“I would never have known, if one of his thugs didn’t come around one day showing me that poorly made image of you. When you still had the longer hair, dyed blond.” She was speaking to a point behind me, beyond my shoulder, not looking in my eyes. “He wanted to know if I recognized the boy in the photo. If I could tell him anything at all. To think hard.” She made a derisive noise. “He gave himself away like a bad chess player staring too long at the piece he wants to move next. My father had told me I had fainted that evening at the night market, even though I’d never fainted before in my life. When I tried to ask more questions, I couldn’t. All three of my bodyguards had been replaced. My friend Marie, who was with me that night, kept telling me it was exactly how my father said.” She paused. “But she distanced herself from me, and I saw the fear in her eyes.”

I lay on my back, gazing up at the domed ceiling, saying nothing.

“I was suspicious,” she said. “My father left his MacFold open one morning while taking a business call and I went in and made myself admin, giving myself remote access. He never suspected a thing.” Daiyu gave a bitter laugh. “So I went through his files, and found the recording of the kidnapping, all of it. And his messages sent directing his men to search for you, to find you, and to kill you. The money was secondary. It was a matter of principle and pride. How could some worthless kid make a fool of him like this? My getting kidnapped was also secondary. It was about him. In the end, it’s always about him.

“I watched and listened to the recording hundreds of times,” Daiyu continued. “So many times that I have our entire conversations memorized. I would never have been able to recognize your face from it, but your voice . . .” She pulled out her hair band, letting her ponytail loose, then proceeded to twist the band between her fingertips. “I thought you sounded familiar at the New Year’s party—but it was noisy. So I showed up at your apartment the next day to be sure. And I knew after that visit, it was the same voice from the boy who kidnapped me in the recording.” She glanced at me for a second, before her eyes flicked away.

“Daiyu,” I said, my voice hoarse.

“No. Don’t interrupt,” she replied. “Let me tell this.”

I let myself look at her then, and she went on, avoiding my gaze.

“You didn’t say a thing after you kidnapped me, but you talked on the whole way back,” she said.