The Destroyed (29 page)

Without moving his head, Michaels glanced to the side. “You’re Quinn. I’m glad to see we didn’t kill you.”

“Are you really?”

“Yes. The shot was only meant to warn you off.”

“Then whoever took it needs some target practice.”

The men from the building were nearing, but their pace was starting to slow as they realized something was wrong.

“Tell them to throw their guns off to the side as far as they can, then get on the ground like your buddy here.”

Michaels relayed Quinn’s order. While neither man looked happy, they seemed to realize Quinn had the upper hand at the moment, so they tossed their guns and lay on the ground.

“What do you want, Quinn?” Michaels asked.

“That’s a dumb question.”

“Look, we’re just doing our job. We were hired to find the girl, so we did. I wish I could let you have her, but I can’t.”

“Too late.”

“You already have her?”

Quinn noticed those at the farmhouse were starting to head back.

“Here’s what we’re going to do,” Quinn said, just as his phone vibrated for the third time in the last ten minutes. He reached down and hit the button that sent the call straight to voice mail. “You’re going to wait until they get—”

Michaels jerked in surprise. “Sorry. My phone. Someone’s calling.”

Quinn’s eyes narrowed. He thought that maybe Michaels was trying to pull a fast one, but then he heard the low buzz of the other phone. It rang twice more, then stopped. Five seconds passed, and Quinn’s vibrated again.

What the hell?

“Don’t move,” he said to Michaels.

Keeping his gun pressed against Michaels’s skull, he pulled his phone out. “Yes?”

“Quinn?”

Quinn smirked as he punched the speaker button. “Hello, Peter.”

CHAPTER 32

FRIDAY, MAY 12
^th
, 2006

7:48 PM

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

L
OSING THE TAIL
had been easy. Friday night. Vegas. Spring. The town was rapidly filling with what seemed like half the population of California. Everywhere you looked, there were cars with license plates from the Golden State clogging up the Strip.

Quinn had counted on this, and had not been disappointed. All it had taken was one well-timed acceleration through a yellow light, and they were free. Julien confirmed the tail had not seen them turn down the side road, so there was no way the spotter could know they had returned to the Manhattan.

Quinn pulled the car to a stop at the back of the casino’s parking garage.

“Walk through there,” he said, pointing at one of the car exits. He handed her a map he’d drawn himself. “Follow this to the safe room, and stay there until you hear from one of us.”

She had yet to shake the stunned look that had overtaken her when he’d explained what was going on. Not only did she just find out she’d come within less than an hour of dying, Quinn had also explained the extreme measures she would have to undertake to remain alive.

“Be someone else…forever?” she’d said.

“Maybe, maybe not. But whoever you crossed undoubtedly has a long reach.”

“I should have never—”

“Wait,” he said quickly. “I don’t want to know what brought this on. It’s better for you
and
me if I’m out of the loop. From this point forward, Mila Voss is dead and whatever she knew died with her. Unless you do something stupid, they’ll have no reason to believe you haven’t been removed. Stay away from the business, contact no one you’ve
ever
known, find yourself a nice, uncomplicated life. That’s the only way you’re going to survive.”

She fell into her thoughts for a few minutes as Quinn drove, then she looked up and said, “Julien and you, too.”

“What about us?” Quinn asked.

“If I show up somewhere alive, they’ll want to know why you said I was dead.”

“Don’t worry about us. My cover is tight, and they don’t even know that Julien’s here. But if it helps you stay hidden, then fine. You’ll be endangering us, too.”

That had been the last they said to each other until he stopped next to the garage.

She studied the map, but he knew she wasn’t really seeing it.

“I don’t mean to rush you,” he said, “but if we’re going to pull this off, I need to be someplace else in five minutes.”

She nodded, but still didn’t move. “Why are you doing this for me?”

“Don’t ask me that,” he said. It was not a question he wanted to even think about. Whatever answer he might have, this
had
to be a one-time thing.

