So Edmondson had…what? Just put his hands on the bike recently for kicks?
She looked down at the tires and noted they were sitting on a large sheet of cardboard. Crushed into the sheet and leading off from the tires was a pair of well-worn tracks. The bike and sidecar had apparently been rolled off and on several times. Given the size of the garage, Edmondson could have done so without opening the larger door to the outside.
Curious, Ananke wrapped her hands around the clean spots on the handles and rolled the bike back. Once it was clear, she lifted the cardboard off the floor and propped it against the Volvo.
Huh, she thought. The cardboard had been clean but the concrete underneath it was covered with dark oil stains. Stains that seemed a little too perfect.
Getting on her knees, she carefully scanned the floor.
There, she thought a few seconds later.
A crack, one too straight to have been caused naturally.
She followed the line until it met another. That one led to a third that connected with a fourth that ran all the way back to number one. All together, they created a nice and tidy rectangle.
“Sorry, Mr. Edmondson,” she whispered. “But I think I just found your ‘down there.’”
The handle for the rectangle was hidden in the blackest patch of oil, under an oval chip of concrete that popped out when she pushed it. She slipped her fingers inside, found a lever, and flipped it.
The door was heavy enough to take both hands to pull it open. Once it was out of the way, she retrieved her pocket flashlight and shined it into the hole beneath the door. The beam revealed a steep staircase going down about fifteen feet.
Before she could decide what she would do next, the alarm on her phone went off. She cursed under her breath. As much as she wanted to see what was below, she had a job to do.
She thought for a moment. Perhaps there was still a way to get a peek.
Leaving the trapdoor open, she headed back upstairs to the master bedroom, where she found Edmondson staring dead-eyed at the ceiling. She checked his pulse, then pulled out her phone and made the call.
When the line was answered, she said, “All yours.”
CHAPTER 3
Jonathan Quinn entered the house through the back door, his partner Nate following a few steps behind. The quiet Seattle suburb was not exactly Quinn’s favorite type of job site. Places like this were too friendly, neighbors knowing neighbors, neighbors watching neighbors, neighbors sticking their noses in neighbors’ business — all raising the risk of him and his team being noticed.
The late hour — about thirty minutes before midnight — helped, but didn’t guarantee anything. Every street had its night owls, many of whom would sit in darkened rooms and stare out their windows at the street.
Quinn and Nate headed up the stairs, the tools of their trade packed in the duffel bags each carried. They were cleaners of the highest order, the people you called when you had a body that needed to disappear.
On rare occasions, however, a client would request that things be arranged so that the body would be found and the death attributed to something other than what had actually happened. Such was the case with the Edmondson assignment.
Per the pre-mission brief, Ananke — the assassin — was to have performed the deed in the target’s bedroom, located on the second floor. She had assured Quinn it would be a bloodless takedown. Having worked with her a few times in the past, he trusted she would deliver as promised, making the body removal and the cleanup of the termination scene the easy part of his and Nate’s night. The part Quinn wasn’t looking forward to would come after that. It too was a special request.
The target, Samuel Edmondson, posed as a small-time financial services broker in his civilian job, but made his real money as an information broker for less than reputable individuals and organizations. Among his clients were several terrorist cells and other groups that were considered enemies of the United States, hence the reason Helen Cho’s group was involved. She was the client who had hired Quinn, Nate, and Ananke.
After Quinn and his partner finished prepping the body for travel, they were supposed to do a quick but thorough check of the house for anything that might provide information on Edmondson’s clients before heading out to set up the target’s alternate death scenario. Quinn could count on one hand the number of times he’d been asked to do the same kind of search. Though he didn’t like it, he knew it wouldn’t be a big deal. Grab whatever computers and files the guy had and move on.
While the upper hallway was dark, light leaked out the partially opened door at the far end. From the blueprints, Quinn knew it led to the master bedroom where the body should be. He pushed the door open but only took a single step inside before stopping.
“What are you still doing here?” he asked.
Ananke was sitting on a chair near the bed. Her part of the assignment complete, she should have left as soon as she’d notified Quinn.
“I had a little free time. Thought I’d watch you guys work. It’s been a while.” She smiled. “You don’t mind, do you?”
He moved over to the bed. The target was lying on his back, under the covers. Quinn scanned the rest of the space. Nothing seemed out of order.
When he looked back at Ananke, he said, “You’re in the way.”
With an ease few people could match, she rose out of her chair and slinked by them. A stray finger traced the muscles on Nate’s arm as she passed.
“You’ve been working out,” she said.
He grinned. “A little.”
“Nate,” Quinn snapped.
Looking the innocent, Quinn’s former apprentice said, “What?”
Though Ananke was a highly respected assassin, she could also be a distraction. She was as tall as Quinn, nearly six feet, with smooth dark brown skin and matching eyes that could be piercing or alluring or both at the same time. Her hair, black as the stocking cap it was currently tucked under, fell several inches below her shoulders when she wore it down. She was, Quinn knew, a lethal combination of danger and intelligence.
He had hoped she would leave, but instead she stopped in the doorway and leaned against the jamb. Doing his best to ignore her, he examined the bedcover to make sure she hadn’t left any stray hairs behind. When he was sure it was clean, he folded the comforter onto the unused half of the bed and then went through the same routine with the sheets.
Edmondson was dressed in a pair of maroon silk pajamas, his monogram stitched on the breast in yellow. If not for the fact that his chest wasn’t moving, he looked as if he were asleep. Quinn turned the body on its side, checking for any injuries that might have bloodied the bed, but, as promised, there was none.
“Ready,” he said to Nate.
His partner unfurled a pre-cut roll of plastic sheeting onto the floor between the bed and the wall, and then they laid the body on it. Quinn grabbed a set of clothes out of the closet to dress Edmondson in later, and tossed it on top of the body. They then wrapped everything up and secured the bundle with duct tape.
Quinn examined the empty bed and found a single dark hair. He plucked it up and held it in the air toward Ananke. “Sloppy.”
“Wrong color,” she said.
She was right. Now that he was holding it in the light, he could see it had an auburn hint to it.
“No one else was here tonight?” he asked her.
She shook her head. “Only me and Sammy.”
The hair might have been there for days. Quinn used a small piece of duct tape to secure it to the bundle, thinking he might as well get rid of it.