On a screen above the stage flashed the same phrase. 旧金山我爱你
The crowd roared. Tsai’s band kicked off her first number and the C-pop artist swayed her hips and pouted into the microphone. The crowd swayed and sang with her. It was going to be a hell of a night.
TSAI ZHOU SAT BACK in the limousine and puffed her cheeks, her head back against the rest.
The blond tour manager grinned. “You were a storm in there, you knocked them silly.”
“Yeah, it was a blast. I need some rest though.”
The limousine ignored the front entrance and pulled into the private parking area of the Fairmont Heritage Place Hotel.
The door was opened, her manager showed a pass to the attendant. They entered and took an elevator.
“I’m going to go to bed Saul. Where are we tomorrow?”
“Late start tomorrow. We fly up to Vancouver in the afternoon, you’ve a night off. You’re on there on Friday. After that, it’s two nights in LA. Get some rest dear.”
The elevator stopped, she walked to her suite and entered. The lighting was low, the room plush and inviting. Tsai took out a half bottle of white wine she’d placed in the refrigerator and poured herself a glass.
She looked around the room. It seemed the only place she got time to herself now, relaxing in a hotel. It was hard to believe just over two years ago she’d been singing at an ordinary club in western Wuhan. Her father was a truck driver and her mother ran a flower store. She’d been spotted one night by an agent visiting town and then, Pow. That was it.
From nothing to real stardom in no time.
She finished the wine, undressed, got into bed and turned out the light. Tsai was soon asleep.
SHE WAS PULLED ROUGHLY from the bed by a masked man. She started a scream, but his hand clamped over her mouth. Tsai was terrified with wide wild eyes, he wore latex gloves, why? He held her close and roughly quickly tied up her mouth with a gag. He was going to rape her, she knew. His eyes ran up and down her naked body, drinking in her sensuous curvy but slim form. The masked man dragged her to the bathroom. She was puzzled then terrified as she saw that he’d already run a bath, he must have been in here sometime. She was turned around and pushed backwards into the bath. She was soon up to her chest in warm water. The man took out a razor blade held in a plastic grip.
“No. No” she tried to shout. He slit her left wrist, took out another blade and slit her right wrist. He held her arms in the water. The man pulled a syringe from an inside pocket, took off the cap, removed a plastic restraint and injected her in the arm. He ran her fingertips around the body of the syringe. Tsai stared in horror as the water turned red with the blood flowing from her wrists. She struggled, but he held her firmly. Within a few minutes she felt herself getting drowsy, sleepy and then…
The man partially cleaned up the area surrounding the scene. He removed the gag and left the syringe on the floor by the bath. He stood and took a picture with his cell phone, then left the bathroom. He pulled on new latex gloves and looked through her underwear, he picked up the panties she’d worn that night. The man picked them up, sniffed them and spent long careful minutes tending to the frontal pad on the gusset. Satisfied he dropped them on the carpet and left the suite.
SUNLIGHT STREAMED INTO the SFPD Lieutenant’s office. He looked up.
“Ah, here you are. Look I’ve got a directive from downtown. You won’t like it Detective, but Three Joe’s from the Chinese consulate are going to be quizzing you.”
“What?”
“It’s that Chinese Pop singer thing two weeks ago at the Fairmont hotel. Any closer?”
“Yeah, got the toxicology report.” He tapped a file. “She pumped herself up with a dose of Max T and slit her wrists. Rich broad, she had more dough than she could use, full of money. Can’t see why she’d do that to herself, but that’s music deva’s, all of them are mad as a March Hare. I’d say it’s a shrink issue, she must have had a problem upstairs to whack herself like that. I’m going to close it.”
“I hear you Dhittha. But work with them ok? They’re Chinese Detectives from,” he squinted at the document, “Wuhan, Hubei province. They’ve got a translator.” The Detective pursed his lips in disapproval.
“If you want me to babysit slopes?” he shrugged.
“Downtown wants you to.” Three Chinese men turned up and asked questions and spent much time quizzing the Detective. Hours were spent accessing records taken after the crime. They wanted to talk to the Doc who carried out the autopsy. After three days they left. That afternoon the Lieutenant walked into the precinct squad room.
“How’d it go, Dhittha?”
“They wanted to go over shit we’d finished with a week ago. Asking all sorts of stuff, pulling papers. Checking prints. Regular pain in the ass. They got all excited over the broad’s panties, dirty bastards. Took pictures of the good luck signs she’d got in them.”
“Good luck signs?” frowned the Lieutenant. Dhittha waved his hand aside.
“Whatever, it was all Chinese shit to me.”
“Ok, you did your thing. Thanks. Now here,” he passed a case document, “there’s a DOA, downtown. An alleyway off East 21st Street, female Hispanic.”
LING SHIMING SAT AT his oversize wooden desk. His face a stern mask. He put down the report.
Opposite him sat a younger slim man, he wore a western shirt and tie, in contrast to Ling’s green buttoned up tunic. Ling was head of Bureau 4 at the Ministry of State Security, China’s equivalent of the CIA. He knew the investigation would be sensitive, she was one of China’s top stars and much loved by her fans. Tsai Zhou was a favourite of the Party Chairman’s daughters. It had landed in his lap as Bureau 4 was responsible for intelligence work in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau. There were suspicions that the region may be involved and there were political implications.
“So, you consider this accurate?”
“Yes Sir. The American’s had done a thorough job. We brought back some samples, and these were tested in the joke factory.” It was the name they gave to the analysis laboratories.
“Her murderer left no prints, but these.” He indicated the photographs of Tsai’s panties, they contained two symbols, 台独 and a blue sky with a white twelve pointed star. Symbols of Taiwan and the Taiwan independence movement. “They point the finger sir.”
Ling nodded and slowly rubbed his forehead. “We’ve seen other indicators too. But it’s a big step to implicate the National Security Bureau. It may be sympathisers who did this, but the evidence is strong I agree.”
“She’d no affiliations or relatives from over there. The symbols and phrases she carried in her intimate clothing must have been planted. It may be a warning. Sir, Taiwan must be desperate.”
THE OLDER MAN STOOD and walked over to the window, birds flew and twittered in the trees. He clasped his hands behind his back and stared. He needed to apply his best judgment. Was the rebel province involved? But could it be another force?
That force maybe? He knew that there’s a minority out there who few knew about. Many senior figures, some of his colleagues in the MSS, didn’t know of their existence. He’d known people put to death for even having knowledge of them.
Ling stared fixedly at his country’s red flag with its yellow stars. Who was behind her death? To err could be a disaster. This was the last thing he wanted.
WITH THE BOAT NOW UPGRADED and the XO handling the sea trials, Nathan and Nikki had spoken to their contact and here they were. She spooned up more of the Four Gods soup, rice broth, pork and barley.