Page 134 of Nash Falls

They stood in the darkened doorway and watched Walter Nash going full bore at the boxing dummy: knife and elbow strikes, knee crushers, head slams. Then he dropped and did push-ups, rose and did pull-ups. Then he jumped rope. Then he slumped to his knees, breathing harder than anyone probably should. Then he rose and did it all over again.

As Shock and Jackson slowly walked back to their quarters Jackson said, “Maybe that boy does have a shot.”

Shock eyed him. “I ain’t never bettin’ ’gainst nobody got Ty Nash’s blood in him.”

CHAPTER

65

VICTORIA STEERS LEFT HER PENTHOUSEin Hong Kong on a cloudy morning, was driven to the airport, and was wheels up an hour later in her Bombardier Global 8000. She was dressed in her finest clothes. Her hair hung straight and her makeup was simple, but it caused her facial bones to stand out and increased the width and power of her eyes.

She had been looking for Walter Nash for a long time now. Though she had been pressuring Rhett Temple to find the man, she had no confidence in his ability or real desire to do so. She had employed private investigators, corrupt police, and savvy street criminals in America to track him down, and none of them could find a trace. It was immensely upsetting to Steers and had also resulted in her superior in this affair losing some confidence in her. He had not come right out and said it; he was far too nuanced for that. But his underlying message had been clear: Walter Nash was a problem that needed to be set right. And as time passed, she felt that they were no closer to finding him. He did not have close friends or acquaintances. His parents were dead. His wife had no idea where he was. Leads had been followed up, questions asked, people bribed and threatened, and, still, nothing. He had truly vanished.

Perhaps, in his despair, he killed himself. But he was an intelligent, resourceful man, perhaps with hidden financial resources. Such a man could lose himself in the wide horizons of the world. And as we created the image of his daughter saying what she had, he could have changed himself completely in the time that has passed.

Hours later Steers was still thinking over this problem as the jet began its descent into a rugged and mountainous area of southeast Asia. The runway was private; the facility next to it was even more so.

The Bombardier touched down in stiff crosswinds coming off the nearby mountains, requiring one go-around and then a turbulent sideways approach before touchdown. The nervous flyer Steers did not seem to notice. She was anxious, but it had nothing to do with the difficult termination of the flight.

She walked off the jet while her armed retinue stayed on board. This was not her doing. This was on orders from one more powerful than she.

A waiting car whisked her away to the one-story building that had a central block and two long wings, as well as numerous ancillary structures. Two twelve-foot-high fences topped by concertina wire encircled the compound. Armed guards patrolled the perimeter as did a platoon of fearsome dogs, a daunting mixture of Dobermans, Rottweilers, and Akitas.

Steers was cleared through security, and she found herself walking rapidly down a long, antiseptic hall behind a bulky, wide-hipped guard who, if he had recognized her name on the visitor’s pass, had made no sign of it.

He had just instructed her in his native language, “Come this way! Now!”

Steers was led down one of the wings of the building, through two more barred entry points, and finally found herself standing outside of a solid metal door with a slot in the bottom for meals to be passed through.

The guard unlocked the door and motioned her in. He barked, “Ten minutes.”

She passed through. The door slammed behind her and she heard the lock turn. The space was six by six, no windows, one bunk, one foul toilet, and a chair bolted to the floor.

And her, the occupant, officially Prisoner Number 113.

Steers had waited patiently for her superior to hold up his endof the bargain and allow her visit here. She knew he had probably delighted in thinking of her impatience.

How a worm squirms on the end of the hook before its death.

Masuyo Steers was in the chair, sitting stiffly. Her legs and arms were shackled to a bolt in the floor. She was in her seventies now, gray haired, wrinkled face, small limbs hung off her shrunken body. She looked defeated, void, unaware of anything at all around her.

But when Masuyo’s eyes fully opened, an observer would forget about the withered frame and the gray hair and the shackles. The woman’s eyes held a force that could not be questioned. They showed a person very much alive, in the moment, and, most important for Steers, a woman who was undaunted.

Masuyo said, “The guard’s name in his language means ‘fat,’ which fits him. I tell him this in my mind. If I had the means I would tell it to his face a moment before I slit his throat. Do you think of such things, Victoria? Tell me that my daughter, my only surviving child, does.”

“Do they listen in here?” asked Steers in her mother’s native tongue.

“They see no need. They are all-powerful here. Confidence is one thing, arrogance quite another.”

“That is good,” said Steers as she lifted her head and met her mother’s luminous eyes, replete with spirit and barely suppressed rage. “And I think of such things, often.”

Masuyo nodded. “I know they brought down our plane. The news reached me in here. Killed Joseph, almost killed you. You survived, as you always have. Through four siblings who wanted nothing other than to bloody your throat. But you prevailed. Some ask, would Masuyo have preferred the quick death? Masuyo says, no, she prefers to live so that one day she may kill those who wronged her. I wait for that day. Do you wait for that day, my daughter?”

“I wait for that day.”

“You must have pleased those who rule here for them to have let you see me.”

“I did.”