Tokyo Enigma (21 page)

Chances were good that even if Nozaka was able to keep up
with us, he wouldn't be in a position to help. Even if he managed, he
might not know what was best to do.

I borrowed a laser pointer from Protect Agency's stash of
presentation tools. If I clicked it on once, it meant Nozaka should
smack the man in front of me with a Pachinko ball. If I clicked it
twice, it meant I was nervous and he should smack the guy
anyway.

None of that would do us any good if they took us to a
basement or an underground railway. They didn't. We met at a fish
market.

Yuri had gotten several calls. Each one directed us to
another location. I guess they'd learned from our park encounter and
intended to make it tough for backup to follow us. The market was
on Tokyo Bay at Tsukiji, a village of shops and quays and auction
sites. At this time of night, things were quiet. Action didn't get into
full swing until just before sunrise, when fishers brought in their
catch.

We parked on the outskirts and waited. After five calls and a
meander through fish stalls, we met our hosts.

I didn't recognize either of them, and no one spoke. They
just led the way to a car. Yamazaki got out of the back seat. He and
the other two men searched us. They had us stand back from the car,
lean forward and put our hands on the roof. They did a thorough job,
especially on Yuri. Yamazaki searched her. He let his hands linger on
the insides of her thighs and across her breasts. I tempered the fire
in my own breast before it blazed out of control.

Another time. Another moment. Soon, Panther.

He found Yuri's sap in her coat pocket. He tested its heft,
slapped it against his palm and put it in his own coat. As long as we
stayed together, and he didn't discover the transmitter inside, it was
fine for him to keep it.

Yamazaki told us to get into the back seat of the car. It was
the first time anyone had spoken. He and I sat next to the doors. The
other two men took the front. As we pulled out of the parking area, I
saw a second car fall in behind us.

We took a freeway out of town. I couldn't tell exactly where
we were headed except that it was away from the bay, which meant
more or less west, toward the mountains. I tried to ask Yamazaki
where Sayoko was, but he ignored Yuri's translation. When we
persisted, he told us to shut up.

I wanted to turn around to see if the other car was still with
us. More precisely, I wanted to know if Nozaka was following.
Instead, I sat still, as Tokyo's neon glare faded to a glow and the land
lay dark beyond the lights of the highway. Our road led uphill
through forest. We turned onto ever-smaller roads, until we were on
gravel and there was only one set of lights behind us. They didn't
belong to Nozaka.

We finally stopped. Yokoyama, his two plainclothes police
pals and a young guy, who looked like a malnourished accountant,
got out of the second car. Yamakazi led us deeper into the woods to a
small clearing.

There was nothing out here. No cabin, no campground, no
Sayoko. Nothing but solitude. It didn't take long to eliminate all but
two of the reasons why they might have brought us there. No one to
hear a gun shot, and they wouldn't have to haul bodies.

The plainclothes policeman who had asked for my passport
spoke.

"Where's the key?" Yuri translated.

"I don't have it."

The cop drew his pistol, aimed it between my legs and fired
a round a couple of inches too low to do damage. I tensed but didn't
move.

"We can hurt you, and then we can search you. Are you sure
you don't have the key?"

Oddly, the smell of gunpowder calmed me. The contrast to
the odor of cedar and pine intensified my awareness of the forest
around us. It was the closest I'd felt to home since I walked off the
plane.

"Where's Sayoko?" I said. "If I see Sayoko, maybe I can
remember where the key is."

The cop blinked. Then he laughed. They all laughed except
for the accountant.

"I'm serious. You've got her. How do I know she's safe?"

"She's safe," Yamazaki said. He drew his pistol and pointed it
at Yuri.

"Wait! This isn't about the key. You want a tape."

No more smiles.

"The one I have is of Ohashi and Maho. They're doing weird
stuff. Is that what you're looking for?"

"Where is it?" The plainclothes cop jabbed me in the chest
with the barrel of his gun.

"Is that what you're looking for?"

"
Hai
!" He screamed.
Yes.

