Time of Attack (8 page)

Q
uinn left the rum and Coke untouched along with a ten-dollar bill and a nod at the waitress. Wanting to stay ahead of Drake’s date, he walked quickly back under Cleopatra’s wooden cleavage, through the Palace casino, and around the corner to Diamond VIP registration. Thankfully, there was no line. He badged the girl with a Croatian accent behind the desk, explaining that he was conducting a routine advance for a protective operation on an Air Force three-star general. She was professional enough that she didn’t mention the Capitol Police detail already on site.

“The general is very averse to the media,” Quinn said, hoping she’d afford him the same restraint when she spoke with any other protective agents.

“Of course, sir.” The girl, whose name was Cetina, gave a conspiratorial nod and pointed to a map on the marble counter. “We have three vacant suites at the moment. I can get security to show you any or all of them if you wish.”

Quinn took a deep breath, feeling a twinge of guilt for lying to this sweet girl. “That won’t be necessary,” he said. “I just need to take a few photos of stairwells, fire escapes, and whatnot. We’re still in early stages.”

“Very well.” Cetina slid a key card across the counter. “This will give you access to the elevators around the corner.” She smiled, a splash of freckles accenting the pink skin of a button nose. “Be careful taking photos of our guests. Like your general, most are not very fond of publicity.”

Quinn made it around to catch the elevator in time to see a flash of red as Drake’s buxom escort passed the restrooms down the hall, coming toward him. She was alone.

Quinn got on the elevator without looking back and punched the button for the twenty-seventh and the forty-sixth floors to make certain the car would continue up when he got back on. He stepped off immediately at twenty-five, but held the door and watched the floor numbers above the adjacent elevator, which surely contained Drake’s date. They flashed past him and on to thirty-nine before stopping. Quinn stepped back on and inserted the card again. He made it to thirty-nine as the red dress disappeared into her room, four doors down from the elevator.

What happened in Vegas did indeed stay in Vegas, often for a great length of time, recorded digitally on cameras in virtually every casino, lobby, and hallway. Thankfully, guest floors were not places where the casinos lost money, so Quinn knew it was unlikely a live set of eyes would be focused on the particular cameras watching the thirty-ninth floor.

Quinn smiled broadly as he gave a knock on the door. The woman opened almost immediately, tilting her head sideways when she saw it wasn’t Hartman Drake.

Quinn held up his room key. “I think you dropped this,” he said. When she turned instinctively to look at the desk where she’d put her own key, he shouldered his way in, pinning her arms and putting a hand over her mouth before she could scream. The door clicked shut behind them as she began to rake his shins with her feet.

Over the years Quinn had dealt with more than a handful of women involved in prostitution. The reasons they got into such work were as varied as their hair color and descriptions. Some were sad sacks. Some did it because they wanted to make a lot of money fast, but nearly all of them shared at least one particular trait. They were almost impossible to intimidate. Unlike most men in modern America, the vast majority of hookers had been punched in the face, many times. They knew what it felt like, and they also knew it took more than a smack to kill them.

“Police!” Quinn hissed in the woman’s ear. He arched his back to make it harder for her to get at his legs with the hard edges of her pedaling high heels.

Her body arched with him, trying to get away, but she stopped kicking.

Quinn moved his hand away from her mouth, careful not to let her bite him. He prepared to slap it back down if she began to scream.

“I knew it. Secret Service,” she spat. “That bastard told me it was okay. He said I wouldn’t get in any trouble.”

Quinn didn’t correct her. In the minds of the American public, the Secret Service protected everyone. For all he knew, Drake had told her just that. Instead, he took a pair of handcuffs from his back pocket and snapped them around the woman’s wrists, behind her back. Knowing Drake could arrive at any moment, he gave her a quick pat-down for hidden weapons. The tight dress left little room to hide anything, but Quinn had seen firsthand how Veronica Garcia could secret a pistol away under some pretty flimsy bits of cloth.

The call girl’s mouth hung open when he spun her around and set her on the bed. A flicker of terror sparked in her brown eyes. Her lower lip trembled slightly. The handcuffs and the dawning reality of her situation had finally staggered her confidence.

“You don’t look like no Secret Service agent I ever saw.”

“How well do you know your client?” Quinn said.

