fic for sanjihan (part 2)
> go to part 1
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It had taken a night and a day to raise Uchi but what he knew was definitely worth the wait.
"I really didn’t have a choice, Ryo. He came up out of the water and Yamashita was in my office not three hours later with a bundle of cash. I listed him as a John Doe and took the money. He said he’d get me out of this dump and back home to Osaka. My mother’s in a bad way, Ryo. I couldn’t say no."
"Cause of death?"
"Strangulation."
So Yamashita had had Kusano offed, probably by his pet creep. Between Uchi and Babyface’s contacts in the Tokyo Bureau of Records he’d been able to get Kusano declared dead and with himself as the beneficiary on a hefty life insurance policy he’d paid off his last round of gambling debts. I was wondering if that might not be his plan this time around but just one policy wouldn’t ordinarily pay out enough to fill a hole as deep as Babyface was reported to have dug.
The thing was, I knew there was no way Tegoshi could have been getting physical with Yamashita without catching wind of at least some of this. This whole thing smelled about as fishy as Tsukiji on a hot day and I didn’t like it one bit.
I had phoned up Tegoshi’s hotel and left a message that I wanted him to get in touch so I wasn’t too shocked the next day when I came into the office to find out he was there waiting for me.
Tegoshi, Kato, and Kei were all sitting around Kei’s desk chatting like they were long-time chums. I was already irritated because I had figured out laying up all night in my lumpy bed how Tegoshi had planned this to go and seeing him palling around with them annoyed me.
"Morning, Boss."
"Morning, Nishikido."
"Morning, precious. Kato." I didn’t look at them, just walked straight into my office and called for Tegoshi to join me. He walked in looking like a puppy with his tail between his legs.
"Close the door."
Tegoshi sat down in the chair across form my desk and for a moment neither of us said anything. I figured better to be out with it, though, so I started.
"This would be a good time to tell me everything you know about Yamashita’s gambling debts and his tendency to off his boyfriends."
"I suppose I should apologize; coming in here with my story about being scared, making you believe me-"
"Don’t sweat it, sweetheart. I didn’t so much believe you as your two hundred dollars."
"You mean-"
"You paid me more than if you’d been giving it to me straight. But this muck you’ve got me standing in is getting deeper with every step I take and I’d appreciate knowing the depths of it before I go getting myself in any further."
"You have to believe me, I truly was frightened. I knew things were getting bad and I was afraid of them killing me any day. I couldn’t get out of it by myself. I needed help and you have a good reputation."
I didn’t know what the kid was talking about. My name was mostly mud around this town, but then again I suppose he did spend most of his time shining on a blue jazz stage and crooning to the more unsavory characters and I guess among the sinners, even I would look like a saint.
"You’ve got a hell of a boyfriend there, ready to kill you at any second and his weirdo toy hit man getting sloppier by the minute."
"Huh?"
"Oh, don’t play dumb with me. You’ve known who’s been following you since you walked in the door. You just put me on the case so maybe I could do all the work getting you out of this sticky situation you’ve gotten yourself into. Well, boy, you’re a great big, shiny fly stuck in a bowl of blackstrap and I’m not seeing any reason exactly why I should be saving a fly."
Tegoshi looked stricken and I could see from the panic in his eyes that it was genuine. I immediately felt a little bad laying into him but I wasn’t about to pull back. Maybe if he was spooked he’d give me all the dirt before he was six feet buried in it.
"Please, you’ve got to help me. I’ll tell you everything I know. But I swear to god, I don’t know who was following me."
"You telling me you missed The Muscle tailing you everywhere?"
"The boxer? Babyface has been meeting with him, I thought it was just about throwing the fight against Sugar Bee."
"Seems that was part of it yeah. What do you know about it?"
"Babyface likes to gamble. He owes his boss some money and I have reason to believe he killed Kusano to make some insurance money. I was scared because I overheard part of a conversation to that effect and there’s a policy on me."
"Why would you go with a man like that if you knew?"
"You don’t say ‘No’ to Babyface. You just don’t."
I scowled. This was a pretty little pickle indeed. "Yamashita is the beneficiary, I assume?"
"Naturally. I don’t have a lot of family and he’s my man, after all."
"Right. And what kind of money does he get if you die?"
"Five thousand."
"Only five? Well that wouldn’t be enough to The Octopus’ sharks off his back. Still. Five thousand. . . why hasn’t he had his crony do you yet?"
Tegoshi looked anywhere but at me. "Well, the thing is. . ."
"Out with it, kid, I haven’t got all day."
"There’s a double indemnity clause in the policy. If it’s an accident. . ."
