Free The Trail to Buddha's Mirror by Don Winslow Page B

opening her eyes, “—is a dream. Tom and Olivia wish to speak with you now.”
    It was one of those don’t-I-hear-your-mother-calling-you bits, and Neal watched as Pendleton dutifully got out of the water, wrapped a towel around his waist, and stomped into the house. So much for the submissive Oriental woman, Neal thought. Then he realized he was alone with Li Lan, and he stopped thinking altogether. They sat there for at least five excruciating minutes before she spoke.
    “You will not let them hurt him?” she asked.
    Hurt him?! What the fuck?
    “Nobody wants to hurt him, Lan. They just want him to come back to work.” I mean, we’re talking about a research lab here, right? not the Gambino family.
    “Please do not let them hurt him,” she implored.
    “Okay.” Look at me like that, Li Lan, and I won’t even let them hurt his feelings.
    “Promise.”
    “I promise.” Should be an easy enough request to fill. They want him back so bad they’ll probably give him a raise and a bonus. Monogrammed test tubes. Fur-lined eyepiece on the microscope.
    Li Lan stood up. She stood in front of Neal as if inviting him to look her over, as if she were in a lineup at a cathouse. He tried to look away, tried as hard as the booze, the steam of the tub, and his own feelings for her would let him. He felt himself swallowing hard and staring, first at her body and then at her eyes.
    “I will go to speak with him,” she said.
    Neal looked around for a towel but didn’t see one. “Yeah, it’s about time to get going.”
    She shook her head. “No. Wait for me, please. I will come back.”
    “Uhhh, would you bring a towel, please?”
    “You are shy.”
    “Yeah.”
    She put her robe on. The silk stuck to her wet skin.
    “There is no reason to be shy. I will come back to thank you.”
    “Aww, shucks, ma’am. You don’t need to thank me … jes’ doin’ my job.”
    He was pretty surprised when she leaned over and kissed him, quickly and softly, on the lips. “I will be back in a moment… to thank you.”
    It was a whisper of a promise.
    “No,” he said, more reluctantly than he felt real good about.
    She looked at him quizzically.
    “You don’t understand,” Neal said. “That’s not the way it works. You don’t need to buy … insurance.”
    Of course, if you want to leave him and run away with me and live happily ever after, that’s another story.
    “It’s not insurance. You have been very nice.”
    Right. She’s not buying it. She’s still scared for him, and she’s ready to give it up to get a little added protection. Where does a painter learn about that?
    “Really, Lan. No thanks.”
    But please don’t ask again, Lan, because I think I’m out of no-thank-yous.
    She looked confused for the smallest part of a second, then smiled and shrugged. The robe came off her shoulders with the shrug and she gave him another long look, a think-about-what-you’re-passing-up pose, and it shook him. Backlit by the light coming through the picture window, she looked unreal, unearthly—divorced from the mundane world of reality, and jobs to do, and boring ethics. She became part of a magical evening, of a different kind of life—a world in which he wanted to lose himself, float with her in the mirror mists. He told himself to get up, get out, but she froze him in place, held him in the whirlpool, trapped him in the vortex.
    He leaned over to splash some water on his face and barely heard the whine of the bullet that just missed his head and smacked into the wall of the house.
    He sank into the water.

4
    Terror has a way of clearing the mind.
    You can cloud the brain with exotic booze and plain old-fashioned lust, but then shoot a little terror at it, and it will clean right up. Adrenaline is a wonderful thing.
    So Neal was already thinking hard as he sank under the water. It was noisy down there, with the filters and bubblers and all, but he could hear Li Lan’s footsteps running, not walking away, and he could