36 The Black Eagles

He tightened his arms about her shoulders. "About time you realised that," he teased her, "and said it without prompting." He smacked her already sore ass lightly.

Changying jumped, startled and about to protest, but he leaned up and kissed her, his smiling eyes disarming her protests as much as the kiss. He pushed her off him rolling her to her back and kissed her again. "Alas, man cannot live on love alone, so let's have breakfast!" Laughing she followed him to the table, and they sat close together eating the food she had laid out earlier.

They showered, and Wang packed the chest back into the car after a cursory glance around the cabin to make sure nothing had been forgotten. "Before I give you this," he said with a smile holding her bag out of her reach. Changying her cocked her head inquisitively and waited for the rest of his sentence. He opened the bag and confiscated her bras as she protested loudly. He smiled as he handed her the bag minus the two bras and stroked a finger around her jewelled necklace. "Do what I say for the whole weekend, remember."

She took the bag nodding begrudgingly. "Yes, Mine," she said with a little more attitude than she meant to come through, making him growl at her. She instantly regretted it. She chose a blue blouse and a flowing white skirt with delicately embroidered blue and white flowers. It was one of her favourites and would be comfortable for the drive home.

Wang sat at the small sofa and coffee table with the large box he had brought in Friday night on his lap. Changying dressed and moved about the small cottage, tidying up after their brief stay so that the owners would not think badly of them. He called her to him and pulled her to sit beside him. She saw that he held the book she had seen on her first visit to his apartment. "You've seen this before at my apartment," he smiled. "It's a work in progress, to rewrite some of the characters from the history of The Honoured Society."

Changying looked between the book and Wang as he spoke. "You read this part I am assuming," Wang continued pointing to a rough hand written page in the front of the book, and she looked down for a few minutes rereading: "Each family had agreed to send a younger son, his wife and a body of slaves to the new British Colony to set up a new seat of power for the table of twelve they had created."

She nodded recognising the section he pointed out. "But why would you rewrite some of the characters, I mean if it is a family history shouldn't it be a real history not a story?"

"My family sits at one of those twelve tables, it is our duty to live by the code set out by the honoured society," he paused seeing her eyes come alight with curiosity, her mind working over what she knew and what she had already read. "Some members of one of the twelve families strayed from that path and have been dealt with accordingly. I won't say much more as it is an old business, but changes must be made before the next quorum if we are to right the wrongs that were done."

"It all sounds so formal and ominous, is the code so very rigid?" Changying looked up again.

"Yes, I think that it is what binds us together, creates a tight network of family and friends that ensures our personal successes as well as the safety of those we love. When the family is threatened by one man's stupidity or ego," he paused struggling to find the right words for her. "When someone seeks to rise above all others, they are cut off, lanced like a boil so to speak. Only then can the rift be healed," Wang spoke. "I know you come from a place where family is not considered the highest of priorities as you never had much of your own but trust me, once you are part of my family, and see all of the branches of that family tree you will begin to understand.

"I would like you to help me with this project, so you can know where I come from, who I truly am, as well as what expectations would be placed on you when you meet the older members of my family," he said, smiling. "Speaking of which we will be having a late lunch with my uncle," he grinned.

"Wait!" Changying stopped him. "The Honoured Society? That was umm," she searched for the word in the dim memory she had of hearing the term, "the 'Black Eagles. It's like the mafia! Your family is involved in organised crime?" She was truly as shocked as she sounded.

"That branch of our family tree has been severed," Wang said abruptly making it clear that his family were not part of some criminal organization. "Our values encompass trust, respect, virtue, steadfastness, discipline, dignity and the bonds of family. Does that sound like the family code of criminals?"

"No," Changying admitted uncertainly. The memory of the gangland killings from years ago began surfacing stronger in her memory. It was drugs and territory and something to do with the produce market. Her researcher's mind filed away the information for another time, and she looked up at Wang. He was the man she knew to be true to his word, he was the man that made her so happy, and he was the man she loved. "No," she said more firmly, "of course not, it was just something that triggered an odd memory of the name."