Code Name Komiko (27 page)

“None whatsoever,” Harrison sputtered. “This press conference is over. Good day to you all.”

The security men swarmed around him, as much to prop him up as to protect him. They began to duck and weave, pole handlers dancing their dragon through the swarming crowd.

Lian took off her sunglasses and stood blocking the path of the processional. To either side of her, Eva removed the snood, and Matt simply smiled.

Harrison skidded to a stop as his eyes met Lian’s, then took in the other two. “That’s . . . not possible,” he said.

“This is the question-and-answer session,” Eva said. “The lady asked you a question. It’s time you started offering up some answers.”

“I . . . have . . .
nothing
to say!” he said, apoplectic. “And especially not to you!”

“Well,” said Lian’s father, tapping Harrison on the shoulder. “Maybe you’ll have something to say to the police.” The life had returned to his face; the fire was back in his eyes. “You may grind me under your heel all you wish, Harrison. But don’t take me for a fool.”

“Hung—” Harrison began.

Two police hands clamped down on Harrison’s arms; two more snapped the metal cuffs onto his wrists. The security detail supporting him was turned away, and in their absence, Harrison collapsed, his legs giving out beneath him.

Lian thought back to the beach, to the day that had set her hand to Harrison’s downfall. And as he was dragged limply from his own festivities, the poetry of a phrase returned to her, and she heard herself say it aloud to her two new friends as they smiled in agreement:

“The dragon’s back is broken.”

11:36 AM HKT —
Komiko has logged on

Komiko:
So this is it, then?

Torch:
It’s going to be strange, isn’t it?

Crowbar:
4 sure, but were doing it 4 all the right reasons

Komiko:
Right. I know that. As much as we’ve talked it over, I feel like we were all in agreement from the beginning.

Komiko:
It’s time to log off the message board for good.

Torch:
Knowing that we did more in the last two weeks than most groups like ours dream of doing in a lifetime.

Crowbar:
& knowing well meet again face 2 face soon

Crowbar:
U guys R probably already sick of meeting face 2 face at school every day, huh? :)

Lian laughed at this.

Komiko:
You’d be surprised. For some reason it doesn’t bother me like it used to.

Torch:
And all I had to do was carry you from a burning building.

Komiko:
A girl’s got to have her standards.

Crowbar:
Theres still plenty of threads 2 follow from this harrison mess

Crowbar:
Im putting out new feelers every day, but Zan still hasnt popped his head back up

Komiko:
If that’s even his real name. Big “if.”

Torch:
My stepdad is still in custody, but he’s lawyered up and not saying a single word to the police other than to request better coffee.

Torch:
The good news is, today the last of his shareholders backed out of the new deal.

Torch:
The company’s value is basically nil, and that’s BEFORE the criminal investigation has even begun.

Crowbar:
U were right, that IS good news

Torch:
And on a personal note, I’m looking into having my last name legally changed back to my birth father’s. I’ve been a Harrison a lot longer than I cared to be.

Torch:
The change has been kind of a hassle to do, though. You ladies might not believe this, but Hong Kong bureaucracy can be somewhat difficult to work with!

Crowbar:
Say it aint so!

Lian loved knowing who was on the other side of those code names now, imagining the smiles on Matt’s and Eva’s faces as they typed their little jokes and repartee. 06/04 had claimed strength in anonymity, but she felt that all of them were stronger for having revealed their true selves.

Komiko:
Maybe the best news in all of this is that Kong Nuying’s parents finally have an answer for what happened to their daughter.

Komiko:
That in and of itself is some closure. The answers that will be pried out of Harrison eventually can only help ease their pain.

Her bedroom door suddenly opened a crack. Lian quickly switched to the Desktop view.

“Oh, sorry,” said her mother, closing the door again. She gave a sharp rap on the other side. “It’s your mother,” she added unnecessarily through the door. “May I come in?”

“Just a second, Mama,” Lian called.

Komiko:
Guys, I need to go now. I’ll be back online in time for the big shutdown this afternoon. 4:06 p.m. See you then.

11:47 AM HKT —
Komiko has logged off

She closed the laptop and ran to answer her door. Her mother was there, waiting patiently but with a concerned look on her face.

