C5 Joe China
Time to secure that slave girl deal for El Presidente. Time to see Joe China.
Joe China was a third-generation crime syndicate. His father was a notorious hitman. He bore the honor of a hundred kills.
Joe China now controlled the Mongols, the ruling syndicate in Chinatown.
Chauncey drove the Bentley toward Joe’s nightclub. Christmas would be a busy day. He had accepted the invitation to visit Ms. Nora Evans and her family for Christmas dinner.
Chauncey was looking forward to that, not so much for the company of Ms. Nora Evans, whom he planned to marry out of sheer ruthlessness, but the deep pockets of her old man.
He was going to marry her out of sheer ruthlessness because she was bulimic, had no tits to speak of, had an ass you could pinch between two fingers and razor blade legs that could cut your balls off when she went nuts in bed under the excessive influence of cocaine.
Still, they would be a picture of innocence when they sat down at the old man’s table for Christmas dinner.
He worried a little about Maxine, Nora’s mother, who was half in the bag when she woke up in the morning and liked to get a good start on the day with a pitcher of Bloody Mary’s and her favorite butter croissant, flown in from a patisserie in Paris, resting on her bedside table.
He couldn’t wait to see the look on her face when Chauncey and Nora returned from a walk to the stables, blasted on coke, to announce their engagement.
Nora had accepted his proposal earlier in the week after snorting three grams of coke. He had been working on this deal for a long time.
The first time he asked her, she gave him a flat refusal. He continued his pursuit, as if he remained a devoted suitor, no matter how many times she denied him.
He knew he had the edge on any of her other suitors because El Presidente’s private plane showed up punctually at the airport on the first of the month. It carried a pound of pure coke meant only for the eyes of Chauncey Gibbons. Having that much pure shit to throw around was a boon for client relations. As well as a way to the hollow core of Nora’s heart.
Chauncey felt confident that the strongest supporter of her need for self-oblivion would ultimately win the race to the altar. Pennies on the dollar, as far as Chauncey was concerned, given the amount of loot her old man possessed.
The second time he asked her, she consented, but then reneged, claiming she was in the middle of a blackout when she accepted.
These rejections only fired his passion, not because he loved her any more than before but because a good salesman never takes no for an answer.
Chauncey planned to hang around till the old man was dead. By then, Nora would be so brain-damaged from coke that Chauncey could take complete control of the family fortune.
Nora was an only child, spoiled rotten from the moment she took her first breath, subject to extreme tantrums, coke spins, and alcohol blackouts that could occur even when she was sober. The rest of the time, she worked on her bulimia.
For Nora, self-oblivion was its own reward.
It wasn’t her fault. She inherited this desperation from her mother, Maxine. Maxine was a former beauty queen, who grew more and more desperate as her beauty faded. When she turned forty, she discovered that no amount of reconstructive surgery could keep pace with her deterioration. The Bloody Marys were bursting blood vessels across the face whose full head had always seemed so noble.
But Maxine and Nora and the Grand Old Man would take place in the afternoon, sitting around a traditional turkey. Now it was time to party and wrap up the slave girl deal for El Presidente.
Unfinished business is what kept Chauncey awake all night, and unfinished business was what woke him in the morning.
He longed for that day, asleep like a child in Nora’s arms, on the deck of her now-deceased daddy’s half-mile-long yacht, off the coast of Tahiti, anchored in paradise, while two slave girls sucked on Nora’s tits.
Chauncey slowed down the Bentley as he drove through Chinatown toward Joe China’s place.
The Chinese didn’t give a shit about Christmas. They were all about the Buddha. They were all about Chinese New Year, which didn’t even fall on New Year’s.
Victorian Chink, he called the buildings as he made one turn, and then another, until he pulled up in front of Joe China’s place.
A Chink valet opened the door for him.
Chauncey opened the trunk and pulled out the metal suitcase he picked up at the office on the way over. He tossed the keys of the Bentley to the valet and told him a scratch could cost him his life.
He gave the guy a twenty-dollar tip, not because he admired him but because he detested him and was afraid he might grab something important some night when he was parking the car and saw that Chauncey was blasted on coke, just to express his resentment.
There was no name outside Joe China’s place. Everybody called it Joe China’s place.
Joe ran everything in Chinatown, but his specialty was the slave trade, both sexual and domestic. The nightclub was a showplace to display his latest acquisitions.
Chauncey descended the narrow stairs from the sidewalk, with a take-out place on one side and an electronics store on the other, all decoys owned by Joe China, to discourage tourists from stepping on his world.
He didn’t worry about the cops.
If you ever needed a cop in Chinatown, the best place to find one was Joe China’s place. There might be half a dozen sitting in a booth at any time of day or night.
A couple more turns down the concrete steps, and Chauncey came to a door from the Roaring Twenties.
It was a speakeasy.
He tapped his fingers twice on the door and then quietly and slowly knocked three times. He paused for thirty seconds. Then he tapped, knocked, tapped.
A small metal window slid open and two squinty eyes peered out.
The door opened immediately and the doorman bowed in deference when Chauncey walked by without noticing him.
Christmas or not, he never tipped the doorman. The doorman was of no use to him.
Joe China would have him exterminated if he ever denied entrance to Chauncey Gibbons. Chauncey stopped and looked around the large room.
Red quilted leather booths surrounded the dance floor in front of the stage, with a bar to either side of it. Asian showgirls in red silk dresses, waving large fans of yellow feathers, danced to a thirties number on the stage while a small girl at the microphone, with blond hair, in a short yellow skirt, sang Tin Pan Alley songs in Chinese.