"If it’s an accident he gets double." It was all fitting into place. That’s why Masuda would have been following him around for a bit instead of just killing him. It was tough to make a murder look like an accident if you didn’t know someone’s schedule well, if you couldn’t set up something that looked pretty plausible.
"Nishikido, I have to get out of here. Please, I’ll do anything if you’ll help me."
I didn’t know exactly what he expected me to do. I could hear a scuffling outside my door and the two goons in the front office hadn’t thought to extinguish the lamp, so I could see their shadows plain as day behind the glass that said "Private". They could hear Tegoshi’s worry plain as anyone and sure enough, Kei and Kato were stumbling through the door with visages of pure anxiety.
"We can’t turn him away, Ryo! They’ll kill him."
"Nishikido, what’ll we do?"
"Well, Mr. Ace-on-the-case reporter, I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We’ll keep our noses out of it because we aren’t the private investigators handling the case, that’s what."
Kato crossed his arms over his chest. "We’re just as involved as you are, Nishikido."
"I’ve gotta skip town. I can’t stand putting you all in danger like this." Tegoshi said.
Then I had a doozy of an idea. "No, no one’s leaving town. I might still need you. You can stay with Kato a couple of nights."
"What?!" Kato shouted. "I only have one room."
I nodded, pleased. "Yeah, this is sounding better by the minute. If you’re so involved, you can take one for the team, Kato."
Tegoshi batted his eyes at Kato. "I don’t bite."
I didn’t believe him. I sent the two of them on their way. It couldn’t hurt to keep Tegoshi on ice for a day or so until I had a flash of brilliance about how to extricate him from the whole mess. At least I knew that Kato would keep an eye on him and probably not let anything untoward happen to him. Of course, if the entire situation grated on Kato a bit, I can’t say it wasn’t at least a little bit of a plus for me.
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Late that night, I was running through some newspaper articles on Yamashita and Masuda trying to get a line on them when my old work buddies dropped in again.
"You boys pick swell hours to do your visiting in." I let them in all the same.
"I have something to run past you, Ryo." Nino took hit hat off, making himself at home, and turned it in his hands while he regarded me with a suspicious eye. I didn’t like it. "There’s some talk about you and Akanishi Jin being close."
"We’re friends, sure."
"There’s some talk about him being friends with Yamashita too."
"That doesn’t sound off to me. They know each other."
"Are you a jealous man, Ryo? Say maybe you didn’t like it if Jin got a little friendlier with Yamashita than he was with you."
"You guys got some funny ideas of small talk."
Matsumoto laid a hand on my shoulder. He looked upset, more upset that I usually saw him get over your everyday, run-of-the-mill crimes. "Come off it, Ryo. It would help you to go along with us. You got away with this and that but you can’t keep it up forever."
"Yeah, well Jin and I weren’t that kind of friends and I don’t know anything about what you’re saying so if there’s something you think I’m doing wrong, you stop me if you can."
"I intend to," Matsumoto said.
Ninomiya went on. "Jin was found dead in a motel room by the motel manager on the far side of town tonight. Coroner’s office says he’s been dead a day or so." Well that did complicate things. I’d known Matsumoto and Akanishi to be friends, so that explained why he was a bit shaken up over it.
"Don’t be an ass, Ninomiya. Your theory about me assaulting Masuda to save Jin falls apart if I’m being blamed for killing Jin."
"You haven’t heard me saying anything about killing anybody, you’re bringing that up. Guilty conscience, Ryo?"
"You take it easy."
"Seems to me it’s time you spilled the beans, Ryo. Speak now or I’ll forever hold your piece." Matsumoto said.
"That’s pretty funny, even for you, Lieutenant," I said. There was a hard edge to his face and I guessed I may as well lay it down for him. "You want the straight line, that’s just fine, I’ll give it to ya. There’s a young singer Tegoshi who’s thrown in with Yamashita and now he’s thinking he’s going to be thrown back seeing as how Yamashita’s into The Octopus for a cool fifteen thousand. See Yamashita’s got a hefty insurance policy on Tegoshi and he’s looking to cash it in."
"And how’s Akanishi fit into this?"
"I went to him looking for a little information."
"If Yamashita was as buddy-buddy with Akanishi as we believe, I don’t like him for putting out a hit."
Fact was I didn’t either. I knew there was a close relationship between those two. I was pretty sure that Akanishi could have run up a million in debts in Yamashita’s name and Yamashita wouldn’t have ordered a hit on him. But that man of his, Masuda, was a wild card and from what I’d seen, more than willing to take matters into his own hands.
I told him, "Me neither. Did you get a cause of death?"
