The Stone Monkey (Lincoln Rhyme 4)

Climbing out, she glanced at a hand-painted sign in the florist shop on the ground floor of his building, next to the restaurant. NEED LUCK IN YOUR LIFE--BUY OUR LUCKY BAMBOO!

She then noticed Sung through the window of the restaurant. He waved, smiling.

Inside, he winced as he rose to greet her.

"No, no," Sachs said. "Don't get up."

She sat opposite him in a large booth.

"Would you like some food?"

"No. I can't stay long."

"Tea, then." He poured it and pushed the small cup toward her.

The restaurant was dark but clean. Several men sat hunched together in various booths, speaking in Chinese.

Sung asked, "Have you found him yet? The Ghost?"

Disinclined to talk about an investigation, she demurred and said only that they had some leads.

"I don't like this uncertainty," Sung said. "I hear footsteps in the hall and I freeze. It's like being in Fuzhou. Someone slows down outside your home and you don't know if they're neighbors or security officers the local party boss sent to your house to arrest you."

An image of what had happened to Jerry Tang came to her and she glanced out the window for a reassuring look at the squad car parked across the street in front of his building, guarding him.

"After all the press about the Fuzhou Dragon," she said, "you'd think the Ghost'd go back to China. Doesn't he know how many people're looking for him?"

Sung reminded, " 'Break the cauldrons--' "

" '--and sink the boats.' " She nodded. Then she added, "Well, he's not the only one who's got that motto."

Sung assessed her for a moment. "You're a strong woman. Have you always been a security officer?"

"We call them police. Or cops. Security officers are private."

"Oh."

"Naw, I went to the police academy after I'd been working for a few years." She told him about her stint as a model for a Madison Avenue agency.

"You were a fashion model?" His eyes were amused.

"I was young. Interesting to try for a while. Was mostly my mother's idea. I remember once I was working on a car with my dad. He was a cop too but his hobby was cars. We were rebuilding an engine in this old Thunderbird. A Ford? A sports car. You know it?"

"No."

"And I was, I don't know, nineteen or something, I'd been doing freelance work for a modeling agency in the city. I was under the car and he dropped a crescent wrench. Caught me on the cheek."

"Ouch."

A nod. "But the big ouch was when my mother saw the cut. I don't know who she was madder at--me, my father or Ford Motor Company."

Sung asked, "And your mother? Is she who watches your children when you work?"

A sip of tea, a steady gaze. "I don't have any."

He frowned. "You . . . I'm sorry." Sympathy flooded his voice.

"It's not the end of the world," she said stoically.