Dr. Beadermeyer was holding his crotch, his face still drawn in pain. Good, she'd hurt him. Anything he did to her would be worth it. She'd hurt him.
'That's enough, Sally.' Holland's voice, soft and hoarse, terrifying.
'I'll kill you, Holland. Stay away from me.' But it was an empty threat. Her arms were trembling, her stomach roiling now. She tasted bile. She dropped the table, fell to her knees, and vomited on Dr.
Beadermeyer's Italian loafers.
'You either help me or you don't, Dillon, but you don't tell a soul about this.'
'Damnation, Quinlan, do you know what you're asking?' Dillon Savich leaned back in his chair, nearly tipping it over, but not quite because he knew exactly how far to go. His computer screen was bright with the photo of a man's face, a youngish man who looked like a yuppie broker, well dressed, easy smile, well-groomed hair and clothes.
'Yes. You're going with me to that sanitarium and we're going to rescue Sally. Then we're going to clean up this mess. We'll be heroes. You won't be gone from your computer for more than a couple of hours.
Maybe three hours if you want to be a hero. Take your laptop and the modem. You can still hook in to any system you want.'
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'Marvin will cut our balls off. You know he hates it when you try to go off on your own without talking to him.'
'We'll give Marvin all the credit. The FBI will shine. Marvin will be grinning from ear to ear. He'll give the credit to his boss, Deputy Director Shruggs, so Shruggs won't cut Marvin's balls off. Shruggs will be happy as a loon.
'And on and on it goes. Sally will be safe and we'll get this damned murder solved.'
'You still ignore the fact that she might have killed her father herself. It's a possibility. What's wrong with you? How can you ignore it?'
'Yeah, I do ignore it. I have to. But we'll find out, won't we?'
'You're involved with her, aren't you? It was only one bloody week you were with her. What is she, some sort of siren?''
'No, she's a skinny little blonde who's got more grit than you can begin to imagine.'
'I don't believe this. No, shut up, Quinlan, I've got to think.' Dillon leaned forward and stared fixedly at the man's photo on the computer screen. He said absently, 'This creep is probably the one who's killing the homeless people in Minneapolis.'
'Leave the creep for the moment. Think, brood, whatever. You're going to try to figure all the odds.
You're going to weigh every possible outcome with that computer brain of yours. Have you developed a program for that yet?'
'Not yet, but I'm close. Come on, Quinlan, my brain is why you love me. I've saved your ass at least three times. You wouldn't trade me for any other agent. Shut up. I've got to make an important decision here.'
'You've got ten minutes. Not a second more. I've got to get to her. God knows what they're doing to her, what they're giving her. Jesus, she could be dead. Or they could have already moved her. If the guy who hit me bothered to check my ID, then they know I'm FBI. We haven't got much time even if they didn't check. I know they'll move her, it only makes sense.'
'Why are you so sure she's at the sanitarium?'
'They wouldn't take the chance of taking her anywhere else.'
' 'They' who? No, you don't know. Ten minutes, then. No, shut up, Quinlan.'
'Thank God, you've already been to the gym this morning or I'd have to wait for you to lift your bloody weights. I'm getting some coffee.'
Quinlan walked down to the small lounge at the end of the hall. It wasn't that the fifth floor was ugly and inhospitable. It couldn't be, since they let tourists get within a floor of them. It didn't look all that institutional, just tired. The linoleum was still pale brown with years of grit walked deep into it.
He poured a cup of coffee, sniffed it first, then took a cautious sip. Yep, it still made his Adam's apple shudder, but it kept the nerves finely tuned. Without it an agent would probably just fold up and die.
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He needed Dillon. He knew that Dillon would set up an appropriate backup in case it turned out they couldn't handle the job. He'd been tempted to go directly from Dulles to Maryland to that sanitarium, but he'd given the matter a good deal of thought. He was in this up to his neck, and he wanted to save Sally's neck as well.
He had no idea about the security at Beadermeyer's sanitarium, but Dillon would find out and then they'd get over there. He couldn't take the chance of alerting his boss, Brammer. He couldn't take the chance that Sally could be plowed under in this damned mess.
He drank more coffee, felt the caffeine jolt hit his brain and stomach at about the same time.
He wandered back into Dillon's office. 'It's been ten minutes.'
'I've been waiting for you, Quinlan. Let's go.'
'Just like that? No more arguments? No more telling me there's a thirteen percent chance that one of us will end up in a ditch with a knife in his throat?'
'Nope,' Dill said cheerfully, pulled several sheets out of his printer, and rose.
'Here's the layout for the sanitarium. I think I've found exactly where it's safest for us to go in.'
'You made up your mind before you even kicked me out.'
