White Tiger

Chen Gui. “Recognize them?”

Chen Gui scrolled through the photos, looking at them carefully. “Yes, all of them. All Fujianese.” Manning reclaimed his phone as Chen Gui stalked to the cream-colored sofa and threw himself onto it.

“Damned Fujianese! We Shanghainese are too charitable-I should have had them killed years ago!” he said, holding his face in his hands.

Manning checked his watch. Chen Gui looked up at him from the couch as Chen Song slipped into the matching love seat. His movements were as sinuous as a cat’s.

“How did they find us?” Chen Gui asked.

Manning pointed at Chen Gui. “Wearing a flame red suit probably wasn’t such a good idea,” he said. And it was true; Chen Gui, lover of all things ostentatious, was indeed wearing a red suit. It looked ridiculous, especially to a Westerner like Manning. But to a Chinese, red was the most auspicious of colors, the color of good fortune.

Chen Gui looked down at his suit, and his face hardened. “How dare you make fun of me at a time like this!”

Manning waved for him to be silent. “Keep your voice down.”

Chen Song looked up at the taller American with hard eyes. “Watch how you address my uncle,” he said.

Manning looked directly at him. “I don’t work for you, dipshit.”

Chen Song got to his feet, facing Manning. His eyes flashed with anger; Manning did nothing more than cross his arms.

“Stop!” Chen Gui hollered in Chinese. “No fighting now!”

Chen Song looked from his Manning to his uncle and back again. After a moment of internal debate, he slowly settled back into the love seat’s embrace, but his thin smirk said it all: This is not yet over.

Manning remained unperturbed. He knew it would infuriate Chen Song more than anything else; like his uncle, he was a vain man, but his vanity centered on his masculinity. Not being taken seriously would bug him. Manning liked that.

“How will we get out of here?” Chen Gui asked.

“The first thing you need to do is change out of that damned suit. You too, Chen Song-both of you have to dress more, ah, casually.”

“I have other clothes with me,” Chen Gui said crossly. “What about the men in the street? And the one in the lobby?”

“There’s only one way out of here, and that’s down the driveway. We could make a break for it and try to get to one of the Azabu Juban stations, but frankly, I’d rather not be tied to public transportation.”

“Agreed. You have a car?”

“I do.”

“Good.” Chen Gui was placated for a moment, then suddenly remembered his original questions. “But the men-”

“The men on the street are less important to me than the one in the lobby. He’s the trip wire. The elevators come out right in front of him, and there’s no way for him to miss you.”

“So what to do about him? Can’t you just kill them? Isn’t that what we pay you for?” Chen Gui was becoming agitated again.

Manning looked at the smaller man. His face was still composed into a placid mask, but there was steel in his voice when he spoke.

“I kill when I have no other options,” he said. “And the reason I picked this place as a safe house is because they can’t move on us. The Russian embassy is right up the street, and so is a police station. There are cameras everywhere, and people of all races mix here. But the things that make this place reasonably safe also prevent me from doing what you ask. Understand?”

Chen Gui fell back against the sofa and seemed to deflate. “So what do you want to do? Just wait?”

“I have a plan. We’ll wait for about an hour or so, then we’ll make our move. In the meantime, let’s get you something to wear that’s a little less…loud.”

The hour passed with lethargy. Chen Gui groused about the outfit Manning insisted upon-a pair of khaki slacks and a dark polo shirt, over which he would wear Chen Song’s jacket. Chen Song had no issue changing into a similar outfit. Then Manning took their bags-they had one suitcase each, as he had told them-down to the lobby. The Fujianese man was still there, thumbing through a magazine, his cell phone in his lap. He did not look up as Manning toted the bags past him and to the bellhop, where he arranged for a Japan Airlines pickup. The bags, at the very least, would be ready for the 7:05pm flight to Shanghai.

Manning then returned to the room and briefed the two Chinese on his plan. They listened attentively and quietly, and if they disagreed with the plan, they kept it to themselves. They had very little choice in the matter. All because they had crossed the rival Fujianese gang by undercutting the prices of illegally-transported merchandise, which in turn was sold on the market by their yakuza partners. Japan was still in the grips of a decade-long recession, and with quality consumer goods available at a markedly reduced price, the Japanese crime bosses enjoyed a wonderful revenue stream. But Chen Gui’s connections were better than his Fujianese counterpart’s, and he had been able to import more goods at lower prices. Logically, the competition had been enraged at being shut out, and the resulting three-day killing spree had gutted Chen Gui’s operation. Thirty-seven Chinese had been quietly murdered, and the Japanese police were just beginning to discover the bodies.

Chen Gui and his nephew had waited too long to return to China, and the noose had almost closed around them. And that was where Manning had come in, catching a flight from San Francisco to Tokyo two days ago.

He hoped he would be able to make it back alive.

“Any questions?” Manning asked after he was finished.

“Let’s get this over with,” Chen Gui said moodily. “I want to get out of this place.”

Chen Gui did as instructed. He walked out in plain view of the Fujianese in the lobby and strolled directly to the lobby restroom. The Fujianese paused only a make a quick telephone call, then followed the portly Shanghainese with quick, sure-footed steps. His face was a blank mask as he concentrated on nothing more than the next few minutes that lay ahead of him.

He did not notice the tall Westerner standing in the elevator bay fiddling with his phone, nor did he notice Manning enter the restroom behind him.

Chen Gui was standing before a urinal. The Fujianese walked into the restroom and reached inside his jacket, his pace quickening as he closed on the Shanghainese crime boss. Chen Gui did not turn to look behind him, merely faced the wall.

The Fujianese pulled his weapon-a suppressed Ruger.22 pistol-from its holster.

He never made it. Manning was upon him in an instant, as fast and powerful as a hurricane. He slammed the Fujianese into the next urinal and expertly punched him in the side of the neck, delivering a brachial stun strike. The Fujianese gasped raggedly; his pistol fell to the floor, clattering on the tile. Manning lashed out with both hands and caught the smaller man beneath his armpits, then threw him into one of the toilet stalls. He closed the stall door behind him, then tossed the man’s gun into the wastebasket.

“Let’s go, Chen Gui.”

“Is it over?”

“Yes, let’s go now.”

“A moment,” Chen Gui said.

“What the hell for?”

“Ni yan xia le! Mei kanjian wo zai fangbian ma?” Chen Gui fairly shouted. Your eyes are blind! Can’t you see I’m pissing?

Chen Song met them in the lobby as he had been instructed. Manning mostly ignored him as he scanned the