I took the key out of my pocket and handed it to him. "That
opens a safe-deposit box. The tape is inside."

He handed the key to the accountant, who studied it with a
flashlight. After a while, he nodded. Maybe the man was a
white-collar locksmith.

"What bank?" the cop asked.

I gave him the bank's location and Maho's alias.

"The tape is still there?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you take it?"

"We made a copy."

That information didn't seem to bother him.

"Do you have a copy of the tape with you?"

"No."

He looked at Yokoyama and gestured toward me. "Search
him."

Yokoyama stood in front of me, made a fist and hit me
across the nose.

I saw it coming and turned my head at the contact. Nothing
broken, but it still hurt.

He opened my coat and stuck his hand into an inside pocket.
There was nothing in it but the laser pointer. "What's this?"

"Don't touch that." I pointed to the ON switch.

The cop must not have been impressed with Yokoyama's
intimidation. He took over. "What is that?"

"It's a transmitter. It sends out our location. That button
turns it off."

He snatched the pointer away from Yokoyama and pressed
the button. The dot of a red laser danced in the misty dark.

A few seconds later, we heard the crack of steel against
skull. Nozaka's pachinko ball had hit the cop just above the eye. He
pressed his hand against the wound. A trickle of blood ran down his
cheek. Four of the men had drawn pistols. Their attention focused on
a ninety-degree arc covering the range that the ball could have come
from. No one moved until we heard our own voices.

Nozaka and his parabolic mike had gotten a recording. He
was playing it back for us.

"Is that what you're looking for? Yes!"

The next ball hit Yamazaki in the face. He and the two cops
sprinted across the clearing and caromed through the trees toward
the sound of the recording.

I glanced at Yuri. She gave a sharp nod. No countdown. She
kicked the man in front of her in the head. At the same time, I twisted
my hips and shoulders. My fist followed and caught Yokoyama on the
temple. Before he dropped, I shoved him into the man with the
gun.

He stumbled.

I grabbed the wrist to his gun hand and drove him
backwards until he fell. I pushed my thumb into the corner of his eye
and bore down.

He screamed and fired the pistol.

I tried to pull it from his hand.

He held on and kept firing until the trigger clicked on empty
chambers.

I heard shouts and gunfire from the forest. "Run!"

Yuri dashed for cover.

I stood, made a clumsy kick at the guy's head and followed
her. Shots sounded behind us and I felt the shock wave of a bullet
pass close to my head.

The skinny accountant squatted with his hands on his
head.

We made the trees and kept running. I couldn't tell how far
we'd gone, but I guessed about two hundred yards when Yuri fell.
Her foot had caught on a root. She got to her feet, but could scarcely
hobble.

I knew three men were down. The accountant wasn't a
factor. There was no undergrowth, no place for Yuri to hide. And I
could hear more than one man moving toward us.

I stood silent against a tree. The men moving our way might
as well have carried sirens announcing their positions. Predators
without fear or caution. In a crouch, I moved silently toward their
flank, toward the sounds of their thrashing. They would come to me.
I only had to be at the outside.

I stopped to listen, adjusted my direction and kept slipping
quietly among the trees. Three of them were spread ten or fifteen
yards apart. My target was thirty to forty yards away. I crouched at
the base of a tree and slipped the cover off Nozaka's pen. I ran my
thumb over the blade. It was shaped like a triangular arrowhead,
designed to maximize bleeding.

I didn't want to move until he came to me, but he had shifted
direction. I pushed off the tree and dashed toward him.

The instant he heard me, he stopped. It was Yokoyama. He
saw me charging, turned awkwardly and fired point blank.

He missed.

I chopped my hand into his wrist, aimed for his carotid
artery and plunged the two-inch blade into his neck.

The other two were crashing toward me. I spun and dove to
the ground, rolled, and came up running.

A bullet splintered a branch in front of me.

I cut right, and then left.

They ceased firing and ran directly at me.

I stopped zigzagging and ran as straight as I could amid the
trees.

They stayed with me. The cold air scoured my lungs and
raked phlegm into my throat. Branches tore at my face and
arms.

