Read Online Bare Facts by Katherine Garbera - Free Book Online Page A

domestic databases, but Anna will run her through the international ones. Daniel, can I ask you something personal?”
    “Sure.”
    “I guess I meant, will you answer?” she said.
    “Depends on the question.”
    “How did you lose this finger?”
    “Accident,” he said. He and Sekijima had entered Dragon Lords as candidates together and worked their way up the ladder. One mistake early on had cost him that finger but he didn’t regret the loss. It had made him the man he was today. A man unwilling to back down and focused.
    “Accident? What kind?”
    “The kind where you lose a finger.”
    “Daniel…why are you shutting me down? You came to us for help.”
     
    Charity watched him retreat, his green eyes going completely blank as he moved away from her. She sent the picture of the assassin to her BlackBerry so she’d have it with her.
    Every question she asked him, he evaded neatly, keeping her not only at arm’s length but in the dark. And that was a very dangerous place to be with a hit man on the loose. There had to be a connection between Daniel and the blackmailer that was more than just an illegal business transaction.
    “For your own safety, there are some things that you aren’t prepared to deal with.”
    “Probably,” she said, “but I don’t think we’re going to be dealing with an infectious disease or a baby.”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “Those are the two things I’m not prepared for,” she said.
    She almost teased a grin out of him and it felt good. She needed to find a way to make him trust her. And she wanted that trust to come from a bond of…well, friendship, if nothing else.
    “I’ve been thinking more about what happened behind the hotel. I think Alonzo was the target.”
    Daniel said nothing.
    “Is it gang-related?” she asked at last, pivoting to face him.
    “Why would you think that?”
    She closed the distance between the two of them, walking straight up to him. He didn’t back down, which didn’t surprise her. “Just ruling out possibilities.”
    “How is that a possibility?” he asked.
    “Everything’s a possibility until we cross it off.”
    “What kind of gangs?” he asked.
    “You tell me.”
    He shrugged. “I’m a CEO—what do I know about gangs?”
    “Your fingertip is missing.”
    He arched one eyebrow at her.
    He’d reacted too strongly to her suggestion that there might be gang involvement, and there was only one reason she could assign to that. She ran through a list of gangs that she knew from the West Coast, quickly eliminating any that didn’t deal in trafficking from other countries. Mexicans would bring their goods up over the border or perhaps in through Canada. Japanese would need a ship. It was hard as hell to get stuff from Asia into the U.S. without one.
    Japanese meant…Yakuza. She knew precious little about the Japanese gangs, other than that they were thought to be modern-day descendants of the samurai. And she knew that they prided themselves on their loyalty to their gang and their boss…someone called the Oyabun. Gang members had elaborate body tattoos that weren’t visible when they were dressed. And sometimes had severed fingertips.
    The fingertips were given to a higher-up in reconciliation for mistakes. Now, Daniel wasn’t Japanese, but…
    “Are we dealing with the Yakuza?”
    For a moment his eyes flashed with her answer. A terse nod of his head was all he gave before turning away from her.
    He wasn’t going to give up any information easily, she knew that. But this one piece…the Yakuza…dammit, that was going to be hard. They were a closed society. Hard to get information on because they didn’t let their people leave alive.
    He was afraid of showing any weakness—most men were, but she added in the fact that his enemy was going after those closest to him, striking at the housekeeper and now his security chief. The Yakuza was the only thing that had made a certain kind of sense.
    “Do you have a