Gina Takes Bangkok (The Femme Vendettas) (8 page)

Gina took the gun and did as she was asked, while Kannon strode over to a set of doors at the back of the temple and disappeared through them. Keeping her eyes on her prisoners, she addressed Jarun.

“What the hell was with all those acronyms?”

“The pedophile community uses them so that they can speak to each other without people knowing what they’re talking about,” he explained. “Helps them recognize each other on chat rooms, too. LBL means ‘little boy lover’. AOA is ‘age of attraction’.”

“And what does CHSC mean?” asked Gina, unable to even guess.

“It stands for ‘ Cement-headed Straight Clown’,” Jarun answered. “Someone who goes out of their way to persecute molesters.”

“How do you know so much about it?” Ryota asked, voice calm even as he held his hostage.

Jarun shrugged. “When I was a kid I used to bring guys like these to my friends. That’s why I worked so hard to learn English. You learn how they speak so that they’ll follow you.”

“Your friends prostituted themselves?” asked Gina.

“Hell, no. We’d just ambush and rob them. How do you think I figured out how to cause people so much pain? When you’re small, you make every hit count.”

The Frenchman glanced at the door Kannon had disappeared through, down at the corpse of his friend, then back at Gina. “Mademoiselle, please, whatever your quarrel, we’re no part of it. Each of the men here is someone influential. Kill us and the police will be after you. I already told you everything I know. Let us go and we’ll forget this ever happened.”

“Shush,” Gina replied, annoyed that the man had a point. There were too many people to question thoroughly, and the only alternative to letting them go would be a massacre. Damn Kannon. She’d had everything under control until he’d gone trigger happy.

As if on cue the door at the back of the temple opened up and he reappeared—this time with company. Filing after him was a crowd of boys and girls, poor peasant children new to the city, by the looks of their clothing. All seemed scared out of their wits. None seemed harmed. At least not physically.

Motioning for the children to remain quiet, Kannon trained his gun back on the temple’s patrons. “Gina, take the kids outside.”

His voice was quiet, eerily serene. “Kannon, what are you going to do?”

He didn’t look at her. “I said, take the kids outside.”

The Frenchman looked up at Gina desperately. “Please, mademoiselle. He’s going to kill us all. I have a family. An important job at the consulate. Please don’t let him do this.”

“Shut up,” snapped Gina, and turned to Kannon. “I know these guys are child abusers, and they deserve to be punished, but we can’t gun them all down.”

Kannon sighed, and slowly lowering his weapon, he walked over to Gina. “Fine. Perhaps you’re right. We’ll tie them up and—”

AS GINA REGAINED consciousness, she became aware of two contradictory sensations: the intense pain throbbing in her head, worse than any hangover she’d ever suffered, and the warm rocking movement of being carried. She blinked open her eyes to discover that it was Kannon’s arms she was cradled in.

“Wha...what happened?”

He slanted her a look. “I knocked you out. The headache will pass in a few hours. Way I struck you the bruise won’t even be visible.”

“You hit me?! What the fuck, Kannon! Put me down right now!”

He did as she asked, and touching the side of her head, she winced at its tenderness. The four of them were still in 70 Rai by the looks of it, dawn had not yet broken, and the children were clustered close.

She dropped her head into her hands. “What did you do?”

“Only lawyers should ask questions they already know the answers to,” he replied.

“You’re a psycho, you know that? I had everything in hand till—”

“Till you drank whatever that man put in your drink. The customers were fooled by you, but the owners saw through your act the second we walked in.”

Gina leaned against a wall of corrugated metal to steady herself. “You don’t know that.”

“I saw him do it. You might have too if you hadn’t been so busy chatting.”

“I got useful information out of them and you know it,” she protested, holding up her hand with the web address written on it. “You didn’t have to kill them.”

“Can you walk?” he asked, pointedly ignoring her rebuttal.

She was dizzy and wobbly and ready to do a face-plant into the muck. “Of course I can.”

She straightened and started off. She staggered, stopped, staggered on.

“We don’t have time for this,” Kannon growled. He scooped her into his powerful arms as if she weighed nothing, and strode on, leading their motley crew out of the slums. Gina rested her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes, because the way she was feeling, she’d end up barfing on his suit.

“Kannon?”

“What?”

“Who the hell wears a suit to the slums?”

“I’m on the job.”

“And you always wear a suit on the job?”

“Yes.”

“Why a suit?”

The arms about her tightened. “It commands respect. Besides, I’ve got a lot of them. Don’t want to ruin my good clothes.”

She opened one eye. His jaw was rigid, his gaze straight ahead. “What do you consider ‘good clothes’?”

“Why are we talking?”

“Because you hurt me, and payback is you get to distract me from my pain.”

“Payback is I’ve got to haul you back to the boat.”

“That, too.”

He made a grumping noise. She snuggled against him, figuring it was easier to carry a load close than farther away, and because even if she verged on losing her cookies, he felt awesome. She slipped her hand under his jacket to the hard muscles of his upper pecs, and brought her lips against his neck. “Maybe you could distract me other ways.”

“I thought you were dizzy.”

“Not if I keep my eyes shut. Lots of things I can do by touch.” To demonstrate she slid her tongue along the tendon in his neck.

He sucked in his breath. “Cut it out.”

“Why? Because you’re on the job?”

“Yes.”

“So you admit that you find me distracting?”

“Like a monkey.”

Stock it up to the pain, or to an evening dealing with the worst kind of scum in the worst part of the city, but Gina decided to call him on this one. She slid her hand from his chest and began to unbutton his shirt.