I broke out of the woods into a clearing. I guessed I had a
lead of about twenty yards. A ravine was about that far ahead of me,
and I sprinted toward it. When I looked back, I saw a man in a
shooter's stance. As I dove and rolled again, I felt the bullet tear
across my left thigh. I fell at the sharp edge of the ravine, tucked my
head, and somersaulted to a gravel riverbank. Another gunshot as I
scrambled into the water. My breath caught at its iciness. Cold crept
into my clothes as I went under and stroked downstream.

I could hold my breath only seconds against the cold, and I
surfaced at too-short intervals. Another shot sounded, and I felt the
shock waves from a bullet through the water.

A quick glance let me see Yamazaki running along the
bank.

He fired as I went under. A bullet, slowed by the water, hit
my back, but didn't penetrate.

I surfaced again and looked toward the bank.

Yamazaki was walking along the ravine's edge, matching my
pace in the water and aiming. But there was no gunshot. He ran
down the wall of the ravine and waded into the stream, not too far
ahead of me.

I was lost in the current, exhausted by the cold and the
weight of my clothes. There was no way past him. I could only go
through him.

He lunged toward me and trod water until we collided.
Wrapping his arm around my head, he forced me under water.

I shoved against his face and pulled impotently at his arm.
Giving up, I struggled for another grip. When I caught two of his
fingers, I jerked. Hard.

Water amplified the crack of bone. His hold loosened.

I pulled my head free, broke the surface and gulped air.

He grabbed me around the shoulders. We both went under. I
worked my hand into my pants pocket and grabbed the key.

My lungs demanded air. In one last, desperate move, I found
his ear, pushed the key inside, and twisted.

Screaming, he pulled away.

I seized his coat at the shoulder and used his body for
leverage until I could get my legs around his neck in a scissors hold. I
squeezed while churning the water with my arms to bring my face to
the surface. One breath and we sank again.

His hands tore at my clothes and at the wound in my
thigh.

I rode his thrashing body.

His movements slowed.

He went still.

I let go.

My legs quivered and I sucked air in desperate gasps as I
pulled Yamazaki through the water and onto the bank. I turned him
onto his back, put my hands below his diaphragm and pushed to
expel water from his lungs. I pinched his nose closed, opened his
mouth and breathed into it again and again. I touched his neck. There
was a pulse, weak, but he was still alive. I continued breathing for
him until his chest rose and fell on its own.

Blood oozed from my leg in a steady stream. I stripped and
tied my undershirt tight over the wound. I put my clothes back on
and cinched my belt around my leg. They were soaked and afforded
little protection from the cold. I curled into a fetal position, shivering
so hard that I bit my tongue.

Muscles in Yamazaki's face and hand twitched. His feet were
still in the river. I didn't have the strength or the will to move. I lay
there, watching him breathe, and found solace in his life. It was one
less sin that I would never carry to confession.

My shivering eased, but I still had no desire to move. When I
heard footsteps on the gravel riverbank, all I did was look up. It was
too late for anything else. The man came close, squatted and looked
me in the face. It was Nozaka.

"How did you find me?"

"I heard shots and walked toward them. You're cold."

"Yeah, I know."

Nozaka took off his coat and sweater. I told him about Yuri
and the men we'd put down as I slipped on the dry clothes. His coat
was snug, but I could wear it. While I was dressing, he pulled
Yamazaki higher onto the bank so his feet were out of the water.
"What happened to him?"

"I tried to swim away. He grabbed me."

Nozaka nodded. "Be careful what you chase. You might catch
it."

Yamazaki had made a gurgling sound when he was moved.
He tried to roll onto his side. When Nozaka pulled him to a sitting
position, he vomited between his legs and fell back, mumbling and
trying to push himself upright.

"Sayoko," I said.

Nozako took over. He knew what I wanted. He rubbed
Yamakazi's face with light, rapid strokes to warm his skin. "Where is
Sayoko Shiyoda?" he said.

Yamazaki wagged his head slowly.