Shadow of Betrayal

by Brett Battles

  Marion climbed out of the car first. Then as she reached in and started to pull Iris out, she heard several quick footsteps that stopped nearby. She pulled herself back out, knowing as she turned who she’d see. It would be him. The man from her house. The face of death.

  But she was wrong.

  There was a man there, yes. He was standing near the back of her car, at the end of the gap between her Saab and the car parked next to her. But he was no one she had seen before. He was taller than the man at her house, stockier, and a few years older, too. He was wearing a suit, like he was on his way to work. That was it, she realized. Someone just passing by, and stopping to see if she needed any help.

  “Miss Dupuis?” he said.

  The relief that had begun flooding through her turned to ice.

  She looked behind her, hoping there was some way out, but there was only the concrete wall her car was parked against. The man was blocking her only exit.

  “Please, Miss Dupuis. You need to come with me.” He had an accent. Australian, maybe.

  Marion’s head whipped back and forth as she looked through the garage hoping to spot someone who could help her. But there was no one. Nine a.m. and no one in the garage?

  The man smiled at her. “I probably should tell you that the structure has been closed for a few minutes. An untimely gate malfunction. But don’t worry. It’ll be fixed soon.” He took a step closer. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that there’s no one around but you and me.”

  Marion began to shake in fear. Iris, sensing something was up, started to cry.

  “Goah. Goah,” she said between sobs.

  “Help!” Marion screamed. “Help me!”

  Iris wailed, scared by the sudden outburst.

  The smiling man walked toward Marion.

  “Help!” she screamed again.

  “That’s not very cooperative,” the man said as he stopped only a few feet in front of her.

  Before she even knew what was happening, one of his hands grabbed the back of her head while the other placed something over her mouth.

  She struggled for a moment, but with Iris in her arms there was little she could do. Then she began to lose focus, her mind becoming heavy. It seemed to take everything she had to keep her eyes from closing, and then that wasn’t even enough.

  No. She wanted to scream it, but the only place the word was spoken was in her head.

  She tried to open her eyelids one last time, frantic to stay conscious. And for a few seconds they obeyed.

  Iris was there, her tear-filled eyes staring into Marion’s.

  “Goah,” she said, her lower lip jutting out the way it did when she was sad.

  Marion’s eyelids closed. She had no strength left.

  Please, God. Don’t let them hurt Iris. Don’t let them hurt… my … child…

  “The situation is secure,” the man Marion had first mistaken for a businessman said into his phone. To his colleagues he was known as Leo Tucker.

  “What are their conditions?” Tucker’s boss, Mr. Rose, asked.

  “The woman’s unconscious. The child seems fine, though she’s scared. Naturally, I guess. What do you want us to do?”

  The original plan had been to just remove Marion Dupuis and the child she’d stolen out from under them. Kill them and dump them someplace where it would be years before they were found. But Tucker knew things had changed the minute they realized in Montreal that someone else was also interested in the two targets. At least Marion Dupuis had been predictable enough to take her sister’s car. The night Tucker and his men had arranged the “accident” at Marion’s family’s house, he had also put a tracking device in her sister’s car just in case. Preparation, that’s what it was all about.

  Unfortunately, what they hadn’t been prepared for was someone else being there, too. Tucker would have been much happier if he knew who the man who’d followed Marion from her house had been, but whoever he was, he’d been able to lose Tucker’s men. A problem, but not one Tucker could personally see to. He’d have to use one of his contacts to see if they could find out anything.

  “Where’s the plane?” Mr. Rose asked.

  “Here. In Toronto.”

  “Use it. Bring them here,” his boss said. “We need to find out what she knows about the others. We can use the girl as motivation. And if the child is still alive after, we’ll make her part of the program.”

  “Consider us on our way.”

  CHAPTER

  18

  QUINN DIDN’T EVEN NEED TO CRACK OPEN HIS EYES to know where he was. He could sense it as his body began to wake. The feel of the sheets, the comfort of a known pillow, and the overall feeling that he belonged.

