[Quinn 04] - The Silenced

“That’s not how it works and you know it,” she said.

“We need to get away soon, or I’m going to go crazy.”

“You get another gig you can dive into and you’ll be fine.”

Quinn wasn’t so sure about that, but he said nothing. The future was not something particularly clear to him at the moment.

Orlando must have sensed something, because she said, “How about Christmas? He’ll have two weeks off then.”

A little over two months away. Not soon enough, but he knew there was little he could do about it. “Sure,” he said.

They sat in silence for several minutes.

“You know, you’re going to have to go in and talk to her at some point,” Orlando said.

He shook his head. “She doesn’t want to talk to me.”

“She wants to talk to you more than anything in the world.”

Smiling without feeling, he said, “She wants Nate to get better more than anything, I think.”

“She can want both.”

He stared at the floor, unsure.

“If you don’t do it for yourself, or even for her, you need to do it for Nate. He nearly sacrificed his life to save her. He did that for you.”

Quinn rubbed his hands across his face. “I know,” he whispered.

“So make it right,” Orlando said.

She got up and walked out of the room.

Make it right. For the third time in his life, he was responsible for nearly getting his sister killed. Make it right? He should just walk away, like he did before. That would make it right, wouldn’t it?

But ten minutes later, he found himself standing in front of Nate’s door, not sure how he got there. He remembered getting up. He remembered walking down the hall. But he didn’t remember choosing to do either.

Make it right, he thought, breaking the trance.

He placed his palm against the door and pushed, hoping that for some reason it would be locked. But it swung inward.

He took a step forward. And then another.

His sister was there, her chair pulled up next to Nate’s bed, his hand in hers. It was as if she hadn’t heard Quinn come in. Then, finally, she seemed to sense that she was no longer alone, and turned to see who it was, her face blank.

Quinn hesitated a moment, then took the last step into the room, and let the door swing shut behind him.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I’LL TRY TO KEEP THIS BRIEF THIS TIME. ALL THE usual circus clowns did superb work keeping me on track, helping me out of holes, and generally moving me forward. Thank you Tasha Alexander, Rob Browne, and Sophie Littlefield. Special recognition and thanks for head clown Bill Cameron for being the perfect sounding board/story compass. And to Tammy Sparks for keeping me from sounding like an idiot.

In addition, special thanks to all the wonderful folks at Preface in the United Kingdom for taking me into your arms and being the most wonderful hosts while I stumbled around London researching this book: Rosie de Courcy, Ben Wright, Nicola Taplin, Trevor Dolby, and the rest of the crew. Thank you!

Big thank-you to the folks at the Novel Cafe for providing a great environment to spend countless hours writing, and for keeping me well fed.

And to K, of course. You were a big part of this one. Thank you.

Finally, to my editors Danielle Perez and Randall Klein, to Nita Taublib, and to my agent Anne Hawkins. Thank you all for everything you’ve done to support and help me with this book.

Oh, one last thing. I blame all errors on software glitches. Yeah, that’s it. Software glitches.