31. Epilogue — Months later
Epilogue — Months later
Andy
“Is this it?” I ask as Chi pulls her black gloves on and tightens them over her fingers.
“Yeah, 327.”
We pull up to the house in our innocuous black Range Rover. It fits right into this neighborhood, filled with expensive, high- end cars, without being obvious. Chi’s Corvette would have fit around here too, but we’re trying to be discreet.
“This is the last one, Chi. Don’t get overzealous like you did yesterday. We almost had to kill those people.”
Chi rolls her eyes. “No way. We had great blackmail. The pictures of her husband assaulting those women didn’t just appear out of thin air. And honestly, I would have cut his dick off if it wasn’t better for our purposes for it to stay intact. I wasn’t lying.”
I take a cleansing breath out. Chi’s sass continues to both enrage and excite me, and I’m certain it always will.
“Okay, let’s go.”
It’s still dark, which we had planned on, and we head in, happy for the cover. We easily get through the security with Oxy’s help; out here in the American suburbs, most of the systems are the same, even in the high-end, million dollar homes.
We sit in the kitchen. Chi gets restless waiting for the couple to wake up, so she scours the kitchen. She’s looking for more information — always greedy for it — but finds some of her favorite mandarin green tea instead. Just then, we hear footsteps coming down the stairs. The woman we will be interrogating today comes into view as she rounds the banister, scratching her hair and yawning. Chi doesn’t even blink before raising her tranq gun and shooting the woman in the shoulder.
“You really are a good shot,” I say as she continues to get the necessary items ready for tea. “If we had real guns, you would have easily incapacitated her, and she would have dropped her own gun if she’d had one in her right hand.”
She smiles back at me. “I know.”
I do the same to the man when he comes down as Chi is steeping the tea. She looks at me as if to say, We make a great team, babe , as I tie them to the chairs.
She finishes making the tea and plops down across from me, sliding a cup over.
“I’m not a huge fan — oh, that’s good,” I say, nodding my approval.
“I use honey,” she says, trying to keep her pride at the compliment off her face.
The woman wakes up first. Chi smiles at her. “Hey lady. Sorry about the tranquilizer, that shit is going to make you super drowsy all day. But it’s Sunday, so I think you’ll be alright.”
The woman freezes as she comes around fully. “Who are you? What do you want?” she asks in perfect English. She knows who we are — everyone in the Kantoku-sha does.
“Well, I’m not going to tell you the whole story because your husband is about to wake up, and I need you both to hear this.”
“Hear what? I can’t think of any reason—”
Chi holds up a hand. “I’m really not interested in the lies. I know who you are and where you and your husband work. We won’t kill you if you just listen to us.”
The woman shakes her head nervously, but keeps her mouth shut, which is probably for the best. Her husband wakes up and tries the same song and dance. This time, I chime in.
“Hey, old man. There’s no reason for you to tell us you didn’t do anything. We know what you did.” I hold up the computer device that Oxy got us so many months ago. “This cool little thing was able to rip a bunch of information from the servers in the Kantoku-sha’s headquarters. We know your role in the death of Chi’s father.”
“We had no role! We had nothing to do with it!” The man bursts out, trying to struggle up from his chair. There’s no way he’s getting out. He’ll rip his skin through the zip-ties, but there’s no way he’ll get free of them.
“Settle down, you good-for-nothing piece of shit,” I say, my voice an angry rasp. “We know you okayed the transaction between Mr. Shimizu and the hitmen. We have it all.”
“But we didn’t do anything else! I swear!” It’s the woman this time, and I am quickly losing my patience.
“Shut your fucking mouth, both of you, and listen to what we have planned for you, or so help me God…”
“And you were telling me not to get overzealous,” Chi says with a smile, chin in her hands.
“You wanna take this one, babe?” I ask, my eyebrow cocked.
“You know it,” she says, flipping one long, silky lock of hair over her shoulder.
“Now,” she looks back at the couple, laying out a folder for them and spreading the contents, “take a good look at the pictures. All of this was in backup surveillance for our hacker to steal. It might have been harder to get it from the company headquarters, but you had this little meeting right here at your table.”
