“We cannot have police here,” Li Jun said, maybe to himself, maybe to his family, confirming the way things had to go. “We will say Jiang has gone back to China, and that is the end of it.”
“What about his wife and kids?” Cassie needed to make sure Li Jun covered all bases, otherwise she’d do it. Pay the woman a visit and ensure she knew what was what.
Li Jun sighed, and those sagging shoulders straightened, as though he’d bolstered himself and courage stiffened his short body. “Jiang left Mei. They had trouble in marriage. This is how the story will go. What we do brings shame on us, so if we are caught… I do not want Mei and her children in trouble.” He looked at Cassie. “Mei packages the goods.”
Mei, and Hua, Li Jun’s sister-in-law, shared that job, but what he was really saying was he didn’t want Mei in the shit for her part in the drug operation. Unexpected guilt poked Cassie with a steel-tipped finger at the thought of Mei arrested and her children scared, wondering what the fuck was going on.
Dad had made some mistakes while running the Barrington, she’d discovered that once she’d taken over. Was this also a mistake? Expecting Li Jun to store drugs in his takeaway and sell them with the meals, popping the baggies inside a plastic carton, noodles packed on top? What had Li Jun done for Dad to expect him to do that? Was it like with Joe and Lou Wilson, who ran Handel Farm, where they owed Lenny for the rest of his life, only gaining freedom upon his death? Dad had found the man who’d kidnapped and killed their three-year-old daughter, Jess—or at least he’d thought he had. The past had come back in recent days, though, proving Lenny hadn’t found the right man at all.
Yes, Dad made mistakes all right.
“I’m sorry you’re in this mess.” She wanted to squeeze Li Jun’s arm to get her sincerity across, but that would mean showing her soft side, something Dad had advised she mustn’t do with employees and residents of the Barrington. “If Lenny hadn’t—”
“No. Stop.” Li Jun wafted a rigid hand to end her line of thought. “Lenny offered me takeaway, he offered me drugs so rest of my family could come here. I chose to do this. He did not force me. If anyone is to blame, it is me for saying yes.”
Dequan stepped into the light coming through the open back doorway, a reed in the brightness. “He’s right. We all knew what was at stake, even Jiang. He died protecting the goods, something we all promised to do.”
While Cassie felt uncomfortable about her feelings on this subject, she was relieved the drugs hadn’t been stolen. Yes, a life had been cruelly taken, but those drugs were the source of employment for so many. People would go hungry if there weren’t any to sell while she waited for another batch. And those who took the drugs would go crazy without them—or go elsewhere, and that wasn’t allowed. She had a bloke who grew the plants and sourced the cocaine, the mollies, the acid, but it would have taken time to collect a new lot.
This way, she wouldn’t be scrambling to sort out the flow of sales.
I’m wicked. I should be more bothered about Jiang.
The problem was, Dad had hammered it into her that sometimes, death was par for the course, nowt more upsetting than spilling a cup of coffee on your nice trousers. It happened, you moved on.
She’d keep her true thoughts to herself, though: no good person should die for the sake of a stash, no matter her father’s opinions. Even if it was a large one that’d net around two hundred grand. If there was a leak somewhere down the line, the machete man may have known the value. So why not take the goods after the murder?
She needed a private chat with Li Jun at some point to see if he could shed any light on that.
“Right,” she said. “I’ll get Jason here to collect Jiang.”
Cassie was supposed to be meeting her right hand in the pub down the road, The Doncaster Arms, known locally as The Donny. He’d been after her to have a relationship with him outside of work, and so far, she’d held him off, citing she was learning the ropes in the field before Dad died, then planting her feet firmly once he’d passed away. Tonight was meant to be a meal, see how they got on in a personal capacity, but this murder had fucked it up.
And business always came first.
Jason would have to wait for his ‘date’. Cassie wasn’t too cut up about it. While she thought he was a good-looking fella, he was pushy, although he was making an effort to hide that side of himself at the minute, per her order.
She gave the family a sad smile, a genuine one, because, fuck, she was upset for them. How must it feel knowing where Jiang was being taken? Would their dreams be filled of him being fed to Marlene, the adapted mincer at Grafton’s Meat Factory? Would they scream out in the middle of the night at the sheer awfulness of it?
“I’ll leave you to say your goodbyes for a bit.” Cassie walked into the kitchen and closed the door to. She took her phone out and scrolled her contacts for Jason’s number. Pressed ‘connect’.
He answered on the second ring. “Got caught up putting your face on, have you?”
Ordinarily, she’d have chewed his arse for that misogynistic comment—for fuck’s sake, so what if she had taken time to put her slap on—but now