Not all the customers were slave buyers.
Membership came at an annual fee of one hundred thousand for customers who were strictly voyeurs who came for the shows and a little nude dancing.
The nightclub was not a part of the prostitution ring Joe China-controlled in Chinatown. That was an enterprise of brief duration. Here, you either bought something for life or went home.
Chauncey watched the suits dancing with naked slaves in front of the stage. They were all tiny Asian girls who looked about twelve years old. There were red flowers in vases on the tables. Open fans of billowing red silk hung from the ceiling. Both bars were crowded with customers, mostly male, and the booths were filled with dinner parties.
A dozen Mongols, wearing sunglasses and leather coats, were stationed around the periphery of the restaurant. A dozen third-generation Irish cops occupied a booth in the corner.
The mayor entertained a crowd of two booths away. Slave waitresses wearing only a little red bow around the neck delivered drinks and food to the customers. The customers were free to grab or probe them wherever they wanted to grab or probe them.
The girls were Korean, Chinese, Laotian, and Vietnamese. The girls were Russian, Romanian, Georgian, and Bulgarian. The girls were Filipino, Guatemalan, Haitian, and Salvadorian.
All the girls were part of Joe China’s enterprise in human trafficking. All the girls came from impoverished countries where life was hopeless. They were flown to the Mideast, Europe, Israel, and England.
The girls thought they were going to become nannies or housekeepers in wealthy homes abroad. They thought they were going to earn good money so they could live like a human being and send some home to their starving families.
They were good daughters who thought they were going to better their own lives and the lives of their loved ones.
They were drugged.
They were cuffed.
They were guarded.
They were transported on planes and ships.
They were auctioned in big lots in the more corrupt countries
where everything was allowed because the police and political leadership lived in the same poverty as the girls they were allowing to be auctioned.
Now Joe China-owned them. At least he owned his share. He bought them in lots of a dozen. He might buy several lots at a time.
Sometimes he bought assortment packs, divided between boys and young men, some of whom had been converted to transsexuals along the way and fully fitted with breasts. They were dressed and made up like women, whether they liked it or not. Joe China never failed to appeal to diversity.
They would all soon be auctioned to the highest bidder, like any other piece of property.
What gave Chauncey a boner about human trafficking was not its sexual aspects but the sheer ruthlessness of the mafias and cartels that conducted it.
They thought nothing of selling their local beauties into a life of brothels and private ownership to serve their masters 24-7 for the rest of their lives.
It was the thought of reducing life to zero that gave Chauncey a boner.
It mattered little to the men who dealt in human contraband whether their cargo fell into housekeeping or brothels, or any other abuse their owners might subject them to. The sooner they were used up and disposed of, the sooner another lot could be sold.
The only other business that got Chauncey that hot was selling weapons. Whether he sold them to governments or rebels, he knew they would be handed out to idealistic young men who would then go out and kill each other.
Chauncey liked eclecticism. He liked to keep it interesting. “Ah, Merry Christmas, Mr. Gibbons,” Chauncey heard behind him.
He turned to see Joe China standing there.
Joe was like that. He took that cagey, quiet feline tack for
approaching his prey undetected. He seemed to appear out of thin air sometimes.
Chauncey held out his pale ham-like hand and grasped the smaller man’s hand in a gentle handshake. Most of the time he liked to crush an opponent’s hand from the moment they first met until the deal was closed. Chauncey saw everyone as an opponent to some degree. He was paranoid as hell.
“Merry Christmas, Joe,” Chauncey responded and then looked across the crowd. “I hope the family is doing well.”
“My family is doing very well,” Joe said, referring to his fourth wife and twelve daughters. “My wife is pregnant again.”
Chauncey turned back to him with a grin of masculine recognition that confirmed Joe China’s sexual prowess.
“Congratulations,” Chauncey told him. “I’m sure it will be a boy worth waiting for. As if his sisters were merely attendants strew- ing the paths he walks on with blossoms.”
Chauncey understood the years of frustration that Joe China had endured in his quest for a son. His first wife gave him three daughters in three years. Joe and his wife had been high school sweethearts, but he decided to cut his losses. His second wife gave him four daughters, the last two a surprise set of twins—a gift from God, the mother had pleaded.
He divorced the mother.
His third wife came up with a set of triplets, and he banned her from ever entering Chinatown again.
She was to stay with her family in the Avenues, out near the beach, if she was to get the kind of money she was demanding.
“My young wife and I are ready and confident this time, Mr. Gibbons,” Joe China said, stealing a glance at Chauncey’s metal suitcase. “Has Christmas Eve been kind to you?”
“I closed a three-billion-dollar deal on the way over here,” Chauncey said.
“Santa’s been kind to you, Mr. Gibbons.”
“I want to throw in a hundred of your best product as a peace offering for kidnapping the client’s daughter.”
“Yes, yes, of course. These things happen. When will you be needing them, Mr. Gibbons?”
“Wednesday,” Chauncey said. “He’ll be flying into the airport.”
“Would he be interested in a mix or does he have certain unwavering preferences?”
“A broad sampler would suit him fine. He is a man of many tastes.”
“A family man, I take it.”
“Utterly devoted.”
Joe China looked across the crowd toward a small table on the other side of the room.
“Would you like a table near the stage, Mr. Gibbons?” he asked
and began leading the way. “We’ll be starting the Freak Show shortly.”