Until it happens again
, a voice in the back of his head countered.

He looked at his watch. “Mila, please.”

“Right, right. Of course. Sorry.” She pointed out the back window toward the trunk. “My bag.”

“No bag.”

“But—”

“No bag. Everything new. Your cell phone, too. Leave it here.”

Looking shattered, she pulled out her phone and handed it to Quinn. He immediately removed the battery, pulled out the SIM card, and snapped it in half.

“God, I can’t believe this. All because of that stupid—” She stopped herself, then opened the door. “Thank you. For…my life, I guess, or whatever life I’m going to have.”

He nodded, but kept his mouth shut. His words would only prolong their parting and cut into valuable time.

As soon as she shut the door, he dropped the car into drive, and sped off. For a few seconds, he could see her through his rearview mirror, standing at the side of the road, watching him drive away, but when he looked up again, she was gone.

Moving to the next item on his itinerary, he pulled out his phone.

“Nine-one-one operator. What’s your emergency?” a female voice asked.

“I have passenger who collapse in seat,” Quinn said, using a flawless Russian accent. “I think she not breathing.”

“What is your location, sir?”

“I driving now. I pick her up at airport, suppose to take to Planet Hollywood. But go for hospital now, yes?”

“Are you close to a hospital?”

“Yes. Think only a few minutes.”

“Which one?”

“I don’t know what is called.”

“Valley Hospital, sir?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.”

“Okay. No problem. Do you know your passenger’s name?”

“Yes, uh, hold on.” He let a few seconds pass. “Ms. Reese. Is only name I was given.”

“Where exactly are you? I can have an ambulance meet you.”

“No, no. Better if I drive. Faster.”

“Sir, please. Where are you?”

“I drive. I—”

He cut off the connection, and hoped the message would get through.

__________

Q
UINN’S PHONE RANG
seconds after he exited the elevator on the eighth floor of the Planet Hollywood Hotel. He glanced at his watch. Two minutes to eight o’clock. He accepted the call.

“Yes?”

“Something’s definitely wrong,” Jergins said.

Quinn reached the door to his room, but paused outside, not wanting Jergins to overhear the sound of the lock opening. “What’s going on?”

“The target’s disappeared.”

“What do you mean, ‘disappeared’?”

“Kovacs’s spotter was following the car she was in, but he lost her. If she was coming here, she should have arrived by now.”

“It’s just eight now,” Quinn said. “Could be she’s just running a minute or two late. Maybe she stopped to get something to eat.”

“I don’t like when plans don’t go as scheduled.”

Then I’m surprised you’ve lasted in the business as long as you have
, Quinn thought. “So should I just sit tight, or what?”

“I need you to do a sweep.”

In a less stressful situation, Quinn might have smiled. While it was the next step Jergins should have taken, there’d been no way to know for sure if the team leader would follow standard protocol.

A sweep, in this sense, meant a rapid check of local emergency services in the event someone didn’t show up where they were supposed to. Accidents happened, not just in the civilian world, but in the spy world, too. It was always best to check every possibility. This particular kind of sweep, though seldom used, was the responsibility of the cleaner.

“Sure,” Quinn said. “Ten minutes, maybe less.”

“Less is better.” Jergins told him, and hung up.

Quinn let himself into his room. On his phone, he brought up the list of law enforcement and medical facility numbers that was always prepared before the start of a job, and began making calls. It was for appearance’s sake only. He already knew what he was going to tell Jergins, but it was important to create a history in case someone checked later.

Exactly nine and a half minutes later, Quinn called Jergins back.

“Anything?” Jergins asked. “She’s not here yet.”

“She’s not going to show, either.”

A pause. “What did you find?”

“At about ten to eight, a nine-one-one operator received a call from a limo driver saying he had a passenger who suddenly became unconscious. A woman he’d picked up at the airport named Reese.”

“Son of a bitch.”

There were two ways Quinn could go at this point. He decided on the riskier move, because, if it worked, it would be the better choice in the long run. “My first thought was that she’d found out what we had planned, and was trying to cover her tracks while she got away.”

