The Enraged (A Jonathan Quinn Novel) (30 page)

“What I think I’ll do is leave you locked in here for a while. If you’re ready to talk when I come back, I may be willing to let you live a bit longer.”

Griffin took a step toward the door.

“Enjoy the dark. I’ll see you in a—”

Quinn grabbed Griffin’s ankles and yanked them out from under the man. Griffin fell backward, tumbling to the floor.

Quinn followed right behind, his hands searching for Griffin’s wrists, mindful of the knife the man still held.

“You son of a bitch!” Griffin yelled, pain in his voice. “Is that how you want to play?”

Quinn found the knife hand and tried to pin it against the floor, but Griffin jerked and twisted and squirmed, making it impossible to hold down. The best Quinn could do was keep the knife from plunging into him.

Griffin smacked Quinn in the shoulder with his other hand, and then popped him in the jaw. Quinn’s grip on the man’s wrist slipped. Griffin immediately took advantage, and shoved Quinn off to the side.

Quinn heard the man jump to his feet and run for the door. Pushing himself up, he followed right behind. Griffin opened the door and exited the room, and tried to pull the door closed again. But Quinn yanked it out of Griffin’s grasp before the other man could shut it all the way.

There were two windows high on the walls of the area beyond the interrogation room, so while the lights were still off, it wasn’t pitch-black, and he could see Griffin was already at the base of the stairs.

“You’re not going to want to go up there,” Quinn said.

Griffin sneered, and started up the steps.

“Let him know you’re there,” Quinn whispered loudly enough for Nate to pick up.

Over the radio, he heard Nate say, “Light ’em up!”

Griffin was halfway to the top when the upper door opened and three handheld HMI spotlights blazed down on him, stopping him in his tracks.

“Drop the knife and stay where you are,” Witten ordered from behind the lights.

Griffin, an arm held in front of his eyes to keep him from being blinded, swiveled his head back and forth, looking for a way out.

“Drop the knife,” Witten repeated.

Some people never knew when to give up. Griffin was one such person. As was Quinn.

In a sudden burst of motion, Griffin leaped down the stairs, bypassing the treads, and landed bent-kneed on the basement floor. As his gaze fell on Quinn, he rushed forward, fury radiating from every pore.

Quinn had his own fury stored up. After the first swipe of the knife passed harmlessly in front of him, he grabbed Griffin’s wrist and slammed it against the metal doorjamb of the interrogation room, following it up with a right hook into Griffin’s ribs.

When the knife finally fell to the floor, Quinn twisted Griffin’s arm back and rammed it into the jamb again. There was a satisfying double crack as both bones in Griffin’s forearm broke.

The man cried out in pain and tried to pull away. Quinn pretended to struggle with him for a moment longer before letting go.

Griffin’s momentum knocked him back against the wall. He took a step, ready to run, but froze as his gaze fell on the squad of men now at the bottom of the stairs, each with an M16 rifle aimed at his chest.

Quinn walked over, careful not to get in the line of fire. He smiled. “So, Mr. Griffin. As you can see, when everyone works together, dealing with people like you is just like swatting flies. If you’re ready to talk, we might be willing to let you live a bit longer.”

CHAPTER
36

I
T WAS NEARLY
one a.m. by the time Quinn and the others finished taping Griffin’s interview. There would undoubtedly be more interrogations in the future. Details were still missing—some names, dates, where the bodies could be found. But what Griffin gave them painted a picture even darker than they had presumed.

A career not going as expected? A competitor more problematic than desired? A negotiation not going the intended way? That’s where Darvot Consulting came in. Using resources such as the flawed O & O, Morten and Griffin had been able to obtain information clients could use to cripple their adversaries. And where information alone wouldn’t work, Darvot provided a heavier hand. Say there was an intelligent, ambitious diplomat whose star shone a bit brighter than yours, and would always be in your way to the career
you
wanted. No scandals to bring that person down? No problem. How about a nice, tidy car crash in a foreign country? And here you were now, ten years down the road, the assistant secretary of state, a position everyone knows you would have never attained if Miranda Keyes had lived. A horrible loss? A tragedy? Not to you. Though you could never say it out loud, you had always thought of it as a
happy
accident.

