Second Skin (41 page)

Then the vision was gone. But the warmth remained, and for a moment he closed his eyes.

‘You are
tanjian,’
he whispered.

‘I know of Akshara. And Kshira. I know the darkness and the light are sweeping through you.’

‘The Kshira is bubbling up, threatening to drown me.’ Nicholas opened his eyes, stared up into hers. ‘What is happening to me?’

‘Change. And whatever it is, you must allow it to take place.’

‘But I –’

‘Banish fear from your heart. Trust in
kokoro,
the center of things.’

‘Kisoko-san, I feel as if the Kshira will take me over completely. Okami-san could not help me. Can you?’

She shook her head.

‘But the darkness –’

‘Linnear-san,’ she said in the most gentle voice imaginable, ‘you do not need help. Let the darkness come.’

When, twenty minutes later, he left her house, the rain had returned, whipping more leaves off the trees. The sky was stained indigo and there was the sound of constant faraway drumming. The blank faces of the warehouses stared back at him with grim and unforgiving looks.

What to make of Kisoko? She was
tanjian,
of that he was certain. He recalled how still she had sat the first time he had come to her house and had a Kshira seizure. Had she even breathed? Surely she had felt what he had felt. Surely she could help him.

Let the darkness come...

He got back on his Kawasaki and wended his way through the traffic-choked streets to Shinjuku. A message had been left on his Kami. It was from Mikio Okami, who wanted to meet him at the Fūzoku Shiryōkan, the Shitamachi Museum, at four forty-five tomorrow afternoon. He transmitted a confirm icon to Okami’s address as he waited for a light on Minami-dōri to turn green.

Let the darkness come...

Could he do that? Was his faith in
kokoro
absolute? He looked deep into his heart and did not know the answer.

They came for Mick Leonforte as he was leaving Both Ends Burning, an all-night S&M club in Roppongi notable for the young, full-breasted women who, slowly and one imagined quite painfully, poured hot wax all over their naked bodies as a crowd of sweaty men looked on.

The plan had been well coordinated. While Ise Ikuzo, the head of the steel and metallurgy
keiretsu
bearing his name, emerged from a gleaming white Mercedes, two burly men popped out of the front seat of the car – the driver and the man riding shotgun – and headed toward Mick at full speed. One was short and squat as a sumo, the other was younger and completely bald. The
irezumi
of a phoenix rising covered half his bare pate.

‘Not so big a man here on the street, are you?’ Ikuzo called. ‘I am here to teach you a lesson. No one causes me to lose face, Mr Leonforte, not even you.’

It was just past three
A.M.,
but by the neon light of the Tokyo night Mick could tell the two men were, indeed, members of the Shikei clan. So the rumors of Ikuzo’s Yakuza connections were true. Mick thought briefly of how sorry Jōchi – his bodyguard – would be to miss the fun.

‘You’re an interloper in our world.’ Ikuzo lounged against the Mercedes. ‘Worse, you’re an
iteki,
a foreign maggot. I am not fooled by your silver tongue as others may be. And when they find you tomorrow morning, it will serve as an example for others who might try to follow your lead.’

The two Yakuza heavyweights expected him to turn tail, but he did not. Instead, he stood his ground, whirling at the last instant to meet the squat Yakuza’s charge. Mick’s right hand, which had surreptitiously slipped beneath his jacket, was filled with the Damascus-steel push dagger with which he had dispatched Rodney Kurtz. He jammed it into the squat Yakuza’s chest just above and to the right of the end of the sternum. After a brief scrape of bone the blade drove completely home, its tip piercing the man’s heart. Then, before the Yakuza could slam into him, Mick swiveled away to face phoenix-man. Behind him, he could hear the squat Yakuza stumbling along on legs that refused to pump. Terrible sounds of labored breathing filled the small street, then a retching and the sudden stench of death.

But Mick had other matters to attend to, the most pressing of which was the snub-nosed automatic phoenix-man was pointing at him. He did the last thing phoenix-man expected him to do. While a broad smile of triumph was still on the Yakuza’s face, Mick ignored the gun and stepped into point-blank range. Reaching up with astonishing speed, his cupped hands brought phoenix-man’s head down against his raised knee.

Cartilage shattered with a satisfying crunch as phoenix-man’s nose collapsed. The automatic fell from his grasp, and Mick kicked it into the gutter while he slammed the heel of his hand into the vulnerable spot just behind phoenix-man’s right ear, home of major nerve bundles.

