Chapter 147 — The Long-Awaited...

Yang Jiyan had not expected Zhang Bin to be so swift and decisive; it seemed he really had been cooped up in the hospital too long, bored out of his wits.

After a while Zhang Bin returned to the screen. "OK, all set. I'm heading to the airport now—wait for me!"

"All right." Yang Ce closed the video, thought for a moment, then called the front desk again to tell them to book one more ticket to Shu Ya's concert—as for the price, it still did not matter.

He dozed fitfully until a little past five in the morning, when he received a call from Zhang Bin and learned that he had already arrived in Macau. Yang Ce told him the name of the hotel and told him to take a taxi straight over.

Yang Ce had booked a twin standard room, so it was no trouble for Zhang Bin to stay there too. Half an hour later came a knock at the door; Yang Ce took a look—it was indeed Zhang Bin.

Seeing Zhang Bin appear before him, hale and hearty as ever, Yang Ce was overcome with emotion for a moment, a feeling he could not put into words. He hugged Zhang Bin and clapped him hard on the back.

Zhang Bin was startled by Yang Ce's sudden move and stammered, "Boss, don't tell me you've taken a liking to, uh, brokeback stuff?"

"Get lost," Yang Hengye cursed. "I just haven't seen you in so long, I missed you. Your being in the hospital is my fault too—but don't you worry, I'll pay that score back for you sooner or later."

"Heh," Zhang Bin said, utterly unconcerned. "It's nothing. I just treated it as a convalescent retreat—only it dragged on so long I got a bit sick of it. See, the moment I was better I ran right out."

"Does Uncle Zhang know you've come looking for me?" Yang Mo asked, a little uneasy.

"Of course he does. When my dad heard I was coming to find you, he even helped me find someone to book the ticket himself—otherwise, at this hour, how could I have gotten here so fast?" Zhang Bin nodded.

"You probably haven't slept, have you? Get some rest. The concert's tomorrow night—I had the hotel help book tickets, though I don't know if we'll actually get them," Yang Yanzhou said.

Zhang Bin did not stand on ceremony. He nodded and said, "Then I'm going to sleep. I'm dead tired. On the flight just now, the girl next to me wouldn't stop jabbering at me—I couldn't get a wink of sleep."

"Don't tell me you're already looking for another one-night stand the moment you're out of the hospital?" Yang Mo sounded half amused, half exasperated.

"Hey, it's not that I'm looking. They just come to me the moment I step outside. Can you blame me?" Zhang Bin said innocently. "Boss, why don't you have some fun too? You're in better shape than me—there must be plenty of sluts out there who'd be more than willing."

Yang Jiyan shook his head noncommittally and said nothing. If he brought another woman back now, Chen Shutang would blow her top. Yang Ce had no desire to stir up any more trouble.

Yang Mo was something of a womanizer, and he had more than one girlfriend, but Yang Jiyan considered himself, at bottom, a fairly conservative man—passionate but not promiscuous. Yang Xufa could not tolerate any woman connected to him going off to sleep with someone else.

The night passed without a word. Yang Ce woke early, but seeing Zhang Bin still sleeping soundly beside him, he closed his eyes and drifted off again. By the time he woke once more, it was already noon.

The two of them were roused by the room phone. The hotel was calling to tell Yang Ce that the VIP tickets had been secured—two of them, at a cost of two hundred thousand. Yang Shuoxuan did not quibble over whether there had been any padding in that price; he was simply struck by how exorbitant Shu Ya's concert tickets had become on the resale market.

He thanked them and arranged to come down and collect the tickets shortly. After a quick bite in the restaurant, Yang Ce and Zhang Bin picked up the tickets, left the hotel, and stepped out into the streets of Macau.

There were still several hours before the concert began. If Zhang Bin had not come, Yang Ce could have whiled away the time in the hotel browsing the internet, but now that Zhang Bin was here, the two of them set out together to look around.

Macau was not a large place, but it was world-famous—naturally because of its highly developed gaming industry, which ranked second in the world, it could be said, only to Las Vegas.

Most tourists who came here wanted to see Macau's casinos for themselves. Gambling was legal here, and betting was legal too, so people who were worth millions today and penniless tomorrow were everywhere.

Of course, there were also those who struck it rich overnight, but the odds were very small. Nine out of ten gamblers lose—that was an unchanging law; otherwise every casino would have shut its doors long ago.

Yang Yongjin had no idea whether those televised king-of-gamblers tournaments really existed, but he did know that master gamblers were very real indeed—nearly every major casino kept one or two such experts on hand to hold down the floor.

The disc Fang Tian had given him contained an introduction to this as well, complete with detailed tutorials on gambling techniques. Yang Ce had little use for any of it, though, and had simply skipped over it.

What was certain was that Yang Juehuan's skill could only be higher than those men's, never lower, because Yang Mo had an innate advantage that no one could match.

To be continued

818. Code Words

818 Code Words "Let's go check out the casinos." Zhang Bin was by nature a restless sort. The moment he set foot in Macau, his hands began to itch of their own accord—after all, gambling was legal here, and he felt no particular guilt about it.

"Right now?" Yang Minlan had no interest in gambling. Yang Ce was no gambler and cared nothing for such things. But rather than call Yang Yongjin a gambler, it would be more accurate to say that Yang Ce had essentially lost any pleasure in gambling.

When you won every single time, gambling ceased to be gambling and became a kind of one-sided, mechanical plundering. And Yang Ce was not short of money—he had no need at all to rake in cash through gambling. So as far as he was concerned, unless it was necessary, he would not touch the stuff.

Seeing how uninterested Yang Ce looked, Zhang Bin could not help saying, "Boss, what's with you? I'd have thought you'd be into this kind of thing. Back in Yunnan, didn't you really enjoy betting on stones?"

"How is that the same?" Yang Xutang gave a wry smile. "That's pure gambling; this could only count as a kind of bulk purchasing."

Just as he was speaking, Zhang Bin's phone suddenly rang. Zhang Bin picked it up, glanced at the screen, and an utterly lecherous expression immediately spread across his face. "It's that little thing I picked up on the plane."

Yang Ce shook his head and watched Zhang Bin take the call. The two of them seemed to be arranging something, but Yang Shuoxuan did not care about any of it.

After hanging up, Zhang Bin scratched the back of his head a little sheepishly. "Boss, she wants me to meet up with her."

"Then go." Yang Ce was only too glad not to have to accompany Zhang Bin to the casinos; now that he could escape, there was no reason to refuse. Still, he cautioned, "Don't miss the concert tonight. I'll call you when it's time."

"No problem. I'll try to wrap things up quick and take her straight to a hotel." Zhang Bin chuckled at that, then flagged down a taxi and left.

Yang Jiyan strolled the streets alone, taking in the exotic flavor of a foreign land. Although Macau had been returned to China years ago, many of the buildings along the streets were distinctly Western in style, quite different from the mainland.

"Mister, want to play?" A short man suddenly appeared in front of Yang Juehuan, making a dice-throwing gesture with his hand.

Yang Puqi was startled, somewhat puzzled—since when did casinos employ touts? But the short man's next words made everything clear to Yang Ce.