"He was drowned in a bathtub in the motel, looked like. But there were some bruises around the neck area."
I had a hunch what had happened, but I knew it wasn’t going to be heard with an ounce of interest by these guys. I scratched my chin and made a thoughtful face. "Drowned in a tub? In a seedy motel, you say? Well sounds to me like it could be an accident while he was taking a bath or maybe he had a meet-up with a lover and things went awry. Could have been any number of things, really."
"Isn’t that convenient. You’ve got an awfully smooth way of explaining things, Nishikido," Matsumoto said.
"What do you want me to do, learn to stutter?"
Matsumoto let out a big, fake laugh. "Get a load of the mouth on this one. You go ahead and keep crackin’ wise, Nishikido. We’ve got a place for smart asses - it’s called Fuchu Prison."
"You boys comin’ around here, always cracking foxy. You make me sick. If you had the skinny on me, you’d be showing me your back, not looking in my eye."
Matsumoto got his back up. "I oughtta-"
"You ought to stick your nose in the direction of someone actually doing wrong is what you ought to do." Jun had a fire in his eyes and I knew what was coming even before he grabbed my shirt collar and popped me one.
It stung but good and I was steamed. "Is that the best you’ve got, lieutenant?"
"You-"
He came at me again and I cracked him with a backhand across his cheek. I didn’t want to really hurt him, I could plainly see he was just upset but I wasn’t about to let it go at nothing. He needed to be shook out of it. He flung his hair back out of his eyes and looked at me.
"You son of a-" Ninomiya grabbed his arm to keep him back but he still got his hand back into my lapel to give me a shake. He had be getting pretty angry now and I was ready for a tussle. I pried his hand off my shirt and said, "When you’re slapped you’ll take it and like it," and then Ninomiya pushed me back.
"That’s it. We’re heading down to the station. Get your coat."
- - -
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I hadn’t set foot in the stationhouse for as long as I’d been off the force. I never much cared for it anyway. Even the building itself was a liar, coming off as some paragon of virtue when anyone who’d spent any time with the law of this town knew that the deals that went down in this building were just as often the under hand of a crooked cop, lawyer, or politician as they were the swift hand of justice.
The entire first floor of the building was grey enough to make a man want to bloody someone’s nose just to see a splash of color. They left me to stew for a while in a dreary, cinder block interrogation room while they were trying to convince the D.A. to level a charge against me for assaulting an officer. I didn’t know District Attorney Sakurai too well, but I knew he wasn’t a fool and I knew they weren’t going to get an assault charge to stick when I was the one with what was, by the feel of it, a pretty ripe shiner.
Matsumoto and Ninomiya came down to get me and from the peeved look on the lieutenant’s face, I could tell I’d been right and charges were rolling off me like water off a duck’s back.
"Come on," Ninomiya said, "The D.A. wants to see you."
I was ushered up the stairs and into the D.A.’s very well-appointed office. The difference between where they kept the grunts and where they kept the brass around here was like the difference between a plugged nickel and a solid bar of gold. It was familiar as ever, but since I’d been out of the thick of the police work in this town, the way things were run had started to grate on me even more. It immediately put my back up.
Matsumoto and Ninomiya came in behind me and sat, and there was a stenographer ready to take down our every word. I didn’t like stenographers. They made me itchy. I don’t like the idea of my words being able to be thrown back into my face and simultaneously giving me a paper cut. It undermines a man’s confidence.
District Attorney Sakurai leaned forward, elbows on his big walnut desk. He launched right into it without doing me the courtesy of any preamble. "Who killed Akanishi?"
"I don’t know."
"I’m sure you could make a fine guess."
"I suppose my guess might be fine or shoddy, but my parents didn’t raise anyone addled enough to make guesses in front of an officer of the court, two cops, and a stenographer."
"Why not? That is, if you’ve got nothing to hide."
"Everybody’s got something to hide."
"Your history with the Tokyo Metro Police department may gain you the benefit of the doubt in a scrap with an officer, but my boy, these men have reason to believe you are somehow connected to these crimes, an assault and then a murder, and if I think you’re withholding information that might lead to the apprehension of a suspect in connection with these crimes, do not think that your past connection with the law in this town will cause me to hesitate in jailing you on those grounds."
Now, Sakurai was as good a man as the city had on its payroll, and I knew that, but I was getting tired of being told what I knew and when I was to talk about it, let alone being as much as accused of being connected to the murder of a man I called ‘friend’ and I wasn’t going to stand for it any more.
