Exit Strategy (55 page)

“I’m
okay
.”

“I know, I just feel—”

“Really bad. I’ve heard it. Heard it from you, heard it from Felix, heard it from Jack, even heard something like it from Evelyn. It was my choice to go in there. Unforeseeable circumstances, and no one’s to blame…except Wilkes and Dubois, but neither is in much of a position to take his share.”

“Well, I still feel—”

“Really bad.”

A small laugh. “Okay, I’ll stop saying it.” He reached out to take my coffee before I could set it down, but backed off at a mock-glare. Then he shifted in his seat.

“So, what I said the other day…Is it still…? About keeping in touch, I mean. Jack’s sure not going to give me a way to contact you, so this is probably my last chance to…”

He let the sentence trail off.

I grinned. “Ask me for my phone number?”

“That’d be nice, but I know I’m not getting it. How about e-mail?”

We discussed it for a minute and each decided to set up a new account. I suggested we use other names, to keep things separate. After I gave him one for me, he thought about it for a few seconds, then sighed. “I’m no good at this stuff. Umm, maybe…geez, I don’t know…”

“Backdoor Man?”

A laugh. “
Your
backdoor man. I’ll use it. You won’t mistake me for anyone else with that.”

Quinn looked left and I followed his gaze to see Jack approaching. He leaned toward me.

“So, you know, keep in touch, okay?” A grin, and he sang,
“Pick up the phone. I’m always home. Call me anytime.”

I grinned back.
“Just ring 362-4368?”

“I lead a life of crime.”

Jack, who’d heard the end of the exchange, looked from one to the other, blank-faced as we laughed.

“AC/DC?” I said.

Still blank.

“‘Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap’?” Quinn said. “Our anthem. Or if it isn’t, it should be.”

“Yours maybe,” he said. “I’m never cheap.”

Waving the tickets, Jack motioned Quinn aside. We said a quick good-bye, and Quinn promised to be in touch. Jack caught that, and he looked at me, but said nothing, just gestured for Quinn to walk with him.

They headed for the domestic flights area, Jack talking and Quinn nodding. Then Jack passed him his ticket. Quinn shot me a final grin, hoisted his carry-on and merged into the flow of passengers.

Jack walked back to me.

“Got an hour,” he said. “Cutting it close for security.”

I nodded and he helped me to my feet. As I arranged my crutches, he looked back to make sure Quinn had disappeared, then led me to the international flights gate.

“Jack?”

“Hmmm?”

“Before I go. There’s something…” I paused, looked around, then led him to a quieter corner. “Evelyn offered me a job going after some pedophile.” I paused. “Vigilante work.”

I studied his expression, but he gave nothing away, only nodded, as if this was no surprise.

“You knew?”

“Knew she would.” A pause, then he looked at me. “You didn’t take it. Didn’t say no, either.”

“I…couldn’t. Either way. Not yet. She said it didn’t matter, that if this one falls through she’ll find me another.”

He nodded, again not surprised. After a moment, he said, “You want my opinion.”

“If I could.”

A longer pause now, staring out at the passengers hurrying by. Then, slowly, he turned his gaze back to mine. “Could argue for. Could argue against. Don’t think I should do either.” He lowered my bag to the floor. “Whatever you decide? I’m here. Won’t tell you which way to go. Won’t let you walk off a cliff, either.”

I considered that, deciphering it, then said, “Meaning it’s an honest offer, as far as you know. She isn’t setting me up for anything.”

“Honest enough. I’ll make sure of that. You wanna say yes? Let me check the job first. She won’t trick you. But…” He shrugged, letting the sentence trail off.

“She’s not above fudging the truth a bit to lure me in.”

“Yeah.”

He checked his watch. I took the hint and started walking. He steered our path away from the other passengers.

“Bring the cash next trip?” he said, voice still low.

“Cash?”

“Your cut. Assume you want cash. Easier if I bring it. For crossing the border. Unless you need it now.”

“I don’t want your money, Jack.”

I waited for him to protest, to say someone else had financed the job, but he didn’t seem to notice my wording.

“You earned it,” he said.

“I don’t—”

“You
earned
it. More than anyone. You need it, too. More than anyone.”

“I don’t, Jack. You know why I did this and it has nothing to do with a payment.”

“Yeah, but—”

“I don’t want your money.”

He hesitated. A flicker of consternation as he realized what I’d said, and that I’d said it before, and he hadn’t denied it. He opened his mouth as if to argue, but realized it was too late, and settled for rubbing his hand across his mouth.

Another pause, then, “I don’t need it, either. You earned it. I want you—”

“You want me to have it? Then I’ll tell you how you can give it to me: take me on an all-expenses paid trip to Egypt.”

He looked at me.

“You did suggest that, didn’t you? In Vegas? You were asking whether I’d come with you to see the pyramids someday, but we were cut off before I could answer. Well, it’s yes. If you were serious, that is. If not, well, I guess you can buy me a trip for one.”

“No, that’d be good.” Another mouth rub. “Yeah.” He looked up. “But your stuff. For the lodge. Gazebos, hot tubs—”

“It can wait.”

“Shouldn’t. I’ll bring the money. You get your stuff. Egypt?” He shrugged. “That’ll be the bonus. You earned it. Won’t be right away, though. Got some jobs.”

“No rush. If we could do it during a slow period at the lodge, that’d be great.”

