Authors: Phillip Finch
They were watching him, waiting for his response. Mendonza and Stickney sat on either side of Arielle, around an octagonal table in the center of the gazebo. Favor realized that although they spoke on the phone several times a year, he hadn’t seen either Mendonza or Stickney in almost four years.
The two men had always been physical opposites: Mendonza blocky and muscular, Stickney slim and spare. Favor, looking at them now, thought at first that the years hadn’t changed them much. But he realized this wasn’t exactly true. They had become even more intense versions of themselves: Mendonza, an avid weight lifter, was now truly bull-like, with a thick, corded neck and a powerful upper body; Stickney was now completely lean and angular, without an ounce of excess flesh on his bones. His face was drawn, almost ascetic.
Favor said, “I’ve been in a little funk, that’s all,” he said. “It happens.”
Mendonza gave a derisive snort. “Never saw it happen to you, stud.”
Stickney said, “A funk, Ray? Can you be more specific?”
Favor didn’t like explaining himself, but he was enjoying the moment, the four of them together again. He couldn’t imagine talking this way with anybody else.
“It’s like this,” he said. “When I started investing, I got some advice from an old fart. He told me that banking the first hundred million is always fun. After that, making money starts to feel like real work. He
said that’s when you find out if you want to be just rich or filthy stinking rich.”
Mendonza said: “And he was…”
“Oh, he was filthy stinking rich for sure,” Favor said. “I laughed at him. At the time, I couldn’t believe that making lots and lots of money would ever be anything but lots and lots of fun.”
“You’re telling me you hit a hundred mil?” Mendonza said. “Nine figures?”
“Probably about two years ago. I never knew it at the time, though.”
“Jesus, Ray. I knew you were doing okay. But a hundred million?”
“It’s up around one-sixty now,” Favor said.
“Jeeee-zus!”
“And he was right,” Favor continued. “It hasn’t been fun for a while now. I just never slowed down long enough to realize it.”
Stickney was nodding. “I understand that,” he said. “You’re at a point, you start to sort things out. You wonder how you want to spend the rest of your life.”
“Exactly.”
“You could give it all away and start over,” Mendonza said.
“I’ve considered that. I might do it. But the point isn’t how much money I have. It’s how much time is left, and what I’m going to do with it.”
Nobody spoke for a couple of minutes. The day was bright but chilly. A steady breeze rippled the water along the shoreline and raised a chop out on the lake. To Favor, the sunlight seemed startlingly
bright, and the wind had a delicious bite on the skin. The day was almost painfully beautiful, as if his senses and perception were amplified.
Favor hadn’t felt this way for years, and he knew why he felt it today: it was the action in the campground, the swinging of the biker’s chain and the sweep of the knife’s tip across his chest, the loathing and then the fear in the eyes of the bikers. Climbing provided some of the same jeopardy, but not the pure kill-or-be-killed intensity. As he sat in the gazebo and felt the breeze on his face and watched the sharp glint of sunlight off the rough water of the lake, Favor recalled that exquisite moment when the third Demon had pulled the pistol. Oh, the malevolence in his eyes as he brought the gun up. The surprise, the shock, as Favor sprung across the packed dirt of the campsite and disarmed him, and held the muzzle to his head. No rock wall ever gave him that. Not even close.
Stickney broke the silence: “Ari also says you were talking about One Nine.”
“Apparently Ari is a goddamn bottomless fountain of personal intel.”
“Looking back? Taking stock?” Stickney said.
“Don’t go there,” Mendonza said. His tone was bantering, but Favor knew that Mendonza genuinely didn’t like this tack. The differences between Mendonza and Stickney were not just physical. Stickney had always been introspective, analytical. A thinker. Mendonza, though intelligent, was most comfortable in the concrete, the here and now.
“Taking stock, yeah, something like that,” Favor said to Stickney.
“Worried about how you stand in the karmic ledgers?”
“Don’t go
anywhere
near there.”
“I don’t know about karma,” Favor said. “But you look back, you’d like to think that you’ve left the world at least in no worse shape than it was when you arrived. I can’t say that.”
Stickney was nodding, his face serious. He understood. Mendonza was shaking his head, arms folded across his big chest. Mendonza really didn’t like this kind of talk.
