottage. It was the only time she would have been able to watch him sleep.

Quinn turned the page, hoping to find another entry — not quite ready to say good-bye to this sweet little woman. His breath caught in his throat when he saw the map.

There was a short note, hastily scrawled in pencil as she’d stood there beside him in the alley watching Yanagi Pharmaceutical, a cold wind whipping her hair across her face.

Below the note was a map, captioned with a single word: Oda.

CHAPTER 68

Governor Lee McKeon stood in front of the bathroom mirror of the Hay Adams Hotel and slipped a pair of beige latex gloves over slender fingers.

He had already showered and shaved. The French cuffs on his starched white shirt were folded but open. Gold cuff links sat in a small leather case on the white marble sink next to his wife’s makeup. He wore a conservative burgundy silk tie that his wife said would suit his Asian complexion. This was, after all, an extremely big night for him and he needed to look his best.

The wooden box Qasim Ranjhani had given him lay open beside the cuff links, dark and polished in stark contrast to the white marble. Inside, resting on a small velvet pillow, was a Rolex Sea Dweller, its second hand sweeping around the face in a smooth, fluid movement.

McKeon retrieved a roll of beige athletic tape from his shaving kit and took a half dozen wraps around his wrist, making a sort of gauntlet. Ripping the tape with his teeth, he smoothed the edge on the end nearer his hand so it wouldn’t be seen past the cuff of his dress shirt. Next, he tore open a large four-by-four plastic bandage and applied it to the underside of his left wrist over the tape, pressing it tight to make certain the edges didn’t roll up. He added one more for safety’s sake, placing it halfway up his wrist, overlapping the other so he had a protected piece of skin roughly four by six inches as well as the gauntlet of tape.

McKeon held his wrist up and examined it in the mirror. Satisfied that he was well protected, but inconspicuous, he lifted the Rolex from the wooden case. Careful not to touch the sapphire crystal, even with his gloves, he slipped the watch over his hand so the face was on the inside of his wrist, toward his body, and snapped the clasp. It fit snugly; Ranjhani had made certain of that. The consequences would be dire if it was allowed to slide around and possibly come in contact with his skin.

He removed the latex gloves and had just finished putting on the cuff links when his wife’s voice buzzed through the bathroom door.

“Are you ready?” She was a fanatic about many things; early arrival to meetings was at the top of the list.

“Just putting on the finishing touches, my dear.” McKeon took his dark blue suit jacket out of the plastic bag hanging on the back of the door and slipped it over narrow shoulders. He tugged the cuff down so it covered the watch. It wouldn’t do to accidentally brush the thing against his wife’s skin.

“We must not be late,” she said again, prodding.

“It’s okay. They have assigned seating.” Looking in the mirror one last time, he gave the burgundy tie a final adjustment. “Do not worry.” He put a hand on the door, heart pounding in his chest at the thought of what lay before him. “I’m a friend of the President of the United States. I get a seat on the House floor.”

CHAPTER 69

Quinn sat on the bike with the engine off, perched on the crest of a hill half a mile away from Oda’s compound. The rain had stopped and a weak winter sun showed between the low clouds and the rolling mist-choked mountains to the west. Dark forests ran along the snaking valleys, populated by deer and wild boar. Large houses with tile roofs ran in meandering lines on another foothill to the south. Step-terraced tea plantations, groves of orange trees, and thick stands of bamboo created a glistening wet patchwork of green in the low sunlight. It was singularly beautiful and uniquely Japanese.

He’d briefly considered riding back through town to find August Bowen and ask for help, but in the end decided against it. Not because he didn’t want the help, but because he couldn’t trust that the deputy would believe him, much less follow him into the mountains to fight some mysterious assassin.

Ayako’s map was excellent, and Quinn was able to work his way deep into the mountains to Oda’s sanctuary in less than two hours. She’d gone so far as to warn him of sentries and direct him in the best avenue of approach. For a woman who made her living in the floating quarter, she was a brilliant tactician.

