Lee Weeks - Kiss and Die

‘I know, and the trouble is that conflict of interests is going to be a permanent problem unless Mann can resolve it,’ said Mia.

‘Given time, he will make the right decisions,’ said Ng. ‘He needs the pressure taken off him to do that. They are forcing him out of the job he was born to do and back into a world he was born into. It will break him. He will snap if he is forced to bend against his will.’

‘So, we carry on without him and hope that we can clear his name,’ said Mia, sounding as upbeat as she could but feeling anything but.

Shrimp and Ng agreed. It was the only thing they could do. They walked back to their office. Ng reached over to turn on his PC and hung his jacket over the back of his chair. He turned to look at Shrimp whose face was frozen in a puzzled expression. He was staring across at Mann’s desk: papers, files, messages in his in-tray, memos stacking up on his desk.

‘What do you think he’s doing right now?’

‘He’s probably drinking himself into a stupor.’

‘What’s he going to do, Ng?’

‘I don’t know, Shrimp.’

Shrimp looked lost. Mann had been his mentor and his friend. He couldn’t imagine him leaving the force. Mann lived for it more than any of them.

‘I’ve seen him go through some bleak times. I’ve seen him be self-destructive but I’ve never seen him as bad as this. He’s always had his work but it’s not enough at the moment. I think it’s almost like he feels he doesn’t belong here any more.’

‘What can we do?’

‘We have to leave him alone, wait until he comes out of it one way or another and then we have to clear his name.’

‘I’m on it.’ Shrimp picked up his jacket.

‘Where are you going?’

‘I need to get them to leave Mann alone. I’m going to go and see CK. I’m going to face him and tell him we’ll have him in for questioning about the murder charges. We’ll bring his daughter in for inciting racial hatred, for being an accessory to the murder of a police officer.’ Shrimp stood and picked up his vintage denim Gaultier jacket.

‘No. You’ll blow your cover. Anyway, we mustn’t be hasty. We must think it through. He is not a man to be easily outsmarted.’

Shrimp wasn’t happy about it but he shrugged and left, throwing his jacket over his shoulders.

Ng waited until Shrimp was out of the office and then he dialled CK’s number.

‘I need to see you.’

Ruby stood over Sheng’s naked body. The ball gag was in his mouth. His arms were tied together and chained to the wall behind his head. His legs were open and chained to the wall either side of the mattress. The lamp shone down onto him. Ruby was very pleased with herself. She might be young but she understood that sex was every woman’s ultimate killing tool. A woman’s body was her weapon. She had fooled three policemen in one night. Sheng was still recovering from the Rophypnol.

She went over to him and knelt beside him and whispered in his ear:

‘You fell for the oldest trick in the book. Never judge by appearances.’ She ran her hand down his body until it settled on his cock. She stroked it. ‘You were ruled by this weren’t you?’ He didn’t move. ‘Tut tut tut. You should have kept your eyes open. You looked away once too often. I have very quick hands. I have very nimble fingers. I can put something in your drink faster than you can look down my cleavage.’ He was still dopey, coming round slowly. ‘You’re still not listening to me. I know just how to wake you up.’ Ruby picked up the autopsy pliers and she rested Sheng’s little finger between their open pincers and then she shut them- snap – tight.

Sheng’s eyes opened wide. He stared straight at Ruby and then at the finger she held in her hand and he screamed into the gag.

‘One finger, two fingers, three and four.’ Snap snap snap…she cut his fingers off and placed a finger on each of the dolls’ laps and when she had run out she began cutting off Sheng’s toes.

Mann didn’t answer the door straight away. He sat in his armchair in the lounge; Daniel Lu had let Mann keep the lounge furniture. The bedroom was empty; every item removed and now being scrutinized in the lab. The telly blaring. He thought it was Ng. He shouted, ‘Fuck off,’ and turned the volume on the telly up. The knock came again. Then Mann realized the knock was different; it wasn’t Ng’s. He paused the film and slipped out of the chair. He walked to the side of the door and called out.

‘Who is it?’

A woman’s voice answered. ‘Victoria Chan. I need to speak with you. It’s urgent.’

Mann looked through the spy hole. Victoria Chan looked back.

‘What do you want?’

‘To talk, as I said.’

She raised her hand, knuckles at the ready to knock again. She wasn’t going to go away. He unlocked the door and walked back into the room, his back to her. She walked straight in and seemed oblivious to the mess. She was wearing a black pencil skirt, a checked jacket, red stilettos, matching red handbag, red lipstick. Her hair was tied up.

She strode over to the armchair and sat down. ‘There were things I didn’t want to discuss in public, things that are just between us.’

Mann looked at the TV. He threw the mess off the other chair and sat down. He cleared the glass-topped table and placed the bottle of vodka down on it. He studied her with a cold eye.

‘You have nothing to say that will interest me.’

‘I had nothing to do with the death of your officer. I cannot help the fact that I used the information given to me and told of her infiltration into our ranks.’

‘Shut up. I don’t want to listen to you. I know where the blame for it lies. I have been suspended, and when I look at you, I see you had a big hand in it. Congratulations. But, before you start gloating, it won’t be for long. And just because I am suspended from the force doesn’t mean I have switched sides.’

She sat with her legs to one side, her hands on her lap. She looked around the room. ‘I can’t see you getting reinstated in a hurry, can you? I see that you have been going through your father’s papers.’

Mann studied her. She had balls. She was a woman who would never give up. She looked at the pile next to Mann’s chair. He’d been going over Tammy’s autopsy report. He picked it up and moved it out of her line of sight. ‘Believe it or not, there’s a system to this chaos. Now, can we get to the point? I’m a busy man.’

Victoria settled back into the chair. ‘Take the afternoon off. Let me get some food in. You look like you could do with some time out. Take a shower, relax. I may not be a friend but I am a business associate whether you like it or not. We have things to talk about. I expect by now you have seen that what I said is true. Many of your late father’s enterprises are linked with the Leung Corporation dealings.’

Mann rubbed his face. He pushed his hair away from his eyes. He suddenly felt completely drained. She was right, at least in that one small thing, he needed a break. ‘Okay.’ He stood up. ‘There’s a list of numbers in the kitchen. They all deliver. You choose.’ Mann got up and began to pick up the piles of papers.

‘I’m surprised you live alone here. No adoring girlfriend?’ she called to him from the kitchen. ‘Although it does look like a woman lived here once. There are things in here that no man would buy.’

‘My private life is none of your business.’

‘Of course it isn’t, but you’re a good-looking man. You are not short of women wanting to marry you, I’m sure. But you choose to stay single. Why is that?’ She took off her jacket and draped it over the chair. Beneath it she had on an expensive white lace blouse sheer enough to see a broderie anglaise slip beneath.