Favor said, “What we did, a lot of it, you never know. Somebody gives you a job, tells you it has to be done. You do the job, they say you did a good thing. But you’re never sure. All you see is the blood on the floor. That’s real, the rest is guesswork. And some of it, you
know
that it was bad juju. That bothers me. It does, I won’t lie.”
Mendonza’s phone chimed. He took it out, looked at it, and said, “My mother. I have to take this one. Ray, no shit, don’t torture yourself over things you can’t change.”
Mendonza got up and walked some distance away, standing out of earshot as he spoke on the phone.
“Seems you were quite the badass last night,” Stickney said.
“A taste of the old times.”
“Havoc was wreaked. Bones were broken. Heads were cracked.”
“So I’m told.”
“Ray Favor at his best,” Arielle said.
“At my best, he never would’ve gotten near me with that knife,” Favor said. “But yeah. That was me.”
“How was it?” Stickney asked.
“I have to admit, I haven’t had so much fun in a long time.” Favor found himself grinning.
“No misgivings?” Arielle said.
“Hell no. They were raping that girl. And the way it went down, I’m sure it wasn’t their first time. They had it coming. Unmitigated assholes.”
“You see our point,” Stickney said.
“What point?”
“Favor being Favor isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s all in the situation. Just make sure you’re right. I mean locked-down sure, no questions, no gray areas. No goddamn ambiguity. Then when you’re clear about that, go out and joyfully be the fearsome badass that you are. You’ll have no second thoughts.”
“But how often does
that
come along? I only had to wait ten years for last night.”
“Some would say that opportunities to do good will come your way when you commit to a righteous path,” Stickney said.
“Who says that?”
“It’s been said.”
“You made that up.”
Favor laughed. Arielle laughed.
“Yes, I did,” Stickney said. He was laughing too. “But I believe it.”
“Tell you what
I
think,” Favor said. “I think it’s goddamn cold here. I want to go someplace warm. We ought
to get on a jet and fly someplace where we can bake. Seychelles or Koh Samui or Raiatea or wherever. And then raise some decadent hell for a few days.”
“When do you want to do that?” Stickney said.
“Tonight. Just go. I can have a G550 sitting on the flight line at South Lake Tahoe in three hours. One thing about money, it makes things happen in a hurry.”
“I have no plans,” Stickney said.
“Beautiful,” Favor said. He looked at Arielle: she grinned and shrugged. Mendonza was walking back to the gazebo, putting his phone away.
“Pack your bags,” Stickney said to him. “Apparently Ray wants to sponsor a disgusting blowout at some place you can’t spell, and we’re going there in style.”
“I’d like to,” Mendonza said. “But I can’t. I’m on a midnight flight to the Philippines. And it’s not in style, it’s on standby.”
“An emergency?” Favor said.
“I have no idea. A kid, a teenage girl, is in trouble. I’ve been conscripted to help out.”
“Your family?”
“Her father is the second cousin of my mother’s uncle by marriage. Something like that. Don’t laugh. Please. It’s a Filipino thing. There is no such thing as a distant relative. Something else about Filipinos. When Mom says you get on a plane, you don’t argue, you look for a ticket counter.”
“Want me to come along?” Favor said.
“I wouldn’t mind a little company,” Mendonza
said.
“I’m going if Ray goes,” Arielle said.
“I’m in,” Stickney said.
“You don’t have to do this,” Mendonza said.
“We were just going to fart around and get a sunburn anyway,” Arielle said. “We can do that in the Philippines.”
“Okay,” Mendonza said. “Great. But I don’t think we’ll all get on the flight.”
“I wouldn’t worry about the flight,” Arielle said. “We have an alternative.”
“What’s the story on the girl?” Favor said.
“The girl went missing; nobody knows what happened. Mom was getting this thirdhand, and she was vague on the details. All she said was ‘You must go to Manila, the truth is in Manila.’ Quote unquote.”
Far from Manila, and half a world from Lake Tahoe, Marivic Valencia lay on her cot in a small room with high concrete walls. She was waiting for the sign that would reassure her, tell her that her situation was not as desperate as she feared.
It would be a few bars of a beautiful melody, whistled pitch-perfect by someone who really knew how to whistle. She had been waiting for it almost half a day. But she heard only the incessant churning of the ocean against a shore, and the soft whisk of the ceiling fan, the broad blades turning overhead.