"See, here. This office, not to mention the police have as much as accused me of murder. I’ve been in it with both of you before and from experience I can say that my best bet of clearing my name is to do all these guys’ work and round up all the criminals for them neat and pretty. You got nothin’ on me and everyone here knows it and I’m getting a bit weary of you guys coming around or bringing me down here for these casual chats being called a killer and a liar and who knows what else when I could be out there doing your work. So seems to me we’re done here and if you’re wantin’ to see me again it’s not going to be without some stiff charges or a subpoena and my lawyer." I stood and stormed out, slamming the door behind me and tore out of there before they could trump up another few charges just to put a damper on my day.
I started walking. The city at night is a fine place to get to thinking, there’s something about the way the rainy streets shine like silver in the lamplight, or maybe it’s the way the memory of bustling activity keeps you walking fast even when the streets are empty. It gets your gears turning and I couldn’t get how upset Matsumoto was out of my head. He and Jin had been friends, sure, but no closer than Jin and I had been and I didn’t think he was especially sensitive as guys go. I guess the only reason I wasn’t more shocked about it was that I’d sort of seen it coming. But if you were close to a man it’d hurt you to see him go suddenly, right? Even if it was your idea to kill him. So I was thinking one of two things. Either Yamashita, who was real buddy-buddy with Jin would be in a bad way and that would trip him up, maybe. Or else he was stone cold and not shook up at all, but that would mean he was probably getting a little cocky. Like thinking maybe he couldn’t get caught.
I was beginning to get an idea how to catch these guys up. I didn’t bother going back to my place. I went straight to the office so I could catch Kei first thing when he came in and have him round up Kato and Tegoshi to get things in place, that is, if they didn’t come in of their own accord. The office was getting to be about as busy as Shinjuku Station.
- - -
- - -
Sure enough, they all come in laughing thick as thieves first thing.
"Did you sleep here Ryo?" Kei asked.
Kato snorted. "You gotta get a social life, man."
I wanted to come back at him with some clever remark, but I was tired and we just didn’t have the time for that any more. While I was sleeping I had a plan percolating in the back of my brain and now was the time for action.
"Shut up and everybody sit. I’m about to break it all down for you guys. We’ve got some work to do if we’re going to bring these guys in."
Kato raised an eyebrow in my direction. "What’s this ‘we’? I don’t see my name on the door and I’m not the one who’s gotten myself into trouble. No offense, Tegoshi."
I regarded him dubiously. "I seem to recall you telling me not too long ago that you were just as involved as any of us. If you don’t want to be working this case, Ace, then maybe you’d better get down to the paper."
"I didn’t say I didn’t want to be working the case. I’m saying I want in officially."
"Not a chance."
"Then you’re not getting any more help from me."
That riled me a bit. "What happened to this place being the bottom of the barrel, eh?"
"Well to my way of thinking, seems if I were working here, maybe it’d be a little more seemly." Kato smirked.
I scowled. I was dying to wipe that smirk right off his damned face, but fact was that, for what I had in mind, I needed him. "I’ll consider hiring you on in a provisional capacity. You’re not a P.I., though. You need a license for that, you know."
"Of course I know. I’ll put my application in at the ward office tomorrow."
"Why don’t we wait and see what tomorrow brings before we make any promises, hm? After tonight you might not want to throw your hand in on the investigation game." I turned to Kei. "Kei, would you mind making some coffee, darlin’? It’s going to be a long day."
I began laying out the plan for the boys.
- - -
- - -
What we’d needed was the perfect blend of information from Tegoshi, equipment from Kato, or at least his newspaper connections, and blind luck. At eleven that night, I thought we’d done the best we could.
It was up to the Lady, now, and she’d never favored me in the past. I prayed that the kind of luck that had kept Tegoshi alive for so long when he was a walking dollar sign to one of the most powerful men in the city, who was desperately in need of money, would be with us tonight.
Tegoshi was doing a special one-night engagement at one of Yamashita’s classier places. If The Rusty Nail was the place where he kept his shady dealings, and The C-Note was the place where he kept his secret lover, The Diamond Club was where Yamashita kept his reputation.
It was a ritzy place in the first floor of The Hotel American, which he also owned. It was richly decorated in a black and red card-suit theme with lush ivory table cloths and heavy crimson drapes. It was the kind of place where the rail liquor was the top of the line and you could rub elbows with the most powerful men in the city. With all those slick dealers in there, it was a wonder people didn’t walk out slimy from head to toe.
We had good information from Tegoshi that Yamashita would be there and if I wanted him to pinch me, which was exactly what I was hoping would happen, I needed him to see me there. So there I was like a duck in a shooting gallery on a velvet-cushioned bar stool, sipping dollar-a-glass brandy that the stuff at The Nail dreams of growing up one day to be.
