Michael Connelly - 9 Dragons

“Then, let’s go.”

Bosch put his arm around his daughter and they started to follow Sun off the pier. She held on to him the whole way and it wasn’t until they got to the car that she seemed to acknowledge the meaning of Sun’s presence and asked the question Harry had been dreading.

“Dad?”

“What, Maddie?”

“Where’s Mom?”

Bosch didn’t answer her question directly. He simply told his daughter that her mother could not be with them at the moment but had packed a bag for her and that they needed to get to the airport to leave Hong Kong. Sun said nothing and picked up his pace, moving in front of them and removing himself from the discussion.

The explanation seemingly bought Harry some time to consider how and when he would give the answer that would alter the rest of his daughter’s life. When they got to the black Mercedes, he put her in the backseat before going to the trunk to grab the backpack. He didn’t want her to see the bag Eleanor had packed for herself. He checked the compartments of Eleanor’s bag and found his daughter’s passport. He put it in his pocket.

He got in the front passenger seat and handed the backpack to her. He told her to change out of her school uniform. He then checked his watch and gave Sun a nod.

“Let’s go. We’ve got a plane to catch.”

Sun started driving, proceeding out of the waterfront area at a brisk but not attention-getting pace.

“Is there a ferry or train you can drop us at that will get us there direct?” Bosch asked.

“No, they closed the ferry route and you would have to switch trains. It would be better if I take you. I wish to.”

“Okay, Sun Yee.”

They drove for a few minutes of silence. Bosch wanted to turn and talk to his daughter, putting his eyes on her to make sure she was okay.

“Maddie, are you changed?”

She didn’t answer.

“Maddie?”

Bosch turned and glanced back at her. She had changed clothes. She was leaning against the door behind Sun, staring out through the window while hugging her pillow to her chest. There were tears on her cheeks. It did not appear that she had noticed the bullet hole through the pillow.

“Maddie, you all right”

Without answering or looking away from the window, she said, “She’s dead, isn’t she”

“What?”

Bosch knew exactly who and what she was talking about but was trying to stretch time, put off as long as possible the inevitable.

“I’m not stupid, you know. You’re here. Sun Yee’s here. She should be here. She would be here but something’s happened to her.”

Bosch felt an invisible punch hit him square in the chest. Madeline was still hugging the pillow in front of her and looking out the window with tear-filled eyes.

“Maddie, I’m sorry. I wanted to tell you but this wasn’t the right time?.”

“When is the right time?”

Bosch nodded.

“You’re right. Never.”

He reached back and put his hand on her knee but she immediately pushed it away. It was the first sign of the blame he would always carry.

“I’m so sorry. I don’t know what I can say. When I landed this morning your mother was there at the airport, waiting for me. With Sun Yee. She only wanted one thing, Maddie. To get you home safe. She didn’t care about anything else, including herself.”

“What happened to her?”

Bosch hesitated but there was no other way to respond but with the truth.

“She got shot, baby. Somebody was shooting at me and she got hit. I don’t think she even felt it.”

Madeline put her hands over her eyes.

“It’s all my fault.”

Bosch shook his head, even though she wasn’t looking at him.

“Maddie, no. Listen to me. Don’t ever say that. Don’t even think that. It’s not your fault. It’s my fault. Everything here is my fault.”

She didn’t respond. She hugged the pillow closer and kept her eyes on the roadside as it passed by in a blur.

An hour later they were at the drop-off curb at the airport. Bosch helped his daughter out of the Mercedes and then turned to Sun. They had said little in the car. But now it was time to say good-bye and Bosch knew his daughter could not have been rescued without Sun’s help.

“Sun Yee, thank you for saving my daughter.”

“You saved her. Nothing could stop you, Harry Bosch.”

“What will you do? The police will come to you about Eleanor, if not everything else.”

“I will handle these things and make no mention of you. This is my promise. No matter what happens, I will leave you and your daughter out of it.”

Bosch nodded.

“Good luck,” he said.

“Good luck to you, too.”

Bosch shook his hand and then stepped back. After another awkward pause, Madeline stepped forward and hugged Sun. Bosch saw the look on his face, even behind the disguise of the sunglasses. No matter their differences, Bosch knew Sun had found some sort of resolve in Madeline’s rescue. Maybe it allowed him to find refuge in himself.

“I am so sorry,” Madeline said.

Sun stepped back and broke the embrace.

“You go on now,” he said. “You have a happy life.”

They left him standing there and headed into the main terminal through the glass doors.

Bosch and his daughter found the first-class window at Cathay Pacific and Harry bought two tickets on the 11:40 p.m. flight to Los Angeles. He got a refund for his intended flight the next morning but still had to use two credit cards to cover the overall cost. But he didn’t care. He knew that first-class passengers were accorded special status that moved them quickly through security checks and first onto planes. Airport and airline staff and security were less likely to concern themselves with first-class travelers, even if they were a disheveled man with blood on his jacket and a thirteen-year-old girl who couldn’t seem to keep tears off her cheeks.

Bosch also understood that his daughter had been left traumatized by the past sixty hours of her life, and while he couldn’t begin to know how to care for her in this regard, he instinctively felt that any added comfort couldn’t hurt.

Noting Bosch’s unkempt appearance, the woman behind the counter mentioned to him that the first-class waiting lounge offered showering facilities to travelers. Bosch thanked her for the tip, took their boarding passes and then followed a first-class hostess to security. As expected, they breezed through the checkpoint on the power of their newfound status.

They had almost three hours to kill and though the previously mentioned shower facility was tempting, Bosch decided that food might be a more pressing need. He couldn’t remember when and what he had last eaten and he assumed his daughter had been equally deprived of nourishment.

“You hungry, Mads?”

“Not really.”

“They fed you?”

“No, uh-uh. I couldn’t eat, anyway.”

“When did you last eat something?”

She had to think.

“I had a piece of pizza at the mall on Friday. Before…”

“Okay, we’ve got to eat, then.”

They took an escalator up to an area where there were a variety of restaurants overlooking the duty-free shopping mecca. Bosch chose a sit-down restaurant in the center of the concourse that had good views of the shopping level. His daughter ordered chicken fingers and Bosch ordered a steak and french fries.

“You should never order a steak at an airport,” Madeline said.

“Why’s that?”

“You won’t get good quality.”

Bosch nodded. It was the first time she had said something more than one or two words in length since they had said good-bye to Sun. Harry had been watching her slowly collapse inward as the release of fear that followed her escape wore off and the reality of what she had been through and what had happened to her mother sank in. Bosch had feared she might be going into some form of shock. Her odd observation about the quality of steak in an airport seemed to indicate that she was in a dissociated state.