Double Play (Nadia Stafford 3.5)

I considered the options, relying on what I knew of Contrapasso. Then I walked to Evelyn, leaving Jack on his own. Sure enough, the partner headed to Jack. A thug would grab the old lady mentor or the girlfriend and use us to threaten Jack. Whatever Contrapasso's faults, they weren't going to even pretend they'd hurt Evelyn or me. And they were bright enough to go straight for the biggest threat.

Jack pretended not to notice and kept goading Haskell. I feigned boredom with the proceedings--a pissing match between alpha males--and started whispering to Evelyn, asking her when they'd arrived, how they'd found me. Pointless crap that did have a point, in that it gave Haskell's partner the confidence he needed to get right up behind Jack.

Jack's gaze flicked my way. I hesitated. I thought I knew what he meant. But I wasn't entirely sure he'd put that much faith in me until--

The partner took two final steps, bringing him right up behind Jack.

I spun, gun up, snarling, "Stop!" It startled the guy enough that he did exactly that, as Jack wheeled and slammed his fist into the guy's gun arm, knocking the weapon to the ground. I was there in a few running paces, kicking the gun away. The guy danced back as he went for a secondary weapon.

I was already turning on Haskell, who'd been caught off guard. Evelyn turned, too, and stumbled, dropping again to one knee. I started after her, but Haskell was faster. He lunged after the easy hostage . . . and found himself with a gun pointed at his groin as Evelyn recovered from the pratfall.

"Drop it," she said.

He hesitated. She fired a shot between his legs. He lowered his weapon.

"Drop the gun and put your hands behind your back."

He did. In the meantime, Jack had the partner down and was relieving him of his weapons and cell phone as I stood guard.

Once they'd patted down the two and eased back, I said, "We have no reason to take Quinn, and Quinn has no reason to fake being taken. You seem to think we lured Contrapasso in, but that's just paranoid bullshit. Diaz knew it. He still did as he was told, testing me. I passed. While he's not alive to confirm that, unfortunately, the battleground should speak for itself. Unless you guys are hooking up with cartels, we're both caught in a trap. I have no idea what the purpose of that trap is . . ."

I trailed off as I saw Jack's expression. I turned to him. "You do."

"Yeah. Hiring me."

"Kidnapping Quinn is about hiring you?"

"Daisy chain," he said. "Take Quinn. Lure you. Take you. Get me."

"Grab Quinn to lure me away from home and then take me hostage to convince you to do a job. Cartel work, I'm guessing. Because you don't take those jobs."

"Yeah."

"Isn't that a little complicated?" Haskell said.

"Not if you want Jack badly enough," Evelyn said. "Obviously it's a big job. Important enough to go through the hassle."

"Political?" I said.

"That's our guess," she said.

I turned to Haskell. "The fact it seems so damned complicated should suggest it's true. We'd make up something a lot simpler. And if you know anything about Jack's work history, you know that's not his line of work--cartel or political assassinations. Meaning he'd need a very big carrot to do it. But you two are just Contrapasso lackeys, so since we have some idea what's going on here, we're going to leapfrog over your heads."

Evelyn took out Haskell's cell phone. I reached for it, but she pretended not to notice and placed the call herself. She did have more contact with them, and where I'd have dialed a number in Haskell's recent call list, she dialed one from memory.

"Edgar?" she said. "Evelyn. I'm with Dee and Jack. I'm sure you know what's going on, so I'll skip to the update. Diaz is dead at the hands of the people who took Quinn. We have Haskell and his partner. If you want them back, you'll give us everything you know about Quinn's kidnapping, and then back the fuck off before you lose more agents. Understood?"

She listened for a few moments and then said, "You do that. We'll call in two hours for an exchange: your agents for your intel."

Jack had the hostages sit back-to-back while Evelyn and I watched him. Then he jogged off, presumably to get bindings. And, yes, he did return with those, but he secured the men as fast as possible and then opened the first aid kit he'd brought back.

He didn't ask me to remove my jacket and shirt. Didn't tell me to either. That was implicit. I did, and he cleaned my wound and dug out the shotgun pellets. Evelyn grumbled that I was obviously in no danger of bleeding out and we really needed to move before more thugs arrived. It was a half-hearted complaint, stopped by a single look from Jack.

I added my protest, more fervently. My injuries, far from life-threatening, should not take precedence over a speedy escape. But, well, having someone care enough to make sure I was okay before we went another step? It meant something. I'd spent a lot of years being that person for others--strangers even, at the lodge--while feeling as if I didn't deserve the same in return. So I appreciated it . . . though I still did hurry the process along, well aware that I didn't want us facing more danger because I enjoyed being fussed over.

The bullet wound was tissue damage, nothing serious, as gunshots went. Jack had Evelyn take a look to confirm his diagnosis. Then he bound it and tried to check my head, but I insisted that was fine and we got our hostages up and moving. That's when his phone vibrated. He cursed and waved for us to watch the hostages while he took a phone from his pocket. Someone else's phone.

"No," he said when he answered. "I don't fucking have him, all right? I told you I couldn't do it in two hours. I left a message through his answering service, and I'm expecting a call back any minute now. If you give me a number--"