Lurbud was lucid enough to know that he had to continue to make regular calls to the John Dory. Their action, if he failed to report, would surely jeopardize his chance at revenge on Ohnishi’s former assistant.
It had taken him nearly two hours to stagger and crawl to where the van was hidden, his mangled body leaving a vivid trail of blood across Ohnishi’s estate. The fifteen-mile drive north had taken another hour and a half; he had to stop about every ten minutes to allow his graying vision to return to normal.
Now he lay in a shallow ditch no more than one hundred yards from Kenji’s home, peering at it through night-vision binoculars. The view dimmed and blurred from pain and effects of the morphine as he strained to focus his one functioning eye.
The sprawling two-story house was not nearly as grand as Ohnishi’s, but it was very impressive. Constructed of dressed stones coated in beige stucco, the two main wings of the house spread from the central entrance like the blades of a boomerang. Each second floor window was a pair of French doors that opened onto narrow wrought-iron balconies. The fire-baked barrel tile roof and the expansive lawns betrayed the home as a former plantation from a bygone era.
A separate guest house sat on the other side of an Olympic-sized pool from the main structure. After making his latest report, Lurbud knew that he had two hours to concentrate on Kenji. He was professional enough to realize that in his condition, he was no match for the Japanese killer. He had to plan carefully. Kenji’s martial arts skill would render anything less than a long-range rifle shot useless. Therefore a diversion was needed to bring the Oriental out of his home and within range.
Lurbud slithered further into the ditch to get a better view into the rooms and hoped that something would present itself.
Hawaii
Way Hue Dong was the head of Hydra Consolidated, the Korean consortium that had bought the volcano from Ivan Kerikov. His grandson, Chin-Huy, sat at Kenji’s desk smoking a fragrant Romeo y Julietta cigar. He was young, not much past twenty, but he possessed the eyes of an old man, eyes that had seen many things in the service of his family. When his grandfather had ordered him to lead the fifty-man contingent of troops to Hawaii, Chin-Huy had not questioned, merely obeyed.
His family had sent him and his older brothers to some of the most dangerous places on earth in search of profit. Whether it was poached ivory from war-torn Angola or stolen artifacts from the ravaged jungles of Central America, the younger members of the family had responded with vigor and initiative.
This mission, though potentially dangerous, had proved quite easy for young Chin. His local contact, Kenji, had done much of the work necessary to ensure that the family would not be bothered when they seized the volcano. Chin’s men held the airport under the auspices of Hawaii’s more fervent national guardsmen and few had had to be used at Pearl Harbor to incite the assembled students to open fire at the military compound. The only difficulties had been at Ohnishi’s house, where more than twenty of his men had been cut down by a failed commando strike, presumably American.
All in all, Chin’s role had been minor. All that remained now was confirmation from the mining ship en route to the volcano that its target was in sight. That would not take place for another ten hours or so. Once his family had possession of the volcano, Chin would recall his troops, making sure that their withdrawal would bring a swift end to the state’s unrest. The violence now gripping Hawaii served only a limited purpose. Once the volcano was secure, it was best that the islands quieted.
“Your rewards will be great, Kenji. What do you plan to do with them?”
Kenji did not like the young man sitting languidly in his chair. Chin was brash, uncouth, and obnoxious.
“Do not speak too quickly; everything is yet to be settled.”
“That commando team fell for your ruse perfectly — they attacked the wrong house, just as you planned.” Chin waved his cigar in a dismissive gesture. “The volcano is within our grasp, surely you no longer worry.”
“Ivan Kerikov believed that the volcano was within his grasp and Takahiro Ohnishi believed that Hawaii was within his, too. Both men were wrong. I will not believe that we are successful until the mining vessel anchors at the volcano site.”
“Ach,” Chin said, then launched into another story of his own bravery in the face of adversity.
He had told Kenji nearly a dozen such stories earlier in the afternoon, before Kenji had set out to murder Ohnishi. Chin’s tales of bravado had a whining tone to them, as if daring Kenji to doubt them. Since Chin had not volunteered to lead his troops in the assault on Ohnishi’s mansion, Kenji needed no proof of the boy’s true character. Kenji had grown weary of the stories and the boy, yet listened as if rapt. It was expected of him.
Chin summed up, “If I could survive that and still keep the diamonds with me the whole time, surely I will get us out of this.”
Kenji tightened his fists at his sides. He could disembowel Chin with his bare hands without raising a sweat and the idea was a pleasurable one, but he had to maintain his composure. His grandfather held Kenji’s fate after he escaped Hawaii and he wouldn’t jeopardize that for the mere pleasure of killing the boy.
“All operations are different, surely you know this. Because you survived many in the past does not mean you are protected in the present.”
Though not chastened by Kenji’s comment, Chin remained silent.
Kenji was content to lean against the paneled wall of his study, arms now crossed over his chest, watching Chin smoke his cigar. His years of training had taught Kenji to remain impassive no matter what the situation around him. The tension within him would make a weaker man pace, but Kenji simply stood, quiet and dangerous.
“What of the woman,” Chin said, breaking the minutes long silence, “the reporter you have in the gardener’s shed?”
“What about her?”
“She has refused to help us; surely it is time for her to die.”
“Yes, maybe it is,” Kenji said sadly.
“I will do it,” Chin volunteered. “I want her first.”
“Take her,” Kenji replied casually, masking a sense of hurt.
At first, Kenji had entertained thoughts of taking Jill Tzu with him. There was something in the defiant beauty of the woman that made Kenji want to dominate her. Maybe it was because she knew of his Korean birth? He knew that she would never willingly be with him. Of course she could be drugged, like that American woman he’d rescued a week ago.
But Kenji knew that that was not a solution. Jill had to be eliminated, yet he had not been able to bring himself to do it. Chin’s lurid request was the perfect opportunity. Jill would die, but her blood would not be on his hands.
Chin pulled his small feet from the desk and slammed them against the carpeted floor. Kenji expected him to skip from the room like a spoiled child granted his favorite wish. Instead, Chin swaggered out, eyeing Kenji in an adolescent attempt at domination.
Jill wasn’t sure, but it felt as if night had descended once again, making this the fifth she’d spent locked up inside the maintenance shed. She could hear the incessant buzz of insects if she pressed her ear against the tiny crack under the door. The slit was too narrow for her to look through, not that it really mattered to her anymore. What was another night after all?