Hong Kong (42 page)

"One more time," he told her. "I enjoyed that."

He used almost the whole roll of tape on her. "Now," he said, removing the bomb that had been in Alvin York from his pocket. "Here's how we're going to do this. You are going to tell me where my wife is, and Mr. Carmellini and I will go get her. If we return with Mrs. Grafton, we'll come in here and disarm this bomb. If we don't return ... well, I guess you'll die when Sonny pushes the button to pop the Sergeant Yorks."

Carefully, with her watching, he twisted the wires that ran to the blasting cap back together. "There."

"You're an American naval officer," she whispered. "You can't do this to me."

"Everyone keeps telling me that. Actually, I was thinking of taping this bomb to your head. What do you think, Tommy?"

"Asshole," she hissed. The blood covered her mouth and shirt. She was a hell of a mess.

"Get the WB phone out of her bag."

Carmellini did as he was told.

"I doubt if she memorized the phone number. Look for something with phone numbers written on it, a little pad, her checkbook, anything."

Kent's eyes widened.

"You were supposed to blow the Yorks with the cell phone, weren't

She lost control of her face.

Jake continued. "We'll just tape the bomb to your head. If anything happens to Callie, I'll call you. How's that?"

Her eyes narrowed. She wiped the blood on her mouth off onto her shoulder.

"She doesn't think you'll really kill her," Carmellini said.

"I won't have to," Jake told him. "All I have to do is tell these people how she betrayed Wu and them. If Wu dies, she won't live another ten minutes. They'll kill her with their bare hands."

Her head was down now. Blood still flowed from her nose.

"He's holding them on a yacht, the
China Rose."
Her voice was a husky whisper. "It's at the Kowloon docks."

Jake Grafton lifted her head. He looked straight into her eyes. "You'd better pray we find them alive and get back here. Without me you're dead. Understand?"

They put tape over her mouth and punched a small hole in it so she could breathe. Then they left her, locking the door behind them.

"Sorry about that," Jake said to Tommy Carmellini as he used a rag to wipe blood from his hands. "When you left the room she turned wildcat, so I punched her in the nose."

"Glad it was you and not me. I knew Harold Barnes. He didn't deserve what he got."

"Cole is going to give me some weapons. I don't know what is on that ship. Maybe two people, maybe fifty. You want to come along?"

"Yeah."

"Ain't in your job description. When you're dead the story is all over; the movie ends right there. If you've got a woman somewhere and big plans, I understand."

Carmellini shrugged. "Going places people don't want me to go is what I do."

Jake tossed the bloody rag in a corner. "I'm going to kill anybody who gets in my way," he said. "No questions asked, no hesitation."

Carmellini glanced at the closed office door. "And Kerry Kent gets off with a busted nose."

"Oh, I doubt it," Jake said, sighing. He gestured to the people conferring in front of the map and checking the computer monitors. "She betrayed these people. If they don't kill her, Wu Tai Kwong will."

When the helo brought Tiger Cole back from Kowloon, he had five more small bombs with him. "Okay," he told Jake Grafton, "you've convinced me. She sold us out. There was a radio-controlled bomb in every one of the Yorks."

"Only one?"

"God, I hope so. I inspected them as carefully as I could. We could take them out of service for a week or so and disassemble each of them into a pile of parts and check every goddamn nut, bolt, and screw, but..."

"She says Callie and Wu are being held in a yacht tied up at the Kowloon docks."

"She being cooperative now?"

"That's probably not an accurate statement."

Cole snarled, "By God, I have a few things I'd like to ask her."

"Hey, she isn't going to tell you anything you don't already know. She did it for the money."

Virgil Cole shook his head, rubbed his eyes. "I just don't understand people like that. Maybe I've had too much money for too long...."

"You were never that poor, believe me," Jake said. He handed Cole the sixth bomb.

"You said you wanted weapons?"

"And the use of your helicopter. I want to find this yacht before the light fades."

"Wong has a yacht?"

"Kent says he does.
China Rose."

Cole's eyes lit up. "I've seen it! An older ship, steel, about two hundred and fifty, maybe three hundred feet long, with a little bridge and a massive salon aft. White with red trim." He looked at his watch. "The sun sets in about ten minutes. Go find that thing while I round up some weapons and clothes."

"Black."

"Today's your lucky day. Black is our uniform. I've got a truckful of black shirts and trousers. I'm trying to convince my friends that night is the time to fight."

Jake settled into the copilot's seat of the Bell and the pilot immediately lifted it into a hover. When he was above the power lines, the pilot eased the nose over and let the machine fly between the buildings toward the harbor.

They stayed low, the skids almost in the dark water, as they worked their way northwest up the Kowloon docks. Scanning the ships with binoculars, Jake fought down the sense of panic that welled up within him as the sun dipped below the horizon. Time was running out.

Coasters, tankers, container ships, tramps, fiber-optic cable layers ... ships of every kind and description. They were Russian, Chinese, Japanese, Greek, American, and flag-of-convenience ships from all over the globe. Grafton hunted through them as the light faded slowly, inexorably.

Lin Pe worked her way along the nearly deserted streets of Kowloon. She was very tired and her feet dragged.

Unable to go farther, she sat on the sidewalk against a building, her bag clutched in her hand.

She had never seen the streets this empty. Those people who were out walked purposefully, determined, with quick glances up and down the street.

There were soldiers, of course. PLA trucks drove along the streets with soldiers sitting on the fenders, rifles in hand. At street corners soldiers directed traffic, waving civilian cars off the streets to make way for trucks.

And tanks.

