I was a bit nervous. Fred had a plan, but this involved infiltrating Little China, so we stopped by a shady-looking tailor shop on the way.

  I glanced at him. Traditional Chinese attire, fully black. A cigarette dangled between his fake mustache and the long beard that reached his stomach.

  “How do I look?” I asked, posing in my layered robes like a foreign princess.

  He stared at me for half a second. “Chinese.”

  I stumbled back.

  Is that it?!

  “This won’t do.” The tailor tied my hair up with a chopstick, then gave me a veiled hat that covered most of my face. “Remember to hide your hands as well, otherwise those ball-jointed knuckles will betray you.”

  I nodded, slipping my hands inside my flowy sleeves.

  Fred put some bills inside the man’s pocket. “We’re renting these, Thomas. I don’t have the money to buy it right now.”

  The tailor seemed disappointed. “Just don’t rip them at least.”

  “Sure.” Fred turned and left the shop.

  “Thank you,” I said and scurried after him.

  It didn’t take long before the streets narrowed ahead. Here, people walked fast and kept their heads low as the scent of fish and opium mingled in the air. Cops were almost nowhere to be seen.

  This was Little China.

  Some of the locals stared at us, making me uneasy.

  I glanced down at my hands to make sure they weren’t visible, but they were looking at Fred this time.

  Sometimes I’d forget how abnormally tall he was.

  “Don’t worry,” he said without looking at me. “Just keep walking.”

  “Do you know who took Savio?”

  “I have an idea.”

  We took a sharp right turn and entered a busy street market, where there was lots of shouting.

  Fred stopped, looking across the street at a tall, heavily guarded building.

  “How are we getting in, though?” I asked.

  A boy pushing a handcart full of sacks bumped into me as he was about to leave the sidewalk. Fred grabbed his arm.

  The youngster’s eyes widened in fear. “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t see—”

  “Is this rice going in there?” Fred looked at the building.

  The boy nodded.

  “I’ll take it for you.” Fred slipped a crumpled bill inside his pocket, but the boy looked at it and shook his head defiantly.

  “Bloody hell, it’s just rice.” Fred gave him a couple more bills, and he ran off. “I’m officially broke now.”

  I smiled sheepishly at him.

  “Let’s go.”

  Fred began talking in broken Chinese with one of the thugs at the entrance. It seemed to be going well until another one tried to pull my arm from behind.

  I stiffened in response, glancing down at my hidden hands.

  I was afraid they would see through our disguise if I said anything, so I just planted my feet on the ground like a statue, hoping the man would eventually give up.

  He pulled harder instead.

  My hands were about to slip when the thug cursed out loud, growing angry at my resistance.

  Fred turned.

  The man released my arm immediately as if it were a hot fire poker, as Fred told him something I didn’t understand. I sighed in relief.

  I had no idea Fred had influence with the Chinese. It was weird, though, since next the thug at the door shooed us inside like dogs.

  “Thanks for the help, but what the hell did you do?” I asked.

  “I just told them you were showing early signs of leprosy.”

  “WHA—” I covered my mouth, lowering my voice to a whisper. “Leprosy? Seriously?”

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  He shrugged.

  We dropped the handcart and climbed the stairs, coming face-to-face with a bunch of doors.

  Fred scanned our surroundings for a heartbeat, then nodded towards one of the street-facing rooms.

  “We’re going in hot,” he said. “Are you ready?”

  I nodded.

  We slipped inside as soon as he yanked the door open.

  Click.

  “You!” Noticing us, an old man tried to get up from his desk in a hurry.

  “Connie,” Fred said.

  “On it.” I slapped off my hat and drew the chopstick in a single motion, pressing it against the man’s throat like a dagger. “Do not scream.”

  He sat back slowly on his chair.

  “So.” Fred stepped towards the desk, the wooden boards creaking under his feet. “Where is he, Chang?”

  Chang’s eyes darted to me, then back at Fred. “Do you think I’m afraid to die? Your butler owes us a crap lot of money. This is a matter of honor!”

  I pressed the stick hard enough to hurt. “Lower your voice.”

  The old man gulped.

  “How much does Savio owe you exactly?” Fred pushed a piece of paper toward him.

  He looked at me as if he was asking for permission to move.

  “Write,” I said.

  With trembling hands, Chang scribbled a number on the paper and pushed it back to Fred.

  “Fuck, I knew it.” Fred slammed the paper back on the desk. “I wouldn’t be able to raise this much even if I sold the house.”

  I shot a look at him.

  The house?!

  Chang spoke up. “We’ll take the house AND the living doll then.”

  Me?!

  Fred’s expression darkened.

  “Kill him,” he said.

  I blushed. “I’m flattered to know you wouldn’t sell me but... you sure?”

  The fake beard didn’t even move—Fred was dead-serious.

  Chang’s face went pale.

  “Well, I’ve never done this before, but here we go—”

  “W-wait!” Chang's voice cracked. “There’s a job you can do in exchange for the doll, but I’m keeping the house as well!”

