26. Chapter 26
Chapter 26
Vincent
“ T here are two streams that would be reliable sources of water during the dry season,” Elijah explains from the front passenger seat as our all-terrain vehicle makes its way past the flat and rolling landscape. “As we already proved, we can grow the plants here in Trinidad as well as they grow in Jamaica. Clearing the vegetation on the land would give us an additional fifteen to twenty acres.”
“That would produce a lot more than our farms in Jamaica,” I note.
Beside me, Cho pulls at his shirt collar. He’s not used to humid weather, having grown up in the dryer parts of North Korea, in the leeward side of the Nangnim Mountains, which block moist air from reaching his provincial town.
Reggie rides in the last vehicle with Ming and one of Elijah’s men. Yang Mi and Charlie are in the second vehicle with Andre, another member of our security team.
“Is that another vehicle?” asks the driver, pointing ahead into the bushes.
“Slow down,” Cho says immediately while he pulls out his light machine gun.
Something doesn’t feel right to me either. I see three men get out of the car.
Cho pushes me down just before bullets start to fly, piercing into our vehicle. Glass shatters around me. Cho leans over me to return fire. I hear additional gunfire coming from the other cars. Bullets dent the other side of our vehicle. There’s more than one enemy car.
“Give me your handgun!” I shout to Cho.
“Stay down!” Cho replies.
Ignoring him, I grab the Merck from his holster and fire out the other window. A man covered in dark green and black falls to the ground. From the sides of my eyes, I see that Elijah and the driver are both slumped forward. A bullet ricochets and skims my bicep.
Reggie moves into view, spraying his automatic into the trees and bushes. The gunfire dies down.
“Stay in the vehicle, Boss,” Reggie says before stepping over a fallen body. He signals to Andre, and they head into the forestry to scout for additional gunmen.
Who the fuck just ambushed us? I wonder.
Looking to Cho, I see blood running along the side of his face. He’s also been shot in the shoulder.
“I’m okay, Boss,” Cho assures me.
Reaching into the front seat, I check for a pulse in Elijah’s neck. Nothing. I pull the driver off the wheel and see a bullet struck him right between the eyes.
Reggie returns. “Looks clear.”
Stepping out of the car, I see three bodies around the first vehicle we had spotted. I walk over to see how the others are and open the back door to see Yang Mi lying against Charlie, holding her left side. Blood oozes from between her fingers.
Charlie looks at me, his face pale. “She’s been shot.”
Seeing that Charlie looks unscathed, I tell him to get out and I take his place. Ripping my shirt off, I use it to apply pressure to her wound and lean her against me.
“Where’s Ming?” I ask.
“Here, Boss, I’m fine,” Ming says as he walks up.
“Cho’s been shot, too,” I tell Reggie. “Get him and us to Port of Spain as fast as possible. Have Dr. Das meet us at the hospital.”
“I’ll stay behind to question our attackers,” Charlie offers.
I direct Ming to help out Charlie. Reggie takes the wheel as Cho gets into the front passenger seat.
“Stay with me,” I tell Yang Mi.
She nods.
I wipe the sweat off her brow and monitor her breathing. “It’s just a flesh wound. You’re going to be fine. Don’t think you’re going to get out of being the next head dragon with this weak injury.”
She returns a shaky smile. “Yes, Boss.”
“Ming’s on the phone,” Cho says, handing me his cell.
“Any clue on the assailants?” I ask Ming.
“They’re locals, but they have advanced automatic weaponry. I don’t think the gangs here pack this kind of heat. Someone supplied them is my guess.”
“Are any of them alive?”
“One of them, but he might be in a permanent vegetative state from the look of it.”
“They were waiting for us.”
“You think they were targeting Elijah?”
“Most of the shots seemed to come into the back of the car,” Cho says.
Elijah is small fry, so it’s hard to imagine such a coordinated attack was meant for him.
We get to the hospital, where Yang Mi and Cho are rushed into the emergency room. Ming and Charlie arrive later.
Cho comes out of the operating room a few hours later. Yang Mi remains in surgery for several more hours. I pace the room where Cho is recovering.
I curse. Who the fuck did this? Who the fuck?
“Charlie, get feelers out and see what you can pick up here,” I command.
“Sure, Boss. You think a local gang didn’t want us in their backyard?”
