Brett Battles - Shadow of Betrayal

“Piss off,” Quinn told him.

“Fuck you, too,” the man said. “Hey, babe, you got a number I can have?”

Orlando didn’t look back, but she did flip him off.

“That ain’t very ladylike,” he called out.

Quinn could sense Orlando tensing beside him. For a second he thought she was going to pull her gun on him.

“If he’s still out here when we leave, you can shoot him,” Quinn whispered.

The hand that had begun moving upward relaxed back against her side.

“Ah, never mind. You’re probably a pretty lousy fuck anyway,” the man said.

Quinn stopped, then turned back around. The man was twenty feet behind them, the woman he’d been with long gone.

“Hey, you’re the one who wanted me to relax,” Orlando whispered.

“Excuse me,” Quinn said to the man. “Not sure I heard you correctly.”

“Wasn’t talking to you,” the man said.

Quinn took four casual steps forward, halving the distance between them.

“You think you’re going to scare me?” the man asked. “Turn around and go have your little fuck. I’ll find her later when I’m ready.”

Orlando moved up beside Quinn. “You sure I can’t shoot him?” she asked.

“What’s your name?” Quinn said.

“Mick Jagger. Who are you?”

“Inspector Barclay.”

The man laughed, though it wasn’t as assured as his tone had been moments before. “Inspector Barclay? That’s funny. And who’s she? Inspector Chan?”

“Please,” Orlando said. “I’ll just graze him. I swear.”

“You look kind of familiar,” the man said, squinting as he looked at Quinn. “I know you, don’t I?”

Quinn smiled at the man. Then in a single swift motion he pulled his gun out of the holster under his jacket. Orlando followed his lead and had her weapon out a second later.

“Shit. Oh, shit. Shit. Man, I didn’t mean anything, okay? Shit.” He was backing rapidly down the hall. “I’m sorry. I mean, I was just joking, okay? Shit.”

He reached the elevator and tapped the down button over and over until the car arrived. He jumped in and began his button routine inside.

Once the doors closed, Quinn slipped his gun back into its holster.

“You should have just let me pop him,” Orlando said as she stowed her weapon.

“Come on,” Quinn said, turning back in the direction they’d been headed before they’d been interrupted.

He had no concern that the man would come back. The guy had had all the earmarks of some office jerk out for a little action. Quinn thought it might be a long time before Orlando’s would-be suitor would return to the Motel Monique.

At room 326, he slipped the key into the lock and gave it a turn. It worked. If it had been a trophy from years before, the motel didn’t seem to care enough to change the locks.

Quinn drew his gun again, then pushed the door open and slipped inside. Once Orlando joined him, she shut the door.

The room was as worn and uninviting as the rest of the place. A bed with a spread from deep in the last century, a TV that couldn’t have been much younger, and awful dark red paint on the walls.

“Are you sure she’s staying here?” she asked. “Doesn’t look like anyone’s used the room. I mean, you know, in the last twelve hours. I’m sure the room’s had plenty of use otherwise.”

Quinn looked at her as she shivered in repulsion.

“She had the key for some reason,” he said.

Their search was a short one. The prize was lying flat on the floor, hidden behind the bed. A carry-on suitcase. Black like ninety-nine percent of the other carry-ons in the world.

Quinn picked it up and placed it on the bed.

“So she was planning on returning,” Orlando said. “Maybe she’s still coming back.”

“Perhaps,” Quinn said, but he didn’t think so. The terror in her eyes had been genuine. And when she realized she’d left the key behind, Quinn didn’t think there was any way she’d risk coming back no matter what was inside.

There was no lock, so Quinn unzipped the top and flopped it open.

Clothes mostly. Women’s and—

“This is for a little girl,” Orlando said, holding up a small dress.

Quinn rooted around until he found something other than clothes. What he pulled out was a stack of passports. Four total. They were all Canadian. The first one was for Marion Dupuis. It was the most used of the bunch. There were several stamps inside, most recently from customs at JFK in New York, and a smeared one that he thought was from Côte d’Ivoire in Africa.

He handed it to Orlando, then opened the next one. A child stared out at him. According to her date of birth, she was five. Her name was listed as Iris Dupuis. The child was either from Africa or of African descent. And it was evident that there was something different about her. Her face was round and her features seemed closer together than normal. But it was her eyes that were the telltale sign.

“What do you think?” he said, showing Orlando the picture.

“Did you see a child with her?”

Quinn hesitated, then said, “I saw something in the back seat. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I think it might have been her.”

Orlando looked at the picture again. “This girl has Down syndrome.”

Quinn had thought the same. There was no mistaking the look.

He looked at the remaining two passports. While the pictures were the same as in the other two, the names were different.

“False IDs,” Quinn told Orlando. “She’s on the run.”

Quinn put the two false passports back in the bag, but slipped the ones with the name Dupuis on them into his pocket.

Across the top flap of the bag was a cover secured by a couple of metal hooks. Quinn released the hooks and lifted the cover. Underneath was a single item. A manila envelope.

Orlando picked it up and unclasped the top. Inside was a stack of papers.

Before she could pull anything out, Quinn said, “Let’s not hang around here any longer. We can look at this back at our motel.”

Orlando nodded, then put the envelope back.

As Quinn closed the suitcase, he thought about the child. Iris Dupuis. Marion’s child? If so, either her parents had disapproved or had not known. There had been no pictures of the girl in the house. Odd.

Even odder, though, was the false set of identification. A dozen questions came to him, one on top of the other. But he had no answers.

“Let’s go,” he said.

Five rings, then voicemail again. A generic voice telling Quinn, “Leave your message after the beep.” But he disconnected the call before the beep could sound.

“He’s still not picking up,” Quinn said.

He’d been trying to reach Peter for the last ten minutes. He’d already left two messages on Peter’s mobile. A call to the Office’s main line had been equally frustrating, the night operator simply telling Quinn the message would be passed on.

“I’ve got something here,” Orlando said.

She was sitting on their bed at the Comfort Inn, her computer in her lap. Beside her was the manila envelope from Marion’s suitcase. The papers that had been inside now sat on top of the envelope in a neat stack.

Quinn walked over and sat beside Orlando.

“Is that Marion?”

She turned the screen so Quinn could see. On it was a photo of several people standing together, smiling for the camera. A posed shot that could have been taken almost anywhere. The background looked like it was the side of a building. The wall was dingy white, either stucco or plaster or something similar. There were five people total, four women and one man. Two of the women and the man were African. The other two were Caucasian. One was a lanky blonde, and the other a shorter brunette—Marion.