Nine Dragons - A Beatrix Rose Thriller: Hong Kong Stories Volume 1 (Beatrix Rose's Hong Kong Stories Book 2) by Dawson Mark

Author:Dawson, Mark [Dawson, Mark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Unputdownable
Published: 2015-03-04T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIX

GRACE WAS sitting quietly in the chair. She looked up with alarm as Beatrix opened the door.

“It’s all right,” she said. “It’s just me.”

The girl’s face was ashen and her eyes stared ahead, unresponsive. Beatrix recognised the beginnings of shock.

“It’s going to be fine, Grace. I’m going to take care of it for you.”

No response. Beatrix felt overwhelmed. She didn’t know what to do. She had been a mother, once, but that seemed a hundred years ago now. She had never been particularly maternal, although she loved Isabella with all her heart. The responses and reactions that came naturally to some mothers did not come as easily to her. She’d had to work at it, constantly reminding herself to focus on her child’s needs.

“Grace,” she said. “That’s a cute name.”

“My mother liked it.”

That was an opening. “Your mother… where is she?”

“I have no mother,” she said, before she realised that she had betrayed her lie from before.

“The woman in the flat?”

“She is not my mother,” she said, with a little heat.

“Then…?”

“My mother is dead. That is my sister.”

Beatrix stopped. Her sister? The woman didn’t look young enough to be her sibling. Whatever it was that she was addicted to—heroin, or ice, or crack—it had scoured the youth from her face.

Grace looked down at her lap.

“Then where is your sister?”

“I do not know. I have not seen her for a week. And I do not care.”

She stared at Beatrix and, without warning, began to weep.

Beatrix hovered before her, unsure once again what she was supposed to do. She knew that she was being drawn into a situation that she might come to regret. But the girl was so pitiful and helpless that it was impossible not to think of her own daughter.

Isabella had watched her father’s murder.

She had watched her mother kill.

She had watched her mother abandon her.

Beatrix hoped that the men and women responsible for Isabella’s abduction would show her compassion, despite the circumstances. This was not so different. Grace was a child confronted by the most obscene situation and unable to work out how to react.

And she was alone.

Beatrix drew the girl into a hug, stroking her glossy black hair with the palm of her hand.

“It’s all right,” she said. “You’re safe.”

She disengaged herself with a sudden jerk. “I am not safe,” she said, her eyes full of desperation. “He is triad. They come for me.”

Beatrix held on to her shoulders. “No,” she said. “They won’t.”

“Beatrix. The men he work with, they are dangerous.”

“I’ll look after you, Grace.”

“They are killers.”

“Grace, you’re not listening—”

“No, Beatrix, you not listening.”

“They don’t know what has happened to that man. We will make him disappear. And then we will make you disappear, too.”

“You cannot hide from triad. Triad are everywhere. Triad are Hong Kong.”

“They won’t be able to hurt you, Grace. You have my word.”

Did she believe it herself?

Not really.

She hoped the girl didn’t hear the uncertainty in her voice.

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