“Look,” he said. “It’s easy to see why you’d think Mukhtar might be involved, especially with upstanding citizens like Brooks giving you your intel, but I’m the one who called you guys over the PA. This man helped save a lot of people in there — including my daughter.”
“It’s not as simple as that.” The older agent shrugged. “I think we—”
“It’s exactly as simple as that.” Quinn stepped in, nose to nose with the man. “I don’t know who you are, and frankly, I don’t care. I’ll give you a number to call, but I’m warning you, you’re going to wish you’d taken the cuffs off before you called it.”
Quinn’s boss — the man on the other end of the number he gave the agent — happened to be sitting in the Oval Office when he took the call. Mukhtar’s father had been waiting frantically in the outskirts of the parking lot. He was finally let through the outer perimeter and allowed to collect his son.
Ronnie Garcia exchanged numbers with the boy with the promise that she and Quinn would join his family for dinner in a few days. Mr. Tahir then wisely whisked his son away from the crowd, which was still jumpy about anyone with dark skin wearing a Buccaneer Beach Thrill Park uniform.
Exhausted to the point of falling over, Quinn held both Mattie and Garcia close as he staggered back to the triage tent where Jacques waited with his family. The ringing in Quinn’s ears made it difficult to hear everything that was being said, but he could tell Camille Thibodaux was busy alternately chastising Dan for running off on his own and showering him with hugs and kisses.
“A burglary, Chair Force?” Jacques said from where he sat in the folding chair next to Quinn, shaking his head. “I’m hearing estimates of a hundred and three dead and twice that number wounded… All this killing for a little dab of cash?”
Quinn shrugged. Mattie sat in his lap. Garcia sat in the chair beside him. He took a moment to give her shoulder a squeeze and sniff Mattie’s hair before he spoke. “A park as big as Buccaneer Beach could rake in a quarter million in receipts every day,” he said. “And that’s not counting the concessions.”
“Wouldn’t a lot of it be credit card receipts?” Ronnie asked, batting exhausted brown eyes at Quinn.
“Some of it would,” he said.
Thibodaux rubbed his jaw in thought, following the logic. “But if he rounds up a bunch of guns from his uncle’s safe and a bunch of radical yahoos take care of the shootin’ spree that covers his crime, this little sociopath had no upfront investment and no accountability. Even half the daily gross in cash would be free money.”
“Exactly,” Quinn said.
Thibodaux leaned back in his chair and shut his eyes. “I guess they all got to die as martyrs,” he said.
Mattie lifted her head from Quinn’s chest. “What’s a martyr, Daddy?”
Thibodaux gave a low groan, his eyes still closed. “Martyr is another word for dumbass,” he sighed. “Go ahead and quote me if you want to, darlin’.”
Quinn hugged his daughter and chuckled. “We’d better not mention that definition to your mom,” he said.
Mattie pulled back, blinking huge blue eyes, her mother’s eyes. She sniffed, flashing a beautiful grin — the type of grin that made him want to buy her things.
“Sorry I scared you, Daddy,” she said. “But there was this guy with a gun, and you always told me I should run from a guy with a gun. Then Dan said we should run, too, so I did.”
“He was right,” Quinn said. “And so were you.”
“Did you see Dan made a bow and arrow out of a piece of plastic pipe?” Her beautiful eyes grew even bigger. “And it really worked.”
“I saw that,” Quinn said, squeezing her as if she might fly away. “I’m just glad you’re safe.”
Mattie went on talking without taking a breath. “Then the bad guys threw us into the swimming pool. And it was really deep, and we treaded water, but Dan said we should stay out of the shallow end because we might get trampled.”
“He did?” Quinn said, shooting a sideways grin at Ronnie.
“It was really, really scary, Dad.” Mattie gave an emphatic nod, her arms still around Quinn’s neck. “We thought they were going to shoot any minute, then Dan told me and my friend Sarah that we should swim close to the edge and run—”
Jacques looked at Quinn, smiling broadly, mouthing his words so Mattie couldn’t hear him. “Well, Chair Force,” he said. “Looks like she got over Shawn…”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
A native of Texas, MARC CAMERON has spent over twenty-nine years in law enforcement. His assignments have taken him from rural Alaska to Manhattan, from Canada to Mexico and points in between. A second-degree black belt in jujitsu, he often teaches defensive tactics to law-enforcement agencies and civilian groups. Cameron presently lives in Alaska with his wife and his BMW motorcycle.