Chapter 53
“I can explain,” Quin said again.
I jerked my hand back. “You’ve been carrying a gun this whole time?”
“Did you think a third drawn weapon would have made that standoff at the bar any better?” Quin said. “I’m a federal agent.”
In the next room, Lumpy Jim grunted. “Should have come in handier than it has,” he said.
“There were too many innocent bystanders,” Quin said, ignoring Lumpy. “Until we got the rest of your friends out of here, there were too many people to protect. My priority was their safety. Is. Your safety.”
“You don’t have a friend high up in the FBI, DEA, alphabet soup,” I said.
“In point of fact,” Quin said. “I have a lot of them.”
“Why have you been hanging around McPhee’s?”
“For Wednesday night music club, of course,” he said.
“And?”
He took a big breath and blew it out. “And … everything we already talked about. Edith Maxwell. I told you she was getting tracked because of the company she kept. Well, she led us … here. And whatever this is.”
“You’ve been nursing a single beer for a month,” I said. “Once you realized Edith was just trying to buy the place, why stick around?”
“This investigation is, uh, classified,” he said, like he was reading from the manual. “I can only dispense information on a need-to-know basis.”
I gestured at the ridiculous scene around us. “A mobster leads you to Edith, Edith delivers you to McPhee’s, and—tough job if you can get it—you have beers on Uncle Sam until the entire place gets taken hostage? You just stood aside and let it happen.”
Just as when Joey’s body was found. Quin had stood aside and watched. He’d stood aside and asked nosy, nonsense questions about Joey.
“There were other threads we needed to see to their end,” Quin was saying. “We couldn’t close down the operation here until we were entirely sure.”
Nosy questions … about Alex.
I looked up at him. “You were digging into Alex.”
“I can’t confirm or deny—”
“You asked me all about what dirty business Alex was doing, telling me how addiction was forever, once it’s under your skin, sweetheart—”
“I don’t believe I called you sweetheart,” he said. “That would be condescending. And highly unprofessional.”
“Hey, G-man, you know what would also be highly unprofessional? Letting all the private citizens around you exit by way of the morgue.”
“I have no intention of letting that happen,” he said. “In fact, I’ve been trying to get you out of this situation for the last five minutes. Dahlia, will you please go?” He lowered his voice. “Please.”
I looked toward the opening. It had been quiet down below for a while, and I hoped that meant everyone had gone ahead, had been boosted out, pulled up, all of them to safety, to a phone, to the end of this day, this nightmare.
“You’re refusing a chance at escape so you can stay here and what? Keep an eye on me?” Quin said.
I didn’t know if I could climb through that hole and drop into nothing. My nightmares, come to life. But worse than that, it had been a long time since I’d seen Alex led away with a gun to his back.
“I can’t,” I choked out. “I can’t leave Alex.”
“I won’t leave Alex,” Quin said. “I promise you. I like him. I like—” His voice dropped further. “This place. Please, Dahlia. I can cover one hostage better than two. And our mutual friend out at the door can’t begin to fit through this gap.”
“Neither will you,” Lumpy Jim jeered from the next room.
“When they come back, I’ll have the element of surprise,” Quin said. “I’ll use it. Please. Trust me. As soon as that door opens, I will take control of this situation.”
I was so tired. I wanted someone else to be in charge for a minute. He seemed like he meant it.
Quin held out his hand. Finally, I took it and he handed me up. Boots into the sink, then one leg over, saddle-style, into the dark. There were stairs, Pascal had said. It was easy, he’d said.
My hand was bloody from grasping Quin’s. “Don’t bleed out before you allow someone to help you,” I said.
“Good advice,” he said. “I’ll try.”
My right foot dangled. Here we were, tipping into the void that had always awaited me.
Quin steadied me as I brought the other leg over the threshold and scooted around to get into the right position to slip down.
I grasped the two-by-four at the base of the opening, feeling gravity pull at me.
Quin had a knee on the sink to help me lower down, his hands under my arms, his breath against my temple—
My tail end had wedged into that tight spot. I was caught.
“My best feature,” I said.
“Not even close,” he said softly against my cheek. The air around us was charged, this time, no mistake, electric—
“Did you all leave me?” Lumpy Jim called from the next room.
I ducked my head, squirming and wiggling through the squeezy bit, trying not to imagine what any of this looked like from either direction. Shimmying, boots kicking for solid ground.
And then I broke through—
And lost my grip.