Tokyo Enigma (24 page)

Maybe supposition on the past wasn't worth a plugged
nickel. What mattered was where to go from here. I didn't know at
the moment. Yuri, Nozaka and I were shaking our heads at one
another, when a young investigator for Protect Agency knocked on
the door. He held a mobile phone.

"There is a call for Sanchez-san."

It was Abe Granger.

"Congratulations," he said.

"For what?"

"Job well done. The client is happy with your work. You can
come home now."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Kyle Solutions is satisfied with your investigation. It's over.
Come home. We've got another case for you, in Portugal. You'll love
it."

"Nothing's ended here, Abe."

"Not everything ends, Mick. Sometimes things just stop.
That's what happened. Kyle said stop. That's it. You've got until
tomorrow morning. Check out of your hotel, buy an air ticket and
come home."

"I'm not very happy with that, Abe."

"Why did I expect you to say that? Here's the deal. Kyle cuts
the cord at checkout time tomorrow. Get out of the hotel. Get on a
plane. It isn't a complex proposition."

I glanced at Sayoko, a young woman who was still in danger,
not quite ready to get herself back together. Nozaka was a kick-ass
pretty-boy, who'd put his life on the line. I'd disliked him at first
sight, but had grown to respect the guy. As for Yuri, my feelings for
her were off the charts.

"Not going to happen. If I'm off Kyle's tab, I'll figure
something."

"Mick, as far as your job goes, I'll vouch for you. But, I'm not
the only one who has a say in this. Do you understand? If we get a
cowboy reputation, it would hurt the company for a long time. It'd be
especially bad if a client told us to stand down, and we didn't. What if
we dug in and ended up hurting the client? It's not a crusade, Mick.
It's a business."

Funny how things work out. Several more years and I
would've retired to a place on the Gulf and done some fishing. If I got
frisky, maybe some windsurfing.

"I understand, Abe. Do me a favor."

"You got it."

"Tell Kyle to bite a big one. And Abe."

"What?"

"Same to you." I cut the connection.

The next morning, I booked a cheaper room at the same
hotel with my personal credit card. As soon as I settled in, I called
Lance Allworth. His secretary said he was unavailable. She said the
same thing when I showed up and walked into his office.

"What's going on, Lance?"

"Mick, I heard you were injured. Are you all right?"

I hadn't come to talk about my health. "Why is Kyle pulling
out?"

"That decision was made at the home office. I filed reports,
but otherwise, I'm out of that process."

"The question on the table is 'why' not 'who made the
decision.' If you insist you have no idea, this could be a long
visit."

"It's no reflection on your work, Mick. I've already sent in a
high appraisal of your effort. That's been forwarded to your
company. In fact, I think we could arrange a bonus. Say twenty-five
percent over your standard compensation."

"I say again, why?" I sensed Lance was about to shift from
carrot to stick. Threaten to retract the "high appraisal" and the offer
of a bonus. He obviously hadn't talked to Abe.

"I suppose someone realized it was time to cut losses. You
have to agree that the evidence against Dorian is damning. You've
taken this investigation much further than we might have expected. I
admire your dogged determination, and I praised that. On the other
hand, someone else might have seen the futility earlier. That could
have saved quite a bit of money, not to mention the needless physical
risk."

There was that stick.

Lance must have mistaken me for a section chief bucking for
department head. I shoved some family photos aside, sat on his desk
and leaned in close. "Dorian didn't kill Hosoi. I think I know who
did.

"One was our friend at the park. He's certified dead. The
other one, a private investigator, might be dead. We found the guy's
business card in Hashimoto's office. Hashimoto is dead. I will put this
all together. When I do, if I find out that you withheld evidence or
any knowledge bearing on this case, I'll see you prosecuted."

As I walked toward the door, I heard Lance's chair thump
against the wall.

"Don't threaten me!" A bulldog growl tinged his voice. The
lad was miffed.

I closed the door softly behind me.

Maybe Ishii, the lawyer, hadn't gotten the word about the
aborted investigation. I called and asked if he would set up another
meeting for me with Dorian.

