Typhoon (32 page)

Five minutes went by. Nothing appeared to change. Sammy didn’t check his mobile phone or give any other obvious sign that he was waiting for company. Instead, he slowly sipped his beer, smoked a Marlboro Light and arranged his hair several times in a manner that Joe thought of as nervous and self-conscious. There were two Chinese girls to his left, close to the far wall, one of whom appeared to be building up the courage to speak to him. It was dark and crowded on the balcony, but Joe could see that the girls were not particularly attractive, and that Sammy seemed to have little interest in approaching them.

“You all on your own, mister?”

Megan had appeared beside him. She slipped her hand around Joe’s back and he felt her fingers briefly move across his skin. The sudden contact surprised him, but he returned the gesture, placing his hand on the small of her back. It occurred to him that this was his first sustained physical contact with another person since he had embraced his mother on Christmas Day.

“Crazy in here, no?” she said.

“Crazy.”

Sammy was about halfway through his beer and still scanning the room for girls. He seemed completely at ease in the Zapata’s environment and Joe was fairly sure by now that he was a naturalized European or American. As Megan curled her hand further around his back, resting her fingers against the edge of his stomach, an idea came to him which combined a certain ruthlessness with the benefits of long experience in the secret world. He would use her for bait. She was by far the most attractive woman in the upper section of the club, and if he could manoeuvre her closer to Sammy, her looks and natural flirtatiousness might prompt him to make conversation. Joe could then introduce himself at a later point without arousing suspicion.

“Let’s go over there,” he said, nodding to his left, “where it’s a bit less crowded.”

Holding Megan by the hand, he waited until Sammy was looking down at the bar, then led her to within two or three feet of where he was standing. There was a Chinese girl positioned between them, but Joe knew that she had been waiting there, un-approached, for at least ten minutes.

“What happened to Tom?” he asked, releasing Megan’s hand and formalizing his body language so that they would not look like a couple. Megan leaned against the balustrade and started moving her body to the music.

“No idea,” she replied.

“He said he was getting me a drink. Wait here, will you? I’ll see if he needs help.”

Megan did not suspect a thing. As Joe walked off, making his way back towards the bar, she continued to look down at the dance floor, mouthing along to the lyrics of “The House that Jack Built.” For the next five minutes Joe gave her the opportunity to work her magic, purporting to search Zapata’s for Tom, but in reality killing time in the ground-floor bathroom. Walking back upstairs, he found Tom and Ricky at the bar of the cantina, took his bottle of beer and led them back to the interior door. As they emerged onto the balcony, Joe looked across and saw what he had wanted to see: Sammy, God bless him, smoothing back his hair and making awkward conversation with Megan.

“There she is,” he said, pointing towards them. “That’s where I left her.”

After that it was easy.

“Oh there you are,” she said, as if she had given up all hope of ever seeing Joe again. “I was wondering what had happened to you. This is Shahpour. Shahpour, these are my friends, Tom, Ricky and Joe.”

“Good to meet you, guys.”

The accent was American, born and bred, but the name was probably Iranian. Shahpour looked momentarily annoyed to have had Megan swamped by male admirers, but any irritation was soon replaced by a confident, conciliatory smile that Joe recognized as natural charm.

“Are you living here in Shanghai?” Tom asked.

“Yeah. Have been for about a year now.”

“Shahpour used to work in construction,” Megan said, making a joke with her eyes. “Now he’s here in China selling software to small businesses.”

By the tone of her voice, it was obvious to Joe that she had been bored by their conversation. Inadvertently, however, she had supplied him with two important pieces of information. “Construction” might mean Macklinson. “Selling software” could possibly imply that Shahpour was using the same cover as Miles.

“What about you guys?” he asked.

Tom and Ricky explained that they had been living in Shanghai for some time. Joe, deliberately standing behind them, added that he had arrived in the New Year. Shahpour did a good job of appearing to listen, but it was obvious that he was interested solely in their relationship to Megan. Was one of these guys her boyfriend? If not, could he take her off their hands?

“And what do you do, Tom?” he asked.

“I’m a yacht broker.”

“You, Joe?”

