Finally she looked at Quinn. “Eye for an eye?”
“I owe him.”
Tasha looked back at Jenny, saying nothing.
“So?” he asked.
“Give us a name,” Tasha said to Jenny. “Something to go on.”
Jenny looked at Quinn, then back at Tasha. “Did you guys work this routine out ahead of time? Think it might scare something out of me? Take me in, and let’s get this over with. I’m getting hungry.”
“Give us a name,” Tasha repeated.
“Mother Teresa,” Jenny replied, smiling.
“Okay,” Tasha said. She looked at Quinn. “I’m done.”
Without another word, she turned and started walking back toward the compound.
Quinn raised the gun another inch. His mind flashed on a memory of a fishing trip out of Cabo San Lucas. He and Markoff downing Coronas and paying very little attention to their lines. Jenny kissing her boyfriend before stretching out on the cabin roof to get a little sun.
Jenny laughed. “You’re not going to kill me, so just arrest me and take me in.”
Athens, where separate jobs had brought Markoff and Quinn to the city at the same time. A bottle of nasty ouzo, a night that went later than either had planned, and a conversation about dreams and desires that could only happen under the combination of the liquor and the hour.
“You’re just a cleaner. A janitor,” Jenny said. “You know how to remove the bodies. You don’t know how to kill them. Quit playing around.”
San Diego, on the sailboat later in the day. Quinn watching Markoff as Markoff watched Jenny. The care and growing love in the older man’s eyes genuine. But for what?
“I’m not playing,” Quinn said.
Jenny was still smiling when the bullet hit her in her chest.
It hadn’t been a perfect shot, but it was more than adequate.
Quinn walked over to where she had fallen backward on the sand. He could hear her sucking in the last bits of air her lungs would ever absorb. The look on her face was one of surprise and shock.
“Your last mistake was underestimating me.”
CHAPTER
QUINN STOOD OVER JENNY, WAITING UNTIL HE WAS
sure she was dead. He then picked her up, put her over his good shoul
der, and began walking back toward the compound.
Tasha was waiting for him at the edge of the bushes.
“You would have never gotten anything out of her,” he said.
“I know.”
“And what I said about her friends being able to get her out, that was the truth, wasn’t it?”
“I can’t know for sure, but my guess would be yes.”
“Who are they?”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out.”
Quinn nodded. This was no longer his fight. Markoff ’s killer was dead. That’s all that mattered for the moment.
“My boss isn’t going to be happy,” Tasha said as they trudged through the brush. “But he’ll understand. I’m ...uh...I’m going to tell him she was killed during a pursuit.”
Quinn shrugged. “Whatever works.”
As he neared the chain-link fence, Lian jumped down from the top of the container on the other side.
“Let me,” Lian said, motioning to Jenny’s lifeless body.
“I’ll do it,” Quinn said.
Lian nodded, then by a silent agreement Ne Win’s man led Quinn and Tasha around the outside of the compound. When they reached the opening in the fence, Lian held it open while Quinn carried the body through.
Ne Win was waiting for him on the other side. “The congressman and my friend?” Quinn asked. “In the car,” Ne Win said. “They are fine.” “What about the man I knocked out?” Ne Win shrugged. “What man?” “Thanks,” Quinn said. He turned to Tasha. “I assume you don’t
need the body.” “No.” Without another word, he turned and started walking silently be
