The AJA, pronounced Asia, was an activist organization that got its juice from young Asian lawyers doing pro bono time, financed by private donations and matching government grants.
They were operating out of a converted storefront down on Chrystie Slip, where the streets left Chinatown and entered Noho.
Jack drifted past the junkie parks and the auto-repair garages until he came to what was once a bodega, under a yellow sign that read ASIAN AMERICAN JUSTICE ADVOCACY.
When he entered he saw her.
Alexandra Lee-Chow. She was thirtysomething, dressed downtown and wore a diamond band on her wedding finger.
The receptionist stalled him at the front desk, and watching Alexandra now, across the room, Jack began to think how uneasy women with hyphenated names made him feel. Ambitious women. The ones who wanted the lab careers, the motherhood, the perfect marriage, strung tight and fully charged.
Lee-Chow. Taking her husband's name but refusing to give up her own, trying to impose the past upon the future. Or maybe it was a gender power thing that came with the white collar.
She reminded him of Maylee, the type she'd become.
"Alexandra Lee-Chow," she announced to him, with a look of skeptical appraisal. "How can I help you?"
"JackYu," he answered. "I'm following up the Golden Venture situation."
"Right, that's what you said on the phone."
Jack saw the impatience in her eyes, and he said, "Right, a murder occurred-"
"And I told you they're being detained in minimum-security facilities on the East coast."
On the rag, Jack was thinking, but bit down on his tongue when she said, "Chinese people float around on the ocean for four months, get beaten, raped, robbed, sometimes killed, just to come here for freedom and a better life. You got a problem with that?"
He let a second pass, leaned back, then let the polite look leave his eyes.
"Look, Mizz Chow," he said, watching her eyes narrow, "there're some bad nasty guys out there. Specialists. Kidnap for ransom, torture, gang rape, home invasion. They pop out eyeballs with ballpeen hammers, break ribs with baseball bats. They slice off fingers and ears. Horrible stuff. Ugly. Chinese, ourpeople. You got the picture?"
Her eyes dropped, a moment after her jaw. Quiet.
"I think some of the men from that ship are connected to a gang war that's dropping dead bodies on my desk." He spoke at the floor. "If I came at the wrong time, I apologize, but I don't have a lot of free time and obviously neither do you."
Her face softened and she took a step back.
Jack looked at her and said quietly, "Now, if we could start over on the right foot, I'll try to be brief."
"Okay," Alexandra said, taking a breath. "Go ahead, what are you looking for?"
"Men with military backgrounds, deserters from the People's Army."
"You have names, pictures?" She raised an eyebrow.
"I've got nothing but words on the wind."
She sighed. "Well, they're all in lockup, but it's minimum security so if they decide to run, I imagine they could do it."
Jack looked across her cluttered desk. "What is their status exactly?"
She sat down. "Right now they're in limbo until the court rules. Or if the President decides to alter immigration policy."
"When does this happen?" he asked, sitting down.
"Could be a week, could be a year. We've filed a class action on their behalf, seeking political asylum."
"You mean Tiananmen Square?"
"No. We're filing on grounds that they would be persecuted for resisting abortions and mandatory sterilization."
"Have you had any interviews? Are there any claims of religious or political persecution?"
"No interviews yet. They haven't given us a schedule."
Jack thought for a long moment and was aware of Alexandra watching him. Checking her wristwatch, she said, "Look, what difference does it make? Immigration's got them and it's going to be a federal problem. Let them sort it out. And no offense, but can't the precinct find better ways to utilize manpower?"
His reverie broken, Jack said, "Excuse me?"
"Cops," she said with professional disdain. "You've got gambling and prostitution all over Chinatown, and you're arresting street vendors and greengrocers."
"I'm working homicides, Mizz Chow," he protested, keeping the edge on his words.
"You know what I mean." She flipped open a file on her desk, pointed to cases on a legal docket.
"I've got fifty-year-old grandmothers and teenage refugees to bail out because they sold T-shirts and socks on the sidewalk. I've got a police brutality rap from a seventeen-year-old schoolgirl, and a racism beef from a college student who argued a traffic ticket and got a busted head. I've got complaints across the board telling me how screwed up the system is."
Jack stared at her, wondering if she was mad at cops, or men, or if it was just him at the wrong time of the month.
"You think you make a difference?" she asked. "Tell me, why is it that you can't walk down the street in Little Italy, there are so many sidewalk cafes, but the Chinese guy with the fruit stand or the grandmother with the tray of socks rates a hundred-dollar summons and gets hauled away in handcuffs?"
Jack didn't know the answer to that. He said softly, "Zoning or health code, probably."
"Zoning, my ass." She leveled her gaze at him. "You know and I know, the laws aren't the same for everybody."
"I'm just doing my job," he said, tired of hearing it.
"Yes," she answered with quiet triumph. "We all have to do our jobs, don't we?" She paused for effect. "So what if a refugee woman gets kidnapped and sold as a sex slave? You turn a blind eye? Or do you make a difference?"
"I'm not working Vice, and besides you don't know how the Department works."
"I know it's not working for us, brother."
"Don't get righteous, sister, it's not becoming."
"It's becoming a waste of time. So, like I said, Immigration's got them and they haven't been very forthcoming with us. So, Detective, it's been real, and I know you've got to get back on the job."
Jack had nothing left so he extended his card to her, asked her to call with any new developments, a professional courtesy he'd appreciate. Alexandra Lee-Chow was checking her watch and punching up the telephone as he left her office.