“Could I have a word with you, Lian?”

“Of course,” Lian said, holding open the door. She had been dreading this conversation for days. She’d left Wednesday’s press conference too wired to sleep, and had spent the afternoon switching channels on the television and updating the news Web sites, looking for any morsel of information. After dinner she’d crashed hard and was surprised to wake near noon the next day, her mother having already called the school to say that Lian was ill and might not return until after the weekend.

To her surprise, it had been left to her father alone to nudge her for the truth about her involvement with Harrison. Her mother instead had worn a continuously worried expression, but had shown her concern through frequent spontaneous hugs and just as frequent offers of food. Her father had done his best to remain stoic, but he’d wanted to know how it was she came to be at the press conference, and what exactly her links were with the recording that sealed Harrison’s fate. She had pleaded ignorance, no connection outside of an economics class with the man’s son, and her father had accepted the explanation—just. As he too hugged her tight, he’d said in her ear, “You’re not telling me everything, little panda, I know that. However, I am going to trust you.”

But her mother’s curiosity had obviously reached its limits.

“Lian,” she said haltingly, “our maid found something in your laundry that needs an explanation immediately.”

Lian cocked her head. This certainly wasn’t how she’d expected the conversation to go.

“Tell me the truth, please,” her mother said. “Have you started smoking?”

Lian broke into a smile. “What?”

Her mother held up a matchbook, its cover open and a single match torn out. Lian recognized it after a second of confusion: Yeung had slipped it into her pocket as a farewell gift. Just good business. She started laughing and tried to stifle it, her hands over her mouth.

“This isn’t funny, Lian!” her mother said sharply. “I asked you a question. I need an answer.”

Lian took a deep breath and forced herself to put on a straight face. She reached for the smallest and most believable fib she could find.

“Those are from Mingmei’s house, Mama. She asked me to light a scented candle, last time we were studying. I must have just hung onto them by mistake.”

The relief that washed over her mother’s features was beautiful. “Oh, thank goodness,” she said. “For a moment . . . it seems silly now, but for just a moment I thought you might have done something you shouldn’t have.”

“No,” Lian said, throwing her arms around her mother. “I would never, ever do that. I’m still your good girl.”

“Still my little panda,” her mother agreed, hugging her back and kissing her on the forehead.

She closed the door behind her, and Lian lay back on the bed. It was such a little wisp of a lie, comforting to hear yet completely insubstantial.

But it was what her mother had wanted to hear. Scented candles were at the lower end—while still making an appearance—on a list of risks that Lian might take. Cigarettes were, she supposed, the upper limit of what her mother could imagine in this case.

So it wouldn’t have done any good to bring up the activist group that had staged the midnight office break-in that had led to her escape from a ninth-story window. Or to mention the hostage situation that had turned into a blazing inferno and ended with a well-placed bullet.

Scented candles were just fine.

Lian was about to open her laptop back up when her eyes fell on the matchbook, still open and resting on her comforter. Its cover was emblazed with words she knew all too well.

THE FAMILY HAND CAFÉ. The simple characters for
mahjong
. The dirty little dive where she’d first followed Harrison and Yeung.

Except that these matches had come from Zan. At some point, he’d been there, too.

Which meant that, at some point, he might go back. Especially if he had nowhere else to run.

Lian pocketed the matchbook and went to put on a jacket. She would text Matt and Eva on the way there. Before she left her room, she practiced the café’s code on her wall: three fast knocks, a pause, then two more.

Just a tiny courtesy before she kicked down their door.

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LCCN: 2013934268

Paul, Naomi.

Code Name Komiko / Naomi Paul.

Summary: In Hong Kong, high school senior Lian, code name Komiko, begins to investigate the Harrison Corporation, a clothing business using an illegal workforce, after a dead body washes up in Big Wave Bay. With the help of her cyber-investigating group 06/04, Komiko plunges into a world of corruption and danger to uncover Harrison Corps’ crimes.

ISBN 978-1-62324-023-3

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ISBN-13: 978-1-62324-005-9

ISBN-13: 978-1-62324-018-9