Quinn

by Iris Johansen

  “I know that,” Catherine said. “But it wouldn’t have been easy for him to escape the sheriff and deputies we called in when Joe was hurt. They had him on the run. He was sighted at least twice.”

  “And then they lost him, and he hasn’t been seen since,” Eve said. “You told me yourself that it was as if he dropped off the face of the Earth.”

  “I think he’s still in those woods. He owns the property. He knows it better than anyone hunting him,” Catherine said. “I have a feeling.”

  “Instinct,” Jane murmured. “I believe in instinct.”

  “So do I,” Catherine said. “And it’s saved my ass too many times for me to ignore it.” She met Jane’s eyes. “I don’t like leaving Eve here alone. Are you staying?”

  “I’m staying,” Jane said. “I wouldn’t leave her.”

  “Good.” She turned back to Eve. “Is there anything I should know about Gallo? Anything that could help me?”

  Eve thought for a moment. “He’s not … When he killed Bonnie, he may not have been aware of doing it. He claimed he loved her, and I believed him at the time. He had blackouts after those years of torture in that North Korean prison.”

  “And does that mean you think she should be easy on him?” Jane asked in surprise.

  “Hell no; if he killed Bonnie, he deserves everything anyone could do to him,” Eve said coldly. “I’m just telling Catherine that he’s definitely unstable, particularly where Bonnie is concerned. She may be able to use it.”

  “It’s a possibility.” Catherine turned to Jane. “And no, I won’t be easy on him. It’s tough that he went through hell in that prison through no fault of his own. But if that turned him into a child killer, then he deserves to be exterminated.”

  “No, you can’t do that,” Eve said quickly. “Not until he talks to me. I have to know where my Bonnie is buried.”

  “If he remembers. He might not if he’s as unstable as you say.”

  “I have to talk to him,” Eve repeated.

  Catherine didn’t speak for a moment, then shrugged, and said, “Okay, I made you a promise, and I’ll keep it.” She smiled. “And now I think I’ll go to the ICU and see Joe.”

  “They won’t let you visit him,” Eve said.

  “Then if he’s awake, I’ll make faces at him through that glass window. He’ll get the message.” She gave Eve a hug. “Take care. I’ll be in touch and tell you how it’s going.”

  “See that you do.”

  Eve watched her leave the waiting room and walk quickly down the hall. There was purpose in Catherine’s steps and determination in her demeanor. She looked like a warrior going into battle.

  “I was right. She’s tough,” Jane said. “Is she as good as she thinks she is?”

  “Better, probably.” And Eve was feeling a rush of relief about having Catherine moving quickly to find Gallo. Having Gallo out there was a double-edged sword. He’d be both a threat and temptation to Joe once he was in his right senses. And she was still experiencing the pain of that moment when Black had told her that Gallo was guilty. The bond between them as Bonnie’s mother and father had turned tight and bitter, but she found that it still existed. It was Eve’s job to go after Gallo and bring him to justice, but for the moment, she had a more important job in helping get Joe well. She could rely on Catherine to search in Eve’s place until she was able to turn her attention away from Joe.

  “I’m going to call the Hyatt and get a room for you, too,” Jane said. “We’ll probably both be here at the hospital most of the time, but we don’t have to live here as you’ve been doing. It seems the urgency is gone.”

  “Yes.” She again felt that profound rush of thanksgiving she had felt when Joe had opened his eyes. “The urgency has definitely been downgraded. You make your call, and I’ll go back to the ICU and try to get the nurses to let me go in and sit with him again.”

  Jane smiled. “You feeling lucky? You said the rules were pretty stern.”

  “Yeah.” Eve threw her cup in the disposal. “I’m feeling very lucky, right now.”

  * * *

  JOE WAS sleeping.

  Catherine stood at the window and gazed at him and the nurse moving around the ICU.

  His color was good, and the sleep appeared normal.

  Catherine let out a sigh of relief. She had believed Eve when she’d told her Joe was on the mend, but she’d had to see for herself. It was too easy for love to paint a false picture.