Apparently satisfied Quinn didn’t mean to rape her or beat her to death, the woman fell back onto the bed, looking up at the ceiling with a tired groan. “I don’t know, seven, eight months. My friend says to me, ‘Dolores, you should meet this guy. He’s some big shot in politics and he pays very well.’ ”

“Does he talk to you?” Quinn kept an eye on the door.

“Hell, yes he talks to me,” Dolores said. “He won’t shut up. Mostly about himself and how buff he looks. I think he only hires me so he’s got somebody to brag to.”

“Anything else?”

“Every man I know gonna brag some.” She rolled sideways a little to take the pressure off her wrists. Her face remained passive as if she was used to being handcuffed and thrown on a bed. “Drake, he brags a hell of a lot more than most. Like he can’t help himself, you know. Says he’s gonna be the most powerful man in the world someday. He’s always going on about how he could save the world or destroy it if he wanted to, just like God himself.” She blinked up at Quinn. “No shit, I ain’t lyin’. He actually says stuff like that.”

Quinn took her by the arm and helped situate her in a more comfortable position against the headboard. “Did he say how he might save or destroy the world?”

She batted her eyelashes and stuck out her bottom lip, pouting. “I don’t suppose you could loosen these cuffs a little?”

“Maybe in a minute,” Quinn said. “Did Drake ever give you any specifics?”

The pout vanished. “To be honest, I usually just tuned him out. If you guys knew the things that go through a woman’s mind while you’re breathing in our ears—”

“But you heard something.”

“He talked about the Bible all the time,” Dolores said. “You know, all that whirlwind, fire, and pestilence crap and how he would be a modern-day Moses.”

“What else,” Quinn prodded every time she fell silent.

“No kidding, I really did tune him out.” She shrugged, eyes wandering around the room trying to find something more interesting than this conversation. “You can ask him. My meter’s running and he don’t like to pay me to just sit here in the room, if you know what I mean. He’ll sneak away from his agents pretty soon.” She looked up at Quinn, dark eyes shifting to the pistol that was now visible under his open jacket. Her voice was strangely detached, as if she’d seen this sort of thing many times before. “Are you gonna kill him?”

Quinn shook his head. “No,” he said.

Not right away
, he thought.

D
olores said she had no great love lost for Drake. She swore she would cooperate but didn’t have much else to give in the way of helpful information.

The far end of the suite was a sunken living area with plush sectional couches to match gold drapes. A glass coffee table and long oak chest of drawers with a big-screen television rounded out the décor. Quinn left Dolores in handcuffs and sat her on the far couch so she could lean against the corner with her back to the door.

“You know what they call handcuffs in Spanish?” she asked, settling in against the cushions.

“No idea,” Quinn said. He spoke five languages but Spanish wasn’t one of them.

“Esposas.” She winked thick, heavily mascaraed lashes. “It is the same word for wife. Fitting, don’t you think?”

Quinn didn’t answer. He’d have to check that one with Garcia. He set the television to a home shopping channel and turned up the volume.

“You don’t have to worry about the noise, baby,” Dolores said. “The ladies who clean on this floor are used to me making a lot of racket. I give them a nice tip when I leave.”

“Good to know,” Quinn said, stuffing half a wadded washcloth in the hooker’s mouth. She accepted it with little more than a roll of her eyes.

A sudden rattle at the door, followed by the electronic whir of the lock, sent Quinn around the corner between the wall and the plush king bed. From here he had a clear view of Dolores and would be in the perfect spot to ambush Drake when he walked down the small entry hall past the bathroom.

He popped his neck from side to side, letting his shoulders hang loose and ready to move. He’d waited over a year for a chance to have a few minutes alone with Hartman Drake. The picture of Kim, lying on the concrete covered with blood, flashed before his eyes. Quinn pushed thoughts of revenge down in the dark recesses of his gut. It would be so easy to end this man here and now. Beating him to death would bring a certain closure if not real satisfaction, but there were still too many questions that had to be answered.

Quinn held his breath.

“Honey, I’m home!” Drake clapped his hands, stepping out of his shoes as he came through the door. Quinn heard the jingle of a belt buckle before the man even made it down the short hallway. “Let’s get this show on the—”

Fighting was rarely something Quinn took lightly. Underestimating an opponent could cost the battle, or worse, your life. But in this case Drake did half the work for him. His arms were occupied with shrugging off his sport jacket when he came around the corner, while his ankles were effectively hobbled by the puddle of loose slacks at his feet.

