distance, a single light moved to the west, a plane flying from one unknown point to another. Along the road, trees that were no more than dark shadows rushed by solo and in groups with no discernible pattern.
A memory hit him, unexpected and hard.
He was in the back seat of his family’s car. Beside him, his sister.
Liz was probably six at the time, which would have made him fourteen. In the front his mother sat in the passenger seat and, as usual, his father was behind the wheel. Outside, it was night, and the trees of Minnesota, much like the trees of Maine, flew by the window like a dark, silent army.
Liz yawned, then leaned over and laid her head in his lap. Automatically, his hand went to the side of her head, stroking her long hair so that she’d fall asleep.
“Good night, Jake,” she said groggily.
“Good night, sweet pea,” he replied.
Quinn’s phone buzzed in his pocket again, jerking him out of the past.
It was a text from Orlando, sent when they were in position outside Moody’s house. He had forgotten about it.
Call Me
This was no simple request to touch base. Orlando wasn’t like that. If she’d been thinking about him, and wanted him to know, that’s what she would have said. If she had something to talk about, but could wait, she would have said that, too. A simple CALL ME meant do it now. Urgency in her simplicity.
The phone began to vibrate in his hand. He looked down. A call this time, not a text. On his screen was a single word: WILLS.
“David,” Quinn said.
“I just got off the phone with Donovan,” Wills said. “What a disaster!”
“Yeah,” Quinn said. “Pretty much.”
“He told me you recognized the people who showed up.”
“Just one of them. Not the whole group. It was the woman from L.A. The Russian.”
“Are you sure?”
“No question.”
Silence.
“And the target?” Wills asked. “Donovan thinks he left with the others.”
“That would be my guess, but we don’t know for sure. They could have killed him and left him in the house.”
“Didn’t anyone check?”
“There wasn’t time,” Quinn pointed out. “Donovan gave the order to abort, and we all scattered. Good thing he did — the police arrived just as I was leaving.”
“Donovan didn’t say anything about the police.”
“We delayed our departure for a few minutes.” Quinn explained about the wallet Nate had taken from the victim.
“That was good thinking,” Wills said.
“We weren’t the only ones with the idea. One of Donovan’s men hung back to grab it, but got scared off by the police.”
“Really? Which one?”
“A guy named Mercer.”
There was just the slightest of pauses before Wills spoke again. “Well, I’m just glad somebody got it. What did you find?”
“Hold on.” Quinn held out his hand. “Wallet.”
Keeping his eyes on the road, Nate dug the wallet out of his pocket and handed it over. Quinn flipped it open and found a driver’s license tucked behind a clear plastic cover.
“According to this his name is William Burke. B-U-R-K-E. Address in Manhattan.”
“Burke?” Wills questioned to himself.
Quinn looked through the rest of the wallet. “He’s got a credit card and an ATM card. Wait, here’s something interesting.”
“What is it?”
“Several business cards. They all have the same name, but the companies are different. Comcast Cable, Faye Construction, Triple A. There’s one here that says he’s with the FBI. They all have the same address. Some place in Manhattan.” Quinn paused. “No chance William Burke is this guy’s real name.” Quinn looked at the guy’s picture again. “Something else.”
“What?”
“Hold on.” Quinn held the driver’s license out on the dashboard so Nate could see it. “This
Nate glanced quickly at the picture. “Yeah. That’s him.”
Quinn put the phone back to his ear. “I’ll check this guy’s ID against the pictures I took in L.A., but I’m pretty sure he was behind the wheel of the car at the warehouse the other night, too.”
Wills said nothing for a moment, then, “The client isn’t going to like this.”
That wasn’t Quinn’s problem. Even if the job was canceled, Quinn had already been paid, and per his standard arrangement, the money would stay with him.
“Given all that’s been going on,” Wills said, “I want to meet with you in person. Today. Well, tomorrow for you. It’s not even midnight there yet, is it?”
“Not quite yet,” Quinn said.
“I’ll fly over. Not Portland, but maybe Boston.”
“New York,” Quinn said. “The Grand Hyatt. There’s a bar beyond the elevators on the main floor. Text me what time you’ll be there.”
“Bar at the Grand Hyatt,” Wills said. “Okay. I should be over there in time for lunch. And Quinn. Thanks again. You haven’t disappointed me yet.”
“You say ‘yet’ like you’re expecting me to.”
“Actually, I’m not.”
“Good.” Quinn disconnected the call.
He was about to slip the phone back into his pocket when he remembered he needed to call Orlando.
She answered after only one ring. “Finally done?” she asked.
“That’s one way of phrasing it,” Quinn said. He filled her in on what had happened.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she said.
“Wish I was.”
“You know you took a chance with the ID.”
“Not a big one,” he said.
“Bigger than you should have.”
“I made Nate do it.”
“Well, that’s reassuring,” she said.
Quinn smiled. “So what’s up?”
When she spoke again, all the playfulness that had been in her voice was gone. “Somebody tripped one of my flags.”
Orlando knew her way around computers better than most people knew how to walk. One of the things she had done was set up electronic tripwires throughout cyberspace that would notify her when someone looked at whatever it was she’d flagged.
“Okay,” he said. “Is this something we need to worry about?”
“It got me to check some of the other related flags I’d set up,” she went on, ignoring his question. “There are at least five that should have sent me a message, but didn’t. Someone bypassed them.”
Quinn started to feel uneasy. “What does that mean?”
“It means someone’s been poking around where they shouldn’t. It’s been going on for over a week. The only
