Kamikaze Read Online Free Page A

Taser darts, knockout gas jets.
    The doors slid open.
    The three stepped out.
    And Kazuya got the shock of his yakuza life.
    So sunlit was the penthouse that he might have been in heaven. In front of them, a man was seated on an ornate chair. He appeared to have samurai warriors guarding him. The suits of ancient armor were genuine and belonged in a museum, as did the thirteenth-century Mongol War antiques that were on display for this modern shogun’s exclusive pleasure. Traditional Japanese instruments—a banjo-like koto and a wood flute—played soft music. Two samurai swords hung in a rack on a foot table set before this octogenarian. Adorned with the crest of his family, a tanto knife slung through its belt, his kimono was gray, in keeping with his dignified age.
    Tokuda! thought Kazuya.
    The kumicho —the supreme boss of the post-war yakuza—had lived in seclusion for so long that he’d taken on a mythic status. But here he was in the flesh, the burned half of his face an ugly scar. The old yaks on either side of Kazuya were moving toward their master, heads bowed and thumbs tucked under their palms as a sign of respect, so the young yak approached too. The thumb was the most important finger, the last to be cut off by a disgraced underling.
    Suddenly, Kazuya found himself sweating.
    “A vial of blood?” he’d said to his uncle back in the car. “How important can that be?”
    More important, it now appeared, than he could have imagined.
    Important to Tokuda!
    The floorboards were thick wooden planks that had been laid down to squeak as they were trod upon. A nightingale floor like the singing of birds. A shogun was always in peril because the man who assassinated the shogun could become shogun himself. The same was true for the kumicho. A nightingale floor was constructed so no one could sneak up on the shogun, and that’s what gave rise to the legend that ninja assassins were able to walk on the walls and the ceiling. To get close enough to kill the shogun, an assassin would have to find a way to bypass the boards.
    The three men ceased treading when they reached a white sheet that had been spread on the floor. From dips in the cloth, Kazuya knew it covered some kind of grate. Skirting around his side of the white mat, the fat yak placed the paper containing Makoto’s bloody finger on the table at Tokuda’s feet.
    The kumicho said nothing.
    He stared at the offering, then stared at Makoto’s bandaged hand, then nodded his head.
    Never had Kazuya seen a glare as menacing as the one that fell on him. Tokuda’s eyes locked onto the slick yak’s hands. His lips moved as if he was counting fingers.
    “You dare to dishonor me?” he snarled.
    “I—” began Kazuya.
    “Shut up!” Makoto whispered.
    Tokuda beckoned his injured henchman to approach, then reached down and lifted the battle sword off the rack in front of him.
    Makoto took it.
    “You dishonor yourself,” Tokuda said, sneering at Kazuya.
    Grabbing the short sword from the rack, the kumicho passed it to the sumo-sized yak.
    Both men bowed away from their master, careful not to turn their backs on him, and returned to their original positions flanking Kazuya.
    “Sit,” Makoto said, indicating the white sheet on top of the grate.
    When Kazuya hesitated, he was shoved to the floor.
    Behind him, the young yak heard the long sword slip free of its sheath. He began to tremble when the fat yak laid the short sword on the mat in front of him, a white cloth wrapped around half of its shining blade.
    “Redeem your honor,” Tokuda ordered.
    Still refusing to believe that his failure in Vancouver had come to this, the dumbstruck yak made his most serious—and final—error by shaking his head at the kumicho.
    Shhhhewwww!
    The last sound Kazuya heard was the Divine Wind.

Yubitsume
     
    Vancouver, British Columbia
    October 30, Now
    It wasn’t hard to spot them. Though a deluge of tourists came surging out of the chute from customs clearance at