“I told you, cut it out, or I’ll throw you over my shoulder and take you back that way.”

“Aren’t you in enough trouble with my old man as it is?”

“It’ll be worth it.”

“Uh-huh. How about I play nice if you just admit that you think I’m hot?”

There was a deep volcanic rumbling from Kannon that finally erupted with, “A Hawaiian shirt and a pair of cargo shorts.”

She paused her work on the buttons to take that in. “Those are your good clothes?”

“Yes. Now do up my shirt.”

She thought to negotiate when there was a sudden scuffling from behind them. Kannon spun around, and Gina sprung her eyes open in time to see Jarun sprint off into the darkness. Ryota, who’d been herding the children, cursed and drew his gun. There was nothing to aim at. Jarun had vanished.

Ryota moved to pursue. Kannon stopped him. “Let him go. He knows these slums. You don’t.”

Reluctantly Ryota obeyed.

“I told you to keep an eye on him while I carried Gina,” Kannon ground out. “Now he’s gone.”

Ryota bowed. “I’m sorry.”

“If we were still Yakuza, one of your fingers would be shorter. Better hope your mistake doesn’t put Tasanee at risk.”

Ryota’s shoulders slumped as the group trudged on.

“How did you know Ryota has a crush on Tasanee?” she whispered.

He readjusted her in his arms, not very gently at all. “I have a daughter. I know the look.”

His jostling and Jarun’s escape was doing a number on her, and she quickly closed her eyes. In the comfort of near unconsciousness, she murmured, “You think my father knows the look, too?”

Kannon’s answer was an exasperated hiss. “Yes.”

“So you’re not worried about what my father’s going to say when he learns you hit his daughter?” Gina asked. “Or let Jarun escape?”

Kannon didn’t answer. Seemed he was done talking for the night.

John Wakai brooded while his sister gave him a shoulder rub, surveying the city as he contemplated what more he could do. Her Cambodian friends were prowling the slums and red light districts, searching for any hint of Tasanee’s whereabouts, but thus far had come up empty handed.

Odds were excellent she was back in Bangkok. Before he’d wiped out Montri’s lieutenants, the Black Lotus had the support of virtually every gang in the city. Tasanee was too young and inexperienced to rally them, but she had Kannon on her side. Already Jarun and one of the Cambodian gangsters had gone missing, confirming his fear that Kannon was trying to find him as hard as he was trying to find Tasanee. Every day she was free the situation became more dangerous, and without her, Alak would remain stubbornly defiant.

Under normal circumstances Kannon wouldn’t have been such a problem. He’d outwitted several criminal masterminds in his time. Russians, Chinese, Nigerians, Japanese, Pakistanis, Iranians—all of their respective syndicates had failed to wrest control of the city away from the Black Lotus, and Wakai knew he’d been a key component in Alak’s success.

In this case, however, he’d little to work with. Forced to betray a man that he respected and hoped to serve for the rest of his life, he was now pressured for fast results by blunt-minded savages he scarcely trusted. At least he knew where the Cambodians were. Kannon could be anywhere, could be taking out the guards in the lobby right now, could be riding the elevator to put a bullet in him and his sister.

Somehow he needed to regain control of the situation, and fast.

His phone rang. It was a call he couldn’t ignore.

“We were hit,” said the familiar cold voice. “Four dead in 70 Rai, and all six clients. Kids gone. Didn’t know a thing until a customer called. He got there late and found the bodies.”

Well, he had his answer about Kannon’s whereabouts. Victoria came around in front of him, her eyes wide and worried. He tried to appear calm. “That driver of yours must’ve talked.”

“No. He didn’t.”

“How else could they have known about the place?’

His question was met with another. “How much did you tell Jarun?”

Wakai’s jaw tightened. Perhaps he’d confided in his childhood friend too much. Still, would Jarun turn on him that fast? Perhaps, since Kannon was involved. Wakai felt suddenly sick at what horrific pain Jarun must’ve experienced at the hands of someone who could unleash a one-man massacre and walk away unscathed.

Apparently his silence was all the thug needed. “We gave you a week to solve the problem. It’s been five days now and it’s only gotten worse. Lost men. Lost clients. Lost property. We were counting on your brains to take the city quickly, not start a war.”

“Unlike you, I’m no sorcerer!” Wakai retorted, no longer able to hold back his sarcasm and frustration. “I’ve given your people a list of every ally Montri has in this city and they haven’t accomplished anything. Fourteen million people in Bangkok, and you want me to find one girl? For all we know she might not even be in Thailand! What do you want me to do, wheel around the city showing her picture? I can’t work miracles. These things take time.”

There was an ominous silence, and Wakai found himself holding his breath.

“You have two days left.” The line went dead.

Wakai set his phone back on his arm rest. “Victoria, we need to take care of this quickly. How’s Alak doing?”

Victoria’s girlish features twisted into an angry pout. “He’s so stubborn. I can’t break him. I’m not as good at it as Jarun.”

“That’s because he’s a torturer,” said Wakai. “You’re a sadist.”

He hadn’t kept the disgust from his voice and she’d picked up on it. “I can’t help it,” she whimpered. “Please don’t be mad with me, John. Please....”

“I’m not mad,” he replied wearily, the same words he’d said a million times over the years. “But I need him brought here, now. Arrange it, please.”

Victoria trotted off to fulfill her brother’s wishes. She was small, shorter than even the typical Thai girl. If ever looks were deceiving….