Pools of Blood

Chapter 29

Jasmine looked awestruck. I was at a loss for words. We didn’t mention our secret regarding Alfred’s diary to Bo Chang or Angela, so they looked rather perplexed at our reactions.

The same name that Alfred had scribbled on a corner of a page of his diary.

FTH= Frank Ting’s House

"Who is Frank Ting?", Bo Chang entered with a question which was the one we were searching too.

"He is my boyfriend", replied Woori. She too was looking at me with raised eyebrows.

"Tell us about him", I said.

"Um- I don’t know much about him. He met me in Afghanistan. Said that he was there as a part of some humanitarian issues. I liked his smile, his nice looks, and his casual spendthrift nature. He pampered me with a Porsche too. Then after some months of staying together, he asked for marriage, to which I readily agreed."

-"Do you know anything about his background?"

-"Yes. He said he owns a real estate business and he sells shares. His father was a big businessman in south Asia. He has inherited a lot of fortune. He is a billionaire in one word."

-"What about the boy’s parents? Are they alive? I didn't see them at the wedding", Bo Chang asked.

-"His father had died a long time ago and his mother committed suicide in grief. He had no one."

Why did Alfred write his name as an abbreviation of FTH? I couldn’t solve the puzzle. Something was missing, and I couldn’t figure out what it was.

"Did he know about your dirty past?", Jasmine asked her.

Woori shook her head. "He knows me as a tattoo artist".

Both of them were hiding their lives from each other. But why? What if Frank Ting was another contract killer? Bo Chang looked at me. He probably had guessed that I had heard the name Frank Ting before.

"Tell us about the other associates", I repeated my previously asked question.

This time she blurted out everything. She knew if she still tries to hide, she would be sent back to the burning coal room to experience another round of pain.

"After Lenus was captured by the police, we all went underground. Especially the boys. I being a girl, would be hard to find so I had no risk of exposure. Rumi, Chang, Alonso, Derb, and Ginn. All five of them. Then scattered everywhere in the country. Last I heard from Rumi, he is hiding on a farm in Naju. Chang is working in a garage somewhere in Youngu , Alonso and Derb are together on the island of Cheju and Ginn are working in a pub at Miryang. All are scattered. I don’t know the exact details of their location. We cannot share it among ourselves in fear of getting caught."

Bo Chang was looking intently at her. He got up from his seat and ordered a policeman standing outside to take Woori away. She was not to be kept in any quarter like Lenus but somewhere else. Somewhere more secure and would only be known to us four.

After she was taken away Bo Chang looked at me with a question mark expression.

"What are you hiding Michael? You know this man, right? "

I sat down and looked away with a deep sigh. My life had always been a piece of a puzzle. Firstly, I was an orphan that for thirty years I couldn’t solve that puzzle. The death of my wife, the death of my best friend all were big black holes for me. It seemed they were sucking me inside and I have no idea how to resist the pull. I detailed him with what I had discovered in Alfred’s diary. The name and its link with the company. Bo Chang looked tensed.

"What do you think the man might be?", he asked me at last.

"I don’t know. I mean we all saw him, there right? We even commented on him and sympathized with his loss of his bride. Did he look like a criminal? "

-"Michael. You are working in this sector for so many years. You know better than a criminal never looks like the crime he commits."

I nodded. "Of course, I knew that. But why did Alfred write his name on his diary? ", I asked him.

He had no answer.

The case was getting terribly complicated and we realized we were moving slowly towards a dead end.

"I think I know or rather I can guess ", said Jasmine. She was staring intently at a crack on the wall.

"Try to remember the audio recording of Lenus before he died. The boss mentioned that he would be going to kill Woori at her wedding, right? "

I nodded. Indeed, he had said that.

"Where was he? Did you see anyone, anywhere in mask spying down upon her with a gun hiding from some culverts or pillars of the church? "

-"No. We didn’t. Before we reached, I had already sent police in civil dresses on the pretext that there was a bomb in the church. They were ordered a thorough search of all the guests. No weapons were discovered."

-"Exactly. Then how could he have killed her? "

"What are you trying to say Jasmine? ", Angela asked. I knew where this was going. I knew what Jasmine would say. I would very well predict her thoughts that her face was displaying. 

" I think Frank Ting is the one. The boss. Not only he killed Alfred but also he is the one behind everything that the company does. By killing Woori, he probably didn't mean to murder her in front of the whole church. Probably he had something more up in his sleeve, that's why he didn't even try to hide when he got exposed, he didn't even try to run on seeing you three, instead, he pleaded for his would-be wife. That is a big mystery. Don't you think so? The owner of the FTH whose real full form stands for Frank Ting’s House. We find him. And the case will be the over."