No way out

Chapter Sixty-eight

Quinn drove east on Independence Avenue, slowing down as we approached Roni Chase’s office. Night had fallen, and it was dark and deserted, the adjacent storefronts shut down for the day.

“Turn in here. That’s Roni’s office,” I said. “Circle the building. I’ll check the door.”

“Why?”

“I want to be certain she’s not lying on the floor with a bullet in the back of her head.”

The door was locked. I peered in the windows, but there was nothing to see, just chairs, her desk, papers stacked in neat piles from one side to the other, her computer monitor turned off, no dead bodies in sight, a light on in the back. Quinn pulled up, leaning out his window.

“The back door is a piece of cake. You want to have a look around?”

“We have time?”

He looked at his watch. “We’ve got fifty-five minutes. If we can’t toss her office in ten, we should hang it up.”

Quinn drove, I walked, and he had the door open by the time I caught up to him, his canvas bag open at his feet. He pulled out two halogen penlights, handed one to me, zippered the bag, and put it back in the SUV.

“What are we looking for?” he asked.

“Missing pieces.”

“Oh, missing pieces. That’s helpful.”

I turned off the light in the back of Roni’s office, crossed to the front, lowered and closed the blinds on the storefront glass and turned on my penlight.

“If Roni is protecting Brett Staley, she probably knows where he is. We’re looking for anything that can tell us where he’s hiding.”

“You think she’s part of this?”

“No. I think Brett is and she’s helping him.”

“Then that makes her part of this.”

“Not in the way you mean it. Whoever killed Nick Staley stuck around in the grocery for a reason. The only reason that fits is that the killer was waiting for Brett. Which means Brett didn’t kill his father or Frank Crenshaw. I think Roni is protecting Brett in the truest sense. She’s trying to keep him alive.”

Quinn’s cell phone beeped. He read the screen. “Text message from Mendez. He moved up the meeting time. He says if we’re not there in ten minutes we can forget it.”

“How far away are we?”

“Ten minutes.”

“I’d say Mendez just put your orange peel in his pocket.” I took a quick glance at Roni’s desk, sweeping everything into a wastebasket and tucking it under my arm. “Let’s roll.”

Quinn barreled onto Independence Avenue, fish-tailing and slaloming through eastbound traffic.

“Independence Avenue becomes Winner Road about four miles east of here just before we hit what’s left of the old steel mill,” he said.

“I’ve driven past it. There’s a building a couple of blocks long that’s nothing but a bunch of broken-out windows and aluminum siding.”

“That’s the billet yard where they stored steel rods and bars. Access is off a side street called Ewing. Winner bridges the steel yard like an overpass. Ewing runs parallel and one-way east down a steep hill. The gate to the yard is at the bottom of the hill underneath Winner.”

“We’re meeting him at the billet yard?”

“No. There are two layers of ten-foot chain-link fence topped with razor wire to keep people out. The yard is abandoned. No need for on-site security with that fence. We’re meeting Mendez at the bottom of the hill beneath the overpass.”

“Is that the only way in?”

“There’s a road that runs north and south along the yard called Winchester. There’s nothing else down there, except a couple of old machine shops and a few broken-down abandoned houses.”

“Perfect for Mendez. The overhead traffic muffles any noise. He can put people at the top of the hill on Ewing and down along Winchester in case anyone gets close. This time of night, we should be the only people within a mile. No one will hear or see us. We should have gotten there earlier.”

“And done what? Set up an ambush? We’re there to talk to the man, not take him down.”

“He made sure of that, moving up the timetable.”

“This was never about gaining a tactical advantage. There’re only two of us, and I don’t know how many of them. This is about going in and getting what information we can without giving him a reason to kill us. You want to take a pass, now is the time to tell me.”

I shook my head. “This is my deal. Not yours. Drop me off. I’ll call you when it’s time to pick me up.”

He laughed. “I’ve met Kate Scranton one time, but that was enough to know I don’t want her coming after me the rest of my life.”

Two minutes later, we stopped at the top of the hill. A burly figure stood five feet back of the curb, camouflaged by darkness, one arm at his side, his hand tucked behind him, no doubt holding a gun. He motioned us down the hill with his other hand.

Quinn let the SUV coast down the hill, headlights picking up the sign above the gate, SHEFFIELD INDUSTRIAL STATION, GATE NO. 2. Another solitary figure stood in front of the gate, hands in his jacket pocket. Rectangular pillars supporting the overpass broke the hill into four segments. The man at the bottom of the hill waved at us, gesturing that we were to pull over into the center, the pillars funneling us toward him. When we were halfway down the hill, he raised his hand, telling us to stop.

High-beam headlights flashed behind us, filling the cab of the SUV. I looked over my shoulder, squinting at three cars that had been parked at the top of the hill beneath the overpass, invisible to us until now. The cars crept closer, the center car holding course, the other two flanking us. Only then did a Lexus sedan emerge from Winchester, passing the man at the gate, blocking us in, its high-beams adding to the blinding glare.

The driver got out of each car on our flanks, opening Quinn’s door and mine, motioning us to get out. No one had spoken a word, but there was no doubt who was in charge and what we were supposed to do. They closed our doors, turned us toward the SUV, and made us spread, patting us down and taking our guns and holding them up to the Lexus.

The lights on the Lexus went off, the other cars doing the same. I blinked in the sudden darkness, aware that the passenger door on the Lexus had opened and someone was getting out, my eyes too dilated to capture any other details. I felt a hand on my back shove me toward the Lexus.

There were seven of them, the guy at the top of the hill, the one at the gate, the drivers of the three cars, and the two in the Lexus. They were half my age, faster, and stronger, no doubt armed and anxious to prove themselves in a fight even if it wasn’t a fair one.

I looked to my left, expecting to see Quinn, but he wasn’t there. Doors on the car next to Quinn opened and closed, the engine racing as it sped away, Quinn staring at me from the rear passenger seat, a gun pressed against his cheek. The numbers had changed, five against one for me and two against one for Quinn. I didn’t like either of our odds.

Cesar Mendez stepped toward me as one of the other men handed him the keys to the SUV.

“You wanted to talk,” he said. “Let’s talk.”