The Killing Hands (15 page)

A
t 8:40 a.m. I swing into the FBI's lot, armed with my four
dim mak
books and an anatomy chart Lee gave me with key pressure points circled. But before I can talk to Grove, I have to brief the team. I race up to the meeting room Petrov booked on the fifteenth floor, where most of the Gang Impact Team resides. Special Agents Hana Kim and Joe De Luca are already there.

“Hi, Sophie. How'd you do last night?”

“Good, good. I'm pretty sure the two maybes are related, so that's nine in total. But there may be even more.”

“More?” Hana's face crumples and De Luca looks up, also intrigued.

“Long story. I'll tell you about it in ten minutes?”

“Sure.” Hana looks at De Luca. “Joe and I were just about to flip for the coffee run. Maybe now we should draw straws.”

“I'm desperate for a coffee, but do you guys mind flipping for it? I need to set up in here. I'll get the next round.” The Federal Café runs a coffee cart right at the front door of our building so it shouldn't take them too long.

“You're on.” Hana lets the coin fly into the air.

“Heads,” De Luca calls as the coin reaches its peak. It lands and spins around a couple of times, before coming to rest on tails.

“Yes.” Hana pumps the air, like a tennis player who's just won a long point.

“Man, you must rig this.” Despite the complaint, De Luca stands up.

“I'm just lucky.”

De Luca turns to me. “That's her tenth straight win.” He shakes his head. “And the killer is that the loser pays. My kids are never gonna get to college at this rate.”

Hana laughs. “Sophie's getting the next one. You can put the few bucks you'll save into their education fund.”

He rolls his eyes and points casually at Hana. “So, a mocha for you.” He turns to me. “What about you, Agent Anderson?”

“You going downstairs?”

He nods.

“I'll have a strong latte. Soy milk.”

“Done. And don't start without me.” Even though I'm the one doing the briefing, he gives the warning look to Hana.

Once I've distributed the printouts around the table, I sit down. In front of each seat I've laid out ten sheets of paper. The first two pages are stapled together and feature the summary table of the nine victims I showed Lee this morning—the eight from ViCAP and Saito. In these copies, the names aren't blanked out and some columns, like the
Association
one, will be more important for us. Lee didn't need to know if the victim was Mafia, Yakuza, Russian. The other eight pages cover the previous eight attacks in more detail, one page per victim. I summarize crime-scene location, the forensic pathologists' reports, any witness statements and general comments from the law-enforcement personnel involved. It took me three hours to draft last night, but it was worth it. I feel like I have a good preliminary grasp of all the victims, and through them an insight into our killer. Maybe even enough to draft a profile. I haven't added anything into my printouts about
dim mak
, but I will cover it during the briefing.

The task force team members arrive one by one, and by 9:00 a.m. everyone's here except De Luca and the coffee.
Then again, his progress was hampered by a couple of last-minute additions to the order. Ramos arrived just as De Luca was leaving and Hana added an espresso to the list, and then decided to keep the boss happy, so she rang De Luca a minute later to request Petrov's cappuccino. His kids' college funds must really be hurting now.

It's only three minutes past the hour when De Luca walks in and distributes the coffees. “Sorry, Williams.”

Williams shrugs and holds up his cup of brewed coffee from the Bureau's kitchen. “I'm covered.”

We all sit down.

“Okay, people. Now that the caffeine's here, let's get started.” Petrov takes the top folder from in front of him. “This is everything our IT people could find on Mee Kim and her mother, Sun-Mi Kim. We've got birth certificates, death certificates, driving records, bank accounts, immigration records…the works. The father on Mee Kim's birth certificate is listed as unknown. So it doesn't get us any closer to discovering if the connection between Saito and Mee Kim was father and daughter. However, now that Kim's gone missing, we've swabbed for DNA in her house. It'll take a few days, but we will be able to compare her DNA to Saito's and uncover any blood relationship that way.”

We all nod.

Petrov continues. “We also found that when Sun-Mi Kim was alive, she received regular monthly payments, probably directly from Jun Saito.”

“That sounds like maintenance,” I say.

Petrov nods. “It looks likely that Saito is Mee Kim's father, but until we have the DNA there's no proof. I'm going to update you on our progress on who, or what organization, might be behind the hit, and Anderson's also got some ViCAP results she'll take us through. But first up, last night's developments.” Petrov summarizes our discovery of Mee Kim's disappearance and the forensic tests currently in the lab's queue, before asking if anyone else has got any general updates.

Ramos raises his forefinger into the air. “I found out yes
terday that Saito booked his flight, under the name of Jo Kume, three days prior to travel. This ties in with what we already knew from his hotel and the State Department—that he booked his hotel online three days prior to arrival and that he flew out of Singapore.”

“So it wasn't a planned trip?” Williams says, writing it down.

“Probably not.” Ramos looks up. “The November 24 Singapore flight was the first he could get when he called the airline on November 21…. My officers have also finished interviewing everyone whose car was in the lot at the time of Saito's murder. I've had a look through all the notes myself but nothing looks suspicious. Certainly no cars registered to people with organized-crime ties.”

“Does it need any more follow-up?” Petrov's hand hovers over his notepad.

Ramos shakes his head. “We can go back to it in the future, if need be.”

When we're all silent for a few seconds, Petrov says, “Anything else, people?”

The others shake their heads.

“Okay, Anderson. You're up.”

I take a deep breath. “I believe that our killer, our hit man, is using the Ten Killing Hands as his primary method of attack. The Ten Killing Hands are ten strikes or series of kung fu strikes that are meant to either severely disable or kill your opponent, sometimes with one blow.”