  And the love between Eve and Joe was very strong. Catherine had had moments of envy when she had seen them together. When Catherine had married, she was seventeen, and her husband was sixty-two. They had both been CIA, and it had been more a partnership than a love affair.

  Not that she had not loved him. But it was a quiet affection rather than a passion. She would not have done anything any differently. If she had not married Terry, she would not have given birth to her son, Luke. Why would she change anything when she had been given that gift? Her son was everything.

  But the love that Eve and Joe possessed appeared to have all the facets missing in Catherine’s marriage. Yet she had not even realized that they were missing until she’d met Eve and Joe.

  Joe was opening his eyes. Did he see her?

  Yes, he was smiling at her.

  She blew him a kiss.

  He smiled again and closed his eyes.

  Yes, rest, my friend. Get well. I’ll stand guard over Eve. You can trust me.

  She turned and moved down the hall toward the elevator. But first she had her own decks to clear before she went on the hunt.

  She took out her phone as soon as she was in the car. She dialed her number at the house she rented in Louisville. It was after midnight, but her son, Luke, probably would still be awake. He read till all hours of the night and still managed to be up early in the morning. She’d tried to tell him it wasn’t healthy, but Luke would only look at her and not say a word. It was hard trying to convince him such an act would affect him in any adverse way when it brought him pleasure. Luke had not had much pleasure in his life. He had been kidnapped at the age of two from her home in Boston by Rakovac, a Russian criminal, as an act of vengeance against Catherine for undermining his mafia operation. She tried not to think of the torture and deprivation he had suffered until she and Eve and Joe had managed to free him. Nine long years. He had been two when he’d been kidnapped and eleven when they’d managed to free him.

  It was no wonder that, now that he was safe and free, he was gobbling up experiences as if they would be snatched away from him in a heartbeat. He still didn’t totally trust her, but he was coming close. She had to handle Luke with the most delicate touch imaginable, so that he wouldn’t walk away from her.

  She tried to make her tone light when he picked up the phone. “Luke, what the heck are you doing? Didn’t that tutor I hired give you a curfew?”

  “Yes, Mr. O’Neill said that I had to get to bed before three. I’m in bed.”

  Thank heaven that Sam O’Neill didn’t keep Luke to an ordinary child’s schedule. But Sam was too savvy to do that. That was why Catherine had chosen Sam as Luke’s tutor. He was not only ex-CIA and fully capable of protecting her son, but he was a wonderful teacher. After what Luke had gone through during his captivity, strictness would have been absurd. He had been stunted in many ways by his isolation, but his childhood had been stolen from him. His independence had to be respected. “But you’re reading. What’s the book tonight?”

  “Midsummer Night’s Dream. I’m trying to understand it. But it’s very odd.”

  “Yes, it is. But don’t give up on it. You might learn something.”

  “I never give up.”

  No, he had boundless stamina and determination, or he would never have survived those nine years. “What else are you and Sam doing?”

  “Swimming. Tennis. Golf. I don’t like golf. It’s too slow,” he said quickly. “You’re going to tell me that golf is like Midsummer’s Night Dream. I might learn something
.”

  “You might. There are a lot of golf pros out there who don’t think it’s slow.”

  He was silent. “Why did you call me in the middle of the night? Are you in trouble?”

  “No.” She paused. “Can’t I call you without being in trouble?”

  “Maybe I said it wrong.” He didn’t speak again, and she could almost hear the cogs turning. “I meant you think that I might worry about you being in trouble.”

  “And would you worry, Luke?”

  “You’re very strong and smart. It wouldn’t be reasonable for me to worry. Everyone says that you’re very good at what you do.”

  “I didn’t ask if it was reasonable. I asked if you’d worry.”

  He was silent, then said slowly, “I’d worry.”

  She felt a warm rush of love and joy. Every admission from him of a growing affection between them was a triumph. When she had rescued him, she’d had to start at the beginning in earning his love. After his emotional deprivation, she could not push him, but slowly he was learning that there was a bond between them.