When everything was ready for the next phase, Quinn looked at the laptop from which Helen Cho had been monitoring the situation. “We’re all set,” he said.

“You’re cleared to make the call,” she told him.

Quinn turned to Dima. Except for his attempted escape after the lights went out, Dima had done well. “No screwups,” Quinn said.

“I won’t,” Dima said.

They had rehearsed what he was supposed to do half a dozen times.

Quinn nodded at Witten, who then escorted Dima into the den, so the others could listen to the call on the laptop in the living room without their presence being picked up over the line.

For a few seconds, they all stood there waiting—Quinn, Nate, Daeng, Misty, Howard, Lanier, Berkeley, Curson, Witten’s team, and, remotely, Helen. When the sound of the ringing phone suddenly blared from the speaker, Misty jumped. Quinn turned the volume down a few clicks, and looked around to make sure everyone could still hear. He received nods all around so he moved to the side.

There were three rings before the line was finally answered.

“Yes?”

__________

“M
R. MORTEN? THIS
is Central at O & O.”

Morten looked at the clock on his desk. “Do you realize what time it is?”

“Yes, sir, I apologize, but Mr. Griffin asked that I call you.”

Morten paused. “Why would he do that?”

“I’m told by our team on the scene with him that he’s interrogating a suspect at the moment.”

“He’s using one of your teams?” Morten asked.

“Yes, sir. We received a call from him a few hours ago requesting emergency backup. Thankfully, we had a team available and were able to dispatch it right away.”

That actually made some sense, Morten had to admit. If Griffin found himself in need of manpower right away, O & O would have been the quick solution, despite the organization’s recent failures.

“So why are you calling?”

“Mr. Griffin thought that you might want to talk to the suspect. He said to tell you that…” Central paused. “I want to make sure I get this right. He said, ‘Tell Mr. Morten suspect knows all, and insists on talking to him before giving up network.’”

Holy God. The mention of network meant there were more than just a couple other people who knew. He and Griffin needed those names, but Morten was reluctant to involve himself at this level. He dealt with the client end of things. Griffin handled the dirty work. Of course, this wouldn’t be the first time Morten would have to cross the line.

“Mr. Griffin can’t handle this himself?” he asked.

“I don’t have the answer to that, sir. I only got the impression this was time sensitive.”

Indeed it was. Griffin undoubtedly could get the names on his own, but, from the sounds of it, it would take too long. If Morten making an appearance sped up the process, then so be it.

“Where is he?”

__________

M
ORTEN LOOKED OUT
the window as his driver turned the car onto the cul-de-sac. Though this was not his first time visiting one of the houses he owned there, it had been a while. They were used more for Griffin’s work.

As expected, the street was quiet, all the houses dark. The one Griffin was using was straight back in the middle. No car was in the driveway, but Morten assumed Griffin and the O & O team had parked in the attached two-car garage to avoid being seen when they transferred the prisoner into the house.

Morten instructed his driver to pull into the driveway.

“I shouldn’t be long,” he told the driver, hoping he was right. He had several phone conferences planned for not long after sunrise, so whatever the prisoner had to say, he’d better say it quickly.

Morten exited the car and walked over to the darkened porch. As he neared, the door opened.

“Mr. Morten.” The man who greeted him was in the dark-suit uniform preferred by O & O.

“Where is he?” Morten said.

“Downstairs, sir. I’ll show you the way.”

Two other O & O men were in the basement, one sitting in front of a computer station set up next to a closed door, the other standing in front of the door itself. The monitor showed a box clearly intended to display a video feed, but at the moment it was black. Below it was a second rectangular box, housing an undulating series of vertical bars.

The man at the computer stood up the moment he saw Morten. “Good morning, sir.”

“What’s going on? Where’s Mr. Griffin?”

“He’s in the interrogation room, sir.” The man nodded toward the closed door, and then turned to the computer. “We’re recording the session. There’s a problem with the video at the moment, but the audio is working.”

“You’ve been listening?” Morten asked, concerned.

