Free Soul Meaning (A Seventeen Series Novel: An Action Adventure Thriller Book 1) by AD Starrling Page B

help you?’ he said in thick Mandarin, squinting in the glow cast by a nearby street lamp.
    ‘We’re here to see Yuan Qin Lee,’ I replied in the Zhongyuan dialect.
    The old man brightened. ‘You speak Han Chinese?’ he exclaimed in broken English.
    ‘A little bit,’ I said with a faint smile.
    ‘Come in, come in.’ He beckoned us inside the building with a sharp wave of his liver-spotted hand and closed the door.
    We were faced with a cramped corridor filled with the smell of cooking and cheap disinfectant. Curious faces appeared in an open doorway to the left. The old man gestured frantically and shouted harsh words in Mandarin. The faces disappeared.
    I glanced at the toys littering the passageway. ‘Are you the patriarch?’
    ‘For my sins,’ grumbled the old man. ‘They all useless, the lot of them. Only one who make money is Qin Lee.’
    We followed him to an alcove at the end of the hall. He pulled aside a curtain and revealed a door that opened onto a dimly lit staircase spiraling down to the lower level of the house.
    The basement was large and extended well beyond the boundaries of the property. I spied a second door at the rear of the room.
    Banks of computer monitors lined benches along the walls, their screens flickering oddly under the harsh light from the half-dozen fluorescent tubes crowding the low ceiling. A low hum emanated from the hard drives on the left, dark monoliths in the otherwise bright room. Wires crawled between the cable organizers dotting the concrete floor.
    A young man with horn-rimmed spectacles and shiny black hair sat hunched over a drafting table in the middle of the room. The frames around his eyes glinted under the spotlight screwed into the desk.
    ‘Qin Lee?’ I called out. The young man’s head came up sharply. Almond-shaped eyes narrowed behind the lenses. ‘Solito sent us.’
    He observed us for a couple of beats before carefully putting down the document he had been working on. He removed the latex gloves from his hands, rose from the chair, and spoke a few words to the old man. The latter glanced at us with a troubled expression, nodded once, and left.
    Qin Lee waited until the door closed at the top of the stairs before turning to us with a frown. ‘What do you want?’
    I indicated Reid. ‘I need some passports for him, among other things.’
    ‘I already have a passport,’ Reid protested.
    ‘You need new ones,’ I retorted.
    He held my gaze for a couple of seconds before sighing; he knew not to ask for the reasons why. Yet.
    I listed the additional items I required.
    Qin Lee crossed his arms and pursed his lips. ‘This will cost you.’
    ‘Money’s not an issue. When can you have the documents ready?’
    He shrugged. ‘Day after tomorrow, at the earliest.’
    ‘We need them tonight.’ I ignored his shocked expression. ‘Like I said, money isn’t an issue.’
    Two hours later, we walked out of the house with three fake passports and a document wallet.
    ‘It would help if I knew what was going on behind that thick skull of yours,’ Reid muttered once we were inside the Cruiser.
    I started the engine. ‘What do you want to know?’
    ‘Well, for one thing, why the hell did you just fork out a fortune for those forgeries?’
    ‘Because I suspect we’re going to need them before the week’s over.’
    ‘Why? Where are we going?’ said Reid.
    ‘France.’
    His brow furrowed. ‘Any particular reason?’ he said after a beat.
    ‘The last paper Strauss published was from UPMC, the Université Pierre et Marie Curie, in Paris,’ I explained. ‘I want to know why Burnstein and the Crovir First Council are so interested in this person.’
    Reid studied the road for a while. ‘You sure about this?’ he said finally.
    I hesitated. ‘It’s the only clue we’ve got.’
    He sighed. ‘When do we leave?’
    I took out the cell and dialed the Vauquoises’ number. ‘Hello, Pierre? It’s Lucas.’ I listened. ‘We’re fine. Look, we need to get to