Page 40 of The Dragon 1
The other chefs worked in rhythmic harmony. One sliced tuna belly so thin it curled under its own weight.
Another fanned eel over glowing rice.
Steam curled from wooden bowls.
Fish shimmered on chilled porcelain.
Yamada-san stepped aside and one of the younger shokunin—nervous, barely old enough to grow stubble—hurried to open a narrow door at the back of the kitchen.
We moved through and left that space.
Back here, the smell shifted. Soy gave way to cold air and rust. The temperature dropped several degrees. The passage was narrow, lined with crates of seaweed, ginger, and Styrofoam bins still crusted in melting ice.
Then came the metal door.
Unmarked.
Matte black.
I touched it.
Cool steel met my palm.
The door opened and we stepped into a different world.
The warehouse stretched long and wide. The walls were concrete, the floor waxed smooth. At one point it had stored seafood.
Now it held something else entirely.
The scents were a cocktail of gun oil, damp concrete, and the faint trace of chemicals. Rows and rows of sealed crates stretched across the warehouse like soldiers in formation. Labelsin multiple languages—French, Russian, Arabic—marked the boxes.
Not a single one of them honest.
What was really inside the boxes?
Guns.
MDMA.
High-end designer pills cut with pharmaceutical exactness.
Unmarked vials that could drop an elephant in ten seconds.
Heroin so pure it sparkled.
Cocaine that moved through veins like liquid lightning.
Dozens of men patrolled the space with Uzis slung over their shoulders and pistols tucked within their waistbands.
We moved forward.
Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead.
Then we reached the back wing.
Hiro pushed open the reinforced door and entered what he loved to callthe Candy Room.
Warmth hit me first.