Oda’s secluded garden compound was itself located on a hill, but by coming in on a forest trail on an adjacent hill Quinn was able to get a good look at the front gate and the three sentries that guarded it, if not the compound itself.

He could make out the dark shapes of several buildings through the thick woods on the other side of the fence. One, presumably the main house, rose like a smaller version of a feudal lord’s castle, high parapets and curling green tile roof visible over the treetops. It was the way he’d imagined it from Miyagi’s stories.

Quinn could tell from the insulators that the fence was electrified. He recognized two of the guards from Tanaka’s warehouse. Still dressed in business suits, the men paced outside a tall wrought-iron gate. One of the men smoked an entire cigarette while Quinn watched. The other, less nervous, periodically aimed his submachine gun at some bird in a nearby tree pretending to shoot. Inside the fence, a third man, dressed as a groundskeeper in baggy canvas pants and a denim shirt, stood post next to a small security booth — presumably with the controls for the gate. All carried short-barrel Uzi machine pistols on single-point slings around their necks.

He not only had to take care of the two out front, he’d have to somehow get through the electrified fence and dispatch the third man before he could bring the Uzi into play. Quinn had no real plan beyond that other than fighting his way forward until he found Oda or the woman. He really didn’t care which. It was certain to rain guards as soon as the fence was breached. Some would call that overwhelming odds. He thought of it as a target-rich environment.

Foot on the brake, Quinn tested his arms, moving them back and forth and feeling the wound open up along his ribs. He flexed his hands. His left still worked, albeit a little slower than normal. He still had a full range of motion in his right arm, and though his back was sore, adrenaline, brought on in anticipation of battle, loosened his muscles and dampened the pain. He was not in optimum shape, but he was as ready as he would ever be. And for the sake of Kim, Mattie, Miyagi, and Ayako — he could not stop now.

Holding the sheathed sword in his right hand so it ran along the top of the handlebars, he released the clutch and let the bike roll.

The two yakuza guards jumped back when Quinn and the silent Blackbird burst from the trees ten yards to their left. The nearest tried to raise his weapon, but Quinn hit him across the face with the sheathed sword as he rolled past, moving well over twenty miles an hour. The blow shattered the man’s nose and sent him stumbling backward into the electrified fence with a hiss and a puff of acrid smoke.

Rolling from the moving bike, Quinn shook the sword from its scabbard and came up on his feet directly in front of the second guard just as the five-hundred-pound Blackbird crashed through the gate. He swatted the Uzi aside and cut up obliquely, severing the single-point sling and the man’s jugular in one motion.

Quinn grabbed for the falling machine gun, but the sling caught on the dying man and jerked it out of his hand. With no time to waste fumbling with the tangled weapon, he sprinted toward the fence, clearing the demolished gate at the same moment the third guard stepped around the shack and raised his weapon. Still five meters out, Quinn knew he was too far away to do any good with the sword. A claxon alarm began to blare beyond the trees, but that didn’t matter. In less than a second the guard would send a volley of bullets into him that the torn armor of his Transit jacket would not be able to stop.

The phhhht of suppressed gunfire caused Quinn’s heart to sink. He marveled that he didn’t feel more pain or loss of motion — until he watched the guard ahead of him fall like wheat before a sickle.

Quinn pulled up short, touching his stomach where he assumed the bullets would have hit him. The guard’s weapon lay at his feet, carrying no suppressor.

A crunch of gravel behind caused Quinn to wheel, bringing the sword around in a fluid arc.

Jacques Thibodaux’s Cajun drawl stopped him cold.

“I know, I know, this boogerman is too dangerous for the likes of us. We should let you do this all by yourself.” The gunny trotted up with a suppressed MP5 in his shovel-size hands. He scanned the trees ahead. “But come on, Chair Force, did you really think Palmer would know where you were and not send us to give you a hand?”

Emiko Miyagi and Ronnie Garcia fanned out behind the Marine. Both women carried MP5s identical to Thibodaux’s, but Miyagi also carried a sheathed samurai katana slung diagonally over her back.

