Detective Armhurts.
“Uh, I need to take it,” I say, holding up the phone.
Davis nods. “Sure.”
I turn away and answer. “Hey, Detective, how are you?”
“The security system went off fifteen minutes ago and you didn’t call to let me know it was a false alarm, so I’m following up.”
She sounds tired.
“I’m sorry,” I say, guilt hitting me. “Yeah, so, someone broke in and trashed the place.”
“Someone,” she says, suspiciously.
Ceramic cups crunch underfoot as I step toward the pantry. “Shang’s son came to the shop yesterday.”
“Why didn’t you notify me? This is a serious security issue.”
“I didn’t notify you because…”
Because he has leverage against me that you can do nothing about.
“Because?” she prompts.
There’s no lying my way out of this one. If I want to maintain some level of police protection against Lei, I have to tell her. I need to protect Zixin and Nai Nai.Theyare my responsibility. Not my ma and ba.
“My parents have been held against their will in China for the last four years. The Zhao family are in control of them.”
“Jaw-hwey.” She sighs my name. “Why didn’t this come up sooner?”
“You can’t do anything for them,” I snap at her patronizing tone.
“Yes, but we could’ve done something foryou. We could’ve made it impossible for the Zhao family to contact you.”
“So I just wouldn’t know if Ma and Ba were being tortured because of me?”
“Are they being tortured?” she asks.
I swallow back the emotion threatening to spill out. “Zhao Lei implied heavily that they would hurt them if I didn’t sign a contract that says I made everything up about Zhao Shang.”
“You didn’t sign it, did you?”
It stings that she’s more concerned with her evidence than for my family. Evidence that Ididfalsify. I was never in the room with Shang when he discussed his plans or revealed his books. I only know of them because of my magic…
Bitterness spreads over my tongue. “No.”
“Good, that’s good,” she says. “I’m sorry that you’re in this position, truly. There’s not much I can do about your parents if they’re outside U.S. jurisdiction.”
“Not much, but something?” I ask, hope blotching out my anger.
“It’s possible we could get in contact with the U.S. embassy, if you know where in China they’re being held. If their passports are still valid, we could petition their local police to search for them.”
A message dings in my ear, and I pull my phone away to look. My stomach bottoms out and knocks the air from my lungs.
“Baba,” I murmur, touching the pixilated image of him on the screen. He’s holding a sign with today’s date and two words written in English.
Please sign.