  “I don’t mean to insult you,” Luke said. “But I’d be willing to come and help you if you need me. I’ve been taught very well.”

  Taught the skills of weapons and guerrilla fighting, taught violence and cruelty, taught to bear pain without flinching. All the things a child should never have to face. Lessons that Rakovac had known would torture Catherine when he told her about them. And it had been torture, it had nearly broken her heart. “I know you have. But I’d like you to forget that now.”

  “But how can I do that?” he asked in wonder.

  She had responded instinctively. She wanted to block out all that ugliness, but she knew she had to deal with her own horror and accept what Luke had become through those experiences. “That was stupid of me. Of course, you can’t forget it. And thank you for the offer. If I find I need you, I’ll be sure to call.” She added lightly, “But I’d rather think of you having a good time with Sam. You like him?”

  “I think so,” he said cautiously. “He knows a lot.” Another silence. “He smiles quite a bit. But I don’t think he’s laughing at me.”

  “I’m sure he wouldn’t dare. Maybe he’s just enjoying his job. He always wanted to go back to teaching.”

  “I guess that could be why.”

  “Did I tell you that Kelly was coming to visit you this week?”

  “No, but she called me,” he said shortly. “She told me to get ahead in my studies so that we could have some time together. She’s very bossy.”

  “But you like her.” It was true that fourteen-year-old Kelly Winters could be very domineering with Luke and had been from the start of their relationship. But he seemed to accept it from her as he would not have taken it from an adult. They struck sparks from each other, but it didn’t stop them from getting along. Kelly was as mature and scarred in her own way as Luke. She had come into Catherine’s life because Catherine had been sent to rescue her and her father when they’d been prisoners in the camp of a drug lord in Colombia. Kelly had survived, but her father had been killed before her eyes. She was a genius on the scale of a young Einstein, and that had led her down another rocky path. Perhaps that was why she and Luke understood each other. “I hoped to have her with us before this, but she has to attend that think tank at that college in Virginia.”

  “I didn’t miss her. Well, maybe a little. She’s kind of … interesting.”

  “I’m sure she’d appreciate it if you’d tell her.”

  “No, she wouldn’t. She doesn’t need me to tell her stuff.” He paused. “She won’t like it that you aren’t here. She likes you better than anyone. She told me you saved her life.”

  “We’re friends. But she likes you, too. So enjoy yourselves and don’t argue too much. Okay?”

  “Okay.” He added haltingly, “You know, I think I’d like it better if you were here, too.” Then he added quickly, “But I’m not like Kelly. I don’t need— You go do what you have to do.”

  He would never say he missed her, but this was so close it brought tears to her eyes. “I want to be there with you, too. You know I wouldn’t have left you right now if it hadn’t been to help Eve. I can’t ever repay her for helping me find you, but maybe this is a start. Do you understand?”

  “I think I do. It’s like the honor thing in all those Knights of the Round Table books. Sometimes it’s hard to connect the ideas in books with real life.”

  And books were all Luke had had to go by in that barren world Rakovac had made for him. “Yeah, it’s like the honor thing. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” She cleared her throat. “In the meantime get back to Midsummer Night’s Dream. And talk to Kelly about it. Maybe she’ll have an opinion that will make you see something worthwhile in it.”

  “Nah, she’ll only tell me to look for the patterns in the story. That’s all she thinks about.”

  Catherine chuckled. “Probably. Good night, Luke.”

  “Good night, Catherine.” He hung up.

  He never called her “Mother,” and she would never insist on that intimacy. Perhaps it would never happen. It was enough that he looked upon her as a friend. They were just learning each other, taking small, halting steps.

  But this step tonight had been bigger and might lead her closer to him. Lord, she hoped that it would. Sometimes she ached with the need to tell him how much she loved him, how desperately she had loved him all through the years they’d been separated.

  Play it cool. Don’t blow it. Let him come to you.

  She shoved her phone in her jacket pocket and started the car.

  But for now put him out of your thoughts and go do your job. One of the big reasons she had her Luke back was the risk Eve and Joe had taken to rescue him. Now, as she’d told Luke, it was payback time and Catherine had an agenda.