Phoenix-man plunged to the street as if in heavy gravity. Mick put one foot on his shoulder, the other on his neck. Kicking out with the heel of his foot, he heard the neck vertebrae snap.

In almost the same motion Mick turned and loped down the street to the white Mercedes. Ikuzo had wisely retreated to the car’s interior. He had just electronically locked the doors and was fumbling with the gearshift when Mick put his left elbow through the driver’s side window. Ikuzo yelped as the safety glass collapsed onto him, and then Mick had hold of him and was hauling him out through the window. He fumbled out a small .25-caliber automatic, which Mick contemptuously slapped away.

‘Iteki
am I?’ Mick breathed as he struck Ikuzo a paralyzing blow between his eyes. ‘Too bad. This
iteki
will be the death of you.’

His push dagger was in his hand, and he made the first ritual incision, as the Nungs had taught him. There was no hurry now. The street was deserted. Tokyo watched his revenge with blank eyes.

He excised the heart, liver, and spleen, then he hefted the bloody corpse across the hood of the idling Mercedes, its white sheen bluish in the light. Blood, black as cuttlefish ink, crawled across the once-pristine hood. Mick took the spleen and, using the blade of the push dagger to open Ikuzo’s jaws, jammed the glistening organ in.

‘You had the right idea, setting an example. You just had the wrong victim.’

Mick walked ten minutes until he came to his car, which he never left in the vicinity of the club he was patronizing. There, he crouched down as he’d done so many times in the jungles of Vietnam and Laos, setting the organs in front of him. He wiped his hands as best he could and took out his cellular phone.

Jōchi answered on the first ring, listened in silence as Mick related what had happened. ‘I want you to dispose of the two bodies in the street in the usual way, so no one knows they ever existed.’

‘Only two?’

‘That’s right. Leave the one on the white Mercedes. It’s an ensign of a very private war.’

Lew Croaker stretched out on the turquoise chair at Playa del Sol, one of the myriad beachfront restaurants that lined the newly renovated South Beach area of Miami. The sun burned bright and hot in a cloudless sky that could make the skin turn red even through high-level sunblock. In an oversized rayon shirt, peach-colored slacks, huaraches, and wraparound mirrored sunglasses, he pushed around a forkful of sausages with rice and black beans –
cristianos y moros,
as the Cubans called it – but he didn’t eat it. No appetite; his stomach was doing flip-flops. He looked up just as a bronzed beach bunny in a string bikini went past him on Rollerblades on the beach side of Ocean Boulevard.

South Beach had returned to the art deco splendor it had achieved in the thirties and forties, hot tropical colors and all, due in no small measure to an influx of international models and fashion designers who had drawn the interest of jaded Europeans and wealthy South Americans alike. So new buildings were going up shoulder to shoulder with the renovated ones from decades ago. In fact, he was just down the block from Gianni Versace’s ornate European villa, whose important Italian facade stood guarded and gated against the almost constant
turista
crush.

A fire-red Camaro cruised by with a testosterone rush of music blaring from its stereo system. The two blond muscle boys inside were having a grand time ogling all the female flesh in sight. They were followed by three hard young men on Softail Harleys vrooming their way on clouds of thrumming exhaust.

Croaker’s cellular phone buzzed and he picked it up. ‘I hope to shit what you and Vesper’s got in mind’ll spear Bad Clams in his tracks.’ It was Wade Forrest, the Anti-Cartel Task Force fed. ‘Otherwise we’re all lookin’ at a shitload of trouble.’

Croaker hitched his chair closer and cocked his head forward. Previously he’d kept one eye on the lookout for Vesper and Bad Clams, who, according to their timetable, were due any minute. Early this morning, he’d sneaked out of the Marlin, the way-cool hotel on Washington Avenue where he’d been sleeping, and had driven to Bad Clams’ white mansion. There, using a pair of high-powered binoculars, he’d focused on the second-story window directly over the front door and at precisely seven o’clock had seen the curtains stir, then part. He had been so relieved to see Vesper’s face clearly but briefly in the window that he’d let out an audible sigh. Her appearance there at that time had been their prearranged signal that everything was on schedule. She and Bad Clams were due at South Beach by lunchtime. ‘What’s up?’ Croaker asked the fed.

‘Bad Clams’ people whacked Tony D. and tried t’do the same to his old lady.’

