Donovans 02 - Jade Island

left hand held a nearly empty plate. His other hand was out, American-style, ready to grasp Kyle’s.
    “I knew I could count on Lianne’s sense of duty,” Johnny said with a big smile, shaking hands. He nodded to Lianne and then focused again on Kyle. “Come in and meet everyone. I’ll translate for you.”
    Kyle looked at Lianne. Hunch and intelligence together told him that she was certainly angry and very probably hurt, but her game face was excellent. If she resented being dismissed by her father like an employee, nothing showed on her face. Perhaps she felt nothing. Perhaps she was simply an errand girl whose errand was finished. She had produced Kyle Donovan for the Tangs, and now they had no further need of her presence.
    Then Kyle saw the pulse beating hotly in Lianne’s neck and knew she wasn’t nearly as unaffected by Johnny’s brush-off as she appeared.
    “No need to take yourself away from your family,” Kyle told Johnny. “Lianne is an excellent translator.”
    “Of course. I keep forgetting that she spent a couple of years in Hong Kong.” He turned to Lianne and spokein rapid Cantonese. “You did well, but do not monopolize our guest. I want Harry to meet him.”
    “After Uncle Wen, I will of course introduce Mr. Donovan to Number Two Son,” she said.
    Impatience thinned the line of Johnny’s full mouth, but only for a moment. “So very proper and Chinese.”
    “You are very gracious.”
    “After we make the necessary introductions,” Johnny said, “help the others serve drinks. I will act as translator for Kyle Donovan.”
    Lianne’s eyelids flinched, the only outward sign of her sudden fury. “I think not, Mr. Tang. I am not a trained companion. Nor am I an untrained one.”
    “So very proper and American,” Johnny said.
    “You are kind to notice.”
    “You would do better to remember that you are here at the sufferance of the family of Tang. Do not make your mother lose face by showing less than the manners she would expect.”
    Chinese culture dictated that Lianne accept the reprimand with bowed head and many apologies. Part of her intended to do just that; then she saw a willowy young female kneel at the feet of Harry Tang and offer tidbits to him with a pair of ivory chopsticks. He didn’t even look away from the man he was talking to. It was typical of the treatment women expected in Asia.
    And Lianne was damned if she would bow her head and take it like a good Asian girl. Not here. Not in America.
    “I have an excellent memory,” she said, meeting her father’s eyes squarely. “It is my only value for the family of Tang. As for my manners, they are what one would expect from the daughter of an adulterer and his paramour.”

Chapter 9
    K yle didn’t understand the words father and daughter were speaking, but the body language needed no translation. Lianne looked icy. Johnny looked like a man who had just taken a slap across the face and was about to return the favor.
    “Sweetheart,” Kyle said, smiling engagingly at Lianne, “I hate to interrupt, but I’m hungry enough to go back and eat that damn elevator jockey. Think it would be possible for you to translate all those buffet dishes for me?”
    Lianne turned away from her father. Her expression softened as she spoke to Kyle. “Of course. You’re the Tangs’ honored guest. Johnny will explain to Uncle Wen how hungry you are. Won’t you, Johnny?” she asked carelessly.
    An odd combination of hope and anger crossed Johnny’s handsome face. Then he nodded curtly and headed back across the room to a place where an old man sat with a beautiful girl at his feet. She was playing tunes on a yueqin, a Chinese “moon guitar.” Neither the tonal scale nor the style of singing owed anything to Western traditions.
    As Johnny started talking to Wen, another young, lithe woman hurried over to take the nearly empty plate from Johnny’s hand. Without a word from him, she went toward the buffet.
    “I suppose it was rude of me to insist on being fed before the introductions,” Kyle said.
    “No more rude than Johnny speaking to me in Cantonese in front of you.” Or dismissing her as though she was a badly trained employee.
    A corner of Kyle’s mouth turned up. “That’s kind of what I thought.”
    As they crossed the room to the buffet, Lianne recognized two of the young men as her half brothers, Johnny Jr. and Thomas. She didn’t wave or speak in greeting, for the simple reason that she had never been