Gentleman Takes a Chance (43 page)

The man held the door open to her. "Please come in."

He led her past the counter, manned by a small lady who was watching TV and doing accounts at the same time, then past the dining room where only three people sat at tables, and into a door that led into busy, noisy kitchen. Before she had more than a moment to recoil from the sound of pans banged together, the clash of plates, the way people yelled at each other across the room, she felt Mr. Lung's cool hand on her elbow, and saw him pointing at yet another, narrower door.

She went through it to find herself in a very small room. There was only one table, long and narrow, covered in an immaculate white tablecloth. Three chairs, one on either of the longer sides of the table, and one at the end. At one corner of the table, the tablecloth had been pulled back, to reveal a cutting-board surface. That area was covered in cabbage and there was a cleaver amid it. On the other side sat a pile of papers that looked like account books, but which Kyrie could not presume to decipher, given they were written in Chinese ideograms.

Mr. Lung smiled and waved her to one of the chairs on the long side of the table, then sat himself on the facing one and took up the cleaver. "I hope you don't mind," he said, "if I work while we talk? I find it helps me concentrate. Also, we are a family operation. I don't cook, but I help with the preparation for the cooking. And then I take off the apron and serve at tables." Judging from his smile, one would think this was a pleasant social chat.

"You . . . know my name . . ." Kyrie said.

"Of course," he said, equably. "We met before. I mean, I've seen you. And I knew who you were. I was not . . . in my human form."

Kyrie thought of the assembly of dragons, of the Great Sky Dragon and of Tom—as she then thought—getting killed. She felt as if her throat would close.

Mr. Lung seemed to notice her discomfort. He set the cleaver down again, amid the chopped cabbage, gently, as if he were afraid the blade might scare her. "I know what it must have seemed like to you," he said. He joined his hands and rested them on the edge of the table, but kept his spotless shirt sleeves away from the cabbage. "But even then, I knew . . ." He shrugged. "He doesn't tell us much. He doesn't need to. He's like . . . the father of the family, and the father doesn't owe explanations to anyone, does he?" He smiled suddenly. "Well, now your attitudes here are different, but where I grew up the father could do as he pleased and didn't need to tell wife or children anything." For a moment it seemed to Kyrie as though he glanced across endless distances at a time she couldn't even imagine. "But we don't question him, and I haven't. I do have my suspicions, but I'm not so foolish as to share them, and besides, I might be quite wrong. But I can tell you he didn't mean to seriously punish the young dragon. If he had . . ." Mr. Lung shrugged.

He picked up the cleaver again, and resumed chopping cabbage. "If he had, you wouldn't be worried for the young dragon now, because he would be dead. Himself can be quite ruthless when he chooses. I don't think he has it in him to mind what other people feel or think." He shrugged again. "But he treated the young dragon very gently, particularly for someone who had just led him on a chase and defied him the way—what is his name? Mr. Ormson?—had."

Kyrie heard herself sniffle skeptically. "He had given people orders to kill him before."

Mr. Lung narrowed his eyes at her. "This is where I can't give you more detailed explanations, Ms. Smith. Partly, because they are only my conjectures. But I think . . . I think Himself found out something about Mr. Ormson when he met him in the flesh. And that's when he decided he could not kill him."

"Found out what?"

Mr. Lung shrugged. "I can't tell you that. All I can say is that the dragon triad looks after its own."

"But he's not . . . an Asian dragon."

"Sometimes the differences are smaller than you think," Mr. Lung said. "And not everything is as black and white as it appears. For now . . ." He chopped cabbage with a will. "Let's establish that it matters to Himself—in fact, it's important to him—that nothing should happen to the young dragon. So, anything I can do to help you with this . . ."

"He'll never join you, you know?" Kyrie felt forced to warn. "He just can't. He would . . . he will never give anyone that sort of authority over him."

Mr. Lung nodded. "I talked to his father," he said, as if he were admitting to a distasteful encounter. "I know all about Mr. Ormson's hatred of authority. All I can say is that he's very young."

Kyrie opened her mouth and almost said it wasn't the authority, it was the feeling of belonging absolutely to someone, and the fact that the triad was, after all, a criminal organization. But she realized in time that nothing could be gained from antagonizing the people she needed to help her, and almost smiled. It would be such a Tom thing to do, after all. Perhaps Tom was contagious. Instead, she closed her mouth. And when she opened it again, it was to say, "There's a dire wolf shifter in town."