Quinn let the short sword hang by his side.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“ ‘Thanks for saving my myopic ass’ would seem appropriate.” Thibodaux scoffed. “A body would think you might actually be glad to see us.”

Quinn felt as if he might cry.

Ronnie ran to him, lowering her weapon long enough to give him a hard kiss on the mouth.

Thibodaux pressed a small microphone at his throat. “Tell me what you got, kid.” He motioned the group forward toward the cover of thick-trunked Japanese cedar, nodding as he listened to the information coming across his earpiece.

Quinn retrieved Fujin’s scabbard and stuck the sword down the back of his jacket, before scooping up the dead sentry’s Uzi and following at a trot.

Miyagi scanned the woods, saying nothing. She had yet to meet Quinn’s gaze. Considering the mission that lay ahead, it was easy to understand why.

Garcia had her hair pulled back in a thick ponytail, and Quinn found himself amazed that someone could fill out a set of khakis as well as she did.

She pointed skyward with her thumb when they slid up next to the trees, explaining Thibodaux’s conversation.

“Guttman’s got Damocles loitering above us.”

Quinn smiled at the news.

Damocles was an off-the-books stealth drone. Developed by Lockheed Martin’s infamous Skunkworks, it was extreme high-side technology, “over-the-top” secret. Few in the government, and certainly no members of Congress, knew of its existence. Hanging overhead like the sword on a single hair from the Greek story, the drone could be armed with Tomahawk missiles and, more important to Quinn, a Gorgon Starepod with an array of cameras capable of counting the fuzz on a dandelion blossom from the nether regions of the atmosphere.

“Here’s the deal, kids,” Thibodaux said at length. “Our young Sergeant Guttman says we have five guys heading our way. There’s a female coming around the north side of the main building and another squad of four spilling out of some barracks straight up the middle. According to the kid, some old guy appears to be directing things from on top of the main building.”

“That would be Oda,” Miyagi hissed. “Where on top of the building?”

Thibodaux consulted with Guttman for more information from the loitering drone.

“Northwest corner,” Thibodaux said. “Looks like he’s—”

Miyagi was gone before he could finish.

“Damn,” he muttered. “I was gonna say looks like he’s got four other guys up there with him.”

Quinn watched Miyagi meld into the shadows with the sword across her back. “I almost feel sorry for them.”

Approaching voices sifted through the trees, yelling commands and demanding answers from the dead gate sentries.

“I don’t think these guys know that there is anyone here but you.” Thibodaux winked his good eye, nodding toward the white building that was barely visible through the forest. “How about you pretend for a minute you’re not a lowly Chair Force officer but an honest-to-goodness Marine and help me charge this castle.”

The high likelihood of imminent death aside, Quinn couldn’t help grinning like a schoolboy as he ran into the trees alongside his friends.

CHAPTER 70

“Mister Speaker!” the House Sergeant at Arms shouted as he stepped through the heavy oak door and stopped. “The President of the United States!”

Thunderous applause rose from the House Chamber.

Governor Lee McKeon was lucky to have a seat among the shoulder-to-shoulder crowd. House and senate members took up most of the floor. Vice President Hughes and the Speaker of the House, Hartman Drake, faced the hall above the lectern under a large American flag. Drake wore a sling over his left shoulder, cradling his wounded arm and reminding the American public that terrorism could strike all too close to home. His bright red bow tie looked like a second smile as he tapped the desk in front of him in polite, one-handed applause. Cabinet members and justices of the Supreme Court occupied the front row near the raised dais. Secretary of State Melissa Ryan, close friend and protégé to the president, was conspicuously absent. Since September the eleventh, one member of the Cabinet was customarily asked to wait in an undisclosed location so the entire line of succession to the presidency could not be wiped out in one fell swoop.

President Chris Clark began to work the crowd the moment he entered the chamber, kissing women, shaking hands, and smiling as though his dimpled cheeks might shatter. McKeon nodded cordially to Jack Blackmore, Clark’s lead Secret Service Agent. The two knew each other from the governor’s recent meetings with the president. Blackmore stepped aside as McKeon extended both hands, taking Clark in a firm, brotherly shake with both hands so the Rolex Sea Dweller’s crystal face rubbed the skin on the back of the president’s hand. It was little more than a passing touch, but, according to Ranjhani, it would be enough.