Well muscled, Hartman Drake was no one to toy with even when hampered by his pants. A snap-kick to his unprotected groin bent him double and put his chin in a perfect line with Quinn’s uppercut. Quinn was on him in an instant, slapping him hard across the ear to keep him stunned.

Pressing the advantage of momentum, Quinn rushed in, pummeling Drake with blow after blow to the ribs, driving the wind from his body and shocking his heart. With no time to collect his thoughts or regain his bearings, Drake could do little but give a halfhearted attempt to ward off the assault. Ten seconds from the time he’d walked into the room, warm in the knowledge he would have some quality time with sweet little Dolores, Hartman Drake found himself nauseated, dizzy, and half-deaf.

Quinn caught the Speaker’s wrist and wrenched it backward, feeling a satisfying crunch as tendons stretched and tore. Dolores half turned on the couch to watch the show and looked on with an interested sparkle in her eye. Quinn used three zip cuffs from the lining of his jacket to hog-tie Drake and leave him lolling, facedown, on the bed. With his target incapacitated for the moment, Quinn took the protesting Dolores by the arm and dragged her into the bathroom. She managed to spit out the washrag on the way.

“Whoa!” she said, wide-eyed. “You’re pretty damn good at what you do. Can I please watch? I’ll be quiet as a mouse, I swear.”

“Safer for you if you don’t hear this,” Quinn said, checking her cuffs. He took another zip tie from his jacket and fastened her to the sink before turning on the faucet in the tub for background noise. Stuffing the washcloth back in her mouth, he shut the door.

With Dolores stowed out of the way, Quinn sat on the bed beside a blinking, wide-eyed Drake. “Now,” he whispered, “you and I have some things to talk about.”

“Do you even know who I am?” Drake mumbled, his face smashed against the bed linens.

Quinn grabbed him by the hair and lifted his head. He looked the man over, as if considering how to carve a piece of meat, then let his head fall back to the mattress. “Let’s see what I know . . . I know you’re the kind of trash that kicked out three of your wife’s teeth and then held her underwater until she drowned. Yeah, I’d say I’m probably one of the handful of people in this country who actually does know who you are. What I need to know is who is pulling your strings.”

A flash of panic crossed Drake’s eyes. “There are a bunch of Capitol Police guys looking for me right now . . .” His words slurred against the bed with a line of drool.

“I’m going to ask you this once.” Quinn’s voice was barely audible above Drake’s whimpering. “Who shot at my family?”

Drake began to sob uncontrollably, flinging his head from side to side. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Seriously . . . I am . . .” He panted, as if trying to catch his breath. “I am the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. My name is Hartman Dra—”

Quinn slipped into Arabic. “Who is the Japanese woman that was sent to shoot at me?”

Drake rolled his lips, pressing them together in a tight line as if to keep himself from talking. “Mister,” he finally said, trying to regain some of his bravado, “you have no idea what a shitload of troub—”

Quinn cuffed him on the back of the head, then drew the suppressed .22 from the shoulder holster under his Transit jacket. “As you wish,” he said, pressing the weapon to Drake’s temple. Without another word he turned the pistol slightly and fired a round into the mattress. Drake flinched at the shot. The spent casing ejected and landed in his ear, causing him to howl as if he’d been splashed with molten lava.

“I know you worked for Doctor Badeeb,” Quinn said, still in Arabic. He leaned in for effect. “And I know you tried to kill my little girl.”

“Please, I can’t understand what you’re saying,” Drake yowled. “I don’t speak Arabic . . .”

Quinn sighed. His voice grew calmer, almost sweet. “Perhaps you will not mind if I shoot you in your foot.”

Drake flinched at the words, doing the best he could to move his trussed feet out of the line of fire.

“You understand me perfectly,” Quinn spat. He flicked the pistol a fraction of an inch to put a round in the sole of Drake’s foot.

The .22-caliber bullet punched completely through, snapping tiny bones and spraying the sheets with a fine mist of blood.

“Okay! Okay! Stop!” Spittle spewed from Drake’s mouth. “Don’t shoot me anymore! But stop speaking Arabic. Badeeb was Pakistani. I barely understand Arabic.” He turned his head sideways, cheek against the mattress, sobbing through clenched eyelids. He nodded in defeat. “What do you want to know?”

Quinn leaned in, whispering. “What was killing her supposed to do to me, exactly? Make me lay down and die?”

