of the project?” Takumi asked, all business.
“It’s proceeding well, sir. I anticipate a breakthrough later in the week.”
“That’s excellent. I shall expect another call when all of it is finalized.”
Meaning Machii should not call again until he had good news. The kyodai nodded, feeling slightly foolish when he realized his master could not see him.
“I shall definitely be in touch, sir.”
“I look forward to it with anticipation. Goodbye.”
And the line went dead.
Machii was not sure if he should feel relieved or apprehensive, maybe some of each. His boss had not raged at him, but that was not the oyabun’s style. If he wanted you dead, he would smile to your face, then make arrangements for your execution when it suited him. A soldier who displeased Kazuo Takumi might be left as an example to his comrades. Other targets of his anger simply disappeared.
Machii knew he was not safe yet. To secure himself and his position in the family, he had to correct the problems that beset him. First and foremost, he had to find out who had dared to move against him and eliminate the threat. When that was done he could proceed with taking over Wolff Consolidated.
Which, of course, included a casino in Las Vegas. That, under the old plan, would have gone to Jiro Shinoda, but Machii had other plans for Shinoda now. He would not forget being stabbed in the back.
And he would not forgive.
* * *
Azabu, Tokyo
AZABU WAS THE richest neighborhood in Tokyo, home to celebrities and business moguls, living side by side with foreign embassies. It bordered the Akasaka business district and upscale Aoyama, where fashion was everything. Aside from the Roppongi entertainment district, most of Azabu was relatively quiet, considering its placement in the world’s most crowded city. One-bedroom apartments in Azabu started at 700,000 yen—call it $8,500—per month.
That had no impact on a man who owned seven high-rise apartment buildings.
Kazuo Takumi kept large suites in five of those buildings, and smaller bolt-holes in the other two, sometimes spending a month or more at one apartment, other times shifting each night, if he believed that staying in the same place might involve some risk.
Above all else, he took no chances where his safety was concerned.
This day he had awakened at his second-favorite home, on Block 8. City addresses in Japan did not depend on street names, but on numbered blocks. Within each block, buildings were numbered by their age, with “1” assigned to the oldest, and so on to the newest structure. Thus, Takumi’s present home, however briefly, sat atop building 12 on Block 8, with a view of traffic gleaming on the Sakurada Dori freeway.
He was troubled by the two calls from America. Jiro Shinoda had been on the line as soon as he had finished speaking with Noboru Machii in Atlantic City, voicing his concern, twisting the knife in a transparent effort to advance himself. That was unfortunate, but nothing unexpected for a relatively young, ambitious big brother. Bad blood would separate them now, a fact Takumi had been conscious of when he informed Machii of the call from Shinoda.
It was always best to keep subordinates at odds with one another, constantly competing for their master’s favor, rather than agreeing to conspire against him while the master’s back was turned.
Machii’s call had been more troubling. Seven men lost, and police would now be on alert to watch him, if there had been no surveillance previously. An attack was bad for business, all the more so when its source was unidentified. Noboru would be working urgently to solve that problem, knowing that his very life depended on it, but the crime lord wondered now if his Atlantic City kyodai was equal to the task.
Machii had disposed of Tommy Wolff, using the agents he’d supplied, but now the takeover of Wolff Consolidated would be stalled until Machii solved the riddle of his latest difficulty. Should that drag on much beyond Wolff’s funeral, Takumi was prepared to send more men around the world to lift the burden off his kyodai’s shoulders.
And, if necessary, they would lift his head at the same time.
Machii had a short window of opportunity in which to prove himself. And when that window closed, it would descend upon him like the blade of a katana in a ninja’s hands.
After victory, he thought, quoting a proverb from his youth, tighten your helmet strap.
The moral: premature excitement over great success might cause a careless man to drop his guard before the war was truly won.
Takumi never quit, never let down his guard. As for Machii…
The Yakuza crime boss decided he would send another team, four of his best this time. His private jet was always ready on a moment’s notice, and the flight from Tokyo to Atlantic City International Airport was fourteen hours long. If they arrived in time to help Machii, fine. If not, at least they would be on-site to begin the cleanup process.
Put things right before it was too late.
Meanwhile…
Takumi had his own concerns at home, completely unrelated to the situation in America. His son and heir apparent had not grown into the man Takumi hoped would run his empire when the time came for him to depart this life. In youth, Toi had been frivolous and spoiled—his father’s fault, of course, as it had to fall on any father. Lately, he had grown more serious, but also more distracted, as if no part of the family business inspired him in the least. The thought that Toi might try to leave the Sumiyoshi-kai appalled Takumi, but he could not rule it out.
Worse than the personal insult, of course, would be the blow Takumi suffered in the eyes of other godfathers when he could not control his only son. It would be viewed as weakness, and he could not argue with that judgment. Toi’s abdication, if it happened, was a threat to the whole family. Better if he had not been born, in fact, than to run off pursuing other friends and goals entirely foreign to his upbringing.
That was a problem for another day, however.
Reaching for the intercom beside him, Takumi summoned Kato Ando and greeted him with curt instructions. “Call The Four,” he said. “They must be ready to depart within the hour.”
“Yes, sir,” Kato replied, and left the room without a backward glance.
* * *
Atlantic Avenue, Atlantic City
BOLAN’S INFINITY TRANSMITTER was not hampered by the scrambler on Machii’s telephone, because it picked up conversation from the office, not the phone line. There were pros and cons to that: he only heard the kyodai’s side of the discussion, had to guess what he was hearing from the other end, but Bolan still had contact when Machii cut the link and called out for his flunky.
“Tetsuya!”
A moment later, Bolan heard the second now-familiar voice, reading the captions as his smartphone carried out translation.
“Yes, sir?”
“Are we ready to get out of here?” Machii asked.
“As ordered, sir. The limousine is downstairs, waiting.”
Bolan twisted the RAV4’s ignition key and pulled out of the Tropicana’s parking lot, turned left and drove southwestward, back toward Sunrise Enterprises. There was traffic, sure, but it would slow Machii’s getaway as much as it did Bolan’s progress, thirteen blocks to cover from the huge casino to the office building where he’d killed three men that evening.
Machii had disposed of their remains, presumably, since he hadn’t been carted off for questioning. It didn’t pay to underestimate the Yakuza, either in terms of their ferocity or their efficiency. The Yakuza served as the planet’s oldest criminal syndicate—older even than the Chinese triads—and survival spanning some four hundred years