“Good to see you, Lee,” Clark said, pumping the man’s hand in an earnest handshake of friendship. Laughably, he thought they were allies.

McKeon released his grip and slid away. “Good to see you as well, Mr. President.”

Up on the dais, Vice President Hughes and Hartman Drake clapped politely as they watched Clark work his way down the imperial blue carpet toward the podium, shaking more hands along the way.

He couldn’t see it, but McKeon knew that on the desk in front of Hughes was a brand-new fountain pen, a gift from the Speaker of the House, who, in turn, had received it from Qasim Ranjhani.

Clark stepped up to the podium and handed an envelope containing a copy of his speech to the vice president and another to the Speaker. Turning, the president stood at the lectern, grinning while Drake introduced him.

“My fellow Americans,” he said. “Though recent horrific events may lead you to believe otherwise, the state of the union is…”

The president paused, scratching the back of his hand. He looked down at his copy of the speech as if he’d lost place.

“My fellow Americans…” The ever-present smile vanished from his lips. He clutched his arm and stared out into the chamber, eyes unfocused, his mouth agape in a silent cry of pain.

Special Agent Blackmore, ever attentive to the needs of his charge, rushed to the president’s side the moment before he collapsed, guiding him to the ground. Secret Service personnel rushed from the sidelines, forming an instant perimeter around the fallen leader.

From the back of the chamber, Governor Lee McKeon watched four other agents bound up to the vice president while Capitol Police officers moved to Hartman Drake, ready to usher the men toward the Speaker’s Entrance, away from any threat as dictated by protocol.

Bob Hughes turned to look back at the flurry of activity around the president, the heavy weight of responsibility certainly bearing down on him.

McKeon suppressed a smile. The vice president needn’t have worried. In a few short seconds, any possibility of him stepping into the presidency would be gone forever.

CHAPTER 71

Thibodaux and Garcia engaged Oda’s responding troops with a withering fusillade of gunfire as Quinn skirted to the north side of the palatial home. Two sentries rounded the corner of a covered pavilion beside a koi pond, nearly running headlong into Quinn. The Uzi burped in his hands, killing both of them before they realized they’d found him.

A flash of movement caught his eye from above and he watched Miyagi scuttle along the outer edge of the parapet that ran lengthwise down the top of the roofline. Oda had indeed modeled the place after a feudal castle. Each corner had a raised tower with a metal railing that allowed a commander or defenders to look down on anyone trying to mount a siege from below.

Quinn heard a twig snap behind him and spun, moving to the cover of a nearby cedar. A volley of gunfire rattled from the shadows. He raised the Uzi to return fire, but when he pulled the trigger nothing happened.

Tap-rack-bang, failure-to-feed, failure-to-fire drills had been ingrained into his brain from the time he’d first started to carry a gun for a living. Tap—he slammed his hand into the base of the magazine to make certain it was seated. Rack—he worked the Uzi’s open bolt to clear any possible misfeed, then aimed again and pulled the trigger.

No bang.

His back pressed flat against the tree, he lifted the weapon to check in more closely. A round had impacted the stamped metal frame, denting the action and rendering it inoperable.

“We did not get to finish our contest,” a woman’s voice said from the other side of the tree. “The foolish whore prolonged your miserable life.”

Quinn dropped the Uzi to the ground. “So,” he yelled, “you want to finish what you started?”

“Pitiful Mr. Quinn,” the woman said, “that is exactly what I plan to do.”

He stepped around the tree, short sword in his hand. He half expected her to shoot him but only breathed a hair easier when he saw the long sword held before her in two hands. She’d beaten him before with the shorter wakizashi. Now she had another foot and a half of razor-sharp reach and the leverage of a two-handed grip.