He didn’t come in until after midnight, which was fine by me because it gave Kato plenty enough time to get in place and make sure his equipment was working. I’d just finished a drink and called for another to nurse for a while when I saw him waltz in looking fine in a wide lapel pinstripe number and a wide-brim hat. Masuda was behind him in a blue suit and homburg with a yellow hat band. He looked so dapper, you’d never guess I’d seen him happily trying to kill a man bare-handed just a few days earlier.
My brandy tasted bitter. I still needed a few things to go my way tonight, but I was mostly just feeling like I wanted the whole thing over with. The plan had me making sure I was seen, making sure they knew I was asking questions, and then going out the back door to the alley.
The Hotel American was in a good neighborhood, best on this side of town, and there was no way they were going to strong-arm me into a vehicle right there under the streetlights. The streets are full of eyes but the lighter the neighborhood, the darker the alleys. I’d go out back where they’d anybody could to any manner of evil. The alleys were always blind.
I let him enjoy his first couple of drinks while Tegoshi sang. The kid sang right to him and he never even glanced toward the stage. I wasn’t sure if that was more likely a sign of heartlessness or remorse.
I headed out for the back door right when Tegoshi was finished with his second set. The idea was my moving about would take the eyes off of him and he could slip out the front and get back to my office to hide out with Kei while I got snatched from the back entrance and hauled off to Yamashita’s fishery warehouse by the docks, the same one I’d seen him meet up with Masuda at before.
I held up my end all right, downing the last of my drink and making a show of thanking the bartender for what could have been any information from the time of day to what he’d thought of the Giants’ season this year. It didn’t matter as long as Yamashita saw me looking right at him while I nodded along with the barman. I wove my way through the crowd and toward the back of he joint just as Tegoshi was coming off stage. Perfect timing, kid.
I’d cleared the back door and taken about five or six steps into the loading dock area when I heard the door open again behind me. I didn’t look back, just cringed a little waiting for someone to clobber me.
"Nishikido," came the sweet voice of Tegoshi from behind me. I whirled around, livid.
"What the hell are you doing here? You’re supposed to be going out the front."
"I don’t like this. What’s to keep him from killing you when he finds out how much you know?"
I didn’t get a chance to answer because walking up behind me from the dark of the alley was none other than Babyface, I recognized him from his soft, whispering voice. "Just exactly how much do you know, Ryo?"
I didn’t turn around to look at him because my eyes were locked on Tegoshi who was backing up the way he’d come, only to find himself going smack up against Masuda’s chest. Masuda whipped him around by one arm with a crazy smile on his face and decked him before tossing him up against the brick wall. The last thing I’d heard before Yamashita pistol-whipped me was the horrible crack of Tegoshi’s head against the brick.
I around to a slap in the face and Masuda’s soft, skin-crawling laugh. I can see why Jin said he gave him the willies. Any more than a minute or two with someone who could smile and chuckle to himself while he was putting the screws to someone was too much. "A little off," he’d said. I thought that was putting it nicely.
I looked around. I’d never been so happy to see the inside of a scummy fishing warehouse. It was exactly where we’d been hoping he’d bring me, except of course, he also had Tegoshi. We were both tied down to chairs and he was gagged. Presumably I wasn’t because Yamashita wanted to talk to me.
My head was still feeling a little fuzzy but I could hear Masuda talking to Yamashita back in the shadows. Masuda mumbled something indistinct.
"No, not yet," Yamashita said. "Go. Bring it back and keep quiet."
"Okay. I’ll be back, then."
Babyface’s expensive shoes clicked and echoed in the big empty building. He was walking over to where Tegoshi and I were sitting.
"Wake up, little Ryo from the neighborhood." I blinked my eyes a couple of times to focus them and turned them toward Yamashita. His face was hard and cold as steel, despite the amiable tone of voice he was using. There was nothing at all in his eyes of the sweet kid he’d once been. He was dead inside. "Wake up and tell me why it is I keep seeing the end of your nose dug deep into my business."
"Your boy here seems to think his days are numbered."
"And?"
"And I was looking into just how many zeroes come along when that number’s up. See I’ve been looking into you, Yamashita, and it seems to me that it’s dangerous to be in the kid’s position. From what I hear being your partner comes with a shelf life."
"You hear a lot of shit, then. What do you know about it?"
"Not a lot," I lied. "But the Yamashita I knew would never have killed somebody who never did anything to deserve it."
"Yeah, well. Its been a long time. A really long time. You don’t know me anymore, Ryo. You don’t know what it’s like."
"Well why don’t you tell me then. Enlighten me before you turn out my lights. Please."
