Brute Force

Chapter 56

Jacques Thibodaux unfolded his right leg and stretched it into the narrow aisle, trying to regain some semblance of circulation, and resigned himself to the fact that the other leg was just plain doomed. He knew a man of his bulk should really buy two seats, but thankfully Emiko Miyagi had decided to sit beside him. Tough as a leather boot, Miyagi was small enough they didn’t fight over the armrest and play dueling shoulders for the entire five-hour flight out of Reagan National.

Thibodaux fished the cell phone out of his pocket as the plane settled in over the runway, turning it on before the tires squawked on the asphalt.

He tried Quinn twice and got nothing.

“The boy’s gone dark,” he muttered half to himself.

“I will call Palmer-san as soon as we’re off the plane,” Miyagi said. “You can try him again then.”

“I got a bad feeling,” Thibodaux said. “If I don’t get ahold of him pretty damn soon, I say we head straight to Big Uncle’s party and start crackin’ heads.”

Miyagi turned slowly in her seat and raised a thin black brow. Endowed with what Jacques called “relaxed bitchy face”—at least when it came to their relationship — the Japanese woman was so stoic it was sometimes painful to talk to her. “Crack heads?” she said.

“That’s what I’m sayin’,” Jacques said.

“For once, Thibodaux-san,” Miyagi said, “we are in complete agreement.”