The woman cocked her head to one side, hair hanging in a sullen flap across her eyes as she studied him. Absent the heavy motorcycle jacket, she was even smaller than Quinn had realized. She was dressed in tight black spandex pants — like Miyagi wore during their workouts — and a loose cotton blouse, open but for the bottom two buttons to reveal the swirling colors of the tattoo that covered her chest like an undershirt. Unlike Miyagi, there was no un-inked line running up the center of her body. She appeared to use the tattoo as some kind of psychological weapon, depending on the sight of it to disarm her opponents.

“What do you think of the design?” She gave a toss of her head.

“I’ve seen better.” Quinn shrugged. His feet slid over the rough ground, matching her pace as she circled.

“That is laughable.”

“Seriously,” Quinn said. “I have seen your mother’s tattoo. It is more skillfully applied.”

A flash of panic crossed the girl’s eyes. “What do you know of my mother?”

“She is my friend.” Quinn suddenly changed directions, closing the distance more quickly than the young woman had anticipated. She blocked his strike and slashed the sleeve of his jacket, toying with him before she stepped back to disengage. She was not quite ready to finish him until he’d satisfied her curiosity.

“I will ask you this only once.” She began to circle counterclockwise, forcing Quinn to lead with his left leg, sending waves of agony radiating from his injured kidney. “What do you know of my mother?”

Quinn smiled inside, remembering the words Miyagi had spoken in her garden the last time they’d sparred. Just because you hold a sword, does not mean it is the only weapon you can use to win the battle.

Gunfire popped and rattled in pockets below as Miyagi made her way along the rooftop. She’d encountered three sentries and dispatched each of them in turn silently with her dagger. Only one man stood at parade rest beside Oda at the far corner facing the knee-high stone parapet.

“I see you have resorted to bodyguards,” Miyagi said when she came up behind them. It had been years since she’d seen him, and yet it still seemed as if a fist gripped her heart.

Both men wheeled. The guard raised a pistol, but Miyagi put three bullets in his chest and a fourth in his forehead in case he happened to be wearing a vest.

Oda’s mouth fell open at the sight of her.

“Incredible,” he whispered. “You haven’t changed at all.” He had no weapon and raised both hands as if to embrace her as she advanced.

Miyagi found herself amazed at how much he’d aged. Still, there was a ferocity in his eyes that said he was not some old man to be trifled with. She took a half step back, fighting a rising panic.

He saw it and his face softened at once, drawing her in. A smile spread over rosy cheeks. She’d forgotten how handsome he could make himself.

“Oh, how I have missed you, Emi-chan,” he said. “I often wondered if you would ever return home.”

“Home…” Miyagi mused. “You were never that to me.”

Oda shook his head, chiding. “I gave you sanctuary,” he said. “And a beautiful daughter.”

“It would seem,” Miyagi said, swallowing the bile that rose in her throat, “that I gave the daughter to you.”

“As you say.” Oda shrugged. “But you were always my favorite. You know that, don’t you?”

Miyagi struggled to keep her face passive. “Takako-san was once your favorite,” she said. “I just came from her home, where I witnessed what you do to former favorites.”

“That was an unfortunate necessity,” he said. “But, she had become slow of wit — unlike you, it appears.”

“Is that so?” Miyagi said. She wanted to shoot him, but the gun felt like it weighed a thousand pounds in her hands. “It might interest you to know she left behind volumes of notebooks detailing her work for you over the past years — including information on your present relationship with a man named Ranjhani. Not so slow of wit, it seems.”

“Then I was right to kill her.” Oda sighed, but Miyagi caught the tiniest glint of worry in his eyes. “You are strong, Emi-chan, much stronger that she ever was.” He flicked his fingers. “Come, put down the gun and let us relive old times.”

“And what of Ayako?” Miyagi stared at him. “Was she your favorite as well?”

“No, no.” Oda waved away the thought, vain enough to believe Miyagi actually wanted to be his favorite. “Ayako-chan was only a vessel. You are certainly stronger than that foolish whore.”

Miyagi leveled the MP5, letting anger chase away her uneasiness. Oda was a monster, but he was merely a man, not a god to be feared.

