Lights Out (4 page)

“Here’s to nine-lives.”
Rob said, clinking his glass heavily against Ryan’s.

“I’ll drink to that.”
Ryan said as he took a large sip of the whiskey. He let the liquid trickle over
his tongue savoring the myriad of subtle flavors that merged into one another,
hints of smoke and wood mixed with fruit and
liquorice
,
before swallowing it slowly. He felt himself relax.

‘This is good.’

“Tough day at the office?” Ryan asked his friend.

“No worse than usual, but pretty boring compared to yours. Tell me
everything.” Rob said sipping his drink.

Ryan spent the next ten minutes without interruption telling Rob all
of the
days
events. Rob listened intently, nodding and
gasping at all the right moments. Ryan felt like he was living it all again as
he explained in detail about the gunshot, the man falling, the blood seeping
across the floor, the old mans distorted face. After he had concluded his story
Ryan could feel that his heart was racing. He took another sip of the whiskey
to calm his nerves.

Seeing that his friend needed to change the subject, Rob switched to
a lighter topic of conversation.

“OK, enough about Bank robberies and dead people, let’s talk about
girls. Have you called Lily yet?”

“No, not yet”, Ryan replied, pleased with the sudden change of topic.
“I was planning to call today, but maybe I’ll call over the weekend.”

“Are you kidding me? That girl is hot, and it’s a Friday night! You
seriously could have died this morning. If I were you I’d be out there making
the most of it. Call her right now.” Rob pushed his mobile phone across the
glass table to Ryan.

“Just see if she’s out tonight?”

Ryan laughed, took another mouthful of whiskey and swallowed hard.

Without saying another word, he reached for the phone, pulled out the
folded piece of paper from his pocket and punched in the number.

Beluga was a small stylish restaurant in the heart of the fashionable
SOHO district, a name coined by locals referring to its location South of
Hollywood Road. The restaurant boasted a curved walnut bar counter with plush
grey velvet seating against the surrounding walls. It had tall pedestal tables,
which stood facing the dramatic glass entrance. At the rear, a few intimate
tables were pushed closely together in a small wooden decked area, full with
trees and plants. The art against the red walls was striking. Large canvases of
contemporary oil paintings hung from the ceiling creating the feeling of a
gallery. The lighting was warm and subtle and candles shimmered behind glass
holders on each tabletop softening the skin tone of anyone sitting close by.

The music was a perfect mix of Jazz and R&B. Not too loud that
that you couldn’t talk and not too quiet that you couldn’t hear it. Already
Beluga was filled with people laughing and chatting. All of the seating had
been taken early on and the floor space leading to the bar was heavy with
people jostling to get the attention of the bar tender.

Ryan found himself blocked in as he tried to maneuver his way through
the crowds to the back of the restaurant without treading on toes or knocking
people with his elbows. He finally reached his destination and turned to see if
he could locate Rob in the throng of people behind him. Sure that his friend
would find him eventually, he turned to face the beautiful woman that sat
quietly at the corner back table, drinking Champagne.

“Sorry we’re late.” Ryan said apologetically and nodded toward the
heaving crowd of people behind him.

“It took a while to get here.”

“Well, you’re here now”. The woman said smiling broadly, as she stood
to greet Ryan.

She was taller than Ryan remembered. He noticed that she was wearing
tight black jeans showing off her long lean legs. She wore a simple black
cashmere sweater cut to a deep v at the back. Her hair was pulled back from her
face into a loose ponytail that swung to the side, falling across her shoulder
as she moved. She didn’t need make-up, but was wearing eyeliner and lip-gloss,
which made her eyes look smoky and her lips smooth.

‘Where’s our boy?’ Lily said softly as she leaned in to kiss Ryan’s
cheek. He could smell her perfume and he found himself inhaling her scent for a
brief moment.

‘Oh, he’s here
somewhere,” Ryan said totally distracted by her, wondering if he should have
come on his own to meet her.

Ryan felt a firm hand rest on his shoulder and he turned to face a beaming
Rob, slightly out of breath from pushing through the crowd, and armed with a
new bottle of Cristal Champagne tucked under one arm, and three glasses in his
hand.

“
HELLO
Champagne!” Rob shouted happily
above the noise, before placing the glasses and bottle on the table. Lily and
Rob exchanged amused glances before laughing fondly at their friend. Ryan shook
his head, rolled his eyes at Rob and smiled. Finally, the thoughts of the day
were drifting out of his mind and were replaced with thoughts of the fun night
ahead.

