one in the string.
The love motel had been a rat hole of sorts, but it had been improvised, and rat holes weren’t supposed to work that way. Too chancy. Rat holes were supposed to be set up in advance, waiting.
“Jeez, Favor, a rat hole. It’s about time,” Arielle said.
“Is it a good one?” Mendonza said.
“It’s a beauty,” Favor said. “Like nothing you’ve ever seen.”
Franklin Kwok motioned Favor to a seat at his table.
They were in the dining room of a golf club south of Manila. Kwok wore a golf shirt the color of lapis lazuli, mirror sunglasses, and a Rolex watch with a gold band only slightly smaller than a boxer’s championship belt.
“Sit,” he said. “Have a drink. Do you know what you want to eat? I recommend the yellowfin.”
The introduction had been arranged by Favor’s banker in Hong Kong, who knew Franklin Kwok. But this wasn’t surprising. Most bankers in Hong Kong knew Franklin Kwok.
“I’m happy to meet you,” Kwok said after they had ordered lunch. “But I have to tell you directly, I’m not selling. I didn’t build it to sell.”
“I knew it must be a custom job.”
“Custom? I built it! It’s my design, one of a kind. I was even in there getting my hands dirty when I had the time.”
Favor wrote two numbers on the back of a business card, several digits each. He passed the card to Kwok.
Kwok took off his sunglasses and held the card up to read. “What are these figures?”
“The first is my estimate of the fair market value in U.S. dollars. The second is the amount I’m prepared to pay.”
“Twice as much as the first,” Kwok said. “I like the way you think. The first is close. The second … Look, if you’re willing to spend this much, you can build one of your own. I won’t let you have my plans, but I’ll give you a few ideas to get you started.”
“I don’t have time for that,” Favor said. “I need something that’s ready to go right now.”
“Need?” Kwok said. ”One doesn’t need something like this. Desire, yes. But not need.”
“I need it,” Favor repeated. “My friends and I are engaged in a certain enterprise. It’s not for profit—not what you might think—but it entails an element of risk. This could save our lives, me and my friends. I’m not being dramatic. That’s a fact.”
“Tell me,” Kwok said. Now he was interested.
Favor spoke: not all the details, but enough that Kwok would understand.
“Fascinating,” Kwok said when Favor had finished. “This is perfect for your purposes.”
“I thought so.”
“No, I mean perfect. Even better than you could know.”
“I may not even use it,” Favor said. “But I want to know that I have it.”
“And for how long would you want to know that?”
“I expect that the problem will be resolved in a couple of weeks. Maybe just days.”
Franklin Kwok thought for a moment.
He said, “Are you a gambler?”
“Not the casino kind.”
Kwok laughed. “I know what you mean. The stakes that really matter, you don’t bet those at a roulette wheel.”
He dug into a pocket and came up with a coin. He held it up for Favor to see. On the face it showed the national heroes Apolinario Mabini and Andres Bonifacio; on the reverse, the Philippine national seal.
“You call it,” Kwok said. “Win the toss, it’s yours for one month.”
“And if I lose?”
“If you lose…” Kwok flipped the coin into the air.
“Tails,” Favor said.
Franklin Kwok caught the coin and slapped it onto the back of his left hand without revealing it.
“If you lose,” he said, “maybe you should take it as a bad omen, and consider abandoning your enterprise.”
He lifted his hand, just enough to peek at the coin.
He looked down on the faces of Mabini and Bonifacio.
“This must be your lucky day,” he said, and he swept the coin into his pocket. “Let me tell you exactly what you’ve got. No, better yet—let me show you.”
Twenty-four
In Nice, France—seven hours behind Manila time—the sun was just rising as Ilya Andropov’s most important client extracted himself from the limbs and bodies of the four young women who slept sprawled, mostly naked, on his oversize bed. He sorted out the arms and legs and rumps and breasts, clearing the tangle enough that he could crawl to the edge of the mattress.
He was in his fifties, a big man gone soft, his back and shoulders and barrel chest matted in graying body hair.
He was breathing hard as he sat up at the edge of the