Miyagi put two rounds in Oda’s belly, low so he would feel it. He stumbled backward, teetering at the edge of the roof. He reached out, hands flailing for support, seeking to control her even to the end.

“Emiko… help me. .”

Miyagi let the MP5 fall against her sling and drew her sword, extending it toward the falling man. Groping blindly, he grabbed the blade with both hands, leaving his fingers behind as he tumbled over the parapet.

“Ayako-chan survived when you cut her daughter from the womb,” Miyagi whispered, peering over the edge at Oda’s shattered body below. “She was the strongest woman I have ever known.”

Quinn feinted left, offering his injured side to draw the tattooed woman out.

Believing he was beaten, she struck again, slicing the sleeve of his Transit jacket. This time he was ready and took the cut on the crash armor, sliding by so he was inside her guard. Crashing in, he gave her a vicious head butt, shattering the bridge of her nose and sending her staggering backward.

Quinn kept coming, punching her over and over in the face with his left hand. She raised the sword to fend him off. It was a blind reaction but caused him to sidestep to keep from getting cut. Far from beaten, she held the sword with her left hand and brought her right around in a brutal punch to his kidney.

Fighting through the pain, Quinn pressed closer so he was chest to chest with the young woman, rendering her long sword useless.

“Get off me, you fool!” she spat. The odor of peppermint hit him full in the face.

A torrent of white-hot fury flowed through his body. He stepped to the side, stomping laterally at her knee, hearing the satisfying crunch as cartilage tore and the joint gave way. She screamed, twisting to the side to relieve the sudden pain. Quinn stepped behind her, grabbing the flap of sullen hair and jerking her head backward as he snaked his arm over the top of her throat, catching her head under his arm so her body was arched in front of him, her neck bent backward with nowhere to go. Hauling upward and back, he felt a dull snap.

The sword fell from her grasp, but he held her there a full minute longer, panting, squeezing, his entire body shaking from shock and relief. Finally satisfied that she was dead, Quinn let her body fall to the ground. He wasn’t far behind her, collapsing to his knees on the gravel.

Thibodaux and Garcia came up moments later. Ronnie fell beside him, supporting him with strong arms. Jacques let out a mournful sigh. “I wonder if we’re ever gonna run out of folks to kill…”

“Oda?” Quinn whispered.

“Miyagi took a gun to his knife fight,” Thibodaux said.

Still panting, Quinn found the strength to roll the dead woman over and raise her shirt so he could check her tattoo on her back. “Komainu,” he said under his breath.

“What?” Ronnie stayed locked in beside him.

“A foo dog,” Quinn said. “This may be difficult for Emiko to see—”

Miyagi’s voice came from behind him. “I am sorry to say it is not so difficult for me after all,” she said, standing over the body to peruse the tattoo. “This is not my daughter.”

“But the tattoo,” Quinn said, “it is just as you described.

“So it is,” Miyagi said. “But I was a fool not to remember that komainu come in pairs. One most always has his mouth open; on the other, the mouth is closed, as it is here.” She used the tip of her sword to point to the dead woman’s back. The ferocious temple dog did indeed stare at them over a closed mouth.

“Then who?” Quinn closed his eyes, knowing the answer before she told him.

“Her name is Hiromi. Ayako-chan had a difficult pregnancy,” Miyagi said. “She feared that she would lose the child and tried to sneak away, but Oda caught her. He cut out the baby with a dagger and left Ayako to die. Even Shimoyama, who had to that point looked down on the younger girls, took pity on the poor thing and helped her get medical attention. She saved Ayako’s life but gave up a little finger in return — and the trust of Oda.”

“Of course,” Quinn said, remembering the signs he should have seen — the visceral way Ayako had reacted when he mentioned Oda’s name, the way she’d gone pale when he told her he was looking for a girl with a komainu tattooed on her back. Though Hiromi would have no memory of her real mother, Ayako would have kept up with her. Hiromi was the reason she’d kept disrupting his aim during the chase through Yanagi Pharmaceutical. She was the reason Ayako had dropped the pistol during the motorcycle chase.

