A gurgle and a thud.
He relieved the woman of her gun, and then cautiously moved into the brush where the noise had come from. Parting a few branches with his leg, he found the man he’d shot lying on the ground. The bullet had caught him square in the throat, and while he still had a bit of life in his eyes, it was quickly draining away as blood pooled around his shoulders.
Quinn took the man’s weapon and returned to the woman. She was looking at him again, but whatever strength she’d had was gone. He knew it would be only minutes before she took her last breath.
He found Abraham on the ground, wincing in pain.
“Where were you hit?” he asked as he knelt down.
“Nowhere good, Johnny,” Abraham said.
After a quick examination, Quinn knew he was right. One bullet had entered just below his rib cage and the other in his chest. From the wheeze of the older man’s breaths, Quinn was sure one had punctured a lung. He was equally sure there was little he could do for his friend.
Raising his voice, he said, “Clear on this end.”
“Clear here, too,” Nate said.
“I need Orlando.”
A moment later, he heard her cutting through the brush.
When she saw Abraham, she said, “Shit,” and dropped down on the other side of him. “Dammit, Abraham. What the hell did you do?”
“I thought…that was pretty obvious.” He winced again. “Did we get them?”
“We did,” Quinn said, “but it would have been a lot harder if you hadn’t taken out the woman.”
As the others approached, Quinn caught Desirae’s gaze and shook his head. She got the message and tried to stop Tessa from approaching, but the girl kept coming.
“Abe?” Tessa said, her eyes wide. “Oh, no. Are you…”
Despite the pain Quinn knew Abraham was feeling, the old op smiled and said, “Are you…okay?”
She knelt beside him. “Yeah. But you—”
“I need you…to promise me…something.”
With effort, he lifted his hand toward her and she grabbed it.
“I need…you to just have fun…be a girl…enjoy every…”—he coughed—“moment. Can you…promise me that?”
Her lower lip trembling, she said, “I promise.”
As he coughed again, Desirae put her hands on Tessa’s shoulders. “Why don’t we give Abe a little room?”
Abraham moved his gaze to the woman, the look on his face asking if Tessa was indeed okay.
“She’s fine,” Desirae said. “Thanks to you, she’s just fine.”
“I brought the others to you….You would have been…safe if I left…it alone.”
“They would have come for us whether you were looking or not. You helped us stop them. Thank you.” She smiled. “Come on, Tessa.” She led her daughter away.
Abraham seemed to drift off for a moment.
Orlando squeezed his hand, tears running down her face. “Hey, stay with me.” When his eyes opened again, she tried to smile as she said, “You know, you were wrong earlier.”
He looked confused. “Wrong?”
“Yeah, what you said about it not being your best day,” she said. “You saved Tessa. Seems to me this is the best.”
A twinkle flitted through his eyes as a smile touched the corner of his mouth. “Orlando,” he said, his voice no more than a whisper now, “my best day…was the day I found you.”
As far as last words went, Quinn thought Abraham’s were pretty damn good.
CHAPTER 36
When the sun came up, Quinn and Nate got down to the business they were best at, and before long the bodies of the McCrillis crew were buried deep in the jungle where they would never be found.
Abraham was another story. A call to Helen Cho — the first of what would be several — resulted in a no-questions-asked death certificate and a sealed coffin ride back to California.
But Abraham and the bodies of the others were not the biggest issue. Despite what Desirae had said to Orlando’s mentor, Clark and her men had been a symptom of Tessa and Desirae’s problem, not the cause, so the danger still existed.
After Quinn and Orlando promised they would continue their working relationship with Helen’s organization, she was more than willing to provide them with the assistance they required to finish things. It would, after all, clean up a mess the CIA — one of her internal clients — would be very happy to be rid of.
“Big house,” Orlando noted.
“You expected something smaller?” Quinn asked.
The house was in an exclusive neighborhood of San Mateo, California, the heart of Silicon Valley. Surrounding it was an eight-foot-high stone wall with a solid wooden gate across the driveway entrance.
They had no problem getting someone inside to open this gate for them. As a respected reporter for a leading lifestyle website and her freelance photographer, Orlando and Quinn were ostensibly there to interview Jacqueline Rostov, CEO of Rostov Dynamics.
The house was a three-story French chateau, which, according to the information they’d been given, was a brick-by-brick copy of a home in the Loire Valley of France. As they neared the front, a suited man standing in the driveway directed them to a parking spot before leading them up to the front door.
Inside, an older gentleman took them to a lavishly decorated office on the second floor.
“Mrs. Rostov will be with you soon,” he said. “She’s finishing up other business. After you finish the interview, I’ve been instructed to give you a tour of the grounds.”
“That’ll be great,” Orlando replied. “Thanks.”
“Would you like something to drink while you wait?”
“We’re fine.”
To ensure they would have a little extra time before the “interview” started, they had arrived fifteen minutes early. As soon as their guide left and closed the door, Quinn opened his camera bag and he and Orlando set to work.
Thirty-two minutes passed by the time Mrs. Rostov finally walked in and found Quinn and Orlando seated in the guest chairs in front of her desk. While her bio listed her as fifty-nine, the head of Rostov Dynamics had clearly spent a sizable chunk of cash on doctors and clothes to look younger.
Businesslike smiles and quick, firm handshakes were shared, and then the woman settled into her chair behind the desk.
“I’m having some tea brought in,” she said. “If there’s something else you’d rather have…?”
“Tea is fine,” Orlando said.
“Works for me, too,” Quinn said.
They had prepared for the contingency of someone bringing refreshments, so Orlando started in on her list of questions, while Quinn walked around the room under the pretext of checking the lighting and looking for good angles to take some pictures.
He was still walking around when the tea arrived. A young woman in a dark suit brought the tray in, set it on the desk, and left. Quinn arrived at the double doors just as she closed it. With his back to the desk, he slipped the double-looped lock over the two handles and pushed the button that silently tightened the carbon-fiber straps. He then walked toward the window at the other end of the room, pulled out his phone, and sent the pre-typed text.
Commence transfer
Casually, he returned to his chair. Orlando was in the middle of asking the woman about her favorite vacation spots but stopped as soon as he sat down.
Rostov looked at her for a moment, waiting, then said, “Was there a question?”
Orlando smiled, but said nothing as Quinn removed a laptop from his bag and set it on the desk.
Rostov looked confused. “What’s going on?”
Quinn held up a finger. “Just a second.”
“I’m sorry?” she said, clearly unaccustomed to being told what to do.