“No, I was sorting through some papers, but I’m done now. Just a second,” he said. Ava heard him pick up the receiver. “So, thank you for calling back.”
“You’re welcome, although I’m not sure why you phoned me in the first place.”
“We understand you’re here in the U.K. on business.”
“Yes.”
“Has it been going well?”
“No, it hasn’t.”
“Ah. We were told the same thing — that there were some issues.”
“Mr. Anderson, who is we?”
“Ms. Lee, I think you should expect a phone call from Roger Simmons at some point during the day,” Anderson said, sliding around her question.
“I wish I shared your confidence.”
He hesitated. “Look, I don’t want to go into this any further than I already have. What I would like to do, sometime later today, is give you a bell to see how your day has progressed. Would you be amenable to that?”
“I don’t see why not.”
“Excellent. Well, good luck to you then,” Anderson said and hung up.
It was close to midnight in Hong Kong. Ava phoned Uncle.
“I’ve just received a call from the British prime minister’s office and was told to expect Roger Simmons to contact me,” she blurted.
“We were told something like that might happen,” he said over the noise of dishes clattering in the background.
“By whom?”
“Arellano, and then by Tong as well. They both told Ordonez they had spoken to the Prime Minister, or at least someone senior in his office — you can never be sure with these people. In any event, the message got delivered.”
“And it seems that the Prime Minister, or someone in his office, has spoken to Simmons.”
“It seems that way.”
“That still doesn’t mean he’s going to give us what we want,” Ava said.
“No, but at least the door is open again. And we will find out what matters most to Simmons — his reputation and position as a minister of the Crown, or fighting lawsuits and negative publicity as a private citizen trying to hang on to stolen money.”
“Would they have made the choice that clear-cut?”
“Let’s hope it is in his mind, although I am sure that Arellano and Tong did not make it that blatant, and I am sure the Prime Minister did not make any promises. But they know each other and understand each other’s needs. Some things do not have to be said between men in high positions.”
“I was planning to fly to Toronto late tonight. I’m going to cancel.”
“Yes, you need to wait.”
Ava went over to the window. The sky was cloud-free, the sun shining brightly. As she looked down at the street she spotted the two men from the day before. They were standing on the sidewalk in front of Kensington Gardens, directly across the street from the hotel. Even from that distance she could make out the one with the mohawk.
“Uncle, I think Jackie Leung’s men are here,” she said quietly.
“What?”
“I saw two men last night, and now they’re back. They’re outside my hotel, facing the entrance.”
“The contract has been cancelled,” Uncle said.
It was Ava’s turn to be surprised. “What?”
“Jackie Leung is dead.”
“When?”
“Sonny caught up with him tonight. Leung fell into Victoria Harbour. It turns out he could not swim.”
“And the contract?”
“Cancelled as of fifteen minutes ago. I had just finished talking to Guangzhou when you called.”
“No one seems to have told the two guys outside my hotel.”
“There has not been much time.”
“What do you want me to do?”
Uncle paused. “Describe the men to me.”
She did, emphasizing the mohawk and the earrings.
“It sounds like it could be them. I will call Guangzhou on my other phone to confirm.”
She tried to listen but his conversation was muffled. When he came back on the phone, the first thing Ava heard was a heavy sigh. “It is definitely them. The one with the earrings is the leader; his name is Ko. Guangzhou has been trying to contact them. They tell me their mobile phones are off.”
“So what am I supposed to do?”
“Write down this phone number,” he said. “It is the number of the boss in Guangzhou. His name is Li. He is waiting by his phone now and will not leave until he hears from them. He suggests that you go outside and talk to them. Tell them the contract is cancelled and they need to talk to Li.”
She was still standing by the window looking down at them. Their raincoats were buttoned, and she knew that beneath the folds, probably tucked into their belts, they were carrying weapons. She could only hope they were knives or machetes and not guns.
“Okay, I guess I can’t stay in my room all day waiting for them to turn on their phones,” she said. “I’ll go downstairs and talk to them.”
“Call me back as soon as you are finished,” he said.
(41)
Ava stood by the window, staring down at the two Chinese men. They were smoking, their backs pressed against the wrought-iron fence that fronted the Gardens. The one called Ko was talking to his partner, a small smile on his face. They looked relaxed and comfortable, but Ava noticed that their eyes never wandered from the hotel entrance.
She grabbed her phone and put the piece of paper with Li’s number on it into her pocket. She debated putting her jacket on and decided it was warm enough for just her tee. Besides, I shouldn’t be outside that long, she thought. She took the elevator to the lobby and walked out the front door, stopping when she got to the entrance so that she was framed by it and clearly visible.
Ko was talking to his partner, but he glanced across the street and saw her. His eyes locked on to Ava and, without turning, he elbowed his partner. Ava raised a hand to acknowledge them, just as the sightline between the hotel and the opposite sidewalk was blocked by several large trucks waiting for the light to change.
Ava waited for the traffic to shift, reluctant to get closer until she could see them again. It was a long light, and it seemed like several minutes before the trucks moved on and her sightline was clear. When she looked across the street, Ko and his partner were gone.
She scanned the length of the sidewalk in front of the Gardens and saw no one she recognized. There was nothing to her left but the intersection and traffic moving along High Street. She looked to her right. The sidewalk ran for about fifty metres to the next light, and standing alone beside it was Ko. There was no other person between him and her.
Ava started to walk towards him, the phone in her hand hanging loosely by her side. She kept her eyes fixed on him. Ko was as focused on her, his expression, even from a distance, intense and determined.
Halfway towards him, she passed a narrow alley on her right. A sign screwed into the wall read delivery entrance. She was almost beyond the alley when she sensed movement.
She instinctively pulled back to her left and caught the glimmer of steel. The man with the mohawk had removed his coat and wrapped it around his wrist, covering everything but the knife blade. He lunged, aiming at her
