Chapter 5

                                    

                                          
Having dismissed the anxious cab driver with the jarring fee of 7,200 yen, Leon deboarded the taxi and rounded to the trunk to collect his and Sara's meager luggage.
                          
Sara came up beside him to help. "7,200 yen?!" she hissed, taking the two cases bearing their concealed weapons. "How much is that in American dollars?"
                          
"About sixty eight bucks. It's a rip-off in any currency. That was barely a fifteen minute drive," Leon replied flatly.
                          
"I don't think it's as much about the distance as it is about location. He got pretty nervous when you told him we were heading to Kuraishi. I didn't even think he was going to take us," Sara said.
                          
"Well, a fare's a fare, I guess." Leon closed the trunk.
                          
The cab driver quickly did a U-turn and took off, swerving slightly as he sped away.
                          
Leon scoffed. "Like the devil on wheels," he muttered. Now he looked about him, getting his bearings as he finished gathering the bags.
                          
They stood in the middle of a small, shabby town flanked with several ramshackle buildings on either side of the cracked cobblestone street. There were a few businesses among the forlorn-looking edifices, their signage reduced to bare, rusty awning frames or faded metal signs that were scarcely legible. The other buildings stood empty; boarded-up and left to ruin. Sparsely-placed street lamps cast pools of dull yellow light on the broken pavement, offering weak illumination in the gathering twilight.
                          
"This is Kuraishi, right? There actually is a living populace here?" Sara mused, looking around in dismay.
                          
It would have been easy enough to believe that the town was forsaken had it not been for the odor of greasy food issuing from the izakaya―or bar and grill―behind Leon and Sara, and the occasional pedestrian meandering down the street. Those who noticed the two strangers cast apprehensive glances at them as they hurried past.
                          
The distinct feeling of dread hung heavily in the air like a rolling fog. Kuraishi indeed felt like a ghost town.
                          
"Everything is wrong with this picture," Leon said under his breath.
                          
He turned his attention to the small hotel directly in front of them. It was as disheartening as the rest of the town. A dim neon sign read:
 "ゴールデンロータス"
                          
Leon took out a small notepad and checked it against the sign. He exhaled sharply. "Welcome to the Golden Lotus," he deadpanned.
                          
Sara snorted. "You're kidding."
                          
Shrugging, Leon led the way into the hotel.
                          
The vestibule was dimly lit and grungy with racy pictures of scantily clad women. The clerk, a thin man with a scraggly goatee, sat at the front desk reading a novel. He looked up as Leon and Sara approached, smiling broadly and greeting them heartily in Japanese.
                          
Leon shook his head. "Sorry, we don't speak Japanese."
                          
"Ah! Americans!" the man said in heavily-accented English. "Welcome, welcome! You want stay by hour or full night?"
                          
Leon arched a brow. "Say what?"
                          
Sara leaned over to him. "Damn it, Leon, this is a 'love hotel'," she whispered. "For... intimate trysts."
                          
Leon blinked and looked back at the clerk who eagerly awaited his response.
                          
"Uh-huh. That wasn't in Olmire's travel brochure," he muttered. To the clerk he answered: "For the night."
                          
"Very good! You pay cash or plastic?"
                          
"Cash."
                          
"4,800 yen."