“No, sir. Our instructions were to monitor the signal only. See?” He pointed at the rising and falling bars. “It’s strong and clear. If
you’d
like to listen, I can plug in the headphones.”

“Please.”

The man plugged a set of headphones into the computer, and handed it to Morten. “You control the volume there on the side,” he said.

Morten donned the headphones. He could hear a voice, but it was too low to understand, so he turned up the dial.

“…took the shot through the window and hit him in the head,” a male voice said. The audio wasn’t as clear as Morten would have liked. It was full of digital distortion that he assumed was connected to the visual problem with the camera. “The car went off the side and tumbled all the way down. They were all dead. Morten showed up right after the police got there and identified the bodies.”

Morten tensed. The prisoner was clearly talking about the incident in Turkey. He knew precisely how it had occurred.

This was what Morten had feared. Peter had obviously talked before he was killed, and whomever he told had picked up the investigation.

Morten started to pull off the headphones, wanting to go inside right away and find out how many more people know, but the voice stopped him.

There was a loud digital hit, then, “…who made sure the original report disappeared. Only the doctor who performed the autopsy and the lead investigator knew. The doctor had to go, but the police officer was more open to an arrangement.”

How the hell could the man know that much detail? Griffin had handled those matters personally. As far as Morten was aware, his enforcer was the only other person who knew.

He ripped off the phones and marched over to the door.

“Out of my way,” he barked at the man standing in front of it, but the command was unnecessary. The agent was already stepping aside.

Morten yanked the door open and stormed inside. In his anger, all he could see was the man strapped to the chair in the middle of the floor. It didn’t even register with him that the rest of the room was empty.

“Enough! Tell us who else…” The words died in his mouth as he neared the man.

The prisoner hadn’t been sitting up, talking. His head was lolled forward. But it was more than that. He looked…familiar.

Morten froze two steps away.

“Oh, shit,” he mumbled.

This wasn’t the prisoner. It was Griffin.

__________

M
ORTEN WHIPPED AROUND
as if about to run from the room.

“You must be Kyle,” Quinn said.

He was standing just inside the doorway, Nate and Daeng on one side of him, Misty and Howard on the other. Behind him were Lanier, Berkeley, and Curson, and behind them, right outside the room, were Witten and his men.

Morten jerked his head left and right, his gaze in constant motion.

“Perhaps I should make some introductions,” Quinn said. “These three men behind me and my colleague here”—he nodded toward Nate—“were on the list with Peter. You know which one I’m talking about, of course.”

Morten blinked several times as his right hand began to shake.

“The lady is Misty Blake,” Quinn went on. “She’s Peter’s former assistant. So not only did you kill her boss, and her boss’s wife, you almost had our new O & O friends in the back there kill her the other day. As you can see, we’ve forgiven them, but I’m afraid I can’t extend that same amnesty to you.”

Both of Morten’s hands were shaking now. He moved unsteadily backward, not stopping until he bumped into Griffin.

“I’m Quinn, by the way. I was supposed to be on Duran Island, too, but Romero screwed up. Good for me, not so good for my friend here.” He patted Nate on the shoulder, careful to avoid the whip welts. “What you did to me, though, was nearly take away the woman I love.” He paused. “You screwed with the wrong people this time.”

Morten’s lips parted. “I…I want my lawyer.” Looking past Quinn toward Witten and in a louder voice, he repeated, “I want my lawyer!”

No one moved.

“I want my lawyer!”

Quinn looked back at Witten and nodded. Witten worked his way through the others until he was standing next to Misty. In his hands was the laptop computer. On the screen, a video link to Helen Cho.

“Mr. Morten,” she said. “Do you know who I am?”

A hesitation, then a nod.

“Then you know I speak for the US government. Here’s what’s going to happen. You are going to stay right there until you have given a full and complete accounting of everything you’ve done. After which, you will be locked away for the rest of your life. Don’t even think that you’ll get out someday. That will not happen. If, on the other hand, you do not make a full and complete accounting, you will be put to death in a manner decided upon by the people gathered in this room with you. I can’t imagine whatever they come up with will be pleasant, but the choice is yours to make. You have ten seconds.”