“You have any coffee?” Graham asked.

Neal shook his head. If three years’ confinement in a Buddhist monastery had done nothing else for him, it had cured his caffeine addiction.

“How about milk and sugar?” asked Graham.

“Sorry.”

“A clean cup?”

“It is clean.”

Right, Graham thought. He’d seen the rats scurrying around the dining hall down the hill.

“I’ve missed you, son,” Graham said.

“I’ve missed you, Dad.”

Neal had never met his real father, a guy who apparently hadn’t figured on getting a kid for his twenty buck investment, so Joe Graham had pretty much taken over the role. Neal had thought about him every day of his imprisonment. No, not imprisonment… “internment” is what the Chinese had called it. An internment that was finally over. Or was it?

“Did you come to bring me back?” he asked Graham.

“No, I’m picking up my laundry.” Little asshole, Graham thought. I’ve only been tracking you down for three years, ever since they told me you were dead.

“Let me tell you, kid,” Graham said. “It cost the Bank one hell of a lot of money to spring you. Next time get yourself popped in Rhode Island. A pizza with extra cheese and you’re out of there.” Graham tasted his tea and grimaced. “What, they mow the lawn and then dump the grass into a pot of water?”

“How much money?” Neal asked.

“I don’t want you to get a swelled head. But we’re talking about a low-interest, unsecured loan for ‘agricultural development in Sichuan Province.’”

“A bribe,” Neal said.

“Big time bribe.”

“Thanks.”

“You’re a ‘friend of the family.’”

Friends of the Family, Neal thought. The Bank’s shadow department that handled difficult problems for its larger investors. His erstwhile employer. Or was it?

“Do I still work for Friends?” Neal asked.

“Did you ever?”

Since I was twelve years old, Dad. Since you caught me picking your pocket and put my dubious skills to work for you. And now you’ve come to take me home.