‘What?’ Croaker felt as if he’d been jabbed with an electric prod. ‘How is Margarite DeCamillo? Is she alive?’

‘You know this woman?’ Even through the phone line Croaker could tell Forrest was curious.

‘I... Yes. She’s important to this plan... in an indirect way,’ Croaker finished lamely. ‘What the hell happened?’

‘Bad Clams and Vesper in sight yet?’

Croaker craned his neck. ‘It’s clear.’

‘Thing is, his people missed the DeCamillo woman and he had to go to plan B.’

Croaker heard the blood roaring through his ears. ‘Which was?’ At that moment he could have strangled Forrest, who was clearly enjoying drawing this out.

‘He snatched the kid, you know, what’s her name...?’

Croaker closed his eyes for an instant. ‘Francine.’

‘Yeah, right. Francine. Anyway, he snatches the kid, then reels mama in. Only, she’s smarter than anyone thinks and she gets some homicide dick – Barnett, I think his name was – to come protect her.’ Forrest paused and Croaker could hear him giving orders to his team. Meanwhile, blood was pounding heavily in his temples and his stomach felt hollow. ‘Now it really gets goin’.’ Forrest was back on the line. ‘The city dick whacks the two punks sent to take her in, but the city dick, he gets it in the neck from the inside guy – Bad Clams’ man inside the Goldoni machine – Paul Chiaramonte.’

Croaker’s heart flipped over. Bright sunlight spun off the crawling line of cars and rigged-out motorcycles moving like a millipede down Ocean Boulevard. A pair of bare-chested musclemen sat down at a table and, flexing their well-oiled flesh for the bored waitress, ordered Bloody Marys. A willowy young woman in a skintight red, white, and blue outfit that left nothing to the imagination led a black and tan Doberman on a thick chain leash. Everybody, gawking, gave her a wide berth as she went by.

Croaker pulled at his shirt, trying not to sweat into it, because he had to do something to calm himself down. This was explosive stuff. Bad Clams had a mole inside Margarite’s outfit. How come none of them suspected as much? What the hell was he doing here while Margarite and Francie were in mortal danger? He was already planning his quick exit to the Miami airport when he said, ‘What did Chiaramonte do with them?’

‘With the DeCamillo woman and her kid?’ Forrest said as if he didn’t know whom Croaker was talking about. ‘According to our sources, Chiaramonte stuffed ’em into a private plane.’

Croaker waited for Forrest to go on, but there was only silence on the line. He
was
going to strangle this bastard. Then he asked the question Forrest was waiting for him to ask. ‘Where was the plane headed?’

‘Here. Right here. Chiaramonte’s bringing ’em into the lion’s den. Some time today they’re going to meet Bad Clams on his own turf and on his own terms.’ Forrest waited a beat. ‘You still with me, Croaker?’

‘Yeah, sure.’

‘I don’t know what he’s after, but it doesn’t look good for the DeCamillo woman. She’s a Goldoni, after all, and we know what Leonfortes do to Goldonis.’

Croaker knew, all too well.

‘Hey.’ Forrest’s voice in his ear buzzed with tension. ‘Speak of the devil and he pops up right between your fucking legs. North One reports a sighting. Heading your way on Ocean. Be careful, subject’s got on a sports jacket so he must be carrying.’

Croaker turned just in time to see Vesper walking arm in arm with Caesare Leonforte. Just as Forrest had said, the couple was heading in his direction. He folded up his phone and went into the restaurant, wending his way to the rest rooms, where he tried without success to lower his pulse rate.

‘We have about two minutes, no more,’ Vesper said to Croaker. ‘I told him I had to tap a kidney.’ They were locked inside the ladies’ room, which, typically, had one stall. ‘He’s got a line into the Coast Guard.’ She described the meet of last night, including a description of the man named Milo and the number of the Coast Guard cutter, CGM 1176. She also told him how pissed off Caesare was about the arsenic-laced dope.

‘I’ll check it out,’ Croaker said. ‘This Coast Guard connection’s interesting. I have a feeling he’s using the cutter for more than bringing in cocaine. Maybe that’s how he smuggles
out
the DARPA arms matériel.’

‘It’s possible,’ Vesper said thoughtfully. ‘What better cover than a Coast Guard cutter that can go anywhere and everywhere. By the way, there’s a meet I’m going on tomorrow. It’s set for five o’clock in the afternoon.’

‘Great work. With the number of the cutter, we’ll be able to trace its movements.’