  Home. He was in his house in the Hollywood Hills above the Los Angeles Basin. He smiled at the thought.

  It had been almost three weeks since he’d last been here. First the job in Ireland, then the part job, part vacation in Boston, followed by all the fun in New York and Montreal. His work often kept him away for long periods of time, but for some reason it felt extra special this time to be back in his own bed.

  When Peter told him the meeting was to take place in Los Angeles, Quinn almost didn’t believe him. He made sure he, Orlando, and Nate were on the next flight west.

  He opened his eyes and looked at the only thing that was out of place in his room. Orlando lay on the bed next to him, facing away. It wasn’t that she’d never been here before, but those occurrences were few. Mainly he had either gone to see her in Vietnam or San Francisco, or they had met elsewhere. Hawaii, Bali once, Japan, and a very wonderful week in Switzerland.

  But here she was now, her bare shoulder sticking out from under the sheet hinting at more bare skin below. Quinn moved over, spooning into her. He placed his arm over her side and rested his hand on her chest between and just above her breasts. She turned, moving into him, so that they could become as close as possible.

  “Don’t even think about it,” she whispered as his hand began to drift south. “We don’t have time.”

  “The meeting’s not until noon,” he said.

  “That’s only five hours away. We’ve got a lot to do before then.”

  “I can be quick.”

  “Then you can do it alone.”

  There was a second of silence, then they both began to laugh. She turned to him, her face inches away from his. He started to move in for a kiss, but she pulled back.

  “Morning breath,” she said.

  “I love your morning breath.”

  She snorted. “That’s the worst lie I think I’ve ever heard.”

  “I don’t care that you have morning breath. Better?”

  She stared at him for a moment, then smiled. “Better enough.”

  She moved forward, her lips on his lips, her body on his body.

  By the time they left the bedroom, there were only four hours left until the meeting.

  They arrived at LACMA, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, at 10:00 a.m., parking Quinn’s BMW on Sixth Street.

  “We’ll start on Wilshire and do a perimeter search,” Quinn said to Orlando. “You go west and I’ll go east.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “And me?” Nate asked from the back seat.

  Quinn handed Nate the bag of items he’d picked up at a 7-Eleven on the way. Inside were a couple bottles of water, an energy bar, and a newspaper.

  “Find a table in the central court and relax,” Quinn said. “That’s where I’m supposed to meet him, so I want you to keep an eye on things. There’s a chance he’ll show up early to have a look around, too.”

  “I can do the walk-around, one of you could sit and wait,” Nate said.

  “We’ll do it the way I said,” Quinn told him.

  “You worried about my leg again? Jesus, haven’t I shown you that it’s not a problem? I helped you run down that guy in Ireland. I was chased in Montreal. I’m fine.”

  “I don’t care about your leg,” Quinn said. “But if you want
to walk, fine. Give the bag to Orlando.”

  Nate didn’t move. After a moment, he said, “I’ll do the court. Whatever you want. You’re the boss.”

  “Yes. I am.”

  As soon as they got out of the car, Nate started to walk away.

  “Wait,” Orlando said. “You need this.”

  Nate turned just in time to catch the small comm gear packet she had tossed at him.

  He stuffed it in his pocket, then resumed walking away.

  Once he was out of earshot, Orlando said, “It was the leg, wasn’t it?”

  “I don’t know,” Quinn said. “I guess. Shit.”

  “If you’re not going to get past this, then release him. Set him up with someone else. Hell, I’ll take him on. Make him an apprentice researcher. He can sit behind a desk all day, I’m sure he’ll love that.”

  “I… I don’t know what to do,” he said, surprised by his own words. “I want him to succeed, I do. But it’s not as easy as that. I need to know he’ll be ready for any kind of situation. I need to know he’ll be able to function at a high level at all times. I need to know he’ll do the job just like someone who still has both legs. Being a cleaner is a dangerous job, and I’m not going to put him out there if I think he’s going to have problems. He could die. I can’t have that.”

