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“Don’t, Mya.”
Mya avoided looking at Calvino. Instead she stared at Kati, crying and begging, in between her wails and sobs.
“A beautiful woman like Kati always gets what she wants from men, and when she wants it,” said Yadanar. “Somchai was young, handsome as a leading man, and he dressed with an elegant hi-so club style. He talked her into shooting the guy. Just do it. Boom. You got close to him because you’re a woman, a pretty woman, and maybe he thought you were a part of his dream, a hallucination. And you blew out his brains, making it look like suicide. Isn’t that what you told us earlier?” Yadanar sighed. “Not that she wanted to tell the story. But she finally got around to telling us everything.”
Mya walked over to the corner where Kati sat. She saw Kati’s eyes balloon in size as she aimed the Colt .22 and pulled the trigger. The silencer masked the shot. The bullet entered Kati’s skull above her right eye and rattled around and around inside her skull, scrambling her brain tissue into a soft yogurt. She fell back against the wall with the mural, splattering blood on angels and fairies hovering on
a grassy knoll. Mya lowered the Colt .22 and crossed the room while everyone watched. Stopping at the cupboard, she dropped the gun in the drawer.
She turned to Calvino.
“Back in Bangkok, you tell Rob’s father that no one got away with killing Rob. His killer was taken care of. You tell him that Mya made certain herself.”
The three men on the floor squirmed, blubbering, crying and pleading.
“We’ll take care of them later,” said Yadanar.
He opened the door for Mya, who strolled out in her activist T-shirt. Calvino caught up with her and grabbed her arm, spinning her around.
“That was your ‘fuck everyone’ statement?” he asked.
“I can’t think of a better one, can you?”
She broke free and rushed down the stairs.
Yadanar stepped to Calvino’s side, holding a glass of his birthday champagne.
“My cousin was headstrong even as a kid,” said Yadanar. “I liked her T-shirt this evening. STOP Killing Press. How appropriate for a revenge killing.”
“I didn’t think she’d pull the trigger,” said Calvino.
“To be frank, neither did I. She exceeded my expectations.”
Yadanar had seen her impact at the 50th Street Bar on the first night she’d walked on stage and left the audience screaming for more. She was an entertainer, a performer, who was only alive when she stood before an audience. Calvino started down the stairs, squeezing between couples. He looked for Colonel Pratt in one room, then another, until he heard the sound of a saxophone, drums and a violin coming from down the hall. The Colonel was inside, playing the borrowed instrument. After the music finished, the Colonel walked over to Calvino, smiling. Playing the saxophone had him in the groove, the zone, the eye of the storm—a place that had many names, and a place where a man could exit and no one could touch him. Calvino gestured for his friend to step outside. Colonel Pratt removed the strap of the saxophone, swung it over his head and walked out of the room. The other players looked after him, shrugged and kept playing.
They walked down the corner and into the kitchen, past the fridge and into a pantry. Calvino shut the door.
“You were right about the birthday party having risks,” said Calvino.
“You were right about the girl,” said Pratt.
“Which one?”
Colonel Pratt looked surprised.
“Which one? Is there more than one?”
Calvino recovered himself.
“Not really. There’s the Black Cat, of course. Who did you think I meant?”
“I thought Kati would be here tonight,” said Colonel Pratt.
“You thought that she worked for Yadanar,” said Calvino.
“A reasonable assumption,” Colonel Pratt said. “Unless you’ve got some information you want to tell me.”
“Only she didn’t work for Yadanar. She worked for Somchai.”