“Anything’s possible,” I say, though my first instinct doesn’t think so. The organized crime bosses here know it’s best not to take us on.
“I’ll stay to make sure our connection within the police department is solid,” Ming says. “He said the cops are sending people over now.”
The story given to the cops is that Cho and Yang Mi are a newly married couple being given a tour of the area. They were either potential kidnap victims or mistaken by local gangs to be trespassers.
I stay out of the picture while Ming pretends to be Yang Mi’s father. Ming suggests I check into a hotel nearby or even take the jet back to Jamaica. I refuse. I’m not leaving until I see that Yang Mi is going to be okay.
The surgery went well, according to Ming. It went long because there were a lot of bullet fragments, but no organs or major blood vessels were injured.
The following day I get to see Yang Mi in the ICU. Though she’s a petite woman, she carries herself large. And even though she’s pale and weakened and strapped to medical equipment and IVs for fluid, antibiotics, and pain medication, she still exudes strength.
“The doctor said if no complications like infection show up, I will only need minor reconstructive surgery at most,” Yang Mi explains.
“For someone who got shot yesterday, you sound well,” I note.
“Finally got the staff to boil some hot water for her,” Ming says as he pours her a cup. “I can’t believe they expect her to drink cold water after surgery.”
Ming finishes telling me, “The surgeon was astounded at how well she performed under surgery. Her vitals remained remarkably stable the whole time.”
Yang Mi smiles at me. “Probably thanks to all that qigong you had me do.”
“You still practice daily, right?” I ask.
“Till now. You?”
My practice has faltered some due to my headaches, though I have tried to push through the pain. Mostly, I’ve been distracted by a certain omega.
“I’m good,” I reply. “You better recover if you want to head the organization someday.”
“I’m not ceding the position to Charlie so easily. But it’s not like you’re retiring anytime soon. Right, Boss?”
Ming jumps in. “The boss is still young and can lead for decades to come. It will be a blow to the organization when that day comes. Of course, it doesn’t hurt to groom a successor in case anything unexpected happens, but we pray such a thing will not come to pass.”
Thinking back to the hail of gunshots, I say, “Someone’s trying to make it happen.”
“Esen is already making plans to beef up security.”
“You should go back to Jamaica,” Yang Mi says. “It’ll be safer in your compound or yacht. No reason to stay here. I’ll be fine.”
After leaving Yang Mi, I instruct Reggie, “Stay and watch over her. We don’t know that she wasn’t being targeted in the ambush.”
Reggie hands me his Merck and holster. “You better start carrying, Boss.”
“I’ll go back with you, Boss,” Cho volunteers. “The hospital wants me to stay another day, but I’m fine. I can change my own bandages.”
Charlie meets me and Cho at the airport.
“Any intel?” I ask.
He shakes his head. The locals are just as confused as we are,” he replies.
“What’s your assessment?” I ask Cho after we’re settled into my private jet.
“Can’t say for sure,” Cho answers. “It happened so fast, but I had Andre count the bullet holes in the cars. Your side of the car had ten times more bullet holes than any other part of all three cars. I think they were gunning for you, Boss.”
“And Elijah and Yang Mi were collateral damage?”
“That would be my guess.”
During the flight back, I can’t help but wonder how it is there were two attempts on my life within weeks of each other. Hard to imagine it’s a coincidence. Could Martina have orchestrated this? Her family was mafia. She might have had some connections. She managed to get on my yacht after all.
Or was it her accomplice? Did he act alone? Or were they in on this together? Did they manage to communicate somehow even though I had isolated both of them ?
Esen meets us at the airport in Kingston. We discuss changes to security.
“I’ll have more guys flown in from New York,” Esen says. “I also interrogated the pretty boy yesterday after Ming briefed me. I thought I was pretty persuasive.”
He fists one hand into the palm of the other to demonstrate his method of persuasion.
“But he insists he doesn’t know anything,” Esen sighs. “He either really doesn’t, or he’s tougher than he looks.”
Just like Martina. I feel a stab of jealousy and press my lips into a firm line. “Try again.”
When we’re back on the yacht, I don’t bother changing. I head straight for Martina’s suite.
Upon seeing me and Cho, Misty asks to take a restroom break.
“Go ahead,” Cho says. “I’ll stand here.”
I face the door. Time to have a chat with my pet.