She pushes a few pictures forward. “Look at the four of you cozying up like the best of friends. We have the video of this as well. We know everything that was said and… well, the only reason we aren’t playing it today is that I might accidentally go homicidal on your asses and shoot you both in the fucking head.”
The woman swallows hard and gives a small, high-pitched sound of fright. The man winces as Chi yells in their faces. Neither of them speaks. It appears they have finally gotten wise to the fact that nothing they can do will save them from whatever fate we decide for them.
“Now, because of the transgression you’ve made toward the Yakuza queen and her family, you should face a long, torturous, painful death. However, I’m willing to be… lenient. Because you have something I can use.”
The woman nods hurriedly, and the man says, “Name your price.”
“I certainly don’t need money,” Chi laughs. “No, I need something much more important. Your sway with the Kantoku-sha .” She pauses for effect, keeping the room in suspense for a moment more before continuing.
“Andreas Scutari and Chichi Yano will be together, and not only will it be unsurprising, but it will be a good thing. You will tell the administration, in whatever capacity you’d like, that the public has been swayed and that this will be good for business and political opportunities. You will tell them that you enjoy a relationship with each of us, which means you have the ear of a powerful Japanese leader as well as a powerful American leader. So, in us, they are getting two for the price of one. Do you understand me? Both of you?”
Chi and I look back and forth between the couple as they very obviously balk, hesitate, but eventually nod their heads. It’s not quite good enough. Time to scare the shit out of them, which is my favorite part. Chi knows this, so she lets me take over.
I lean in for the kill. “You will do this, or the organization, as well as all of Japan and… the world, really, will find out everything we have here.” I sweep my hand out across the pictures. “They will find out that you aided Asuka’s father for your own personal gain. That you allowed the killing of the Yakuza leader — in fact, spurred the event along.”
I shake my head and tsk them. “And if you think they will agree with you, well, think again. That might have been the case at one time, but you must know now, after the last few months of constant news coverage, that it will not be the case anymore. Your reputation will be shot to hell, and all of your money, your standing; all of it will be gone for good. Your own safety will be no more, as will the safety of your family. I’ll make absolutely certain of it.”
I take a sip of tea and shuffle around in my chair a bit — not because I’m uncomfortable, but because I enjoy watching them squirm. Finally, I give them the conclusion of the plan we have enacted now on multiple leaders of this organization. Every man and woman that allowed Akio’s life to be taken.
“Akihito Yano, Chi’s brother, is in charge of our covert operations. You can spread that news around if you’d like. He’s incredible at his job, and he has a few well-placed moles throughout your organization already. We will be adding more over time. Anyone you get orders to promote or hire, you will do so. If you fail to do it for any reason, our little oral contract here is null and void. In fact, if you fail to do anything asked of you, all of this falls through, and everything you see here goes straight to every news station in Japan.”
Chi leans forward, a slightly unhinged expression lighting up her features. She gets like this each time we make these visits, and it never fails to get my cock hard. “We have moles in every level of your organization. If any of them tell us you haven’t followed directions, I’ll kill you fuckers myself. I’ll give you a thousand cuts and let you bleed out and shrivel up with infection. I’ll watch you die for weeks; do you understand me? And I’ll wait until after you’ve lost everything: your standing, your friends, and your family. Then, I’ll strike. And I’ll do it all with this smile on my face.” She outlines her smiling lips with her pointer finger. “Do we understand each other?”
The couple swallows collectively and nods.
“Great.” Chi stands up, holding their fine china and the tea it contains in her hand. “I’m parched. I’m sure you don’t mind if I keep this, so I won’t get thirsty in the car.” She doesn’t wait for an answer, but nods to me. We turn to leave together.
“Do you really know if Akihito has a mole that high up?” I ask Chi as we wave goodbye to the shaky couple from the car.
“Oh, I doubt it, but once we get them promoted, we’ll be in all levels of the organization. And I know Oxy will be able to monitor them pretty well. If they fall off the wagon, we’ll know.”
*****