"No," he said.

I called Kuroda. He agreed to meet me, in his office this time.
He looked pleased to see me when I arrived.

"The two policemen are in custody. We have a warrant for
Ito, and there will be others. Thank you for your cooperation."

At first, I thought he was making a joke. My cooperation had
been along the lines of keeping myself out of trouble and getting my
client off the hook. I almost laughed, but he was serious.

"I want to see Dorian. He has been terminated by his
company, which disavows any association with him. He's on his own
and so am I. I've been fired."

Kuroda looked at me as though he didn't understand why I
was still here.

A police driver took us to the detention center.

"I'm more convinced than ever that Dorian's not guilty, and I
need your help to prove that. Not just for him. There're connections
among yakuza and government officials that you are in a position to
expose."

"You helped me with my internal investigation, but how can
I go beyond that?"

"Dorian knows more than he's willing to reveal. I have no
idea why, but I think he considered himself untouchable. Once I
thought I needed to shore up his confidence, now I think we need to
break him."

Not only was Dorian in jailhouse togs again, he was in
shackles, at my request. He'd been waiting alone for about an hour.
Neither Kuroda nor I spoke. We just sat and looked at him. He was
cool for the first minute or so. Then, he started making nervous
movements with his hands.

"Kyle's pulling out," I said.

Dorian flinched at the sound of my voice. "They're leaving
Japan?"

"Not Japan. They're just leaving you. My company's contract
ran out at one o'clock this afternoon. You hadn't heard?"

Dorian started to speak. His voice caught. He tried again. "I
wasn't told."

"I saw Lance Allworth this morning. He figures it's time for
Kyle to cut its losses. 'After all,' he said, 'the evidence against Dorian
is pretty damning.'

"I gave it my best, Mr. Dorian. Even got shot, just across the
thigh. We caught some bad people. Danced all around the Maho
murder, but we never danced with it. I have no more evidence to
indicate that you didn't kill her than I did after the first time I met
you. Like I've said, nobody else is looking."

"I want to talk to my lawyer."

"Haven't you been talking to him all along?"

"Yes."

"What was his advice before I got here?"

Dorian looked at his lap as he spoke. "Plead guilty for a light
sentence." His voice was scarcely audible.

"That was then. Still an option, Kuroda-san?"

Kuroda pulled down the corners of his mouth and shook his
head.

"If you plead guilty," I said, "and express sincere remorse
and abject humility, then you'll probably escape the gallows. I know
that much about the system here. That leaves you with maybe
twenty-to-life. I've seen the inside of a Japanese prison, Mr. Dorian. It
makes this place look homey."

"I..." Dorian tried to swallow several times.

He needed water, but I didn't offer to call a guard.

"I want to..." he made a dialing motion with his finger.

I handed him my mobile phone.

He called his company and asked for Lance Allworth.

Unavailable.

"It's extremely important."

Unavailable.

"Please."

Unavailable.

Dorian's hands were shaking when he put down the phone.
He didn't try to hand it back to me.

"This is a private visit, Mr. Dorian. I'm not being paid now. In
fact, I expect I've trashed my career because of this. I don't
understand myself why I'm here now, but I can say that you won't
see me again in this room."

He couldn't speak at all now. He brought his hand to his
lips.

Kuroda called a guard and asked for glasses and a pitcher of
water.

While we waited, I wondered what sort of plans Lance
Allworth and his superiors were working on, now that they were
ready to sacrifice Dorian. They had a few options that I could think
of. For a people who are sensitive to minor social slights, Japanese
are oddly forgiving of human foibles on the grand scale.

With the right spin, Kyle might not incur too much damage.
The company couldn't help it if their executive became consumed
with carnal appetites. Play up the kinky mistress angle, and Dorian
and Maho might have come out folk heroes, who gave up everything
for passion. Not just in Japan, stories like that have played well in a
lot of societies. They've become grand operas, Hollywood
movies.

When Dorian got his voice back, his tale was much more
sordid, because it was devoid of passion. There was no way Kyle
could recover from the truth. No wonder they were ready to let
Dorian swing.