"Ah, the executioner. We've . . . heard." The nimble fingers plied the cleaver impossibly fast, chopping exact, neat strips of cabbage. "We have . . . a pact with the Ancient Ones."

"I know. I don't know if Dante Dire intends to violate it," she said. And watched his eyebrows go up, as the cleaver stopped.

"What do you mean 'violate it'?" For just a moment, Mr. Lung's urbane mask seemed to slip. He set his mouth into what would have been a grin, except that it displayed far more of his small, sharp teeth than any natural grin could display. "He wouldn't dare."

Kyrie could swear she saw an extra pair of nictitating eyelids close, then open from the side, but she knew it couldn't be true. She looked away from him, hastily. "I don't know," she said. "I know the following: he's a sadist. He's not as much in control of himself as he thinks he is. He seems to have decided he likes me, or at least is not willing to hurt me, for now. And he's looking for a scapegoat for the deaths that brought him here."

"He should be more concerned," the dragon said, "with the other deaths. The ones that originally got you involved."

"Yes," Kyrie said. "But he doesn't seem concerned with searching out the true culprits or investigating anything. He wants to protect himself, and get out of here with his . . . reputation undiminished." Mentally she added to herself that at least she hoped he wanted to get out of there. The idea that he had a thing for her and that he might stick around to make himself agreeable to her was driving her insane. In the long list of suitors she'd rejected, Dante Dire was something she'd never met. Something she didn't need.

She started telling the dragon about her encounters with Dire and more, about what she sensed and feared from the creature. When she was done, Mr. Lung swept the cabbage into a mound, and looked at her over it. "So, you fear he might inadvertently kill the young dragon? While baiting him?" He looked skeptical. "We are not that frail, Ms. Smith. Nor that easy to kill."

"No," she said. "That is not what I fear at all. What I fear . . ." She shook her head. "You know Tom, such as he is." She smiled a little. "Hatred of authority and all, he insists on looking after those he thinks he's obliged to protect. To . . . to keep them from harm. As such, he's . . . well . . . he doesn't want me hurt. And he doesn't want Rafiel hurt, nor Keith, nor anyone in the diner. That girl reporter getting killed just outside the diner scared him. He thinks it's up to him to save us all. And I'm very afraid he's about to do something stupid."

Mr. Lung was quiet a long time. When he spoke, it was in measured tones. "I would say he will do something stupid. That sense that he must do something he's completely unprepared to do . . . I've seen it before. He will get hurt."

"Yes," Kyrie said, feeling a great wave of relief at being understood. "That's what I thought. He will get hurt."

"No," Mr. Lung said, with great decision, his face setting suddenly in sharp lines and angles. "No. Himself would not want him hurt. I will do what it takes. What is your plan?"

"Right," Rafiel said over the phone as he drove away from the doughnut shop where he had dropped off Lei Lani. "And I want you to check the backgrounds of the aquarium employees," and to McKnight's protests answered, "No, nothing special, okay? Just basically their resume. But check with the places where they're supposed to have studied and all."

"You . . . suspect one of them is an impostor?" McKnight asked.

"I don't know what I suspect," Rafiel said. "I just want to check it out."

"Oh," McKnight said. "Now?"

"Now would be good," Rafiel said, as sternly as he could. "Call me as soon as you have anything."

He hung up before McKnight could formulate an answer, and set a course towards the laboratory to drop off the petroleum jelly. He was fairly sure the petroleum jelly would have sharkskin in it. He was also fairly sure that the skin had come from the scrapings in that baggie Lei had on her desk. It had taken all of Rafiel's self-control—plus some—to avoid giving away how obvious all this was. Except that he could feel a theory assembling, like an itch at the back of his brain. If he had to bet, he would bet that Lei Lani was the shark shifter. And he would bet she took her dates to the aquarium and then . . . made a snack out of them.

The problem was, even if it proved that she hadn't gone to the University of Hawaii, even if it could be proven that she wasn't who she said she was . . . how could he be sure she was a shark shifter? And even if he were sure she was a shark shifter, how could he be sure that she was committing these heinous crimes? Or that she was committing them on purpose? Or that she knew what she was doing?

