Kelley Armstrong - Exit Strategy

“I snuck out while he was in the bathroom.”

“Smart man.”

I navigated through the commuter crowd and crossed the road, Quinn at my heels. Once across, the bulk of the crowd turned left. I continued straight. Quinn jogged up alongside me.

“I thought this might be a good time to redo my introduction,” he said. “I came off like a jerk yesterday and I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t like the idea of Jack bringing a stranger on board. I don’t blame you. I think that’s why he didn’t want us to meet. Protecting your privacy-yours and the others.”

We turned a corner.

“So you must be Evelyn’s new protégée,” he said.

“Why do you say that?”

“Well, because you’re a-” He colored slightly. “Because I can be a sexist moron. Sorry. Again. I didn’t mean to jump to conclusions. You’re not Evelyn’s, then?”

“No, I’m Jack’s.”

When he looked my way, brows raised, I sputtered a laugh. “I mean his protégée. Strictly business. Even ‘protégée’ is probably pushing it.”

Another light. We waited in silence, then crossed.

“How far do you go normally?” he asked.

“Te-” I stopped myself before saying kilometers. “Five miles. Give or take.”

“Every day, I’m guessing.”

He flashed an appreciative glance down my figure. A nice glance-not a leer or an ogle. The appreciative part was good, too. After that dream, I was certainly in the mood for it. I even returned it, though more discreetly. He was wearing jogging pants and an old T-shirt with the sleeves ripped off, showing his muscles. Good-looking in a wholesome, athletic way, nothing to stop traffic, but enough to invite the gaze to linger…and enjoy.

He plucked at the sweat-sodden front of his T-shirt and pulled a face. “I definitely need to start doing more cardio myself. Soon, or I’ll be skipping ski season this year.”

“Cross-country or-” I stopped. “Sorry. I guess that’d be prying.”

Quinn whooped a breathless laugh. “That’s what happens when you hang out with Jack. You start thinking ‘What do you take in your coffee?’ might be too personal.”

We turned the corner, then Quinn continued, “Sure, you have to be careful, but there’s still stuff you can talk about. What are you going to do, say, ‘Hmmm, I know Jack likes James Dean movies, nachos with chicken, and Bob Dylan,’ and plug it into some national database to figure out who he really is? Even if I knew his name and social security number, what the hell would I with it?”

“If you were caught, you might find a use for it.”

“Cut a deal, you mean? Considering what he knows about me, I’d be nuts to do that. Anyway, I don’t think that telling you I like to ski is a major security violation. So, yes, I ski. Downhill, as you were about to ask. I keep meaning to try cross-country, but I never get around to it.”

“Cross-country is a good winter substitute for jogging, though it can’t beat downhill for the adrenaline rush. I always think of them as opposite ends of the spectrum. Downhill for getting the heart pumping, cross-country for relaxing.”

We crossed at the lights, nearly getting knocked down by the draft of a car whizzing around the corner.

“Cross-country’s more peaceful, I bet,” Quinn said. “Without the crowds of hot-doggers racing around you.”

“God, yes. Find a nice quiet trail through the woods, go out at night with the moonlight glistening off the snow-perfect.”

“There’s this club I go to, up in Vermont. They’ve got a trail along the river, and every year I tell myself I’m going to try it, but I can’t get my buddies off the hills…or off the snow bunnies.”

“Not many snow bunnies on the cross-country trails.”

“Which is not necessarily a bad thing. Last year, we met this group of girls. They must have blown a grand each on their outfits, but they couldn’t even lace up their boots right. We…”

“…ride the helicopter to the top of the mountain,” Quinn said as he held open the hotel room door for me. “Then they drop you off and you ski down.”

“Heli-skiing,” I said. Felix and Jack were watching CNN. “I hear it’s amazing.”

Felix glanced over. He looked different today-his hair color the same, but his manner changed along with his clothes. A well-loved tweed blazer and slacks, hair slightly too long, glasses perched on the end of his nose, pale cheeks hollow-the college professor who doesn’t spend much time away from his books.

“Jumping out of a helicopter and skiing down a mountain?” he said. “Sounds almost as much fun as swimming in a shark tank. But I suppose you two do that, too.”

“Only if we have the right equipment,” I said. “If you forget the blood-soaked bikini, there’s just no challenge to it.”

“ Dee?” Jack cut in. “Breakfast.”

“Oh, right. Should we order-”

“Pick up.” He walked to the door. “Come on.”

“I’ll take the breakfast special,” Quinn said. “Bacon, eggs, whatever. If I get toast, make it whole wheat.”

“And what would you like in your coffee?” I asked.

He grinned. “I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.”

“Cream and double sugar,” Jack said. “Let’s go.”

We got as far as the elevator before Jack said, “You saw my note, right? It said ‘wait.’”

“That was a note? I thought it was a haiku.” I pressed the elevator button. “I left you a note in return, and stuck to the main street, so it was no less safe than wherever you went.”

“That’s not-”

“If you mean Quinn, it wasn’t as bad as it looked. Yes, I know, one minute I’m worried about meeting the guy, and the next I’m chatting and laughing with him. But that’s my way of handling situations like this. Morose and monosyllabic may work for some people, but not for me.”

“Morose?”

“The best way for me to behave with someone I don’t trust is to act like I trust them completely. They may let their guard down, but I don’t. Ever.”

As the doors opened, I could feel him watching me. We stepped on.

“Tomorrow?” he said. “You want to jog? I’ll follow.”

“You run?”

“Only if someone’s chasing. I’ll drive.”

Over breakfast, Jack told us what he’d been doing earlier-checking his messages. And he’d had one, from Shadow. It seemed Sid, his twin brother, had indeed been taken into custody. Now Shadow had decided to make like his namesake and gone to ground, wanting nothing more to do with the investigation. He was in such a hurry that Jack didn’t get a chance to ask whether they’d uncovered any leads or even what angle they’d been investigating.

Then came Quinn’s news: the FBI was investigating Benjamin Moreland but not considering him a viable suspect. What did interest them was the killer’s possible link to Moreland-how he’d gotten that hair.

After we discussed that, we moved on to our own investigation. Jack had me tell Quinn and Felix our progress to date.

“Not great,” I said. “So far, they all feel like dead-ends.”

“Shit,” Quinn said. “At least you’ve got something to look into. With the Moreland lead gone, so’s our investigation. How about we take some of yours?”

Jack shrugged. “Suppose so. Vigilantism. You want that?”

Quinn’s lips tightened, but Jack only sipped his coffee.

“We’ll take it,” Felix said. “I’ll also see what I can do to verify Baron’s death. Damned shame, that. He was a good man once.”

Jack nodded.

Since we were back to wearing our biker-duo outfits, Jack must have thought we needed to get in the right mind-set. After only an hour on the road, he stopped at the kind of place that gives the word “dive” a bad name. It wasn’t even noon, and there was already someone lying on the floor. Probably passed out drunk, but in this place you could keel over dead and not be noticed until the flies started feasting.