The Enraged

CHAPTER 7

Quinn jumped the final few feet from the fire escape to the ground and whipped around, looking for Daeng and Misty, but they were nowhere in sight. Since they could have gone only one of two ways, and the first — heading to the main road — was out of the question, Quinn turned toward the back of the building, and weaved his way around several trash bins before reaching a narrow alley.

A little darkness would have been nice, but the summer sun was still a few hours from setting. Quinn checked both directions, looking for his friends, but the alley was deserted.

Directly across from him was a twelve-foot-high brick wall that extended for a dozen yards in either direction. To the left, it butted up against another building, but on the right there seemed to be an opening to a passageway.

Quinn eased down the alley, keeping as tight to the structures on his side as possible. Reaching the point opposite the end of the wall, he confirmed there was indeed a path that went clear through to the next street over.

He checked both ways again, saw that the alley was still empty, and raced across. Just as he entered the passageway, one of the bricks at the corner exploded from the impact of a bullet. He turned on the speed.

Ahead at the next street, he could see a sidewalk and cars parked along a curb, but between him and them was a tall, wrought-iron gate — chained closed.

Knowing the path behind him would not remain empty for long, he could neither turn and go back nor stop and pick the lock.

Without slowing his pace, he assessed the gate. At the top, the vertical bars ended in pointed spears that could not be ignored. Other than that, all Quinn had to worry about was the cracked, uneven cement on the other side, waiting to twist his ankle or break his leg.

He was fifteen feet from the gate when he heard a bullet whiz by his head and strike the side of the building to his right. What he hadn’t heard was the gunshot itself.

Suppressors. Not surprising, but it did confirm that the men shooting at him weren’t part of some average, everyday security team.

He angled toward where the fence met the wall, and leaped, grabbing the gate as he planted his right foot against it. Using his momentum, he scrambled up the V-shaped junction.

A second bullet hit the fence where his foot had been seconds before, then a third smacked into the wall, sending shards of brick onto his back.

He reached the top and flung his legs over, barely clearing the tips of the deadly spears. He dropped onto the broken pathway, and rolled as he hit the ground to avoid injury.

A double clang as more bullets hit the gate.

Getting to his feet, he could see one of the suited men preparing to take another shot. Quinn raced down the remaining few steps of the pathway and turned down the main sidewalk. Thankfully, there was more traffic on this street than there had been on Peter’s. He moved onto the road and shot through a gap between the cars to the other side, and then sprinted down the block.

As he turned onto the new street, he glanced over his shoulder. The suits were nowhere in sight. He knew it would be a mistake to stop, so he ran for two more blocks before allowing himself to slow down.

Not much farther on, the residential area gave way to businesses fronting sidewalks peppered with pedestrians. Just ahead, he spotted a bar and grill with a substantial happy-hour crowd both inside and around tables out front. He took a spot behind a group of twentysomethings, and used them to shield his presence as he watched the street.

“What can I get you?”

The waitress was a tall brunette dressed in jeans and a red T-shirt that was too small for her.

He donned an easy smile. “What do you have on tap?”

As she went through the list, he returned his gaze to the street.

“…also, um, Speakeasy Big Daddy, Blue Moon, uh, Rolling—”

“Speakeasy? That’s a West Coast beer.”

“Is it?” She didn’t really seem to care.

“I’ll take that,” he said.

“You got it.”

Quinn watched the road for another few minutes before finally pulling out his phone and sending Daeng a text.

Think I’m clear. You?

Ten seconds later, Daeng called.

“We’re okay,” Daeng said.

“Where are you?”

“In the basement of a building a few blocks from Peter’s place. You?”

“I’m in a bar.” Quinn looked around. “I didn’t catch the name. They chased me down an alley, but I seemed to have lost them.”

“A bar? I should have thought of that. Has to be a lot more comfortable than here.” Daeng paused. “So what would you like us to do? Stay put? Go to the townhouse?”

“No,” Quinn said quickly. “The townhouse is out. If Peter’s apartment was being monitored, then I’m sure the townhouse is, too. Just stay there for now and let me know if you have any problems. I’ll call you in a little while.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Find out who our new friends are.”

“Son of a bitch,” Roberts mumbled to himself.

