Swallowing bile, Sally turned and smiled, nonchalantly knocking his hand aside.
“I’m working,” she said.
For an instant, Kano’s face twisted into a mask of rage, but he quickly recovered, showing Sally a smile that was half sneer, full of bravado and male posturing.
“You’re new, heh?”
Sally smiled prettily and shrugged, turning her attention back to her drink.
Kano pressed on, his tone gaining confidence.
“You must be.”
Sally nodded absently at the bartender, saying nothing. He took her empty drink and replaced it.
Kano grabbed Sally’s arm before she could raise her drink to her lips. She noticed he’d made it a point to reach across the bar and use his maimed hand, his shirtsleeve pulling back to reveal the elaborate tattoos on his arm.
“If you’re working this bar,” said Kano, his eyes flashing with broken light, “then you’re working for me.”
Sally smiled again, not flinching under the cruel squeeze of his hand. Letting her eyes move lazily across his tattoos, she looked at him coolly. Reaching out with her free hand, she put it on Kano’s chest, her fingers outstretched. She felt him jerk involuntarily from the warmth of the gesture. She laughed lightly.
“Fine,” she said, removing her hand. “But buy me a drink first.”
Kano blinked as he released her and barked out a laugh. “You have some steel in you, baita.” He gestured at her new drink. “But you already have one!”
Sally took her drink and swallowed it in one gulp, her eyes never leaving Kano’s face. As she lowered the glass to the bar, she jerked her chin at the bartender.
Kano laughed again as he threw some money on the bar. “This will be the first time I paid for a drink in this bar,” he said smugly. He smiled at the bartender as if they were best friends. “Tequila.”
Sally nodded her approval. “A man’s drink.” She raised her glass, reflecting on the advantages of arriving early. At this point the bartender knew she was drinking cranberry juice and soda water, which looked exactly like the vodka drinks so many young girls in Tokyo favored. So while she and Kano kept asking for another drink, he was getting drunk and she was getting more sober by the minute.
Three drinks later Kano asked Sally her name.
“Miko,” she said. She bit her tongue until it bled, forcing a smile.
It was her mother’s name.
The next hour lasted forever, a purgatory of flashing lights, smoke, and the incessant throbbing of the bass in her skull. When Kano finally started to slur his words and his hand slid lazily off her thigh, Sally made her move. She leaned across the gap between the stools and put her lips close to Kano’s ear. It took all her will not to scream.
She pointed toward the ladies’ room. “When I come out,” she said sweetly, “I want you to take me home with you.” She squeezed his thigh as she stood up, then ran her hand across his cheek. Kano had a drunken, lopsided grin on his face as she turned and walked briskly across the club.
Silence.
The door to the ladies’ room was padded, and suddenly Sally found herself in a cocoon, her ears ringing, the bright fluorescent lights making her blink. Walking over to the nearest sink, she looked at herself in the mirror. The short black dress, the makeup, the silver locket around her neck. The dead, flat look in her eyes.
Sally turned away suddenly, rushing to the closest stall. She dropped to her knees and retched, the drinks from the last two hours and what little food she had eaten spilling out into the bowl in a swirl of loathing and pain. Closing her eyes, she rocked back and forth on the cold tile.
“Not much longer,” she whispered. “You can do this. You must do this.”
Coughing, she went back to the sink and washed up, forcing herself to look in the mirror one more time. Her eyes seemed to absorb all the light in the room, green dark seas with no bottom and no shore.
Kano was drunk but not drunk enough. The ride in the limo was the hardest thing Sally had ever done. She needed him sober enough to keep him interested, but that came at a price. She found the strength to smile once or twice, playfully batting his hands away, letting her fingers wrap around his leg or arm. But the ride took too long, and Sally felt part of her soul break away with every passing minute. She closed her eyes as his hands slid across her legs, bit her cheek as his coarse lips drooled their way down her neck. By the time the car stopped, the only sensation Sally had left was the taste of her own blood.
Kano was talking to her, telling her to get out of the car, but Sally couldn’t hear the words, the music from the club still with her, filling her body with a rhythmic drumbeat that kept her heart from stopping.
Sally had been to Kano’s apartment building before, when he was out making rounds. Thirty stories tall, it looked like a sewing needle thrust into the sky, its tip obscured by low clouds mixed with smog. The limo pulled into an underground garage and let them off at an elevator, then pulled away down a ramp. Her arm around Kano’s waist, Sally stepped into the elevator and held her breath.
Kano leaned close, his breath foul with cigarettes and drink.
“I’ve got something to show you upstairs.”
Sally smiled and let her eyes move down to his belt.
“I’ll bet.”
Kano blinked and gave a short laugh, his reaction time a few seconds off. “That, too,” he promised lasciviously, leaning closer. “But something else.”
“I can’t wait,” replied Sally. It was the first time all night she had told the truth.
The apartment was huge, the kitchen bigger than the room Sally shared with Jun back at school. Black leather and chrome, halogen lights. A large modern painting of a samurai warrior filled one wall, slashes of color and abstract shapes surrounding a classic image of a lone warrior with drawn sword. A large television and stereo dominated the opposite wall. The far wall was made entirely of glass.
Neo-masculine yakuza-chic, Sally thought to herself.
“It suits you,” she said, smiling.
Kano grunted absently, then led her through the open kitchen and across the living room toward the glass wall.
“Now I’ll show you something,” he said, pulling open a sliding glass door.
Sally stepped onto a curved balcony that wrapped around the apartment. By Tokyo standards, the entire place was huge, but the balcony alone was larger than many families’ apartments. There could be no doubt that Kano’s uncle paid the rent.
Kano stepped over to the railing and gestured down, reaching out with his other hand to pull Sally closer.
“Take a look,” he said, obviously pleased with himself. “Not bad, huh?”
Looking straight ahead, Sally could see the soft glow of other skyscrapers penetrating the clouds, fixed constellations for the rich and privileged to gaze upon. Looking down, a dark ring encircled the building, a wide swath of landscaping that looked black in the night. But just beyond were the streets of Tokyo, a maze of headlights, neon, and reflections in the clouds that looked like rivers of light. Sally gasped despite herself, thinking of pictures she had seen of volcanoes, rivers of molten lava coursing down the mountainside.
As she stared at the shifting lights, Sally sensed Kano move closer, his hand grabbing her ass and pressing her against the railing. “Turn around,” he commanded. “Now I’ve got something else to show you, bitch.”
Taking a deep breath, Sally felt the fires from below seeping into her. She turned slowly, her