"When we were kids and Takizawa and Shibutani used to run books together, we did it for fun, right? We did it to make a little cash and to pass time. But in the business. . .well in the business it’s not easy, Ryo. Soon you start doing it just so you’re not thinking of other things. And when you get good, when you start winning, it’s tasty, Ryo. All that cabbage, it makes a man pretty keen to keep winning. Before I knew it I was in over my head and my boss starts calling it in."
"And that’s when you bumped off your boy Kusano and paid off men in Chiba to keep it quiet."
"No! Course I didn’t. That was just an accident, but I knew I was going to be collecting the money and I couldn’t let anything stand in the way of that so, yeah. I bought them off. It was chump change compared to the settlement from the insurance." He was gesturing with the gun in his hand.
I wasn’t pleased about the idea of its crosshairs coming to rest on me but that didn’t stop me from going on. I needed the recording of the whole story to hand over to the cops. "And now you’re in deep again so you thought you’d cash in your new boy on a pretty bag of green only this time you’ll set your stooge after him to figure out a way to make it look like an accident so’s you can get double and who cares that he’s a good kid, somebody’s baby even, and he never did anything to you to deserve it." I cocked my head toward Tegoshi, still passed out in the chair next to me and strapped to it looking like a little rag doll.
"What do you want me to say? That I’m sorry and I love him? Well I don’t. I don’t love him and if one of us has to die to get me out of this, then it’s better that it’s him. I’m a big man around here, Ryo, and he’s just a cheap jazz singer. He’s two bits against my cool finn and nobody’s going to miss him. What do you think happens if I go under? Every one of my businesses go under, that’s what. Every club, every bar, every hotel, sure, and I can see you thinking ‘so what’. Well it’s not all seedy underbelly like you’re thinking it is around here. My legitimate businesses go too. This fishery you’re sitting in? Who do you think works here? Gangsters? No. Regular folk. Regular folk who need this place to keep working. If this place shuts down, then what? Two silk factories in Gunma and the new nylon factory in Saitama, countless women and children out on the streets, for chrissakes, Nishikido, I run an orphanage! People count on me!"
Now we had him, so I let him know it. "That’s just what I wanted to hear, Babyface. Yeah, that’s real pretty. Now we’ve got you right where we want you. I’ve got this place rigged up with a recorder. You’re sunk, Yamashita." I wasn’t sure how quick Kato could get the cops here, but I figured a little grandstanding might buy me a few extra minutes of time. "My boy’s got you recorded confessing, Babyface. You may as well give it up. The brass is already on the way. You don’t want a few fresh bodies for them to charge you with when they get here, do you?"
Then a smile cracked across Babyface’s soft features and I didn’t think a heart could sink so low, seeing a sight like that in my position, all tied up as I was. "You mean this boy here?"
He flourished his pistol top the shadows and a door opened to reveal Masuda dragging in Kato’s limp form. Damn it all straight to hell, the greenhorn had gone and mucked it up by getting himself caught. Masuda pulled another chair from the side of the room and lined it up with mine and Tegoshi’s, tying Kato to it before he slapped him across the face to bring him to.
"Kato?" I shouted to him, I just needed him to look at me and give me some sign that he’d gotten the short wave hooked up and broadcasting before he’d gotten made. "Kato." He rolled his head around to me groggily. I guessed Masuda’s popped him good and I didn’t think he’d had a lot of practice getting punched in the face in his lifetime. Kato was a ‘don’t start trouble’ kid if I’d ever met one. He probably got straight As and brought a shiny apple for the teacher too, knowing him.
"This your guy, Nishikido? This your savior? That’s a laugh. Masuda spotted him before you even woke up. Tapping my warehouse and selling me out to the cops? How do you like your chances now?"
Kato caught my eye then with half a smirk through the blood on his lip and I figured I liked my chances pretty good. He’d gotten that ham radio up and broadcasting to Kei, who was holed up in my office out of harm’s way, so I was pretty sure we still had back-up on the way. I was pretty sure I just needed to keep Babyface from killing the lot of us in the next ten minutes or so and we just might make it out of this mess. Then he levelled his pistol at me and I wasn’t feeling quite so confident.
"Now all I gotta do is ice the three of you and I can get out of this free and clear and ten thousand dollars richer. I’ll keep The Octopus’s tentacles off me and then I can get back to my business. All the little kiddies will be safe and happy in their beds and all you have to do to make that happen is sleep with the fishes."
Damn. I could see him flexing his fingers on the gun, getting ready to use them, and I knew I needed to stall him. I had to get him twitchy and I was pretty sure I knew just what subject might do it.
