Broken Storm Part One (4 page)

Chase didn’t answer. He didn’t correct her and
neither did he agree with her; he got that look in his eye again. ‘I don’t
suppose amongst your grandmother’s things you have any... pictures?’ he said with
an odd smile, ‘or letters, drawings, or descriptions, anything on the goddess?’

Keiko pulled her lips to the side, grating them
through her teeth. She thought hard. ‘I don’t know, I guess we probably do. My
grandmother was very attached to that shrine,’ she said in a far-off voice.

Chase leaned forward a little. ‘I would pay to see
those,’ he said in an excited voice.

Keiko’s lips crumpled up. ‘Pay? Why would you have
to pay? You can have a look at them if you want. I’m sure my grandmother would
be happy that somebody else out there is interested.’

‘Do you still have my card?’ Chase asked quickly.

Keiko fumbled in her purse, then brought it out. It
was completely soaked, like everything else. The cardboard, limp and
waterlogged, bent in her fingers, drooping like a dead flower.

Chase didn’t hesitate. He grabbed at his wallet,
pulled one out, flicked the water off it, and then grabbed a pen from his
pocket. ‘Look, if you can find anything, and I mean
anything
, please
come and show me.’

He handed her the card.

With a little shake, Keiko accepted it. She glanced
down at the angry scrawl that was Chase Harlow’s handwriting, then up at his
face.

He wasn’t joking, right? This wasn’t some kind of
elaborate billionaire prank, was it?

He offered her an encouraging smile, and then their
hot drinks arrived.

It was when Keiko had taken her first sip that
Chase’s phone rang. Whoever was calling, the conversation seemed serious, and
Chase got up from his chair, walking away from the table, a stern look on his
face. When he came back, it was to mumble his apologies and to drop a 20 on the
table to pay for their drinks.

‘I have to go, I can call you a taxi though,’ he
tried.

She shook her head, possibly a little too fast, as
if the thought of Chase Harlow calling her a taxi was a terrifying one.

‘Please come and see me if you have anything,
absolutely anything on the wind goddess,’ he said in a careful voice,
maintaining keen eye contact as he did.

And with that, Chase Harlow left.

Keiko watched him go, watched his shoulders and
back as they shifted around under his wet suit, watched him run across the
street, and watching him get into his car and drive off.

She finished her drink, paid for it, left the
change as a tip, and then walked home. Through the rain and wind. She didn’t
care that it pushed at her skirt, tugged at her jacket, or how it whistled and
sliced through her hair.

She needed the distraction.

Because that just hadn’t happened, right?

As soon as she got home, even though all she wanted
to do was dump her wet clothes in the washing machine and have a shower, she
found herself gravitating towards the phone. Then she made an impromptu call to
her parents to arrange a visit the following day to have a look through the
stuff her grandmother had brought back from Japan.

She had no idea whether she really was brave enough
to call Chase Harlow up or to pop into Harlow Enterprises and to dump the
collection of her grandmother’s files on his desk.

But something about the intensity of his questions
and that strange fragile expression he had offered the wind and storm outside
made her do it nonetheless.

I
t took Keiko a little under three days to get what
she wanted. Travelling home to see her parents and trawling through her
grandmother’s collection had been a strange experience, but nowhere near as
strange as tracking down the copious information Ami Teshi had kept on the wind
spirit Aiko.

Keiko had spent several hours tucked up in her
parent’s study, her hands and cheeks and back cold with a single memory.

Dying.

No matter how hard Keiko tried to push herself into
it, there wasn’t much she remembered from that fateful day. Just snippets.
Almost like stills of a film. The billowing clouds above her. The thick mud
underneath her feet as she’d slipped. The sound of the lightning as it had
roared and cracked down from above. And a single view of that statue’s face.

It was seared right into her mind. But the rest of
it was just a jumble.

She had the file of documents she had taken from
her parent’s study sitting on the kitchen table for a good two days until she
bothered to do anything about it. It took far too long to damp down on her
natural embarrassment and pluck up the courage to head downtown to Harlow
Enterprises.

The entire time she kept on promising herself she
wasn’t going to make a fool out of herself. She was just going to drop the
documents off, then get the hell out of there.

After all, he needed them, right? Chase Harlow
certainly had seemed to be serious that night in the cafe. He looked like he
was more than fascinated by the wind spirit Aiko. And if Keiko could help him,
that was a good thing. Her grandmother had always taught her that you offered
assistance wherever you could. It was the sole reason for living.

Keiko of course had not been stupid enough to tell
Jenny what she was up to, and neither had she mentioned a word of what had
happened that night after the party.

So she had crammed on her most comfortable jeans,
T-shirt, and cardigan, and Keiko had called in late for work.

The breeze that had gently been pushing through the
leaves outside of her bedroom window had picked up the further into town Keiko
had drove, until finally as she walked out of her car, the wind rushed into
her, collecting at the file and rustling the papers within. But she held on to
it neatly, tucking it against her chest, locking it in place with her arm.