“Yeah. I’ll do that. Let you know. Work something out.” He paused. “That’d be good.” Another pause, then he looked at the security gate. “You gotta go.”

He helped me get my bag onto my shoulder. Took a moment for me to adjust the extra weight with the crutches, but then I was ready.

Still I hesitated.

I wanted to ask him why he’d done it. Why he’d paid for the job. But if I did, I knew what he’d do. Shrug and repeat some variation on what he’d said back at the lodge: that what was bad for the business was bad for everyone
in
the business.

I didn’t doubt that had figured into his motivation. Was there more?

I thought of Jack, paying Cooper when there’d been no offer of money in our “deal.” Paying that kid at the casino for information he hadn’t been able to give. Why bother? Because, to him, it had been the right thing to do.

As a hitman, he’d been in a position to stop Wilkes, and hire others to help. So he had. Why? Maybe just because it was the right thing to do.

“Gonna miss your flight,” he said.

I wanted to say “forget the flight.” I wanted to get out of this line, this airport, take him someplace and talk to him.
Really
talk to him. But as I looked into his eyes, so unreadable he might as well have been wearing shades, I knew it wouldn’t be as simple as Evelyn said. “Ask him and he’ll tell you” only applied to the superficial. For anything with any meaning—not just this but any of the questions I really wanted answers to—I wasn’t getting them. Maybe not ever. Certainly not now.

Another moment’s hesitation, then I said, “See you around?”

He nodded. “Of course.”

And that, I supposed, was the best I could hope for. So I adjusted my bag, nodded a final good-bye and headed through the gate.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

KELLEY ARMSTRONG
is the author of seven books in the Women of the Otherworld series. She lives in Ontario with her family. You can visit her at
www.kelleyarmstrong.com
.

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If you enjoyed
EXIT STRATEGY
and have not yet read Kelley Armstrong’s Women of the Otherworld series, then here are some special excerpts!

Imagine a world in which supernatural beings lived among us, hidden in plain sight. And then imagine the lengths they would have to go to to ensure that the chaos in their world did not spill over into ours. From witches to werewolves, ghosts to necromancers, Kelley Armstrong presents a perfectly realized world of kick-ass heroines and the men who love them.

Be sure not to miss any
of these riveting novels,
all available from Bantam Spectra.

DIME STORE MAGIC

Paige Winterbourne was always either too young or too rebellious to succeed her mother as leader of one of the world’s most powerful elite organizations—the American Coven of Witches. Now, at twenty-three, with Paige’s mother dead, the Elders can no longer deny her. But even Paige’s wildest antics don’t hold a candle to those of her new charge—an orphaned teenager who is all too willing to use her budding powers for evil…and evil is all too willing to claim her. For she is being pursued by a dark faction of the supernatural underworld. They are a vicious group who will do anything to woo the young, malleable, and extremely powerful neophyte, including commit murder—and frame Paige for the crime. It’s an initiation into adulthood, womanhood, and the brutal side of magic, and Paige will have to do everything within her power to make sure they both survive….

Leah hadn’t settled for placing an anonymous call to the station’s overnight answering service. No, she’d called the local sheriff, Ted Fowler, at home, babbling hysterically about strange lights and screams coming from the woods behind my house.

Fowler had thrown on clothing that looked like it came from his bedroom floor and driven straight over. In reward for his haste, he found the smoldering remains of a Satanic altar a scant ten feet beyond my backyard.

By dawn my house and yard were crawling with cops. By disposing of the cat corpses, I’d only made things worse. When Fowler saw traces of blood and no bodies, his imagination leaped to the worst possible conclusion. Murder.

Savannah and I spent the next several hours huddled in my bedroom, alternately answering questions and listening to the sound of strangers tearing apart our home.

“Ms. Winterbourne?”

I spun to see the lead detective from the state police in my bedroom doorway.

“We found cats,” he said.

“Cats?” I repeated.

“Three dead cats buried a short distance from the scene.”

I motioned toward Savannah and lifted a finger to my lips, gesturing that I didn’t want this discussed in front of her. The detective moved to the living room, where several officers were lounging on my sofa and chairs, muddy shoes propped on my antique coffee table. I swallowed my outrage and turned to the detective.

“So it was cat’s blood?” I said.

“Apparently, though we’ll run tests to be sure. Killing cats might not be on the same scale as murder, but it’s still a serious offense. Very serious.”

“It should be. Anyone who’d do that…” I didn’t have to fake my shudder, needing only to remember the sight of those maimed bodies. “I can’t believe someone would stage a Satanic altar behind my yard.”

“What makes you think it was staged?”

“It looked real to me,” one of the officers said, waving a cookie that looked suspiciously like the same cookies that were in my cupboard.

His wave scattered crumbs across my ivory carpet. I looked at those crumbs, looked at the muddy boot prints surrounding it, looked at the bookcase behind it, my books and photos and mementos shoved into haphazard piles, and I felt a snap. Just a small one.

“And you say that based on witnessing exactly how many Satanic altars?” I asked.

“We’ve seen photos,” he muttered at last.

“Oh, right. The photos. There’s probably one genuine photo circulating endlessly around the entire country. Attention all units: beware of Satanic cults. Do you know who builds all those so-called Satanic altars you hear about? Kids. Bored, angry teenagers trying to shock the establishment. That and the occasional homicidal moron who’s already planning his defense: the devil made me do it. Satanic altar, my ass. What you saw out back there is a prank. A very, very sick prank.”