Though Jergins said nothing, Quinn was sure he’d been thinking along similar lines.

“I called the hospital where the driver would have probably taken her,” Quinn went on. “I was pretty sure she wouldn’t be there, but I was wrong.”

“She
is
there?”

“In a way.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Mila’s dead.”

A second of thick silence. “I don’t believe it.”

It wasn’t the response Quinn hoped for, but the one he expected. “I’m not convinced, either. I’m going over there to see for myself as soon as I hang up.”

“Good. Call me the moment you’re standing next to her body,
if
it’s really there. Maybe Kovacs should go with you in case she’s alive and in the vicinity.”

“If she is, I doubt she’ll be anywhere near the hospital. It’ll also be easier for me to find out anything if I’m alone.”

“Fine. Call as soon as you know anything.”

CHAPTER 33

LAZIO REGION, ITALY

G
IVEN WHAT NATE
could see with the light of his cell phone, the emergency escape tunnel was not in great shape.

Roots pushed through the space between the boards that lined the ceiling and walls, boards that, because of obvious water damage, looked liked they were lucky to still be intact. If the builders had really wanted this to be permanent, they should have enclosed the tunnel in walls of concrete or stone.

“Thick one up here,” Orlando called from the front of the line. She pointed at a substantial-looking root sticking down a few inches.

One by one they ducked under the root.

“Door!” Orlando called out after another sixty feet.

They crowded together, one after another. The door was in the ceiling. Another hatch. Where it led, there was no way to know.

“I’ll go first,” Nate said.

He could see that Orlando had a different idea, but he gave her a look meant to remind her he was in charge, and she kept her thoughts to herself.

The tunnel went on for an additional five feet beyond the hatch. Orlando, Mila, and Daeng squeezed into the space so that Nate could get underneath the exit. There was a chain mounted to the bottom that ran halfway across the hatch. At the end was a metal handle.

Nate grabbed it and pulled until the rod holding the door in place moved free. He then put his hands on the bottom of the door and pushed it open enough so he could look out.

What he saw was unexpected.

__________

“W
HY THE HELL
haven’t you been answering your phone?” Peter asked.

“I’ve been a little preoccupied,” Quinn said.

“I heard you’d been shot.”

“Oh, you did, did you?”

“I assume you’re all right.”

The three men approaching from the house were getting closer. Within seconds they’d notice the two lying on the ground in front of the car.

 “Fine enough. Can you hold for a moment?”

“What? I—”

Quinn touched the hold button with his thumb. “Tell your men to join their friends on the ground,” he told Michaels.

Instead of relaying the order, Michaels said, “Why? You’re not going to shoot me.”

Though the other man couldn’t see his face, Quinn smirked. “You’re probably right, but are you absolutely sure? Your people shot me, after all.”

“You were somewhere you weren’t supposed to be.”

“That’s a matter of opinion. Tell your men to get on the ground.”

With reluctance, Michaels repeated the instructions to his team.

The men took a moment, but all complied. Though most of Michaels’s team was now lying in the grass, Quinn noticed a couple were missing. “Where are the others?”

“What others?”

Quinn jabbed the gun into the operative’s head. “There were five by the house. Only three came back.”

“Go ahead and pull the trigger.”

Instead of taking Michaels up on the suggestion, Quinn took the call off hold. “Let me ask you, Peter. Any thoughts on who might have shot me?”

“I’m not going to bullshit you, Quinn. The team who shot you is working for me.”

“So, in effect,
you
shot me.”

“If I’d known you were going to be there,” Peter said with controlled anger, “I would have told them
not
to shoot. What the hell were you doing there in the first place?”

Fair question. “Looking for the girl.”

“You knew she was alive before all this started, didn’t you?”

Another fair question, but one Quinn wasn’t ready to answer. Not yet. “I’m actually in the middle of a situation here that you’re in a perfect position to handle.”