“Pharmaceuticals.” There was a danger of the conversation lasting no more than a few minutes. Ricky made a drunken joke about “making knickers for a living,” but as far as Shahpour was concerned, he, Tom and Joe were just three British guys getting in the way of his plans for Megan. If Joe was going to find out what he needed to know, he would have to act fast. “I work for a small British company here,” he said. “Quayler. We’re trying to expand into China.”

“Pharmaceuticals, huh?”

“That’s right.”

“Dancing Queen” sealed it. When Megan and Ricky heard the opening bars of the song, they both screamed in delight and announced that they were heading back to the dance floor.

“Great to meet you, Shahpour,” she called out, disappearing into the distance.

“Yeah, great to meet you too.”

There was a certain ruthlessness in the manner of her departure and Joe felt a pang of sympathy. He looked at Shahpour’s face, where an uneasy mixture of loneliness and irritation crossed behind his eyes. Male pride had been wounded. Just as quickly, however, his frustration was replaced by a look of practised indifference.

“So what’s her story?” he asked.

“Oh she’s just crazy,” Tom replied. “Forget about her.”

An awkward silence lingered. To Joe’s frustration, he could sense that both Tom and Shahpour wanted to end the conversation. They appeared to have little in common, and their reason for meeting had just disappeared downstairs. Joe was left with a dilemma. Try to keep them talking, a strategy which might arouse Shahpour’s suspicion, or abandon the contact altogether. He could always tap Megan for answers later on.

“So you’re from America?” he asked, opting for one last question.

“Nowadays I try to keep that a secret,” Shahpour replied. His eyes were once again scanning the balcony and Joe could see that it was a lost cause. A man like that didn’t want to be wasting his night talking to a guy who sold antibiotics for a living.

“Which part?” he asked.

“Pacific Northwest.”

Another disinterested answer. Time to wrap things up.

“Well look, here’s my card.” As a tactic, this was not as cack-handed as it might sound; in China, exchanging business cards is common practice, regardless of social circumstances. “It was good to meet you.”

Shahpour was well aware of the tradition and duly accepted Joe’s card in a manner imitative of the Chinese, clasping it in both hands, studying the lettering carefully and even bowing his head for comic effect. He then returned the favour, as Joe had hoped he would, handing two cards of his own to Tom and Joe.

“Goodarzi?” Joe said, pronouncing Shahpour’s surname. He had noted, with a leap of astonishment, that the card was embossed with the Microsoft logo.

“Goodarzi, yes. And yours? Lennox?”

Joe nodded. Had Shahpour put a slight stress on the surname, as if he had heard it before? Or was he simply checking its pronunciation? Joe could not be sure. “It’s Scottish,” he said.

Shahpour’s eyes went to the roof of the club, as if he had been reminded of something, taken sideways into a separate life. Was Joe imagining this? It was like watching himself struggling with the memory of Ansary Tursun. Where had he heard the name before? Their eyes met but Joe was disappointed to see that Shah-pour now looked just as bored and as indifferent as before. He was even angling past them as he shook their hands, heading back in the direction of the cantina.

“It was great to meet you guys,” he said. “Dancing Queen” was coming to an end. “Maybe we’ll run into each other sometime.”

“I certainly hope so,” Tom said, without feeling, and before Joe could add a farewell of his own, Shahpour Goodarzi had been swallowed up by a balcony of girls.

An hour later, out on the terrace, Joe saw Shahpour leave the club in the company of a young Chinese girl wearing torn denim jeans and a tight pink top. Turning to Megan, whose T-shirt was soaked through with sweat after a long session on the dance floor, he said: “Well, your Iranian friend got lucky.”

“My Iranian friend?”

“Shahpour. The guy who worked in construction. You remember? The one you were talking to on the balcony.”

“Oh
him
.” She had forgotten their encounter entirely. “Were you jealous, Joe?”

He liked the way she went directly to the point. Her game was never over. “Inconsolably,” he said, because he was now loose and drunk and strangely tempted by the idea of going to bed with her. “What was he like?”