  “Quinn, seriously.” She touched his arm, stopping him. “Let it go. If he’s not good enough, fine. Let him go. But you have to give him a chance to prove himself.”

  Quinn looked at the ground near his feet for a moment, then, with a sigh, he tilted his head up. “Come on.”

  He wanted to let it go. He knew Nate would be a good cleaner. His skills continued to improve. But the leg. The leg that had been maimed while he was helping Quinn on that personal mission in Singapore when an LP operative had purposely smashed into it. Would it hold out in the worst of circumstances? Could Quinn take that chance knowing he’d be responsible for whatever happened?

  He gave her a faint smile, then started walking again.

  Quinn’s main concern was being set up. He was looking for any sign that this might be the case. Perhaps a couple of men waiting in a parked car around the perimeter of the museum, or maybe some tourist who didn’t look the part.

  He first walked by the Ahmanson Building and the old main entrance to the museum. LACMA was actually a collection of several buildings: the Ahmanson Building, the Bing Center, the Hammer Building, the Pavilion for Japanese Art, the old May Company building known now as LACMA West, and the newest building, the Broad Contemporary Art Museum.

  The first four were clustered together near the center point of the museum grounds. In the middle of this group, beyond the entrance, was the central court where Nate would be sitting at one of the tables, reading the paper. There, in addition to a dozen or so tables and chairs, visitors would find the ticket booth, a café, and the museum store.

  Quinn continued north along the sidewalk. Traffic on Wilshire was its usual midday busy, not bumper-to-bumper, but constant. Since rush hour was over, cars were again allowed to park along the street. Keeping his movements natural, Quinn checked each of the cars on either side of the street, making sure they were empty. So far, so good.

  Past the last of the museum’s buildings, the grounds continued for another whole block up to Curson Avenue. Here it was more of a park. Grass, trees, pathways, kids running around, people walking dogs, and, of course, four life-size mammoths and a small lake of black tar.

  It was the centerpiece of the famous La Brea Tar Pits, a tar lake about the size of a football field. The mammoths had been added sometime in the past, no doubt to provide visitors an idea of what could happen at the pits—a single mammoth at that west end looked out over the lake, while at the east end a family of three was caught in a life-or-death struggle. One of the mammoths from the family was half-submerged in the black sticky grip of the tar as its mate and child looked on in horror from the shore several feet away.

  Quinn turned north on Curson. Here no cars were allowed to park along the street, but there were several school buses. That explained all the children. Field trips.

  He kept up a steady pace, assessing everyone he saw, and marking those in his mind that he felt might deserve a second look. Five minutes later he met up with Orlando on Sixth Street along the back side of the museum grounds.

  “All clear?” he asked.

  “As far as I can tell,” she said.

  “Nate. Anything?” Quinn asked.

  There was a pause, then the rattle of paper before his apprentice’s hushed voice came over his receiver. “Quiet over here. The museum doesn’t open until noon. Most of the people I’ve seen probably work here.”

  “No one paying attention to you?”

  “I know how to do the job,” Nate snapped.

  “So that’s a no?”

  “That’s a no.”

  “Orlando and I are going to walk around the grounds, then I’ll come over there and we’ll switch.”

  “Copy that,” Nate said. Then, after a slight pause, “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” Quinn said, conceding without actually saying it that he might have pushed too much. He looked at Orlando. “Let’s go into the park, but switch. You take the east, and I’ll go west.”

  She was giving him her patented you’re-an-idiot look, no doubt about the exchange with Nate, but she only said, “Okay.”

  After wandering through the park that surrounded the museums for another thirty minutes, noticing nothing unusual, Quinn decided it was time to get into position.

  He’d almost reached the central court when Orlando said, “I got something.”

