Kingmaker Read Online Free PDF

by a nurse in full blue scrubs, mask, and elastic-lined hairnet. Clear plastic tubs were set into the frames of the carts, and each one contained a tiny infant—all of them Asian, tightly swaddled in clean white linen, with bonnet-style caps tied with petite bows beneath their chins. Lao Ban stepped back as the carts were arranged, then raised his hand in presentation.
    “We have best product in Fangchuan City, guaranteed.”
    “Are they Chinese or Korean?”
    “All are Korean, and all are hand-picked just for you. We are able to match your criteria with perfection.”
    Alexei took the plastic pouch off the table and offered it to the nurses. All three women reached in, selected a packet, and tore it open. They shook them carefully out into their gloved hands and verified their contents: a disinfectant wipe, a small covered needle, a tiny plastic wafer with metal contacts in one side, and a round adhesive sterile bandage.
    Lao Ban frowned. “You do not trust our information?”
    “
Doveryai, no proveryai
,” Alexei said. “Trust, but verify.”
    The nurses bent to the carts and began unwrapping the babies’ feet.
    “I hope you did not bring me rubles or American dollars,” Lao Ban said. “They have little value here.”
    Alexei kept his eyes on the nurses. “New Guangdong dollars, as agreed.”
    The room filled with the angry screams of two of the three infants. Lao Ban did not react to the noise.
    “NGDs are good,” he said. “When will America and Russia join the Yuan Zone?”
    Alexei ignored the question. The nurses turned, and he accepted the first of the three wafers. When he inserted it into the slot on the side of his computer, the screen brightened and he watched carefully as results began populating the cells of a table. Alexei lowered himself back onto the stool. When the analysis was complete, he saved the results, ejected the wafer, and reached for the next one.
    “It’s very good product, right?” Lao Ban asked. “Best in Fangchuan City. Maybe best in China.”
    Alexei looked up and saw the bizarre sense of pride in the man’s face. When he looked back down at the screen, new results were coming in.
    “I recommend you try our product yourself,” Lao Ban said. He was talking too loudly and Alexei could see that he was high on something—probably opium cut with some form of amphetamine. Alexei noted that if things were to get physical, Ban would probably have to be clinically dead before he stopped coming.
    “I don’t think so,” Alexei said. He ejected the second wafer and inserted the third, then adjusted the laptop to make sure Ban remained in his peripheral vision.
    “You buy two today,” Lao Ban said, “I give you half off second one. That’s very good deal.”
    Alexei watched the third analysis complete, then ejected the last wafer. The nurses had picked up the two crying babies to comfort them, and they were quiet again. Alexei pointed to the last child—the one who had not cried when the heel of her foot was pricked and her blood drawn.
    “That one,” he said.
    Lao Ban smiled. “All our product is perfect. You take two. Half off second one.”
    “Just that one,” Alexei said. “What’s her name?”
    “No name. You give her name. You pay, you name.”
    “I want to know her name,” Alexei said. “Do you have it?”
    The nurse looked at Lao Ban and waited for her boss’s nod. She looked back at Alexei, and spoke with timidity from beneath her mask. “Hyun Ki.”
    “Hyun Ki,” Alexei said. “She’s the one.”
    He moved his pack from the floor to the table, then removed his handset from a side pocket. He used it to program a currency chit which he then passed Lao Ban. Lao Ban used his own handset to check the amount, then smiled in a way that only a lucrative financial transaction can elicit.
    “This is very good deal,” Lao Ban said. “You train her good, she make you very rich man. Remember Chinese proverb: Jade must be chiseled before it can be considered