Sarah Lam sat in her office pouring over the details in the police
report. Her coffee mug sat untouched on her desk, the milky brown liquid now
cold to the touch.

So far she had not been able to identify the dead Chinese man. The
circumstances surrounding the shooting at the Bank that morning were still
ambiguous. She had a lot of people still to interview and seemingly a lot of
information missing. She had sent
her partner home a few hours ago already. Chow had a young family and she often
felt bad keeping him at work late, away from his wife and child.

Now her office was quiet, and only a few lights were on in the
building.

She sighed and put down the report for a moment. She rubbed her
temples with her long fingers, trying to massage away the headache that was
threatening to present itself. She straightened her back and sat upright in an
effort to refresh her mind and picked up the report again.

Lam scanned the paperwork familiarizing
herself
with the details. The dead Chinese man, she suspected, was probably from the
mainland. He appeared to be some kind of manual worker based on the calluses
found on his hands and sunspots visible across his face, neck and arms. She guessed that he was from simple
means, and definitely not the mastermind behind the attempted breach of
security.

Her mind began to shift into gear as she ploughed through the file.
If a bank robbery
was
the intention, she thought to
herself, then it would have been a fruitless attempt. The Bank was impossible
to rob, especially single-handed. Security was extremely tight, too complicated
for an old man on his own. Even if he had managed to get past the entrance
undetected, where was he planning to go? What was the purpose of his break in?
Sarah mulled over this for a moment.

Clearly there was more than one person involved in this, she
concluded. But this is where her investigation fell short.

After interviewing the two security officers on duty, Lam felt sure
that they were telling the truth and this collaborated with Ryan Harpers
account of the events.

She imagined the scene in her head.

The old man had walked into the Bank and attempted to enter the main
door using a swipe card. Having interviewed the two security officers
independently, and verifying the procedures with the Bank’s Security Director,
Lam now knew that all contractors must report to the duty security officer at
the desk in the lobby before entering the building. This was their standard
procedure. All work contractors knew that they had to pick up their new
security tag as well as their daily swipe cards. The tags would be permanently
clipped onto their overalls for the duration of their time on the premises and
the swipe cards would allow them limited access to the fourth floor.

The swipe card that the old man attempted to use had immediately
flagged up an error message, and raised the alarm to the security officer on
duty.

When the officer approached the old man and asked him to sign in at
the desk and follow the procedure, he told the officer that he was late for
work, if he could just be swiped through by the officer, then he would be on
his way.

The officer asked again and this time requested another form of ID
from the old man. The old man refused, but was insistent upon getting through
the door. He continued to push his card through the scanner in the futile hope
that the door might eventually open.

The officer radioed through to his colleague, who promptly joined the
two men at the door. After which they their argument began.

From her notes, Lam knew that it was at this point that Ryan Harper
had entered the Bank. She wondered for a moment about Harper. There was
something that she couldn’t put her finger on. Perhaps she just didn’t like
these self-assured Westerners. She often found them too confident for their own
good. She shook the negative thought from her mind and carried on. Harper was
apparently oblivious to the breach of security and only seconds later had found
himself
lying on the floor and a single shot was
fired.

With no CCTV footage on hand, Lam had no choice but to believe each
witness account at this stage.

Lam read through the interview notes that Chow had written up on the
on-site project manager, Lai Wong. He had worked for Wing Land Holdings for
several years and was managing the fourth floor renovations at the bank.

There were twenty building contractors employed by Wing Land to carry
out the work. They had been hired to renovate the entire fourth floor of the
building. This was to become the new private banking section for exclusive use
of the banks elite customers. There was a lot of demolition work, most of which
was completed outside of normal banking hours. Every day, between 06:30am and
07:30am, all of the previous days rubbish and rubble would be removed from the
building, and loaded onto a truck before the roads became too congested with
traffic and before the bank opened to the public.

Lai Wong advised Chow that completion was due in three weeks time and
they were on track, with no issues to speak of.

Lam had also spoken to the Bank Security Director, John McIntyre who
collaborated everything that Lai Wong had said in the report. He also wanted to
add that the authorization and restricted security access that had been
introduced for independent contractors, had, until that moment been working
well, and the fact that the old man had not been able to successfully penetrate
the security, in his mind, meant that the system worked.

