Teddy wasn’t sure how much the detective already knew, and he didn’t want to give up any more information than was necessary, especially any information that might incriminate him further.
“I only know what I heard from my business partners. They said the triads attacked their film sets and then tried to blackmail them to make it stop.”
“The film sets don’t interest me. I asked about the production offices. You were there just today, I believe.”
The man knew more about what Teddy had been up to than he’d anticipated. The key question was how.
“I was there with a woman, Dale Gai. Have you talked to her?”
“Officers are rounding up all of the interested parties,” the detective said.
“Including Ms. Gai?”
“Let’s talk about what you were doing at the production office. We’ve had officers patrolling that area due to complaints of attacks on the film crews. Was this your first time there?”
Teddy started to answer but held his tongue. It was the kind of question a detective asked when he already knew the answer and wanted to see how the subject would respond. Peter and Ben hadn’t called the police to report the attacks, at first because they hadn’t even realized the accidents around the set were attacks, and then because they feared the deepfake blackmail video would land them in hot water. Teddy assumed someone from the local film crew had made the calls.
“I only recently learned of the existence of this office,” Teddy said.
“So that was the first time you’d been there?”
“We both know I’m not going to answer that the way you want me to.”
“How do you think I want you to answer it?”
“I don’t even know how many days I’ve been here. They all kind of bleed together. It’s hard to keep track of what I’ve done or when I’ve done it.”
“There are two production companies in that office, one American and one from Macau.”
“I did know that, yes. I’m a producer with the American production company, Centurion Studios.”
“Are you in Macau on Centurion Studios business?”
This was the question Teddy believed the detective had been building to, and Teddy wasn’t sure what the best way was to answer it. Frankly, he was having trouble answering the question himself. He was helping Peter and Ben, but not strictly on Centurion Studios business — that they had been targeted by a blackmailer was personal.
“I was on my way back to Los Angeles and had a layover in Hong Kong.”
“This is not Hong Kong.”
“Dale Gai met me at the airport and told me I was needed in Macau.”
The more he could stick to the truth, the better everything would be for everyone involved.
“Before or after you attacked her?”
Teddy smiled and leaned back away from the detective. There didn’t seem to be anything this man didn’t know about him. Teddy could see the traps being laid for him. He was done putting himself in a position to set them off.
“I came here voluntarily, thinking you and your associates were acting in good faith to keep your city safe and to protect those of us from outside of the country doing our part to support your economy.”
“You came here voluntarily because you didn’t want to make a scene in the resort where you are staying and where Dale Gai works.”
“Tell me about Dale Gai,” Teddy said.
“You followed a woman you don’t know anything about from Hong Kong to Macau?”
Teddy shrugged. Then he had an idea. He kept a low profile in L.A. and didn’t run into trouble much, but when he was around the police, he found his work in the film industry afforded him a certain status. He’d once heard someone refer to Hollywood celebrities as the American version of royalty, and he believed it every time he saw how everyday people reacted when they heard he worked in movies. He wondered if the same was true of the police in Macau.
“She told me she’d come on behalf of Centurion. She mentioned the film festival, and that my help was needed,” Teddy said.
It seemed to work. The detective put his pen down and scratched at his right earlobe. Teddy also saw the flicker of a smile developing in a corner of the detective’s mouth.
“They have a movie about a gangster showing at that festival. Maybe they should also have a movie about police officers,” the detective said.
“Yes, maybe they should,” Teddy said. “I really do need to get back to work with the festival. Is there anything else I can help with?”
“We know where to find you if anything comes up.”
33
Arrow Donaldson spent the morning regretting his involvement with Li Feng. He had known it would be risky to make a deal with her, to have her lie about her family and the Chinese government spying on the U.S. But he’d thought the risk would be from her family or the government, not from some two-bit Hollywood producer and a has-been gangster.
His original arrangement with Li Feng had been to get her a new identity and authentic papers so she could go to the U.S. and become famous as an actress or something. He’d never really bothered to ask her about it, because he didn’t care. This thing with Sonny Ma was tacked on to their deal, again without him paying too much attention to the specifics, and he figured it was something Ziggy Peng would handle quickly before the government delegation showed up in Macau. Now he was on his way to his stadium to meet with that delegation, to wow them with his power and his plan to remake the rural telecom market in the U.S. And all he could think about was how much he wished Billy Barnett and Sonny Ma were dead.
The delegates were already in the owner’s suite when he arrived, and his assistant mumbled something about diplomatic immunity with a shell-shocked look on her face before she scurried away.
“Gentlemen, I see you found your way to what will soon be the crown jewel of my empire in Macau and, hopefully, a gateway toward an even more advantageous relationship between Macau and the U.S.”
“Cut the crap, Arrow,” Bob Allen, the head of the FCC said, stepping forward. “We heard the Chinese girl was killed.”
“No, no, you’re mistaken. Li Feng is safe and sound in a protected bunker I arranged for her during our business here.”
“We had a meeting with the CIA this morning. We know she’s dead. The inspector general of the CIA was investigating the agent in charge of the operation before the FBI stepped in and took over the case.”
“The FBI? I don’t even know what to say to that. This is China, they have no jurisdiction here.”
“Something about a drone stolen from a U.S. defense contractor that was hacked through a U.S. computer server. All I know is an FBI agent showed up at a warehouse you own with a letter from the president of the United States giving them jurisdiction over the murder of a woman we are supposed to interview! Worse, we had to hear about it from a secretary at the CIA.”
“Millie Martindale,” Arrow said through clenched teeth.
“What else do you know that you haven’t shared with us?”
“She’s not a secretary. She works with Lance Cabot, the director of the CIA, on special projects.”
“Good for her. That still doesn’t answer the question of why you didn’t tell us about this murder.”
Arrow took a deep breath, silently went to the bar, and poured himself the largest drink he could without seeming desperate. He took a long gulp before returning to the group.
“I apologize for the confusion,” Arrow said. “This is a unique case and one that was put together quickly with as few people as possible knowing all of the details to maintain the witness’s safety.”
“You’ve told us that before. Get to the murder.”
“To help maintain Li Feng’s security, we used a decoy to move around town and deflect attention while we moved the real Li Feng into my secure bunker. Millie Martindale had the approval of Lance Cabot to handle the operation, so I trusted her and her agency and gave them control over the security of the decoy. Perhaps I was naïve given previous issues with how U.S. intelligence agencies have operated over here, but I thought Lance Cabot and I had built a better relationship than others in the past.”