“Seriously . . .” He panted, trying to catch his breath. “I don’t know anything about that . . .”

“I need a name, Drake,” Quinn said, his voice an acid whisper. “I don’t care about you or your failed attempt at the White House. I want to know who shot at my daughter.”

Drake looked up, puzzled. “Shot at?” He panted. “She missed?”

“Who is
she
?” Quinn aimed the little .22 at Drake’s other foot.

“Wait, wait, wait!” Drake screamed, wincing at the pain it brought his battered ribs. “What’ll you do with me if I tell you?”

Quinn jerked him sideways to get his full attention. “You should be more worried about what I’ll do if you don’t.”

“You don’t understand . . .” Drake began to hyperventilate. “These people are cruel. Capable of things you can’t even imagine.”

“Oh, I can imagine a lot.”

Drake started to sob again. “I have to have assurances.”

“You—”

Quinn froze as an electronic whir came from down the hall. Someone else with a key was at the door.

“Ahhh.” Drake sniffed, then rolled up on his side with his ear toward the door. His conceited swagger bloomed across his slobbering mouth along with the courage of a man who thought he was about to be rescued. “That’ll be my Capitol Police guys coming to shoot you in the face.”

Quinn grabbed Drake by his collar and dragged him off the mattress to the floor. At that same moment a slender man wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt popped around the corner from the hallway, blazing away as if he had unlimited ammunition. At least two rounds hit Drake as Quinn pulled him down.

At first, Quinn thought the newcomer might be Dolores’s pimp, but the Browning pistol the newcomer carried was nearly a thousand bucks without the suppressor—much too professional for a man lording over a string of prostitutes, even in Vegas. The man took another shot at Drake’s bare feet where they trailed past the end of the bed, obliterating a big toe in the process.

Quinn fired back with the Beretta, sending the attacker into retreat down the hallway. He got a fleeting glimpse of a face under the gray hood and guessed the man to be Pakistani.

Firing with the suppressed .22 didn’t exactly provide a show of overwhelming force, so Quinn swapped the diminutive Beretta for the Kimber 10mm tucked inside his waistband. During the heat of battle, people hit with a silenced weapon often didn’t realize they’d been shot. The big bang provided the signal to drive that point home.

Kimber in hand, Quinn prepared himself for the onslaught of police and federal agents that would rain down on him as soon as he fired the booming gun with no suppressor. No amount of tipping would keep the housekeepers from calling security once he started shooting.

A sudden thud, followed by a surprised grunt, came from the hallway. The door slammed and Dolores’s husky voice came tentatively down the hall.

“It’s me, baby,” she whispered. “Don’t shoot, okay. You good in there?”

“I’m good,” Quinn said. He kept the Kimber trained toward the voice. “What happened?”

“He’s run off.” Dolores peeked her head around the corner. Her hands were still cuffed behind her back. “I smacked him with the bathroom door. He didn’t know I was in there so I think it scared him.”

“Just curious,” Quinn said, standing, but still eyeing the door, “how’d you get out of the flex cuffs hooked to the sink?”

“Oh.” Dolores shrugged. “You gotta learn to loosen up when you search women. Be a little more thorough. We got . . . places, you know.”

Drake moaned at Quinn’s feet. “That son of a bitch tried to kill me . . .”

Dolores sat on the bed, bouncing on the edge of the mattress while she stared down at the bloody mess that had been her date. “I think he did more than try,” she said.

Drake looked up at Quinn, anger flashing in his eyes. “You have no idea what hell I’m going to unleash on you . . .”

“Apparently, I’m not the only enemy you have.” Quinn leaned in closer to make sure Drake heard correctly. “But I’m the one close enough to kill you. Now, who is the Japanese woman?”

Drake smiled through his pain. Blood smeared his teeth. He coughed. “. . . I’m the most powerful man in the world . . .”

“The woman.” Quinn patted his face to keep him focused.

Drake gave a rattling chuckle. “Powerful . . . until they killed me . . .” His head lolled, eyes rolling back to show their whites.

Quinn jumped to his feet and pushed his way past a dumbfounded Dolores. “I’ll leave the handcuffs on you so the police will know you weren’t involved in this. Stay with him.”

“What do I tell them?” she shouted down the hallway.

Quinn yelled over his shoulder as he ran. “Tell them I’m going after the man who killed the Speaker of the House.”