Page 48 of Shadow Lies

As he gripped her head between his palms and thrust between her lips, he realized he’d be lucky if he could leave her at all.

ChapterSeventeen

It was eight hours by bus to travel from Henan to Beijing, not counting rest stops.

The trip from the monastery to the Olympic village took Kane and the other performers all day. Hours during which he couldn’t help thinking about Alexis.

Notthe time they spent together in her hotel room. But the fact she was probably sipping champagne in business class during a flight that would take her less than half the time he’d spent on the bus.

He and the brothers were staying four to a room inside the Olympic bubble with the athletes. There they had to abide by all the restrictions set in place.

Alexis was staying at a no-doubt fancy hotel in a huge suite somewhere nearby in the city. Just her and her computer equipment, which she had secured in hard, padded, locked boxes for the flight.

It had probably cost her—or Charley—more to move the equipment than the total expense for the bus to transport the two dozen monks.

He’d been taught to give up comforts and possessions. Apparently, he’d need a refresher course in selflessness and the evils of envy when he returned to the monastery.

Right now, what he really needed was to pay attention to what was happening around him at the event in progress.

As far as he knew, he was the only eyes and ears on the ground. The one in the best position to observe who reacted when Wei turned up missing during Xi Jinping’s VIP reception currently underway.

The banquet was a small, more intimate event compared to the rest of the ceremonies. Luckily this was where the monks were performing.

He would have had no hope of observing the VIP section in the Bird’s Nest, the eighty-thousand seat Beijing National Stadium where the opening ceremonies were held.

Meanwhile amidst all the pageantry, for the Shaolin performers some things were different and some were very much the same.

There were no chores to do here, but practice happened as usual beginning right after they arrived.

With practice comes wisdom.

That kung fu credo had been as strongly instilled in him as the SEAL motto—the only easy day was yesterday—had been drilled into all the candidates at Coronado.

Practice in Beijing was as hard and as long as it was in Henan. But it had felt good to move after sitting for so long on the bus.

Felt good too during yesterday’s practice to put the mess with Charley and Wei out of his mind for a while.

To solely concentrate on the moves he’d performed so many times so he could execute them mindlessly.

That was the point of the hours of daily training. In battle, muscle memory could take over.

He’d need to rely on that today at this VIP luncheon event as his concentration was split.

Now, as they waited in a room off to the side and prepared to take the stage, he was blind. But once the performance started and he was out in front of the world leaders, he’d be on the lookout for who the puppet master, as Alexis called him, might be.

The joke of it all was that security was less than he’d anticipated.

Yes, the pandemic protocols were intense and they had all been tested, more than once. But no one looked twice at the box filled with weapons they’d traveled with to use during their performance.

Real weapons. Not fake stage props.

Maybe Charley wasn’t as crazy or clueless as he’d assumed for thinking he could have single-handedly assassinated Wei in this environment.

The battle-axe, dharma cudgel, spear, halberd, sword, dart, dagger, black tiger hammer, plum blossom broadsword, Bodhidharma staff, tiger hooks, saber, deer-horn knives, fork, whip, mace, talon and lance were all here with them, lined up and waiting for the performance.

Any one of the traditional Kung Fu weapons could be used to kill a man.

Wei was lucky that Kane was no longer in the killing business. And that Alexis, even after her CIA ousting, was still prone to digging deeper and not blindly following orders.

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