“I like it,” Pig said, lifting a Zhonghua cigarette to his mouth. He deftly slipped a solid gold Zippo from his jacket pocket and fired up the tobacco. Inhaling deeply, he held the smoke in his lungs for a moment and coughed hard when it came out again. “He has taste.”
Rat nodded his head. “He’s always liked his whores.”
Tiger sighed and checked his watch once again. “The Boss says he’s in the team, so he’s in the team.”
A woman stumbled out of the alley to the left of the deceprit brothel. A second later a man stepped out behind her, and kicked her in the stomach. She tumbled over and gasped for air. He pulled her to her feet and slapped her around the face a few times.
Tiger and the other two Zodiacs watched impassively for a few seconds. Men beating women on the streets in a place like this was not uncommon, and only an American tourist outside a nearby laundry looked twice. Everyone else walked past, including Tiger, Pig and Rat as they stepped off the street and entered the dingy brothel.
They walked into a darkened world of coughing and heavy cigarette smoke laying on the air in blankets. Cheap smoke now — rough, and some menthol in there too. A radio chimed in the background, tinny and distracting.
An elderly woman regarded the men’s sharp suits with an avaricious eye. “Good day, gentlemen,” she said.
Tiger reached into his inside pocket and pulled out a small black and white photo of Monkey. He held it up to her face. “Where?”
The woman realized they weren’t here for the women and her eyebrows dropped. Crestfallen, she pointed up the stairs to her left. “Top floor. Front room. No fighting, no killing!”
Tiger placed his hand on her chest and pushed her firmly away from him as he marched past and began to climb the stairs.
The old wooden steps creaked and whined as the three government men made their way up to the top floor, pausing on the landing for a second to check the fire escape. When they reached the top, they padded along the landing until they were at the door to the front room.
Tiger reached out to the door handle. They heard a shallow thud and a woman screamed.
Pig and Rat exhanged a glance and smirked at one another. “Sounds like him, all right.”
Another light thudding sound and another scream.
Tiger turned the handle.
Locked.
Now he raised his boot and put the door in and they all saw what was going on.
A blindfolded woman was tied to the bed and either side of her head several Chinese flying darts were embedded in the wooden headboard. The Chinese flying dart was a lethal hand-held throwing weapon used in ancient China both as a range weapon or in the fist. Now, half a dozen of the razor-sharp metal darts were just inches from the sobbing woman’s head.
“That’s his handiwork, for sure,” Pig said.
“Indeed,” said Rat as he scanned the room. “But where is the man himself?”
“He heard me try the door,” Tiger said. “The three seconds in between my turning that handle and kicking the door down was all he needed.”
“Which is why he’s on the team,” Rat said.
Pig nodded and cast a regretful eye at the woman on the bed. “Sadly, yes.”
Tiger walked over to her, took off her blindfold but left her tied up.
As far as the ropes would allow her to move, she recoiled in fear when she saw the three suited men, but calmed down when Tiger showed her the picture.
“Is this him?”
She nodded and pointed her head toward the bathroom door. “I heard him go in there.”
Tiger thanked her and put the blindfold back.
She kicked out and screamed again but he ignored her, turned and moved toward the bathroom. He drew his weapon as he got closer to the door.
Pig and Rat followed suit and now all three men raised their guns into the aim. It wasn’t that they didn’t trust Monkey, but more that he was unpredictable and had a dangerous trigger finger. He would shoot first and ask questions much later, so they knew they had to be prepared.
Tiger nudged the door open with the toe of his boot. “Come out, come out wherever you are, Monkey Man,” he said. “It’s the Tiger and his friends.”
A heartbeat later an upside-down head appeared above them.
Tiger took a step back and aimed the gun at the grinning face. The man’s long hair was hanging down and his deranged smile looked like a frown because he was still upside-down.
“You mean Pig and Rat?” he said.
Tiger and the others exchanged a look, smiled and lowered their weapons. “Yes, I mean Pig and Rat.”
Monkey swung down from above the door. He had hidden up there like a ninja, using the top the shower cubicle on one side and the aircon vent on the other to hold himself in place. No one else could have done it, but while Monkey shared the other men’s former espionage backgrounds, he had been in a circus when they were in the army. This added to his enigmatic character, but also gave him incredibly powerful arms and legs.
He landed on the bathroom floor with a gentle, controlled thump and then brushed his hair back over his face to reveal his infamous pock-marked face. He glanced over Tiger’s shoulder and grinned. “You really did mean Pig and Rat!”
“Monkey, this is business.”
“Of course,” Monkey said. The smile was gone and now he was scowling. He padded across the room and pulled the darts out of the headboard. He slapped the woman’s face and she screamed. “When the Tiger, the Pig and the Rat come to my playground it is only ever business…but tell me, colleagues — is it a kill job?”
“That’s for Zhou to decide, and you will obey him.”
Monkey moved toward the door and Tiger stepped in front of it to block his exit. “We can trust you to obey Zhou, can’t we, Monkey?”
“Of course.”
Tiger nodded, his eyes heavy with uncertainty. “We don’t want anything like last time.”
Monkey looked offended. “Nothing like last time, I promise.”
“Good,” Pig said, stubbing his cigarette out on the door frame and dropping the crumpled butt to the floor. “Then let’s get out of this dump.”
“What’s the job?” Monkey said.
Tiger fixed his eyes on the dangerous young man. “Agent Dragonfly.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Hawke, Lexi and Devlin waited in the shadows as the minisub pilot pulled alongside a small jetty and killed the engine. When he opened the hatch the first and last thing he saw was Hawke’s fist as it piled into his face. Devlin dragged the body along the jetty as the Englishman fired the engine back up and then they were away.
It didn’t take Hawke long to acquaint himself with the controls and set a course for Zito’s island. He submerged the Aurora a few meters beneath the surface so they wouldn’t be seen: Zito and his men might not be expecting it to return so soon, so Hawke decided to err on the side of caution.
“If they’ve hurt her, I’ll kill every last one of them,” Devlin said.
Hawke and Lexi exchanged a glance. “There’s a line for that,” Lexi said to the Irishman. “And you’re at the back of it.”
Hawke noticed the offshore bars gradually rising up as they neared the island, and he made the decision to surface the small vessel. When they broke through the waves they all saw the lights of Isola Pacifica’s long northern coast. Behind them, in the center of the island, was some elevated ground. It was partly covered in a large pine forest and perching on the top was Zito’s villa complex.
“She’s in there somewhere,” Hawke said, killing the sub’s lights.
“Not for long,” said Lexi.