Her grandmother would no doubt kill her if Keiko ever
lost any one of those documents.

‘I can’t believe you’re doing this,’ she indulged
in her surprise and embarrassment one last time as she walked across the
street, the Harlow Enterprise’s building pulling up stark and huge along the
horizon.

Chase Harlow

This could not be happening. Minutes from making
the deal, and now they were backing out.

He planted a hand onto the wall above his desk. He
pushed into it, teeth locking together.

He balled up a fist and slammed it onto the wall,
not caring that the framed Picaso to his left gave a wobble.

He struck the wall again.

To get this close only to have it taken away from
him. This was torture.

His intercom beeped. ‘Mr Harlow,’ his receptionist
said in a curt tone, ‘there is a woman here claiming to have an appointment
with you. I was going to turn her away, but she showed me a card and it has
your writing on the back. Shall I call security anyway?’

Before Chase could tell his receptionist that he
wanted to be left alone, he paused.

He remembered. How could you forget? The inside of
his car was still completely wet, and that suit was probably ruined, all because
several nights ago he had tracked down that Keiko woman in the rain.

Pushing a breath through his clenched teeth,
leaning back in his chair, not caring that the back of it pushed hard against
his neck, Chase closed his eyes for a second. ‘No, let her in,’ he finally
managed.

In the seconds it took his efficient receptionist
to show Keiko the door, Chase was sure to pull himself together. He tugged down
on his shirt, neatened his tie, and cracked his knuckles hard, hoping the vigorous
move would push away the last of his latent frustration.

It wouldn’t. How could it? This was the closest
he’d ever gotten to finding a picture of her. Only to have it taken away.

Blinking hard, wondering if there was time to rush
over to his dresser, poor himself a stiff drink, and suck it down, Chase got to
his feet as the door opened.

His receptionist walked in, her towering heels
clicking over the marble entrance. And following her was the curious oddity
that was Keiko.

She wore a pair of far-too-loose jeans and a large
T-shirt, a cardigan with holes along the sleeves pulled up around her wrists.

It was not the kind of style Chase was used to. She
looked like she’d bought the lot from a thrift shop. None of it matched her
slim figure, and all of it looked like it belonged in the bin.

Then he looked past the ripped cardigan and saw she
was holding something tucked against her chest. A fat manila file bulging with
documents.

It set his heart racing, and Chase couldn't help
but half jog over to her.

His receptionist raised an eyebrow. 'You have a
meeting in approximately 10 minutes,’ she reminded him.

'Cancel it,' he said through a quick breath.

He watched as Keiko made a face at that, her bottom
lip wobbling down as she turned a little to the left.

She really was painfully awkward and shy, wasn’t
she?

But still, he had to hand it to her, underneath her
social awkwardness she had common sense. He couldn't quite forgotten her
pointing out to him plainly that she was not going to get into a car with a man
she didn't know.

He cleared his throat, it was a nervous and quick
move. ‘Please sit down,' he shepherded her towards his desk, pulling out a
chair for her.

As she walked, her eyes gazes around his office.
She stared at the Picasso, then down at the Ming phase, then over at the statue
by the window.

She looked uncomfortable, intensely uncomfortable.

'What have you got?’ he asked far too quickly, his
words slurring together. 'Would you like a drink?’ he suddenly added,
remembering his manners.

She shook her head, sitting down awkwardly, still
holding onto her files. 'I'm not sure if any of this is going to be interesting
to you,' she said as she tucked her hair behind her ear.

It seemed like a compulsive move. And her hand
shook just a little as she did it.

'Anything,' he sat back in his chair, trying not to
stare at the file lest she think he was looking boggled-eyed at her chest.

Eventually she picked it up and placed it carefully
on the desk. She opened it, pressing her teeth into her lip as she did.

It was cute.

She tucked hair behind her ear one last time,
another cute move. But Chase Harlow hardly ever went in for cute.

'May I?' He gestured towards the documents.

She hesitated for a moment, then finally pushed
them over.

And then she sat there, practically twiddling her
thumbs in her lap as she looked at him nervously. 'I'm really sorry if it’s a
waste your time,' she said several times.

Chase didn't answer.

He flicked fervently through the documents, careful
not to rip any, but practically unable to dampen down on his haste.

'I tried to find all the English ones I could, but
some of them are in Japanese, I'm sure I could get my grandmother to translate
them for you,' she offered in a slight voice.

He looked up at her, one hand still locked over the
file protectively. 'It's fine, I can read Japanese.’

‘Oh, you can, I can't,’ she mumbled awkwardly.

For the next five minutes Chase did nothing but
read. His breath practically caught in his chest, his heart beat ringing in his
ears, by the end of it he'd forgotten Keiko was sitting right there.

Because the information in the documents... it was
beyond incredible.