Three tanks rumbled by Lin Pe, huge beasts with long, clumsy barrels protruding from their turrets. Their treads chewed up the pavement.

She got up and followed them, walking as quickly as she could. The tanks were faster than she was, but they didn't disappear from sight.

The three of them came to a halt at the intersection of Nathan and Waterloo roads. The intersection was about a mile north of the southern tip of the peninsula. One tank went through the intersection, then turned in the street. Gingerly the drivers maneuvered. One tank came to rest in the intersection, its nose and the cannon pointed south. One tank was parked on each side of the intersection, slightly back. The tankers on each flank pushed the barrels of their cannons through the glass windows of the corner buildings so they could also command the street and remain half hidden by the buildings. Two trucks stopped to discharge soldiers, who took up positions behind the tanks and the parked cars that lined the side streets.

Owners of parked cars came pouring from adjacent buildings. They scrambled to move their vehicles, some of which were already blocked in by the tanks. Shouting and pleading with the soldiers did no good. One officer pointed his rifle at several civilians and ordered them to leave. In seconds the last car that could be moved was gone, and the sidewalks were empty.

Lin Pe walked another block and found a store whose owner had yet to lock the door. He protested as she entered, but she insisted, talking loudly, refusing to leave. When the owner went back in the store to summon his wife, Lin Pe took out her WB cell phone and dialed the number she had memorized. It took her but thirty seconds to report the location of the tanks.

"Climb," Jake said to the helicopter pilot. He was desperate. There was

little light left, and the
China Rose
was eluding him. "If we climb the PLA may knock us out of the sky." "Climb," Jake repeated, his voice hard and urgent. The pilot hoisted the collective and the helo bounced upward; Jake

fought against the downward G-force to hold the binoculars steady.

The pilot leveled at a thousand feet above the water. "Fly the whole waterfront again," Jake Grafton ordered, "especially the area by the amusement park."

But
China Rose
wasn't there. The haystack contained no needle.

Just when he was ready to admit defeat, he saw it.

"There!"
He pointed. "Closer. Go closer."

The pilot turned the Bell and closed the distance.

Yes. There was just enough light to see the red trim, the small bridge, and the windows of the salon. A small boat hung on davits behind the stack. The yacht's name ... he couldn't make it out. It must be
China Rosel

The yacht—actually a small ship—was moored to a pier, the last of three large yachts on the north side. Three more were moored against the south side of the pier, which was at least two hundred yards long.

At the head of the pier stood a wire fence with a closed gate. On the quay itself were pallets of boxes, some Dumpsters, stacks of fifty-five-gallon drums, forklifts, trucks, some people walking.... Oceangoing general cargo ships were berthed at piers to the north and south.

"Over the quay." Grafton pointed out the direction he wanted to the pilot. He had to see how he was going to get onto the quay from the street.

In the last of the light he got his landmarks.

It was completely dark when he tapped the pilot on the shoulder and jerked a thumb toward Victoria. The helo turned and dropped the nose and accelerated out over the harbor. The pilot didn't turn on the exterior lights until he was approaching the shoreline of Hong Kong Island.

"Where did you see
China Rose?"
Jake Grafton asked Tiger Cole as they hunted through the clothes littering the floor of the truck for a pair of pants that might fit him.

"At a pier in Kowloon. Across from the yacht of a friend of mine, the
Barbary Coast."

"For Christ's sake, why didn't you say so two hours ago? I damned near didn't find it before the light faded."

"It just slipped my mind, until you asked. I saw it but paid little attention."

"Well, it's still there, on the end of a pier. If we had the time we could get a delivery truck, fake up some invoices, drive through the gate at the head of the pier and motor right up to Wong's gangway. No time, though. We gotta go as fast as we can get there."

"Why don't you land on my friend's yacht? Nikko Schoenauer. He's right across the pier. Has a helo pad on top of the salon."

"This guy German?"

"American as a hot dog."

"It must be nice having all these filthy rich friends."

"Nikko Schoenauer flew A-4s in Vietnam. He told me that he decided to get into a business that would always be popular, didn't pollute or use up scarce resources, with a product that people paid for with discretionary income, something nice to have but not necessary. His yacht's a whorehouse. He fills it with Japanese businessmen and sails off for weeklong parties and writes a fat check to a bank on the first of every month."

Jake glanced at Cole, who looked absolutely serious. "Whores 'n' More, eh? Tiger, you never cease to surprise me."

Jake pulled the shoulder holster containing the Colt on over the black shirt. Tommy Carmellini was waiting outside the truck with two silenced submachine guns and five magazines of ammo for each. He also produced a couple of marine fighting knives, one for each of them, and two sets of night-vision goggles. "First-class stuff," Jake said to Cole after he gave them a quick brief on the goggles.

Jake and Tommy put on the goggles, turned on the power. Idly Jake asked Tiger, "So you were visiting Schoenauer last week?"

"Yeah. The girls are kinda cute."

"I thought you were dating China Bob's sister?"

"Naw! China Bob was a snob. He wanted his sister married off to a decent husband. I was just another dude he was doing business with."

"Schoenauer's got a floating whorehouse, huh?" Carmellini asked. He had been standing outside the truck listening to Grafton and Cole.

"California girls mostly," Cole said. "They come and go. Refugees from suburbia and bad marriages. When they've gotten their batteries recharged, off they go back across the pond."

"Live in a yacht at the side of the road and be a friend of man." "Something like that."

"We'll land on his boat and troop across the pier," Jake said, "if you don't think we'll be interrupting anything."

"I'm sure he won't mind," Tiger rejoined. "He can't get underway until he gets another load of clients, which won't happen until the airport reopens. Tell him I sent you."