His team had searched the area around the apartment building, but the brown-haired man and his two companions had eluded them.

He walked back over to where his men were waiting for him by the team’s vehicles, and said, “Moss, Cruz, you’re with me. We’ll take one of the cars and widen the search area. Girardi, we’ll leave you the other. Stay here and keep an eye on the building in case any of them shows back up. Questions?”

There were none.

It took Quinn ten minutes to discreetly work his way back to Peter’s street. The encroaching evening was finally playing in his favor. Though the sun was still above the horizon, the shadows had grown dark and wide.

Somehow the men in the suits had found out Quinn, Daeng, and Misty were there. A watcher perhaps, but unlikely, given the time lag in their response. What seemed more realistic was an alarm somewhere in Peter’s place had been tripped.

Whatever the case, he knew it was highly probable that most of the men were long gone now, and he hoped at least one had been left behind to keep an eye on the building in case Quinn and the others returned. It’s how he would have handled it.

Where, was the question. A watcher could be almost anywhere — in a car, a building across the street, one of a half dozen rooftops. He could be in Peter’s building, maybe even in Peter’s apartment, looking down on the street. If Quinn had to bet, he’d have put his money on either a car or a roof. Those were the quickest to set up.

The shadows were deeper on the opposite side of the street from Peter’s place, so Quinn entered the block there, and stepped into the recessed doorway of the first building he passed. From the slightly elevated position, he could see almost the entire street without fear of being spotted.

One by one, he examined each parked car he could see into, first on his side, then the other. His gaze stopped on an Audi A4 parked along the opposite curb, approximately halfway between his position and Peter’s building. A man was sitting in the driver’s seat. Given the deteriorating light, he wasn’t much more than a shadow.

It could have just been someone listening to the radio, or maybe a guy who’d arrived early for a date and was waiting for time to pass.

Or it could have been one of the suits.

Quinn mentally marked the car before scanning the rest of the vehicles. As far as he could tell, the others were all empty. Next he searched the rooflines of the buildings on Peter’s side. The sky was still bright enough that any silhouette would stand out, but he didn’t spot so much as a suspicious bump rising above a retaining wall.

The only things left were the rooflines on his side. He’d have to cross the street to check them.

He looked back at the Audi. The driver’s arm was up, his hand either on the side of his head, or in front of his face. It was impossible to tell from Quinn’s angle. A few seconds passed, then the hand lowered. Quinn could see it was holding a box or…

…binoculars.

There was no way to know for sure, but his instincts told him he was right.

He slipped back down the short set of steps, and snuck along the sidewalk in a crouch so that the watcher couldn’t spot him over the other parked cars. When he was across the street from Peter’s building, he cut between a sedan and SUV, and walked deliberately out into the road. Keeping his pace slow, he looked up and down the street as if checking to make sure he was alone. After several seconds, he jogged the rest of the way to Peter’s building. Misty still had the key, but his picks worked quickly enough.

Once inside, he raced down the hallway that ran along the side of the elevators. As he’d hoped, it went all the way to a rear exit on the alley side. He slammed through the metal security door, and ran back up the same passageway where the fire escape had deposited him earlier, not stopping until he was only a few feet from the front corner. Pressing himself against the stone wall, he ease forward until he could peek around the edge.

What he saw didn’t surprise him in the least. The driver’s seat of the Audi was now empty, because the man — the suited man — who’d been sitting in it was walking cautiously down the sidewalk toward Peter’s place. His eyes were trained on the entrance, and while he wasn’t holding a gun, he did have a hand hovering near the buttons of his coat.

You radioed your friends the second you saw me, didn’t you? Quinn thought. What did they tell you to do? Can’t imagine it was to try to take me yourself. Keep an eye on me? Wait for them to get here?

The man’s pace continued to slow as he neared the steps up to the building. When he reached them, he stopped and craned his neck, attempting to get a look through the glass door into the lobby.

One step up. Another look. But it still wasn’t enough, and he kept going until he was standing right in front of the door. He leaned in, moving his eyes as close to the window as possible, his attention fully focused on the lobby.

Quinn crept quietly over to the nearest parked car, crouched behind it on the street side, and peered through the sedan’s window. He had a perfect view of the watcher as the man leaned back from the glass door. A few seconds later, the watcher walked back down the stairs and started retracing his steps to his car.