  “Not my house, Chang!” I pressed the chopstick deeper. “You heard the man—”

  “Stop.” Fred lifted his hand.

  “This is a dealbreaker! I’d rather die than get less than half the value I’m owed.”

  “Not going to happen—”

  Fred sat down. “I’m all ears.”

  My heart dropped.

  “You want to give him our house?!”

  Fred rolled his eyes.

  I gasped.

  “Fine!” I pulled the chopstick from Chang’s neck, drawing a drop of blood at the tip. “I won’t stay between you and your business!”

  He didn’t even look at me; the bastard was hell-bent on giving our house away to the Chinese.

  “Argh!” I stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind me.

  A thug stared at me from across the corridor.

  “What’re you looking at?!” I hurled the chopstick at him, sending him running back to his room. “Hmpf!”

  The job was simple, on the surface at least. The daughter of one of the Chinese bosses went missing in Chang’s territory, so now the guy was blaming the old man and threatening war.

  Fred lit another cigarette. “He insists his people are innocent and wants us to find a supernatural cause for her disappearance.”

  “How old is she?”

  “Nine.”

  “Shit...”

  “Yeah.” Fred stared blankly into the busy street. “Shit indeed.”

  I didn’t need to hide my appearance anymore now that we were working for Chang, so I took my hands out of my sleeves and hugged myself.

  “Sorry, I think I overreacted a bit earlier,” I said, but there was still a knot in my chest; I could feel it.

  “What else did you want me to do?”

  What?

  “I just wish you had consulted me first, at least.”

  “With or without your input, there was no other sane option left.”

  I held back tears. “It’s not... about that.”

  “I’ll buy another house, eventually.”

  My voice rose to a shout again as I lost hold of the knot.

  “It’s not about that either!”

  People stared at us; some stopped on their tracks in the middle of the street.

  Fred blew off smoke, unbothered by the stares, and I don’t know what could even bother him at this point.

  “Then I surrender,” he said. “I don’t know what else I can do for you.”

  Outrageous, I thought as I opened my mouth, certain that something would come out.

  “I... you could...”

  But I had nothing.

  “I move, that’s what I do, Connie. I move.” Fred didn’t even look at me. “If you make the wrong choice and end up in the wrong place, I won’t allow myself to care. Do you understand?”

  My heart deflated like a balloon as I finally understood, or so I thought.

  “Yeah.” I wiped away my tears angrily, the street coming alive again. “Sure.”

  “Good,” he said, exhaustion creeping out of his voice, then threw the cigarette away. “Let’s get this case over with.”

  I went after him, holding myself back from stepping on his foot by “accident”.

  “You look stupid in this rented beard,” I said instead.

  “Yeah. It doesn’t fit my pockets.”

  Argh!

  We split up eventually, and I was glad we did, as I’m not sure what I would’ve done.

  I stopped to interrogate a fruit seller in his stall, as these people seemed to be the eyes of the street.

  “Have you seen or spoken to an unaccompanied little girl recently? She might’ve looked scared or lost.”

  The man thought for a second, then began telling me the story of his life.

  This would take a while, clearly, so I just smiled and nodded along.

  Well, that was a long shot...

  My eyes drifted on their own at some point, and I just couldn’t believe them.

  Across the street, Fred stood surrounded on every side by a pack of curious Chinese grandmas like a cornered deer. It didn’t seem like they were going to let that distinguished ‘Oriental’ gentleman go anytime soon.

  I chuckled against my will.

  Shit, the universe was conspiring against me, or so I felt.

  I just couldn’t stay mad at him.

  And that stupid freaking beard.

  A sudden, chilly breeze struck me, and I felt goosebumps.

  “Did you feel that?” I interrupted the merchant’s monologue.

  He shook his head, confused.

  Weird.

  It hit me again, colder, but this time I turned to find the source.

  A girl stared at me from the sidewalk, wearing a ragged dress.

  I squinted my eyes. “Oi, is that...”

  She ran off.

  “Wait!” I followed her.

  The girl slipped into a narrow alley.

  Then another one.

  “Excuse me!” I dodged fish carts and carriers, trying to keep up with her. “Sorry!”

  But she was too fast for a little girl. I lost track of her amidst the crowd.

  “No, no, no...” I spun around myself, searching for clues in a hectic street that erased them mercilessly.

  There were too many shady-looking shops, too many dark alleys. Nobody cared.

  And I failed.

  I began to retreat. I needed to tell Fred, at least to make sure I wasn’t going crazy, when my bones shivered a familiar chill.

  There she was, staring at me from one of the shops across the street. There was a vertical sign with something in Chinese written on it, curtains that didn’t fully open, and no light inside.

  “Bloody hell, I am going crazy.”

  I put a smile on my face and approached her slowly, trying not to scare her again. “It’s okay, I’m a friend—”

  My smile dropped as she darted inside. The door was open.

  I ran after her, cursing my luck.

  The air pressure changed as I stepped inside the shop.

  That’s all I remember. That and the Chinese sign I couldn’t read.