In a normal crime, you knew. And if you didn't know—if you weren't absolutely sure that the criminal knew right from wrong, or that he was in full possession of his faculties, you had the courts. Rafiel's job was supposed to be to provide a case to the courts. Not constituting himself judge, jury and executioner. That would make him no better than Dire.

No . . . he needed to go and talk to someone. He looked at the clock on the dashboard. Middle of the day. Normally both Kyrie and Tom would be at home and awake. He wasn't sure how the strange schedule was affecting things. He also knew they wouldn't be home. Rafiel had left their key with his father, who said his uncle would have the bathroom repaired in the next two or three days. But for now, Kyrie and Tom would be at the bed-and-breakfast. Or at least one of them would be. Almost for sure.

Rafiel parked in the back of The George. A quick look inside revealed Anthony at the grill, which meant Tom at least was off. The tables seemed to be attended to by Conan and Keith. That meant . . . maybe both Tom and Kyrie were off.

Turning away from The George, Rafiel crossed the parking lot, went up the broad stone steps flanked by sickly-looking stone lions—or perhaps dogs—and up to the front door of the bed-and-breakfast. The sign on the door said do come in, and Rafiel did. In response to a light tinkle from the bell affixed to the back of the front door, the kindly-looking, middle-aged proprietress came from the back of the house, wearing a frilly apron and smelling vaguely of vanilla.

"Hi," Rafiel said. "I'm here to see my friends, Mr. Ormson and Ms. Smith?"
And don't I sound like I have a truly interesting social life, the way I keep visiting Tom and Kyrie in their room.
He felt himself blush but smiled at the woman.

"Oh, sure. Just a moment," she said, heading to the antique mahogany desk in the middle of the room. "I'll just give them a ring to make sure they are decent and want to see you." Her smile somehow managed to soften the implication that he was an interloper or trying to disturb their privacy under false pretenses. She pressed some buttons, put the phone to her ear. "Mind you, I think only Mr. Ormson is in. Ms. Smith—" She stopped abruptly and her voice changed to the mad cheerfulness that people reserve for barely awakened males and slightly dangerous dogs, "Oh, hi, Mr. Ormson! Your friend, Mr.—" a pleading look at Rafiel.

"Trall."

"Mr. Trall is here. He would like to see you. Is it okay if I send him up?"

A series of rasps answered her and she said, "All righty, then. I'll send him up." And then, in her normal voice, to Rafiel. "He says to go on up. You know where the room is, I presume?"

"Oh, yes. I've been there before," Rafiel said.
Not that it would surprise anyone at the station to hear this. They would think that, at one stroke—so to put it—both my aloofness to my dates and my odd changes of clothes midday are explained.
The idea amused him, but it still made him blush, which he was fairly sure made him look very guilty.

He more or less ran up the stairs, all the way to the top floor, where he knocked lightly on Tom's door. There was the sound of steps approaching the door, and then a disheveled, unshaven Tom, in his underwear—and had Kyrie bought him jockey shorts with little dragons on them? Either that or Tom's sense of humor was worse than Rafiel had anticipated—holding a flailing kitten in one hand, opened the door.

"Hi," Rafiel said, walking in. "Sorry to disturb you. I can see I woke you."

" 'Sokay," Tom mumbled, followed by something that might have been "Never mind." He closed the door and set the orange furball gently on the floor. " 'Scuse me a moment?"

Rafiel nodded and Tom ducked into the bathroom and closed the door. Rafiel heard flushing and the shower running, then splashing of water. In what seemed like less than three minutes—spent mostly in pulling Not Dinner off Rafiel's pants, which he seemed to believe were the climbing part of a jungle gym—Tom opened the door again and emerged, wrapped in a white robe, with his hair in a towel.

"Nice turban," Rafiel said.

Tom glowered in response. He had shaving things out on the marble-topped vanity. A spray-on shaving cream can, and one of those razors that seemed to come with an ever-increasing number of blades. Even so, it all looked very Tom-like and unnecessarily difficult to Rafiel who, knowing Tom, was only surprised he didn't shave with a straight razor and use a brush to apply lather to his face. "I use an electric razor," he blurted out.