Keeping in a crouch on the other side of the vehicles, Quinn followed him nearly all the way back to the Audi, stopping one car shy and slipping around the front end so he’d stay out of view. The man stepped around the front of his car and walked to the driver’s door, his back now to Quinn.

That was the moment Quinn had been waiting for. He closed in quietly, and as the watcher reached for the door handle, Quinn stuck the muzzle of the Beretta into the small of the man’s back.

“If I pull the trigger, your spine will be gone,” Quinn whispered. “You’ll die, but you’ll bleed out first, and I guarantee it won’t be pleasant. Do you understand?”

“You don’t have a chance,” the man told him. “Put it down and maybe—”

Quinn shoved the gun forward, knocking the man against the car. “One-word answer. Yes or no. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

With his free hand, Quinn took possession of the man’s gun, a Smith & Wesson complete with suppressor. Since it would make less noise, he switched it with the Beretta, putting his own gun in his pocket. “Who do you work for?”

The man kept his mouth shut.

“I said, who do you work for?”

No answer.

Quinn searched the man for ID, but the only thing the guy was carrying was a hundred and fifteen dollars in cash.

“We’re going for a walk,” he said.

“Like hell we are.”

The words were barely out of the watcher’s mouth when Quinn smacked the suppressor against the side of the man’s head. The watcher groaned in pain, and started to reach a hand up to where he’d been hit, but Quinn used the gun again to slap the arm down.

“We’re going for a walk.”

“Fine,” the man said, his teeth clenched, blood trickling down the side of his head.

Quinn grabbed the back of the man’s jacket and pulled him away from the car. Keeping the gun pressed against the watcher’s back, Quinn guided him to the sidewalk, and over into the passageway beside Peter’s building.

When they reached the back end, Quinn said, “Left.”

Two buildings down, he found an enclosed area built to house a couple Dumpsters. A solid metal door was pulled across most of the opening. It wasn’t the greatest solution, but it was better than standing out in the alley. After Quinn pushed the watcher inside, he shoved him against the grimy back wall.

“Sit,” Quinn said.

The man took a moment before doing as ordered. Once he was on the ground, Quinn closed the metal door the rest of the way.

“Now,” Quinn said, “who the hell are you?”

The man scoffed. “I didn’t tell you before. You think I’m going to tell you now?”

“I know you are.”

A mocking grin. “You don’t scare me.”

“Then apparently you don’t know who I am.”

“I’m not paid to know who you are. I’m just paid to deal with you, and I will. Don’t worry.”

Quinn pointed the gun directly at the man’s head. “Who are you?”

“You’re not going to shoot me. I know your kind. All talk and luck and no real—”

Quinn repositioned the gun and pulled the trigger.

The suppressor kept the noise to a muffled thup, but there was no masking the scream of pain that exploded out of the watcher’s mouth when the ring finger and pinkie on his left hand were blown off.

“Goddammit! Shit, man!”

The watcher squeezed his palm, trying to stanch the flow of blood, his face scrunched in agony.

“Who are you working for?” Quinn asked.

“Fuck you!”

“Your foot’s next, and I won’t just be going for your toes.”

The man rocked against the wall, blood soaking his shirt and jacket.

Out in the alley a voice called out, “Hey, what’s going on? Is someone hurt?”

“Don’t answer,” Quinn whispered.

“I heard a yell,” the voice said, getting nearer. “Is someone in there?”

Quinn leaned down near the watcher. “If you want help, tell me who you are and who sent you.”

Panting, the man glared at him, his eyes a mix of pain and anger. “Go to hell.”

Someone grabbed the outside handle of the metal door and started to pull it open. Quinn knew he wouldn’t get anything from the watcher, so he rose to his feet, and reached the door just as a bald guy with a protruding gut opened it wide enough to see inside.

Pushing past him, Quinn said, “Excuse me.”

“Hey, was that you?” the man asked. “Were you the one who yelled? Are you okay?”

Quinn silently walked on for another few feet.

Behind him, the man must have looked back into the garbage area, because it was only a few seconds before he said, “Oh, my God. What happened? Did that guy do this to you?”

Quinn picked up his pace.