Keiko's grandmother, whoever she had been, had
practically devoted her life to studying the wind goddess.

But as Chase made his way to the last document,
despite how rich the information had been, his heart sank.

There had been no photo. No drawing, nothing.

No picture.

Because there were no pictures of the wind goddess
Aiko. Not anymore.

Which was a fact that suddenly caught his
attention. 'I know this is an awkward question,' he muddled over his words,
'but how old are you, and when exactly did you... ah, die?' For a man who usually
did not mince his words and had been taught by his father to speak his mind
clearly and with precise expression, Chase was having a great deal of trouble
keeping his voice even.

Her cheeks twitched for a second. 'I'm 22,’ she
managed in a small voice, 'I died when I was seven,' she dropped her gaze,
choosing to stare at her hands on her lap instead of looking his way.

Chase stiffened. The hand that still held the
damaged manila folder suddenly tightened. His fingers pressing hard into the
soft cardboard.

'I don't suppose you have a date, do you?'

'27
^th
of April,’ she said immediately.
Though she looked uncomfortable. Intensely uncomfortable.

Could Chase blame her? Here he was drilling her
about her own death. It seemed like an unkind and crude thing to do, but he
really needed to know.

And at the admission that she had died on the 27
^th
of April, his body stiffened so hard that his muscles practically went into
spasm.

'What?’ she asked uncomfortably.

'Nothing,' he eventually managed.

'Why do you need to know that?’ she managed again.

Why did he need to know? He could answer that, he
could tell her exactly what he was thinking, but she would think he was crazy.

The world would think he was crazy. But Chase
Harlow was not insane.

On the 27
^th
of April approximately 15
years ago something had happened.

Chase had been sitting in his father's office,
playing with the one-of-a-kind baseball that had always sat on the end of his
dad's desk, thumbing it around in his hands as he’d waited for his father to
come back in from a meeting.

It was the day John Harlow had told his son that he
would not be following his dream of going to medical school. Instead he would
be taking over the company. As John's only son, Chase was expected to take the
reins of Harlow Enterprises, not become a doctor.

But it wasn't that conversation or the fact Chase's
life had changed from that day on that made the moment stick in his head.

It was what had happened to the statute that had
always sat behind John Harlow's desk.

The large one, the incredible one John had brought
back from Japan.

Pockmarked and made of volcanic stone, it was
beautifully carved, a testament to a master craftsman.

It was not worth a fortune, but it held a special
place in Chase’s father's heart, and the woman it depicted did too. A Japanese
goddess of the wind, the spirit Aiko.

It had exploded.

At approximately 10:15 in the morning, John had
been doing nothing but thumbing the baseball around in his hands, only to
suddenly look up to see the thing break into 1000 parts as if a bomb had been
stuffed in the middle of it.

He’d hit the floor, but the force of the explosion
had pushed the desk forward, and the shards from the volcanic stone had cut
across his chest, face, and arms.

He still had some of the scars.

There was one that ran down his shoulder, one along
the back of his head, one along his hand.

And right now as Chase looked over at Keiko, he ran
his hand over the scar along his knuckles.

He really pressed his fingers into it, letting his
skin track over the old wound.

The same had happened to her. Hadn't it?

If she wasn't lying, and he couldn't see how she
could be, then Keiko had been caught up in exactly the same disaster Chase had
15 years ago.

He tried to keep hold of his expression, he really
did, but he knew that his cheeks were growing slack and that his skin had
probably paled several shades lighter.

'Why are you so interested in this?' Keiko asked,
straightening up a little. 'I can't imagine that there's much of a market for
Aiko,' she brought a hand up and started to tuck her hair behind her ears
again.

Except this time Chase paid attention to the move, and
he saw what she was really doing.

She was running her finger over that scar. The same
one her particularly forward friend had forced her to show at the party. It ran
from her ear down to the base of her skull. Long, deep, and Chase could tell it
would have come from a life-threatening wound.

He straightened up and cleared his throat, buying
time. He had to tell her something, right? 'My father was particularly
interested in Aiko,' he said, not saying the name too loud, and as he did,
instinctively his gaze locked on the windows to his right.

They didn't suddenly buffet as a gale slammed
against them, but just maybe Chase could see the trees far down below bend in a
powerful gust.

'Oh,' she brought her hands back down to her lap.

'I'm following in his footsteps,' Chase said. It
wasn't a lie. Because John Harlow had been obsessed with Aiko.

In fact, after that fateful day 15 years ago, he
had not been alone.

Because it was not just the statue in John Harlow's
office that had exploded.

On that day, at that exact moment, every single
image of that goddess had disappeared. Books depicting her had suddenly burst
into flames, small statues of her visage had cracked and crumbled. Shrines
dedicated to her had fallen over. Drawings and sketches had withered, curled
up, and become unrecognizable.

There were no longer any pictures of the wind
goddess Aiko. No statues, no images, no drawings, no photographs.