Lam referred back to the forensics file.

The old mans clothing had been removed and sent to the lab for
testing. They used one of the Wing
Land standard overalls as a comparison.

Even though the overalls were similar in style and
colour
, the conclusive tests confirmed that it was not from
the same manufacturer. The fabric weight and construction was different, and an
alternative dyestuff had been used to attain a similar grey
colour
.
The twist on the sewing thread was tighter than the original making it
absolutely impossible for it to have been made in the same place or on the same
machine. It looked as thought the overalls had been either custom-made or
purchased for the sole purpose to make the old man look like one of the
contract workers.

After lengthy discussions with both the construction company and the
bank, both sets of records showed that all workers were accounted for that day,
and all security swipe cards and tags had been handed back in to the Bank
security desk. Not a single thing was unaccounted for. At this stage none of
the bank personnel or the employees of Wing Land were under suspicion.

She had nothing.

Sarah closed the file, slipping it back into the pile of papers on
her desk. She sat back for a moment to think. The Chief was giving her a hard
time over this one. The Asia World Bank’s CEO had personally called his good friend
the Police Commissioner to apply a little pressure. “
A man shot dead at a major bank is not good PR, no matter which way the
press handle it
.” The
Commissioner had said. The Chief relayed the message to Lam and Chow. If there
was something more sinister behind this botched attempt, the Chief wanted them
to find out what it was, and quickly.

Lam checked her watch, it was long
after midnight and the last few hours had slipped by surprisingly quickly. Lam
could feel that she was losing the battle against her headache and would be of
no use to anyone here.

She roughly straightened her files, not
wanting to leave her desk in a mess, and gulped down the remainder of the cold
coffee. Then giving the room one final glance, she flicked off the light and
headed home.

Ryan lay on his bed with his right hand pressed firmly against his
eyelids in an attempt to keep his eyes from moving under the lids.

His head was pounding so hard that he was convinced that he could
feel his brain move underneath his skull. He tried to swallow, but the saliva
simply sat underneath his tongue useless against the dehydration. He had no
idea what time it was – he didn’t want to know. He just wanted to stay
completely still and quiet and let the hangover pass.

Ryan heard a movement, his hearing now acute in the quiet room. He
listened again, this time holding his breath with his eyes shut tight against
his sweaty palm. There was a rustle of the bed sheet next to him, a deep
contented sigh and then even steady breathing.

Suddenly the previous nights events came rushing back. With great
effort he moved his head slightly to the left and lifting his fingers opened
one eye, immediately regretting the action as his head threatened to explode.

Lily was lying on her back and was looking up at the ceiling with a
sleepy smile on her face. She turned in his direction and looked at him.

“Good morning’ she purred, “How are you feeling?”

“Like death warmed up”, Ryan’s hoarse voice croaked the reply. He
pressed his temples with his fingertips and watched her for a moment.

Feeling his eyes on her, Lily sat up in bed, pulling the white sheet
with her. Her long thick black hair fell onto her shoulders. Her eyes were
bright and awake now and she still had her eye make-up on. It had smudged
slightly during the night giving her a Bridget Bardot look. Ryan thought that
she couldn’t be more beautiful.

Lily twisted her body to face Ryan and planted a playful kiss on his
forehead. She then swung her long legs over the edge of the bed and leaving the
white sheet behind her stood up gracefully and padded naked into the bathroom.

Ryan lay for a few moments and listened to the mesmerizing sound of
the shower, his eyes started to feel heavy and without effort he fell back into
a deep sleep.

When Ryan woke up again, the apartment was silent. He stretched his
arms and legs slowly, then propped himself up on one arm and checked his
bedside clock.

12.03pm

With a groan and a cough, Ryan moved his body like an old man to the
edge of the bed. He turned back to look at the ruffled sheets where Lily had
been sleeping. Perched on top of one of the pillows was a piece of white paper
folded neatly in half. With some effort Ryan stretched across the bed and
grabbed the paper with his fingertips. He unfolded it quickly and read the now
familiar handwriting.

Dinner tonight? Say 8pm at Cru?

I’ll call you later

L X

Ryan smiled to himself. He had the
whole afternoon to get over his hangover. He lay back on the bed and pulled the
sheets around him, quickly falling back to sleep.