Chapter One

      “If you think you’re going to gamble with our future like that, forget it.”

      “It’s not a gamble! It’s a safe bet.”

      “A bet is a wager or gamble and I said forget it.”

      It was at times like this that Robert Chan forgot about the long, flowing silk tapestry of his wife Kathy’s hair and the dark, deep chocolate wells of her eyes and remembered the sharp, steely mind encased in her slender body. As newlyweds, Kathy and Robert Chan never argued about much except money. And when they did, Kathy won by using the same cold, maddening logic that had driven her through Business Administration at the University of British Columbia. Robert had also taken business, but he had finished well behind Kathy in the class standings. He was finishing dead last in this argument. Nevertheless, he persevered.

      “Look, we won’t have a future unless we take a few calculated risks,” he insisted. “That’s why they call it risk capital.”

      “They call it uninsured investor’s funds, which is a polite term for sucker-cash,” said Kathy patiently. “Watch out for the puddle.”

      Robert jumped over the muddy pool of brown-green water, a reminder of the morning’s rain. It was May and the evening air was cool and damp, gently enfolding them in a growing mist as they walked down the winding, tree-lined sidewalk of Marine Drive in South Vancouver. Above, new leaves on the maple trees arched over them, branches bending, forming an uneven green umbrella. Kathy liked this walk. Here, the road was close to the river and despite the growing number of condominiums lining its banks, there were long stretches of wild woods and grassy clearings where you could almost imagine there was no Vancouver behind you, crowded and bursting at the seams with tens of thousands of families — many of them like the Chans: young, just starting out, and trying to make all the right financial moves.

      “It’s not as if this is some shady resource stock listed on the Canadian Venture Exchange,” said Robert, mounting another assault. “It’s out of Toronto. And highly rated.”

      “That’s what they said about Bre-X.”

      “I know lots of people who did great out of Bre-X. You just had to bail out at the right time.”

      “Like the geologist?” asked Kathy, giving her husband a piercing look with those eyes.

      The gathering darkness matched Robert’s mood perfectly. Like the light of day, any hope of convincing his wife that his get-rich-quick scheme was worthwhile was fading fast. Still, he had won Kathy over and convinced her to marry him by bull-headed persistence and perhaps if he found the right tack, he could sell her on the virtues of dabbling in the stock market with the money they had set aside to start their own business. He was, after all, a young husband with much to learn.

      “Listen,” he said, waving a hand at the row of condos they were passing. “This deal is as safe as those houses over there.”

      Kathy laughed.

      “Those? Those are the most notorious leaky condos in Vancouver! The buyers lost their shirts.”

      Robert looked more closely at the low line of blue-grey buildings in the uncertain light. Only now did he pick out here and there the tell-tale orange tarps and metal scaffolding that signaled the end of someone’s dreams of real estate success.

      “Yeah, well, anyway,” coughed Robert, swiftly abandoning his analogy. “We’re not talking condos or real estate here. It’s a pension fund thing.”

      “Those condos were built with union pension funds.”

      “I give up. We’ll live in desperate poverty for years before we get enough cash to open the store.”

      “Robert?”

      “Yes, darling?”

      “Shut up and hug me.”

      “This a joint-venture thing?”

      They were by a thicket of woods, at the head of a dirt road leading down to what had once been a riverside sawmill. As he hugged his wife, Robert was keenly aware of her scent and the softness of her waist. It was dark now and there were only a few lights across the river to reflect off the dark cascade of Kathy’s hair.

      And then, the night lit up as a ball of fire exploded on the riverbank and Robert was temporarily blinded by the fierce, yellow light. He gasped and blinked, instinctively turning Kathy around to shield her from the blast.

      “Robert!” said Kathy. “What —”

      Less than twenty metres down the road in the middle of the overgrown sawmill site, Robert saw a large car engulfed in flames.

      “Wait here,” he said and before Kathy could protest, sprinted towards the blazing vehicle.

      The heat was intense and thick, acrid smoke was beginning to pour out of the car as Robert looked to see if there was anyone trapped inside. It appeared to be a Cadillac and the fire was centred in the front. To Robert’s relief, there was no one visible inside and the driver’s door was open. The feeling lasted less than an instant, for as he glanced down at the ground beside the open door, he saw the unmistakable form of a person laying on his back. The figure’s clothes were already smoldering and licked by flame.

      “Jesus!” barked Robert.

      “Robert!” Kathy shouted from the top of the road. “What are you doing?”

      “There’s someone here!”

      Robert dropped to his knees and tucked his face into his jacket up to his eyes. He crawled towards the prone human form ten metres away. Later, in the hospital, he would find the details he remembered strange, like how the body had its hands up, as if surrendering to some unseen foe and how he’d wondered why the person appeared to be wearing sunglasses.

      “Robert! Don’t!” shouted Kathy, starting down the road.

      Robert stopped and turned. He was about to shout at his wife to stay put when a movement to his right near the river caught the corner of his eye. As he twisted around to see what it was, there was a second eruption from the car. The gas tank had exploded and Robert was knocked flat by a wall of heat, flames, and fumes. Knocked unconsciousness by the searing shock wave that slammed into him and roared past, he did not feel his eyebrows and lashes being singed off. Nor did he feel Kathy desperately dragging him away from the blaze by his collar. His last thought was how lucky he was not to have invested in that pension fund scheme. There wasn’t much likelihood of him needing a pension now.

      Kathy, possessed of a strength she never suspected she had, managed to haul Robert to the top of the driveway without realizing she had in the process torn a shoulder muscle and sprained her left ankle. The adrenaline masked all pain and the urgent need to get help for Robert overrode any other sensation. She grabbed Robert’s smouldering jacket and yanked out his cellphone. She dialed 911.

      “Police, fire, or ambulance?” asked the despatcher.

      “All three,” said Kathy. “My husband and I are in the 3000-block of Marine Drive, by the old sawmill site. There’s a fire. I think someone’s dead. Please hurry.”

      A part of Kathy’s mind was quite detached from the scene before her — blackened frame of a car, the stench of burned plastic, fabric, and flesh. The part of her mind floating above the havoc wrought by the fire complimented her on how swiftly she had acted to save her husband and how remarkably calm she was now, talking quietly on the phone to the dispatcher as sirens wailed in the distance. It was only later — much, much later — when they played the tape of the 911 call at the inquest into the bizarre death of Sam Schuster, that Kathy Chan realized she had been screaming.

      “Ronald, Ronald, I’m telling you, my friend — get in on the action while you can, buddy.”

      “Not on your life, Hakeem.”

      “I’m letting you in on the ground floor, for God’s sake!”

      “Yeah