Mondays Are Murder features brand-new noir fiction modeled after our award-winning Noir Series. Each story is an original one, and each takes place in a distinct location. Our web model for the series has one more restraint: a 750-word limit. Sound like murder? It is. But so are Mondays.

This week, Dallas Noir contributor Jonathan Woods tells us about a particularly bad day for barbecue. Next week, Christian Aguiar brings us to Providence to share the story of a boy named Brendan.

A Bad Day for Barbecue
by Jonathan Woods
Hollywood Road, Hong Kong

Jiao Lee, the first female owner of Golden BBQ, stood in the restaurant’s doorway. She watched the morning traffic on Hollywood Road in the heart of Hong Kong Central. Massive apartment blocks rose up the slope of Victoria Peak like giant Lego sculptures. Rain clouds of a winter cold front roiled above.

Mostly antique shops and galleries inhabited Hollywood Road, with an occasional sly, upscale restaurant or bar here and there. As the landlords hiked the rents, the galleries were moving away. Life was ever changeable, thought Jiao.

Golden BBQ had been at its location for five generations, offering succulent, mouth-watering barbecue to its clientele. In the window, a suckling pig, a dozen pressed ducks and a brace of geese—favored for their fatty flesh—hung from metal hooks.

Jiao waved at Hamish MacBeth, who was walking his pit bull Doris. “Leih hou,” she said. (Hello. How are you?)

Hamish waved back. He was a regular at GBBQ. Between mouthfuls of Lemoncello-glazed pork ribs he had told Jiao he worked in security for a Scottish bank.

Doris, a magnificent brown and white shorthaired creature, loped at the end of a chain leash. Hamish had assured Jiao Doris was as gentle as Jiao’s grandmother, who had died in the revolution.

Tomorrow the Year of the Snake arrived with pageantry and feasting to honor both gods and ancestors. Jiao’s oldest customers would expect a very special barbecue.

For her venerable customer Mr. Chow, owner of a red Maserati and a condominium on the Peak, Jiao had decided to prepare a most finger-licking treat.

*

On New Year’s Eve a yellow fog consumed the city, sending cold, squid-like tentacles down Hollywood Road. Jiao’s nephew Ang, a thug and heroin addict, crouched in a stinking alley.

Late-night footsteps of man and beast approached. Doris and her master loomed out of the mist.

Ang sprang upon them, blackjack crashing down on Hamish’s skull. Hamish, coldcocked, collided with the pavement. A chloroform-soaked rag went over Doris’ nose. The dog went limp.

Rolling the dog in an old blanket, Ang raced down the alley to the rear entrance of GBBQ, already closed for the evening. In the kitchen he hogtied and muzzled the beast and placed it on a worktable, as instructed by Jiao.

Returning to his filthy tenement, Ang shot up and dreamed he was an emperor of the Ming Dynasty sleeping on silk sheets as soft as a concubine’s skin.

*

Hamish awoke in semi-darkness in a hospital bed. His head pounded like a pylon being driven into the mud of Hong Kong harbor. A figure crossed his line of sight, bringing the scent of perfume.

“Awake now?” said a female voice.