Katsuro laid the flat of the knife against the man’s neck. The metal still glowed blue and the skin sizzled as he pressed it in place. The man screamed, but the dishcloth that Katsuro had stuffed into his mouth muffled the noise. Katsuro wasn’t particularly concerned about being discovered; he didn’t intend to be here for very much longer. The man would break, but, even if he didn’t, there would be other ways for him to find out where Sakura had gone. There would be records of the departures from the dock; he might even be able to access them online. It wasn’t so much the destination that Katsuro wanted to extract from his prisoner. He wanted to know about Sakura and, more to the point, the man with whom she was travelling.

He rested the knife on the stainless-steel counter and picked up his pistol again.

“Ready to talk?”

The man’s eyes blazed with pain and hate, but he gave a shallow nod. Katsuro pressed the pistol against the man’s forehead, right between the eyes, and used his free hand to remove the dishcloth.

“Where did they go?”

“Tokyo,” he said, gasping through the pain.

“Better. Thank you. What is the name of the ship?”

“The Fidelio.”

Katsuro tightened his grip on the trigger. He would ask another question and then that would be that. This man had seen his face, and Katsuro was not in the habit of leaving loose ends.

“The man she is with—who is he?”

“His name is Milton.”

“His full name?”

“John Milton.”

“And how does she know him?”

“She met him on the plane to Bali. You’re here for the drugs she was smuggling?”

Katsuro smiled thinly. “I am.”

“One of the packages split. Milton saved her life.”

“And what does he do?”

“I don’t know. You’d have to ask him that.”

“Well, yes,” Katsuro said, stepping back. “I intend to.”

He took another step, the gun still aimed at the man’s head. He increased the pressure on the trigger and relaxed his arm, anticipating the recoil. He was about to shoot when he saw motion to his left, from the doorway. He shuffled two steps to his right, putting the man in the chair between him and whoever it was who had just opened the door.

“Get away from him!”

It was the woman. The wife. Deschamps.

Katsuro kept the gun trained on the man’s head. “Don’t do anything foolish,” he called back.

He knew that he was safe as long as he stayed where he was. Deschamps would not be able to take a shot at him without risking that her husband would be hit. He needed to leave, though, and that was going to require some careful negotiation.

She took a step closer to them and looked at her husband. “Are you all right?”

“Stay back,” the man replied.