  Give Eve what she wanted most in the world.

  Keep Joe from injuring himself more by trying to get out of that hospital bed and going after Bonnie’s killer.

  Find Bonnie’s body and the man who killed her.

  Where are you, John Gallo?

  * * *

  CATHERINE HEADED NORTH TOWARD the vast woodland acreage Gallo owned about seventy miles north of Milwaukee. It wasn’t an easy area to search: thick woods and shrubbery, hills to the north that plunged to a huge lake hundreds of feet below. She had told Eve she believed in instinct, and she would go with it until proved mistaken. Gallo knew those woods, they were familiar, almost home to him. He even had a cabin on the property.

  Not that he would be at the cabin. With the sheriff and his deputies crawling all over the property, it would be stupid for him to stay anywhere but in the wild. Gallo wasn’t stupid. She had only met him face-to-face once, when they’d been on the hunt for Paul Black. It had been a fleeting encounter and barbed with antagonism on her part, but she’d become accustomed to making quick judgments. It had often been necessary to save her neck. She had grown up on the streets of Hong Kong, and that ability had developed in those first years of childhood. Her first impression of John Gallo was of sharp, lethal capability.

  Definitely not stupid.

  But she had to know more than that about him, dredge her memory of every single inkling she’d had of Gallo in that moment. Not only in that moment, but what she knew of him in general from Eve and her own research. She would take time as soon as she reached the property to go over everything that she knew and felt about John Gallo.

  You always had to know your target.

  CHAPTER

  10

  TWO HOURS LATER, SHE DREW up before Gallo’s cabin, where two sheriff’s cars were already parked.

  She was surprised. When she’d been there before, the sheriff had been doing twenty-four-hour searches, but she’d not expected them to set up a command center. She certainly hadn’t expected them to be there at this hour of the morning. It was nearly 3:00 A.M.

  A young man in a deputy’s uniform came out of the cabin as she opened the
car door. He was stocky and sandy-haired, and his boyish face was very wary. “Ma’am?”

  “Catherine Ling. CIA.” She showed him her ID. “Is Sheriff Rupert here?”

  “Deputy Rand Johan.” The concern in his expression vanished as he grinned. “No, ma’am. He only left a couple of us here overnight in case Gallo showed up. The sheriff will be back in the morning.”

  “He thought Gallo would show up at his cabin?” She shook her head. “Not likely.”

  “Well, the search is kind of winding down. Actually, Sheriff Rupert thinks maybe he’s left the area. He says we’ll continue the search for the next few days, but then we’ll gradually start pulling back.”

  “I see.” Evidently the sheriff was getting frustrated and had the same thought as Eve concerning the possibilities that Gallo would try to leave the woods. Catherine had thought he’d give it more than these few days before he’d abandon the hunt.

  The deputy saw her expression, and said quickly, “It’s not as if Gallo is any real threat. He’s only wanted for questioning.”

  “He killed a man in these woods only a few days ago.”

  “Paul Black. But we’ve got the report back on Black as well as Ms. Duncan’s statement.” His lips tightened. “A serial killer who specialized in murdering kids? Anyone deserves a medal for killing a snake like that. I’d do it myself.”

  And so would Catherine, but she wouldn’t admit it to this youngster. “Black made a statement to Eve Duncan that Gallo was guilty of the same crime, the killing of her daughter, Bonnie.”

  “Who’s to say the scumbag wasn’t lying? Like I said, Gallo’s wanted for questioning. Don’t get me wrong, we’re doing our job. But it’s not a case of life or death, and we’ve spent enough of the taxpayers’ money.” He smiled. “Would you like to come in and have a cup of coffee? The sheriff didn’t tell me the CIA was interested in this case. Gallo isn’t connected to terrorists or anything, is he?”

  “No.”

  “I didn’t think so.” He turned toward the cabin.

  But Catherine had been caught by that first response. “Why didn’t you think Gallo was connected to terrorists?”