Ramos lets out a whistle. “Sounds charming.”

“It is. Most of these strikes only work to their full potential if they're completed by someone extremely skilled.”

“So how many people are we talking here?” De Luca takes a sip of his coffee.

“Hard to say. As an arbitrary line in the sand, I'd say black belt and above. But it's likely the person we're dealing with has trained to the highest level of kung fu, reaching master level.”

Petrov rests his elbows on the table and interlaces his fingers. “I suggested to Anderson that we might be looking
at someone from outside the US. Someone brought in as an external contractor to carry out the hits.”

Louis Williams nods. “That'd fit with the historic MO of a hit. Particularly if some of these victims are high up in the chain of command.”

“Which they are,” Petrov says.

“I was going for the more interesting angle.” I smile. “Hollywood kung fu expert. Until Petrov set me straight.”

“Anything's possible, Anderson. It's just with organized crime, they tend to follow patterns.”

I move back to the Killing Hands. “So, to give you some examples—some of the nondeadly strikes include a double strike on the opponent's ears to burst their eardrums, striking the back of a straight elbow to dislocate and damage that joint, or gouging out the eyes and breaking the floating ribs.”

“All one-strike hits?” Ramos asks.

“If done correctly, yes, those ones are. Some of the other techniques can be two or three movements in combination. For instance, the Squeeze and Crush.” I stand up and move to the nearest person, Hana. “In this one, you strike and grab their throat like this.” I hold my hand out in a tiger shape, with Hana's throat between my thumb and forefinger. She instantly coughs. “I'm barely putting any pressure on,” I explain. “It's just that the correct position blocks the windpipe instantly. Sorry, Hana.”

She gives me a smile. “I'm all right. Keep going.”

I nod. “Then you apply pressure until the blood supply to the brain is cut, or until the windpipe closure blocks the victim's oxygen supply, and then twist.” I take my hand away from Hana's throat and twist it in thin air. “That'll dislocate or break their neck.”

“But the strength required to do that, with one hand…” Williams shakes his head. “The killer must be extremely strong.”

“Not necessarily.” I sit back down. “Combining your own body weight with speed helps to deliver the intensity of the strike.” When Lloyd Grove first talked about Jun
Saito's throat wound and the force required to produce the injury, I also pictured a heavyset and strong attacker. But now that I know kung fu's involved, it's a different story.

“What do you mean?” Williams asks.

I stand up again and move back to Hana. “Can you stand up, Hana?”

“Sure.” She's a couple of inches shorter than me, and now that we're side by side, it's much more noticeable.

“Okay. So I start off in a horse stance, side-on to Hana.” I position myself in front of Hana, but while she's facing me, I'm side-on to her. “Then when I strike, I twist my body around.” In slow motion, I twist so I'm facing Hana but in dragon stance, with my front leg bent in a slight lunge. “The strike's strength comes more from my lower body than my upper body.” I repeat the maneuver to show them again. “I use the twisting motion of my hips to propel the strike, and I hit fast, so the opponent is instantly struggling for breath.”

“Okay,” Williams concedes, “but our guy's still gotta be strong, right?”

“Yes and no.” I scrunch up my face. “I can tell you're envisaging someone tall and bulky, but in this case it's more likely to be lean muscle than bulk.”

“We're more genetically predisposed to that anyway,” Hana adds. “If we're assuming the killer is Asian.”

“True.” I think of someone to give as an example for Williams and the others. “Agent Williams, have you ever seen any Bruce Lee movies? Or Jet Li?”

“Sure.”

“If you look at them in clothes, they look slim—maybe you'd even say slight for a man. But when you see them with their shirts off, they're extremely muscular and every single muscle is defined. Yet they're not bulky like, say, Schwarzenegger.”

“Okay, I see what you mean. But I still reckon Arnie would kick their asses.” Williams gives a toothy grin.

I laugh. “Maybe…but I'd put a thousand bucks on a kung fu expert striking Arnie before he even got his dukes up.”

Williams chuckles.

“Anyway—” I bring us back to the report “—the first two sheets of paper list all the victims, their injuries, causes of death and which of the Ten Killing Hands could have led to those injuries.” I pick up the sheets of paper. “As you can see, the first match is perhaps the most interesting, because the victim wasn't killed.”

“So the killer screwed up?” Ramos asks.

“Maybe. Although there is one other element…a wild card.” I take a deep breath. I guess now's as good a time as any. “I met with my kung fu teacher this morning, and he brought up something called
dim mak
. The premise is that a series of strikes to pressure points can cause death, either instantly or after a period of time.”

“Sounds real
Kill Bill
to me.” Ramos grins.

Williams laughs. “Yeah. Maybe our guy knows Uma's Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique. Five blows to stop blood flow to the heart.”

I know the guys are joking, but I throw in a serious comment. “You've actually hit the nail on the head. It's the same premise.”

“And here was I thinking it was Hollywood hype,” Ramos says.

“Well, there is some debate about whether it's reality or legend. I always thought it was more legend, but my teacher assures me it's not, and he knows his stuff. I've also got some reading material to back it up, including a book written by a doctor.”

“A doctor of what?” Williams grins.

I smile. “I must admit, I wondered that at first, too. But he's an M.D., all right.”

Petrov clears his throat. “So we're being serious here, Anderson?”

“Yes, sir. I need to read this book and talk to Grove at the coroner's office, but we may be able to find evidence of the use of pressure points on Jun Saito's body. The points are very specific, and if our killer is skilled in
dim mak
, Saito's body will tell us that story.”