“Yes,” Quinn said. “What about…?”
“Orlando?” Nate said, guessing what Quinn meant. “She’s pissed and has a raging headache, but the doctor gave her something that should deal with the pain. Told us it should kick in soon. He also said the wound was more of a graze than anything too serious. She’s not going to be able to turn her head for a little while, but other than that, he thinks she’ll be okay.”
Some of the tension left Quinn’s face. “Excellent.”
“The doctor wants her to stay overnight.”
“She must love that.”
“It wasn’t quite what she wanted to hear,” Nate said. “Where are you?”
“Not too far away,” Quinn said.
“I’m not sure where I’d find that on a map.”
Once again, Nate was acting in the exact way Quinn had trained him. Covering his partner whether he wanted him to or not. It was more proof that Nate was going to make it hard for Quinn not to keep him on. If Orlando had been around, she wouldn’t have said “I told you so” out loud, but the look on her face would have conveyed it just the same.
“Look, I’ll call you soon,” Quinn said. His words told Nate to call him every ten minutes until Quinn gave him the all-clear code.
“Problems?” Hardwick asked.
“I believe you were about to give me some hard information.”
Hardwick smiled. “Who were you talking to? That kid who helps you? Or was it your woman friend?”
Quinn’s anger spiked. In less than two seconds his right hand was wrapped around Hardwick’s neck, squeezing tightly.
“Please,” Hardwick said, his voice a low croak. “I can’t breathe.”
“That’s a lie, Mr. Hardwick. If you couldn’t breathe, you couldn’t talk.”
“Please,” Hardwick repeated.
Quinn held on until he was sure Hardwick couldn’t get any air into his lungs, then he let go.
Hardwick gasped, then coughed as he rubbed a hand over his throat. “Jesus Christ.” His voice was raspy and strained. “I’m doing you a fucking favor! You know what? Forget it. We’re done here. Done.”
He started to open the door, but stopped when he realized he could only open it a few inches.
“We’re done after you finish telling me what you need to tell me,” Quinn said.
“Fuck you,” Hardwick said.
The skin on his brow turned red in anger, and his eyes looked like they were on fire. But when he didn’t make any move, Quinn knew he wasn’t going to do anything stupid. At least, not too stupid.
“Talk,” Quinn said.
Hardwick breathed deeply, his shoulders moving up and down each time air passed over his lips. After several seconds the rhythm slowed, and the color of his skin mellowed.
“Fine. I’ll tell you,” he said. “Then you’ll let me out of this car, and you and your boss will never hear from me again.”
“You forget, I know where you work.”
“That’s what you think,” Hardwick said.
“What does that mean?”
But Hardwick only stared back at Quinn.
“All right, then talk,” Quinn said. “You can start with who this group is that approached you.”
“As far as I know, they don’t have a name, just a plan of action.”
“What kind of plan?”
“I’m afraid I can’t help you with that, either. Until we signed on in full, they weren’t going to tell us everything. And since we didn’t sign on …”
“Convenient.”
“I do have
Quinn looked at him, waiting.
“I passed an itinerary of one of their agents on to the DDNI. His travel schedule is very intense, and his destinations … unusual. Again, what he was doing we were unable to discover. I was hoping the DDNI, or I guess your friend at the Office now, would have been able to figure something out from it already.”
“Couldn’t you have done that with your own resources?”
“Perhaps. But this isn’t our number one priority.”
“Care to tell me what priority number one is for the LP right now?”
“Maybe some other time.”