“Didn’t you and Tom stay and talk to him afterwards?” A line of German students squeezed past them, pushing Megan’s body closer to Joe’s. He caught the sweet toxicity of her breath as she held his arm for balance.

“Only for five minutes. He said he used to work in construction.”

“That’s right. Some big American company,” Megan remembered.

Zapata’s was emptying out. Joe could not afford to ask too many questions, at the risk of seeming unusually inquisitive. He offered Megan a cigarette and looked around the terrace.

“Where are the others?”

“Jeff and Sandrine went home about an hour ago. I guess Ricky and Tom are still dancing.” Megan had not moved from her position, close to Joe. It was strange, he thought, how alcohol and the adrenalin rush of work could combine to push his longing for Isabella temporarily to one side. For weeks he had thought about little else but their first possible encounter, yet this alluring, flattering woman had worked her way under his skin. In Megan he detected something of the same rawness of spirit which had once captivated him about Isabella. Running his hand across her flat, cool stomach, he began to doubt the nature of his own feelings. How much of his need for Isabella was love, and how much a desire to get even? Did Joe want to possess Isabella again, only so that he could walk away? Seven years is a long time to harbour the grudge of heartbreak.

“So you think he was Iranian?” Megan asked, the palm of her hand gently brushing the hairs on Joe’s arm. Here was another chance to discuss Shahpour, but all he could think about was the delicacy of her touch.

“Iranian Californian,” he said. “A lot of them live over there. Families who escaped the Shah.”

Megan nodded. They were communicating as much through silence as they were through words. The early hours of the humid Shanghai morning were a possibility into which they could pour their desire. Joe pulled Megan towards him so that his arms were completely encircling her waist. She leaned back against his chest. He lowered his face into her hair and closed his eyes to the smell of her. It was in this blissful instant that the name Ansary Tursun suddenly returned to him and he was alone again on the streets of Tsim Sha Tsui. The process by which Joe’s brain arrived at the inspiration was as puzzling to him as the momentary loss of his desire for Isabella. He looked up at the night sky and smiled.

“So what are the rooms like at the Ritz-Carlton?” Megan whispered.

“What’s that?”

Joe had heard her, but he needed time. His memory was racing back to the apartment, to Sadha and Lee, to stories of torture and betrayal.

“I said, what are the rooms like at the Ritz-Carlton?”

“A mess,” Joe said, because he knew now that he ought to leave, to contact London, to speak to Waterfield before England went to bed.

“Don’t they tidy up after you?”

“Not when I tell them not to.”

Megan was waiting for an invitation. Of course she was. A woman needed more than code. He thought of the long night that lay ahead of them, the sudden end to his permanent solitude, the challenge and the excitement of taking a beautiful woman to bed, then the rapture of eventual sleep beside her. The twin, competing strands of Joe Lennox’s personality, his immense tenderness and his ceaseless professional zeal, helixed in an instant that dizzied him. He wondered whether it was possible to do both: to love and to work; to lie and to please? He was drunk and he was out of answers. A weakness in him, or perhaps it was a strength, said, “Come home with me tonight.”

Megan squeezed his arm so tightly that he almost laughed. He saw her twist away from him and turn and look up into his eyes in a way that was suddenly beyond lust and game-playing. Did this girl actually
understand
him? A few hours earlier Joe had been sitting beside her eating green curry, trying to sound clever about China. Yet his desire for her now was overwhelming. He wanted to kiss her, but also to save that kiss until they were alone and there was privacy and control. He did not want anybody to see them. He did not want those kinds of rumours.

“There are cabs outside,” she said.

“Let’s go.”

Nine hours later,
Megan was sitting up in Joe’s wide double bed, a sheet wrapped around her body, picking at a room-service fruit salad. The curtains were drawn and she was watching BBC News 24 with the sound switched off.

“So is it true?” she called out.

Joe had stepped out of the shower and put on a dressing gown. He could still taste the sweetness of her body, the scent of the night on her skin. Drifting in and out of sleep beside this sensual, beguiling woman had been a waking dream of pleasure, by turns wild and then eerily calm. They were at ease with one another, and the morning had been blessedly free of any awkwardness or indifference.