She gently stroked Cobus’s face to placate him as she mounted him, then began rhythmically rocking with him inside her. It’s okay, her expression told him, as if forgiving him for participating her in exploitation. Cobus locked eyes with the young woman, holding her gaze in silent understanding.

As Cobus climaxed, he shivered uncontrollably for several seconds, as a kaleidoscope of emotions he had been holding in suddenly strobed through him and was released, leaving him breathless. So much pain . . . and so much evil, all in the name of what he had told himself over and over and over was good. The woman saw the tears well in his eyes.

She pulled his face to her small bare breasts in a tight embrace, letting his tears roll down her skin.

CHAPTER 27 ALLIES

CHAPTER 27
ALLIES

Knight leaned on the railing around the man-made lake, smoking a cigarette as he soaked in the opera music booming from the speakers of the Wynn Macau Casino. Geysers of water, dyed all the colors of the rainbow by submerged stage lighting, swayed and spouted and twirled with the rising score. All around Performance Lake, Chinese tourists hugged each other and took selfies.

Knight scoffed at the trite banality of the whole schmaltzy affair. Eventually, his thoughts began to wander, as if the Italian composer’s original intentions for the piece were somehow bleeding through all the soapiness of the performance. He reflected on the ugly world he found himself in, and the horrors he had seen people in his business visit on the creatures in their possession—all the snakes and apes and big cats and horses that had been drugged and beaten and mutilated. Immense suffering so callously inflicted. Though Knight was no savior, he still wanted to believe that he had helped create better conditions for the animals in human custody, just as his father had.

Cobus joined Knight at the railing. His left eye was black.

Knight had decided to summon him for another meeting after conferring with Perkins and the other senior partners at Carlyle Insurance about the possibility of penetrating the Asian market.

Knight noticed a fresh dragon tattoo on Cobus’s forearm. He was careful not to stare, though he knew the significance. Whatever got Cobus that black eye last night had also gotten him accepted into the Sun Yee On triad.

“Why did you leave Kruger?”

The light from the fountain show flickered off Cobus’s face. “Because I didn’t want to draw a line I couldn’t hold,” he said, echoing Knight’s words from the sushi restaurant.

“So instead you went to work for the other side?” Knight knew there was more to Cobus, but the South African was playing his cards close.

Cobus stretched and squeezed his scabbed hand. “What if the animals they’re killing could kill them?” he muttered ominously.

Knight sensed the darkness in Cobus and thought better of pursuing the line of inquiry.