She just turns and starts running north. I follow, moving fast, leaping debris and dodging fallen containers. Endo. For the first time since Boston, he’s within reach, and I intend to put that bastard over my knee and spank the shit out of him, like I’m a card-carrying member of the Pat Robertson fan club.
5
“What the—” I manage to say, before slamming into the steel wall of a bright red container. I grunt and take a deep breath, replenishing the air knocked from my lungs and catching a strong whiff of oil and fishy ocean. “It’s not fair that my girlfriend can manhandle me.”
“On mission, we’re partners,” she reminds me. “Remember? Also, you like it.”
She’s right. My girl is buff and can fight. Not many guys would admit it, but that’s pretty hot.
“And if you’re not too busy whining like a sissy,” she says, “maybe you’d like to help me catch Endo?”
“You saw him?”
“About 200 feet ahead. Walking away with a woman. Straight black hair.”
I inch closer to the side of the container and peek around it. When I was running behind Collins, I couldn’t see much of what was ahead. But I quickly spot the pair, walking away casually like they were supposed to be there. Endo nods to a few of the Hong Kong police searching the area for evidence, and they give curt waves back. Not quite friendly. More like tolerant respect. The FC-P is known throughout the world. Although other agencies wouldn’t have been granted immediate access to a catastrophe in China, the FC-P is welcome, mostly because the images of Boston laid to waste are impossible to forget. No one wants that to happen to their city. That Endo is using our credentials to gain access to sites like this, no doubt on behalf of Zoomb, feels like a frontal wedgie from Hulk Hogan.
I manage to control my ire and focus. “We can follow the rows of containers on either side. Flank them. Catch them in the middle.”
Collins nods and heads off, moving quickly down the left side of a container row, which was undisturbed by the previous night’s attack.
A quick peek around the other side reveals that Endo and his friend haven’t changed course or pace. They’re unaware of us. Moving casually, like I belong, I look south and walk across the open space between containers. Even if they had been looking, they wouldn’t have been able to I.D. me.
Safely hidden by the containers on the other side of the alley, I continue to the far side, but the path isn’t nearly as clear as the one Collins took. Several containers have been knocked over and crushed, their contents disgorged. Toilet seats, clock radios and what appear to be massagers or maybe sex toys, litter the concrete.
I do my best to hurry through the mess, but there isn’t much room to place my feet. After thirty seconds of stumbling, my foot rolls atop a massager, which shoots out from under me. My unceremonious fall is stopped by a toilet seat—the squishy kind, so that’s something. But my knees take the brunt of the fall, and I quickly come to the conclusion that Endo will be long gone by the time I pick my way through this mess. As the massager buzzes at me, I get back to my feet, find the nearest ladder and then throw myself onto the rungs.
Move, you idiot, my internal monologue shouts at me. I climb the ladder, reaching the container’s top quickly. I now have a clear shot down the row. I can see Endo, now much further ahead. In a minute, he’ll be outside the port, no doubt whisked away by a waiting vehicle. I take two steps and stop. Not only are the metal containers slick with morning dew, but my boots sound like thunder as I move.
A menagerie of cuss words flow from my lips as I quickly remove my boots. I’m probably going to cut my foot on the metal and die from some kind of exotic strain of tetanus, but at least my bare feet have better traction, and I’ll be able to move in relative silence.
I sprint down the string of containers, sticking to the right side where the metal doesn’t flex as much and where I’m less likely to be spotted. Half way to Endo, I’m caught off guard by a five-foot gap, but I manage to jump the distance and continue on. Feeling like a real action hero, I turn on the speed, knowing I’ll catch up to Endo before he can escape.
Collins must have seen my approach and realized our flanking plan wasn’t going to work, because she steps out in front of Endo and the woman, reaching into her coat, like she’s got a gun.
Endo and the woman stop in place. They don’t raise their hands, but they don’t make a move for weapons, either. Knowing that they’ll soon call Collins’s bluff, I shift my aim to the left and leap, aiming for Endo. Yeah, it’s kind of a far fall, but Endo is going to break it for me.