"You’re making me so sick I’m liable to lose my lunch right here in this chair. You expect me to believe you’re that goddamned altruistic? That you’re some kind of saint from Chiba, come to champion the weak with your underhanded business dealings? Where was all that love and mercy for the human condition when Akanishi was drowning in a shit-hole motel on the other side of the city?"
The last thing I expected to see on Yamashita’s baby face just then was plain shock. "What did you say?"
Masuda had been standing quietly by in the shadows of the warehouse for some time now. I could hear his quiet hunh, hunh, hunh laughter starting up.
Now here was a possibility I hadn’t even considered. "You mean to tell me you didn’t know? I went to see Akanishi."
Babyface pursed his lips and tried to look disinterested, like he thought I was trying to get one over on him. "So what, Akanishi talks to you all the time. He knows not to say anything."
"No, but this time he did, Yamashita. This time he gave me something I could use and your pet there didn’t like it. I caught him trying to squeeze the life out of Jin in the alley behind The Nail." Now his face turned into a mask of horrified shock and he whirled on The Muscle with the gun.
"What did you do?" The cold terror in Yamashita’s voice gave me goosebumps.
"I was helpin’ you out, Babyface. He was squealing and needed someone to show him how to be quiet. hunh, hunh, hunh, Fish don’t squeal, Babyface. I was teachin’ him how to be quiet like a fish. hunh, hunh, hunh, He kept chatterin’ about how he wasn’t talkin’ and I told him to shut his face. I showed him good how to be like a fish, he even look like a fish then hunh, hunh, hunh, he look like a fish with his eyes bulging and his mouth open in the water. I tol’ him he’ll keep quiet now."
"Shut up!" he screamed.
"I kep’ him quiet so he wouldn’t make no trouble for you, Babyface. hunh, hunh, hunh, Jus’ like I kep’ Kusano quiet for you."
"Shut up! Just shut your goddamned gob!"
But Masuda didn’t shut up. He kept up laughing and Babyface was losing it. "Shut up!" he kept shouting, "Shut up, shut up," and he loosed a couple of rounds in Masuda’s direction, but he was teary-eyed and wiping his face with his other hand and he only hit him once, but it was enough to drop him like a sack of rocks.Yamashita dropped too, down on a knee, weeping for his best friend.
The gunshot finally roused Tegoshi who struggled in his chair, his eyes bulging a little as he realized he was bound and gagged. He screamed around the rags in his mouth anyway when he looked around and saw Yamashita with a gun and one man already on the floor, shot.
Masuda was bleeding out some onto the dirty fishy warehouse floor. He wasn’t dead, though. I could hear him moaning over Babyface’s wracking sobs. I tried to use his distraction to cast an eyeball around for something to get us out of our seats, but I was tied fast and the warehouse was dark everywhere but under the one light we were already under. If there was a knife or sharp surface around to cut the ropes on, I wasn’t seeing it. Where was the goddamned brass when you actually needed them?
Babyface got to his feet, scuffling around a little on the floor, off his balance. He was waving his pistol in my general direction but if he squoze the trigger there was just as good a chance he’d hit one of my guys or nothing at all.
"This is all your fault!" he pointed at me with the barrel, his grip was a little surer now and I was liking his chances of hitting me square. "If you’d have just kept your damned nose out of it none of this would have happened. It’s you! It’s your fault!"
He was coming at me with the gun and I was getting ready for it, I’d almost screwed my eyes shut and if I had, I’d have missed the slim, dove-grey-clad leg swinging up to connect with the back of Yamashita’s head right as he finally brought the hammer down.
It sent him sprawling to the floor face first and threw his shot far enough off-kilter that he only got me in the arm. Pain tore through me in the wake of hot lead and a flash of icy panic. I shook my head to clear it and blinked the stars from my eyes to see my angel with a knee in Yamashita’s back. He’d taken a hit to the cheek from one of Babyface’s flailing fists as he went down. It was going to blossom into a dark bruise. The sight made me see red and I was pulling against my bonds to try and help him but he was whipping the belt out of his grey slacks to wind around Babyface’s wrists, keeping them pinned behind his back.
"Cops are on their way, Boss. I came as fast as I could when I heard them get to Shige over the short wave." He was panting, he must have run the whole way.
"Kei, when did you learn to-"
"You didn’t think I spent my nights knitting and listening to radio shows, did you, Boss?" The grin on his face was just about the sweetest I’d ever seen.
"Koyama, you wanna?" Kato shrugged his shoulders to show he was bound and as soon as Kei got Yamashita good and tied, he went right over to Kato who started untying Tegoshi while Kei came over to untie me last.
"Boy, you sure know how to make your boss feel appreciated, Kei."