It was the first time she’d ever seen her daughter since the day Oda cut the child from her belly. No wonder Ayako wanted to protect her — but even the love for a daughter had limits. Something had snapped when she’d seen her damaged daughter cut down the innocent children. Even then, as she lay dying, she’d given Quinn the last clue in her warning.

“She is fierce,” Ayako had said. “Just like her mother.”

CHAPTER 72

Winfield Palmer answered on the fourth ring. His voice was hollow, preoccupied.

“Oda is dead,” Quinn said. He leaned against Ronnie, who sat with her back to a cedar tree supporting him while Thibodaux and Miyagi went to bring up the car.

“Good,” Palmer said. “That’s good.”

“He was up to something at Yanagi,” Quinn said. “I’d say everything they manufactured is highly suspect.”

“I agree,” Palmer said. His voice was a strained whisper, as if he didn’t want to wake someone beside him. “All that vaccine has been impounded. The pages from the notebook Miyagi texted me line out pretty well what happened. I’ve already got some of your OSI friends looking for the Kyrgyz barber at Bagram. There are others, as yet unidentified, that were spreading the infection by anything that would come in contact with the victim’s blood — infected razors, fingernail files, scissors — even dental floss. We’ve arrested a dental assistant in Cedar City and have leads on several others. Not much hope of finding them now, though.”

“You okay, boss?” Quinn was having a hard time grasping why Palmer wasn’t sharing in his enthusiasm that they had just dodged a very deadly bullet. He sounded like Eeyore.

“Not really,” Palmer said. “Chris Clark was pronounced dead an hour ago.”

“The president?”

“There’s more, Jericho,” Palmer went on. “Bob Hughes collapsed as well. It looks like they both succumbed to some kind of poison.”

Quinn sat up straight as the ramifications hit him. “That means—”

“Exactly.” Palmer spelled it out for him. “Pursuant to the Twenty-fifth Amendment, Speaker of the House Hartman Drake assumed the presidency of the United States. He’s already made an impassioned statement to the American people, reminding them that he was himself the victim of not one, but two terrorist attacks. Citing the need for continuity, he has already named Governor Lee McKeon as his vice president. Congressional approval is a foregone conclusion.”

“I gotta tell you, Quinn,” Palmer went on, “Drake knows who you are now. If you come back here, you’re as good as dead. I sure as hell can’t protect you.”

“Has he fired you?”

“Not yet,” Palmer said. “But it’s coming — probably by the end of the day.”

“Ronnie says the book ties Officer Larsson to this group. Does that put me clear of Jenny Chin’s murder?”

“In a word,” Palmer said. “But like I said, Drake hates you. And he’s the president of the United States, so he’ll push for a thorough investigation and your quick execution.

“Anyway, I used what little pull I have left to call off the Marshals. Deputy Bowen should be linking up with you anytime now, so do me a favor and don’t shoot him.”

“Got it,” Quinn said. “You holding up okay?”

“You know, I lost an extremely close friend,” Palmer said. “But the nation lost a great president. There are still a few of us left who know what Drake is all about. We’ll just have to work on this from the outside.” His voice grew distant. “I don’t know how long I can keep you and Jacques on the payroll.”

“I’m pretty sure I speak for all of us when I say we’re not doing this for the money.”

“Well,” Palmer said, “whatever you do, you have to do it from over there. The others can come home, but you need to sit tight… Listen, I have to go. I’ll be in touch.”

Quinn hung up and turned to Garcia. Thibodaux and Miyagi had come up at the end of the conversation. He relayed the information Palmer had given him.

“Well, l’ami,” the big Cajun said with a sigh. “I’ve done a lot of weird things since we met. I might as well add taking down the president to that list. Any idea where we’ll start?”

Quinn draped an arm around Garcia, leaning on her for support. “I have absolutely no idea.”

“Shimoyama’s book give us some guidance,” Miyagi said, her breath amazingly calm for what she’d just been through. “I suggest we begin in Pakistan…”