an offer sheet to help them save their business; it was going to end with her trying to figure out how to keep Simon To alive.
( 13 )
She went to bed early and slept well. She had placed a wake-up call for six, and by six forty-five she had had two coffees, read the International Herald Tribune, and was on the MTR to the Causeway Bay station and Victoria Park.
She got there just early enough to get in five quick laps before the morning crowd arrived to clog the jogging track. She took that as a good omen.
The night before she’d figured out how to structure the day; the only thing she hadn’t done was organize a car rental. She stopped at the front desk on the return from her run and asked the concierge to make the arrangements.
She showered and put on a black T-shirt and her training pants and jacket. She normally didn’t wear a hat, but she knew she could be out in the sun for most of the day, and took her Adidas baseball cap out of her bag. She didn’t want to lug around her Chanel purse or her notebook, so she ripped out some pages and put them in her jacket pocket with two pens. Her passport, Hong Kong ID card, driver’s licence, and a wad of U.S. hundred-dollar bills went into the other pocket.
She looked at herself in the mirror. No beauty queen, she thought.
Ava ate breakfast downstairs at Café Causette. She ordered plain black coffee and congee with abalone and read the South China Morning Post. She paid special attention to the front page. Hopefully it would be popping up on Michael’s computer screen at noon.
At the terminal she first saw the two boys off to the side, standing close together, smoking as if their lives depended on it. Carlo was the bigger of the two at about five foot six and 140 pounds; Andy was an inch shorter and ten pounds lighter. The last time she had seen Carlo he had a moustache; now his upper lip was as bare as his shaved head. They were wearing T-shirts, and Ava kicked herself for not telling them to wear long-sleeved shirts. Both of Andy’s arms were covered in tattoos; Carlo had only one arm decorated, but a dragon’s tail wrapped itself around his collarbone and neck. Ava had never seen the actual dragon’s head that she knew was situated somewhere on his chest.
They waved, greeting her less formally than at their last meeting, in Las Vegas. They were on their home turf and not so nervous. Andy had a carryall with him.
Amanda was at the gate that led to the ferry gangplank. She was wearing flat shoes, white linen slacks, and an unadorned navy blue silk blouse that still looked as if it had cost two thousand Hong Kong dollars. She held a Louis Vuitton briefcase that wasn’t much bigger than a sheet of paper. The girl couldn’t look middle-class if she tried, Ava thought.
With her baseball cap on, Ava got to within five metres of Amanda before she was recognized. “Hey,” Amanda said, suddenly awkward as she took in Ava’s clothes.
“Hey, yourself.”
“Am I overdressed?”
“No, you’re perfect,” Ava said. “Now come and meet Carlo and Andy.”
Amanda’s reaction when she saw the boys wasn’t much different from Ava’s the first time a gun was waved in her face.
“This is Amanda. She’s my brother’s fiancée,” Ava said, emphasizing the relationship particularly to Carlo, who fancied himself a ladies’ man and was always prepared to give it a go, regardless of the likelihood of rejection. “And these are Carlo and Andy,” she said to Amanda. “They’ve worked with me before, and I trust them with my life.”
The boys smiled at the compliment. Amanda looked a little less uneasy but stayed close to Ava.
Ava bought tickets with an open return, and they hustled down the corridor to catch the ten-fifteen jetfoil. She told the boys to sit in a separate row, as she wanted to talk to Amanda. As always, they did what was asked and took no offence.
“So, how’s Michael?” Ava began. Amanda seemed distracted, her attention still on the boys. “Hey, get over it,” Ava said. “Everyone does silly things when they’re young. They have tattoos but they’re good guys; they don’t bite.”
“Sorry, it was just a bit of a shock. I mean, I wasn’t expecting anyone else.”
“Well, there they are, so get used to them. Besides, you won’t be spending much time with