Singapore Sling Shot - Andrew Grant [131]
The second email was from Sakura. She was asking how I was. What could I say? That I had lost the woman I maybe loved. That half the world wanted to kill me while the other half didn’t care if I lived or died.
“Oh crap!” I snarled aloud at myself. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself, you sad fuck!” My cellphone went a moment or two later. It was Sami.
“Yes, Daniel,” he said. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself!”
“You what?”
“I agree with you. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Sylvia is getting married again. Sakura is calling to see how you are. As you have often said to me, life goes on, my friend.”
“How do you know this?” The answer was obvious, Sami had bugged the office and wherever he was calling from, he had a monitoring system. He laughed.
“Go to my Samurai, Daniel. Lift off his helmet.”
I did as Sami told me. I stepped around the figure to the rear. The fucking thing still gave me the shivers. I didn’t want the arm that held that damned sword to suddenly come to life. I lifted off the ornate, full-face mask. There, in place of the mannequin’s head, was a camera on a swivel mechanism. As I stood looking up at it, the camera moved without a sound. The lens turned 180 degrees and stared down at me. I moved past the warrior and put the helmet down on the desk. The camera followed me. I picked up the mobile and put it back to my ear.
“You look like shit.”
“Thank you, Doctor,” I replied. “I guess the microphone is in the armour.”
“On his belt, actually. It’s amazing what my Samurai sees. Our friend Kaylin indulged herself in here several times with a variety of playmates; including my brother, unfortunately.”
“I didn’t know you were into voyeurism,” I said sarcastically.
“Only when my security is threatened,” Sami responded smoothly.
“Sorry, my old friend, I’m a bit shitty-livered today!”
“It’s called grief, Daniel. I’m feeling it too, but let us put Lu away, say farewell to the Mendez mob and bury our dead. Then we’ll grieve properly.”
“You’re right,” I replied. “Absolutely right. When are you coming in?”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
“Roger that!”
I replaced the Samurai’s mask and sat back down at the computer. I wrote to Sakura asking her how she was doing and told her I was fine. I ended by saying that I would come and see her in a few weeks. I sent the mail and then flicked into my bank account.
I had US$52 million plus change sitting warming itself in the Caribbean. There was some comfort in that, I guess. I poured another coffee, lit a cigarette and waited for Sami. Nicotine and caffeine, the diet of kings and killers!
I’ve always had a problem killing time leading up to an operation, and this day was no different. Sami came. We talked and he outlined his plan. It was simple. It was, dare I say it, brilliant. Now I knew what he meant when he said that just three of us could storm Thomas Lu’s fortress in the sky and take it. If all went well, Thomas Lu’s death would appear to be a suicide. Failing that, it could be seen to be the final act in the gang war that the media and police still maintained had caused the dozens of deaths and injuries in Singapore in the past few months.
However, if things went totally out of control and we failed to kill Lu, the magnificent condo block in which Thomas Lu lived would be reduced to rubble in seconds. The Mendez brothers always kept their promises, according to their legend anyway. Now was not the time to check the veracity of that legend.
Their cartel had blown up the main prison in Bogota in 2003 in a controlled blast. While it had freed dozens of their own men, who obviously knew it was coming, it had also killed two hundred other inmates, many of whom were members of rival drug gangs. Fifty police and prison guards also died in the blast.
The cartel was also blamed for an explosion that completely destroyed the mansion of a legislator from La Palma, chairman of the anti-drug wing of the government in neighbouring Panama. Thirty people died in the blast, all because the official had aligned himself firmly with the Americans