No melody.
It should have happened by now. Every minute that passed, she became more certain that she would never hear it and that she was in a deep pit of trouble, with no way out.
Her ordeal had begun when she stepped off the bus in Manila six days earlier.
She didn’t realize it right away. She was aware only of the thick, pungent air that leaves its impression on all first-time visitors to Manila. It was like walking into a wall. All her life, growing up beside the gulf, she had known only fresh air and ocean
breezes, nothing like this viscous stew of diesel fumes and sweat and rotting garbage and fish fried in hot oil.
The odor stunned her—that, and the mob of people milling around the concrete apron, and the sounds, and the activity. So much happening at once.
A woman was calling her name.
“Marivic Valencia? You are Marivic, yes?”
The woman stood a few feet away. She was about fifty years old. Slim and well dressed. Gold bangle earrings, too much makeup on a bony, pinched face. An overpowering perfume. Marivic recognized her as a
matrona,
a middle-aged woman with some money—a formidable type.
“Yes,” Marivic said, and walked over to the woman. “Are you from Optimo?”
“Were you expecting someone else?”
At first this remark struck Marivic as abrupt, almost sarcastic. But the
matrona
cocked her head and waited for Marivic to speak, and Marivic realized that it was an actual question.
“No,” Marivic said. “Only the representative from the agency.”
“That’s me,” the woman said. “Do you have any other bags?”
“Just this one.”
The woman crooked a finger over one shoulder, summoning a man who stood waiting behind her. Late forties, hair shorn close to the scalp, stocky, face impassive. He stepped forward and reached for her
bag, and Marivic saw that his face was badly pockmarked. His eyes were heavy lidded and unfriendly. He was terrifying without even seeming to try. Marivic stepped back involuntarily as he approached, and he took the bag and turned and began to walk away with it. The woman started after him.
Marivic hesitated. This was all happening so suddenly. The woman stopped and looked back to Marivic and said, “Well? Aren’t you coming?”
Marivic didn’t know what to say. Something here didn’t seem right.
“What? Don’t tell me you’re scared. Yes, you are, you’re frightened,” the woman said. “I can tell.”
Her tone wasn’t so abrupt now. She sounded almost kind.
“I’m Magdalena Villegas,” she said. “You can call me Magda. That’s Totoy. We’re from the agency. You’re here for a job, yes? Come on, girl, it’s all right.”
Marivic began to walk with her. The three of them passed quickly through the terminal, out onto the boulevard, to a dark Toyota van parked at the curb. Totoy put the bag in the back, opened the doors, and slid behind the wheel. Magdalena got in up front, and Marivic found herself alone in the backseat.
Totoy started the engine and pulled out into the boulevard. He glanced back in the mirror. He was looking straight at her, Marivic realized, as if checking her. She caught something in his eyes that she didn’t like.
Magdalena turned in her seat, looking back at Marivic.
“You must be hungry,” she said. She held out a white paper bag.
“Siopao,”
she said. Steamed pork buns. “We picked them up just for you.”
Marivic took the bag and opened it. Two plump buns, still warm. The scent of dough and sweet meat rose from the bag. Marivic realized that, yes, she was very hungry. She took one of the buns and tried to pass the bag back.
“No, that’s for you,” Magda said. She opened a small insulated cooler between the front seats and gave Marivic a chilled orange drink in a carton. Marivic quickly ate the second
siopao
and drained the drink.
“Is that better?” Magda said.
Marivic nodded. She did feel better. She was relaxing now. Traffic was light, and they were cruising along the boulevard. Manila was clipping past the window, and Marivic knew that she should be getting her first good look at the city, but for some reason it didn’t seem to matter at this moment.
Tomorrow,
she thought, and she leaned back against the seat.
They continued to drive through the city. Marivic wondered whether Totoy even knew where he was going. The route seemed aimless. Marivic tried to focus, examine what was happening, but she was suddenly so weary that she could barely keep her eyes open. Her head seemed thick.
She was tired. So very tired. She lay back and closed her eyes.
She dozed.
She became aware of Magda and Totoy speaking
to each other. The voices came to Marivic as if from the other end of a very large, empty room.