sunburned lying on the sand, watching girls hip-roll past in bikinis.
He grinned again. That had been a long time ago.
He and Morrison had been here for almost two hours, and of course his
people had been in place since before Wu had called yesterday. The
regular staff had been given three days off with pay and told that a
special training session for employees of a different theater was being
conducted. If anybody had wondered about it, the free days off were
apparently enough to keep them from asking.
Wu would expect Ventura to get there early, of course, and he wouldn't
know who normally worked there, but he'd figure Ventura hadn't chosen
the place because he liked breathing hot smog.
Like a game of chess or go, any move in this level of play, no matter
how innocuous it might seem, could have a^major impact later on. You
had to be very careful, always looking ahead.
Only a fool would choose a neutral meeting place if he could pick one
that would tilt the playing field in his favor.
Taking the high ground was an old and battle-tested adage. The Chinese
knew this--their culture had been steeped in war for thousands of
years, and it made for a pungent, bitter drink. They knew this brew.
Within three hours of the call, Chinese agents had put the theater
under surveillance, and a couple of them had tried to con their way
inside. Ventura's people had kept the place secure, though they really
couldn't do anything about the watchers outside. Well. That didn't
matter.
The arrival of an ostentatious stretch limo in the front two hours ago
had likely drawn most of the outside attention while Morrison and
Ventura slipped in the back door, bracketed by four of his best
shooters. The guy having coffee in the Starbucks all morning would
have seen them and reported it, but Wu wouldn't want to risk a
shoot-out in broad daylight next to a major street--it would be too
easy for Morrison to take a round, and nobody wanted that. Yet.
Once inside, Morrison felt a lot safer, and Ventura let him believe
that, though the truth was, it didn't much matter. If Ventura screwed
up, the client was in deep shit no matter where he was.
Still, Ventura knew they had the advantages: He had chosen the time and
place, he controlled the building, and they needed Morrison alive,
whereas Ventura could pot anybody on their side he wanted. And when it
got right down to it, he was pretty sure he was better at strategy and
tactics than Chilly Wu.
Of course, that was the crux of it--'pretty sure' was not the same as
'absolutely certain,' which you could never be in such an encounter.
And in that was the secret shared by serious martial artists
everywhere. If you were a warrior--a real warrior--there was only one
way to test yourself. You had to go into battle, guns ready, and face
the enemy. No amount of virtual reality, no practice with targeting
lasers against others, nothing other than the real thing mattered. In
the end, the only way to know you were better when it came to life and
death was to pull the triggers, rock and roll, and see who walked away
when the smoke cleared.