"I'm not a regular Kyle employee. I was brought in to fix this
takeover. It's what I do. How do you think the world functions?
People like me make things happen when bureaucrats won't move
unless money is in their hands.

"In this case, money didn't work. The FTC commissioner
was wealthy. I used Hashimoto to find out what would work. He
knew someone. I don't know who. All I did was give him payoff
money supplied by Kyle. Even if I don't remember what happened
that night, I didn't kill anyone! Mick, you told me you were convinced
I didn't.

"Kyle saved this company. No one in Japan was willing to
take a risk until Kyle spelled out what no one else saw. I didn't kill
anyone. I just..."

Blackmailed an FTC commissioner. It was easy to see why
he had kept the story hidden. He'd just confessed to blackmailing a
public official, but hadn't provided any direct evidence for his
defense on a murder charge. He had, however, provided a motive for
someone to frame him for murder.

"So long, Mr. Dorian. I'll see what I can do."

Kuroda gave me a ride back to the hotel.

I called Will Simons and filled him in on the latest. "Can you
set up a meeting with the commissioner's secretary?"

"With the video and what you just told me? I expect so," he
said.

"Mind if I bring someone from MPD?" I glanced at
Kuroda.

He nodded.

"Sounds entertaining," said Will.

Ueno agreed to meet us the next day. I called Yuri and
invited her to dinner. She suggested a late lunch, if I hadn't eaten. I
hadn't. We met at a restaurant in my hotel.

"I took sick leave, workman's comp." She pointed to her foot.
"If I'd stayed on the job, they'd have given me another case."

"You didn't have to do that."

"The only reason I didn't take off right away was to work on
this. I'm not going to stop now."

"There's not much left for us. Will Simons has set up a
meeting with our FTC pal. Kuroda's going to be there. You go should
come. Could be the last hurrah. Whatever we do next will depend on
what happens at the meeting."

"You sure it's all right, if I'm there?"

"We need to rattle him. Your foot alone will be an asset. He
might know what's been happening, but that's not the same as
seeing it up close and physical. Maybe I should wear shorts, show
him my leg."

I could sense the gears of Yuri's mind grinding as I carved a
bite of fish away from the bone.

"You got the news about Kyle yesterday. Why then?" she
said.

"My guess is that Allworth, somehow found out about
Dorian's blackmail. Maybe someone else in the company knew. How
ever he discovered the truth, it wouldn't take a genius to realize the
jig was up if it got out."

"Dorian said he didn't know what happened to the
video."

"Right, he probably never saw it. Morimoto uncovered a
convoluted money trail from the FTC to Maho. You know what's on
the video. A romp with a young chippie you might write off to
alpha-male hormones, but not what we saw. Maho or Yokoyama might
have figured they had a commodity that was worth more than
expected. They kept it for themselves, a little free-lance blackmail on
the side."

"If Yokoyama had ties to the plainclothes that Kuroda was
investigating or ties to Ito, then his safest route would be to make it
look like Maho had gone independent."

"Or Maho, actually did go independent. I don't think we'll
ever know."

Some things you can't figure out on your own. Other things
you can, like what to do after lunch. We went to my room for dessert.
I ordered wine, fruit and cheese. When we finished that, all we had
was each other.

I held Yuri against me and prayed against hope that some
things would neither stop nor end.

* * * *

We awoke to a pristine blue autumn morning, only a short
while from show time at the Imperial Hotel. Yuri and I arrived
together. Will Simons and Kuroda showed up within seconds of each
other. We were all early, as planned. A bellman directed us to the
same room where Will and I had met Ueno before.

Musashi, Japan's greatest swordsman, is said to have used
late arrivals as a tactic to unnerve his dueling opponents. Ueno might
have had him in mind when he kept us waiting half an hour, but he
wasn't really a fighter. Each of the four people he now faced
was.

Yuri's crutches rested against a wall. Her foot was propped
on a chair. She didn't stand when Ueno was ushered in. The rest of us
did. We bowed in unison.