  Quinn stopped, instinctively turning east toward the part of the park she’d been in.

  “Is it him?” he asked.

  “Might be. I’m down near the east end of the lake, along that small walkway between the tar and the fence near Wilshire Boulevard. I have a good view here of the Curson gate.”

  Quinn pictured the spot in his mind. “All right.”

  “Two men just entered. Not tourists. Casual suits. Looking very serious.”

  Quinn thought about all the office buildings that were within a few blocks of the park. “Could be a couple of businessmen trying to get some air.”

  “Could be,” she said, “but they have the look.”

  He knew what she meant. Tough, focused, not letting anything escape their gaze. Quinn looked at his watch: 11:15, still forty-five minutes until the meeting was to occur. Advance men, maybe? Doing the same thing Quinn and his team were doing? Or another assassination team, like the one in Ireland, getting into place?

  “This is L.A.,” Nate said. “Maybe they’re agents. You know, of the talent kind.”

  Quinn was about to tell Nate to knock it off, but he stopped himself.

  “Keep an eye on them,” Quinn said. “Could be nothing.”

  “Copy that,” Orlando said.

  Instead of continuing toward the central court, Quinn headed down the path that ran along the back side of the Hammer Building, toward the tar lake.

  “What are they doing?” he said.

  “Hold on,” Orlando whispered.

  Quinn picked up his pace as much as he could without drawing attention.

  Five seconds passed. Then ten.

  “What’s going on?”

  Nothing.

  Screw drawing attention. He began to run, leaving the path when it veered to the left, and instead keeping to the grass that grew behind the Pavilion for Japanese Art. When he reached the end, he slowed again, then stopped behind some foliage that grew next to the building.

  “Orlando?”

  There was a single cough over the receiver. The message was clear. She was there, but she couldn’t talk.

  “I’m moving in to help,” Nate’s voice broke in.

  “No,” Quinn said. “Hold your position.”

  “But she might need—”

  “Just hold your position.”

  Quinn peeked th
rough the bushes, trying to see what was happening. But Orlando was too far away, and the black wire mesh fence that surrounded the lake was between them.

  He pulled out his phone, accessed the camera function, then activated maximum zoom and pointed the lens toward the lake. The image on the display screen jumped wildly as he moved the lens from right to left. There was a couple walking down the path, holding hands. Beyond them, a couple of kids were trying to throw rocks over the fence into the tar. Nothing for a while, then near the east end of the lake, a man in a suit leaning against the railing and looking through the wire mesh at the mammoth caught in its daily struggle for freedom. A hard man. A man with the look. And five feet farther on, also looking through the fence, Orlando.

  Quinn continued scanning past her for a moment. She had said two men. But there was only the one. Where had his friend gone?

  “Nate,” Quinn said. “Up and moving. Head toward the café, then take the ramp down into the park. One of the suits is next to Orlando’s position. Don’t worry about him, I’m on that. But I don’t know where his partner is. Locate him. Do not intercept. Recon only at this point.”

  “Copy that,” Nate said.

  As he watched, Orlando pulled her camera phone out of her pocket and held it up to her eye, acting the part of tourist. She could pass, probably. But if the guy in the suit was a legitimate concern, something must have caused him to be interested in her.

  “I think he’s made you,” Quinn said. “But you’re too public there. Let’s get him someplace we can deal with him. You think you can get him to follow you?”

  A low, grunted “Uh-huh.”

  “Good.”

  Quinn thought for a second. The problem with a public place was that there was too much public around. But he knew one place that might work.

  “Head west, behind the museum. There’s an observation pit of an old excavation area. It’s covered by a cinderblock building, but there’s an opening on the north side. When I was there a few minutes ago, no one was around. I’ll wait inside.”

  Another grunt of understanding.

  Quinn watched through his camera as Orlando straightened up and began walking around the east end of the lake, then turned and headed west through the park. The man in the suit didn’t move at first.