"Hey, I saved you, didn’t I?" He jostled my arm while he was getting me untied and I winced and cringed away. "Oh my god, Ryo! You’re hurt."
"It’s a flesh wound. He’ll live," Kato informed him, finally getting Tegoshi’s knots undone.
The chorused in unison. "Shige!"
I shrugged before I realized how much that would hurt. "It’s true. It ain’t pretty but it certainly ain’t fatal. Your concern warms my heart, though, Kato. Now you guys get out of here before the cops get here and i have to explain the whole damned operation." You could have knocked me over with a feather when they actually listened.
Not long after that, the police finally arrived, Matsumoto and Ninomiya at the head of the pack.
"There you are, coppers," I said. "All your work tied up for you in a pretty little package. You’ll want to call a bus for that one, though," I added, pointing to Masuda. "Yamashita here tore a hole in his side. You’ll be getting a recording of Yamashita’s confession bright and early tomorrow. Right after it runs as the top story on The News-Courier’s front page."
"That’s withholding evidence, Nishikido," Ninomiya said.
"Not if it’s not admissible anyway." I gave him a winning grin. "You’re top brass’ll have their work cut out for them trying to cover it up no matter how much money Yamashita offers them now, though."
I was heading off to get my arm stitched up when I heard Matsumoto muttering "He’ll be insufferable after this, you know."
I barely suppressed my chuckle when Ninomiya came back with, "When wasn’t he insufferable?"
- - -
- - -
The first thing I did when I left was get my arm stitched up so I was decked out in shirtsleeves and a sling, laid up in my office when Kato brought Tegoshi in late in the afternoon of the next day.
"Hey, Ace. Kid. How’s it going?"
"You’re in high spirits for someone who was shot early this morning," Kato said.
I laughed and blamed my good mood on the pain killers but the fact was I was pretty happy we were all alive. Things could have gone way worse for us, all things considered. "Did you get your big breaking news in?"
"Sure did. And they offered me a full time position as a writer."
"Oh yeah?"
"But I turned them down. I was just swinging by to measure for my new desk."
"I don’t recall offering you a job. I believe I said I’d take it under advisement or something like that."
"I believe you’re full of shit." Okay, he had me there. Kato went over to chat with Kei who was putting some paperwork together and making some fresh coffee.
"Nishikido?"
I don’t believe I had ever seen the kid look so small or nervous before that moment. I kept my voice quiet so as not to spook him. "Yeah, kid?"
"I just wanted to thank you and apologize for getting you all into this. I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you."
"My fee will be plenty compensation enough."
He blushed and ducked his head. "Thank you." I figured he was still a little shaken. I guess having your boyfriend wave a gun in your face and threaten to kill you and a few others will do that to you, so I didn’t think to much of the fact that he left wordlessly when Kato came by and said "Let’s go get the rest of your stuff from your old place, Tegoshi."
When the door shut behind them I turned to Kei. "You’ll need to call down to the hardware store and have them send a man up."
"Something broken, Boss?"
Yeah, I must have cracked my skull. "No. Have them take my name off the door and put up ‘Nishikido and Kato’."
"You’re really going to let Shige come work here?" If I hadn’t already decided, the grin on his face might have swayed me.
"Don’t think I have much of a choice."
Kei brought me a hot cup of joe and explained that Tegoshi was moving out of his apartment since he didn’t have a sugar daddy around to pay for it anymore. "He’s a good kid. Trouble, but a good kid," around sips from my mug.
"I’m glad you think so because he’ll be coming around here Thursdays with Shige for cards from now on." Kei sat on the edge of his desk, facing me on the chaise.
I scowled.
"I thought you said he was a good kid!"
"Yeah," I said, getting up to go over to the desk to put a thumb under his chin and turning his face toward the light to get a good look at the shiner across his eye and cheek. "I also said he was trouble. Something you don’t seem to be able to stay away from lately. Not that I don’t appreciate you saving my skin, but I wish you wouldn’t have come to the warehouse. What if something had happened to you?" I couldn’t have kept myself from running my hand over his cheek and I didn’t much want to.
It had been raining for the last few days but today had dawned bright and clear. The sun coming in the window and glinting off his tan skin and copper hair made him a little difficult to look away from. The look in his eyes like I meant the world to him didn’t help matters any.
"But what if something had happened to you? I almost lost you, Boss."
"You shouldn’t be chasing after my ugly mug, babe."
Kei smiled, soft and handsome. "I guess I can’t help it. I must be in love with you, Ryo."
"I know it, angel. God help you. I know it."
And then I kissed him.
[Music swells. Fade to Black.]