Read The Risk Agent for Free Online Page A

with me,” she said, softly, “but I have a boyfriend.”
    “Good for you. Bad for me.”
    “My guy has converted a lane house into office space. Leases the ground floor to a coffee shop. Good salads, if you’re interested. Cobb, isn’t it?”
    Fay didn’t forget much. He made a mental note and nodded, smiling.
    “I will tell my staff you are not here,” she continued. “That they never saw you. But you will want to avoid our night watchman. I don’t know him well enough yet. He just started. He smokes out in the front patio from midnight to dawn. You should be fine using your key on the back door.”
    “I don’t have a key.”
    She tossed him a loaded key ring. “A man like you, you must be pretty used to back doors.”
    He switched to Mandarin and cursed.
    She laughed and returned one worse. He prepared to continue the exchange of insults—good Chinese sport—but she was interrupted by a call.
    When she turned around a moment later to speak, Knox was gone.
    4:15 P.M.
    PUDONG DISTRICT
    SHANGHAI
    The pressure of lost time beat down on Knox as steadily as the rain. The likelihood of Danner being found alive diminished with each passing hour. Some friendships carried debt—classmates, survivors of catastrophe among them. Danner was both: a fellow civilian classmate of Knox’s during SERE training; his shotgun rider on the resupply convoys from Kuwait City into Iraq. They’d grown rich together, both avoiding serious injury and death, and had each other to thank for it.
    But “Danny” was even more: Tommy’s legal guardian should anything happen to Knox. A lifelong burden he’d readily accepted when asked. Now it was evidently Danny’s life at risk and Knox knew that to turn his back was akin to Danny turning his back on his brother when pressed.
    Knox rode a city bus across the Huangpu River into the Pudong district. Before attempting a search of Lu Hao’s residence, where he hoped to locate Lu’s bribery records, Knox first wanted to visit Danner’s apartment. He knew the DNA was crucial. But he also knew Danner to be a thorough researcher. If he were minding Lu Hao for Rutherford and The Berthold Group, then he would have known all about Lu’s “consulting” work. So there was at least a small chance he’d have made a copy of Lu’s books, or created his own version, or perhaps even made notes about where Lu Hao kept his confidential documents. Likewise, if Danner had had any suspicions about Lu Hao’s clientele, he might have noted it in advance of their abduction. Knox would gladly follow any leads that Danner had left behind.
    Pudong had arisen from shipyards and rice paddies twenty years earlier and was now the Wall Street of Shanghai. Inventive office buildings and gorgeous apartment towers lined the wide streets. The security guards in Danner’s river-view co-op were twenty-year-old boys in ill-fitting gray suits. Knox knew they wouldn’t mess with a waiguoren—a foreigner. Their job was to put a face on the compound and to keep out potential thieves and robbers.
    Knox introduced himself as a friend of Mr. Danner’s and saw in their faces that they were aware of their resident’s absence.
    “He asked me to get a few of his things and send them to him,” Knox said. Again, he monitored their response. What he detected surprised him. What were they expressing? It looked like fear—just below the surface. It took Knox a moment to make sense of it, but once he did his heart sank: someone had beaten him here. He had a fairly good idea who that might be.
    “Entrance to Mr. Danner’s apartment is not possible,” said the most senior of the boys. “So very sorry. Must hear from Mr. Danner directly.”
    Knox switched to Shanghainese, a local dialect few Westerners could command. Politely, he berated the man for his insolence.
    The guard flushed.
    “You will join me,” Knox said, still in Shanghainese. “Together we will take inventory. Anything I remove, I will sign for. No problem.