Read Online The Collected (A Jonathan Quinn Novel) by Brett Battles - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Brett Battles
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Did anyone ever do that? He’d never heard of it before.
In the hours after the call, he’d moved through his apartment, sitting down on the couch or the bed or a kitchen chair, but never for more than a few seconds before his nerves made him stand back up and walk around again.
Fucking money , he thought. You’re an idiot, idiot, idiot!
He should have never taken this job. He should have thought about it more when it was offered to him, but he hadn’t been able to see through the piles of cash, and the dangled possibility it would lead to more.
Lead to more. What a joke .
While his client had dutifully come through with the payment, the man had also conveniently fallen off the map. The timing of which, incidentally , coincided with the job going to shit.
The hit hadn’t been the problem. The target was dead. There was no question of that.
But the cleanup?
Something had gone seriously askew, and Quinn—who Pullman had been hearing for years was the cream of the crop—had disappeared without a trace. That might not have been so bad if police hadn’t discovered the body in an abandoned van just outside Monterrey. And that might not have been so bad if the body had been unidentifiable. Unfortunately, with the exception of a well-placed bullet hole and a few burn marks from a fire that had been quickly extinguished, the dead man was apparently in perfect condition. The police had no problem identifying him as a powerful Mexican senator, and former United Nations official.
If word got around about how disastrously things had gone, Pullman would have a hell of a time drumming up any new business. But it wasn’t business, or even the potential lack thereof, that had kept him awake all night.
It was the phone call.
“I was given your number by a cleaner named Quinn,” the woman had said.
Whoever she was, she wasn’t some broker waiting for Quinn to show up. Pullman was sure about that now. So who, then? Probably more importantly, who did she represent?
His biggest fear was that the senator had ties to the northern Mexican drug cartels. It hadn’t been mentioned in any of the news reports, but he knew all those political types, especially in that part of the world, had to have their hands in someone’s pocket. What if the senator’s cartel friends had already discovered that Pullman had been involved in the assassination?
Perhaps they had captured Quinn, and tortured Pullman’s name and number out of him. That stopped him pacing for a moment.
Jesus. If that were true, he was toast.
Those bastards weren’t just dangerous, they were unrelentingly vicious, and wouldn’t be content to just kill Pullman.
Not long after midnight, he’d retrieved his Colt .45 pistol from the safe in his room. Being on the administrative end of projects, and never having to go out into the field himself, he’d only used the gun a few times at a firing range, with less than spectacular results. But he felt better having it in his hand as he continued carving a path across his floor.
He next wondered if there was a way they could figure out where he lived.
He’d always been careful never to let anyone know where his place was. Even his family had no clue. And when he craved companionship, he paid for a few hours of Jessica’s time in a cheap motel room across town.
The phone call. Could they pinpoint his location through that?
He didn’t think so. He’d paid good money for some equipment that was supposed to prevent anyone from doing that. Granted, it wasn’t quite top of the line, but the guy who sold it to him promised it was more than adequate.
More pacing, more questions.
Run?
Don’t run?
Threat?
Not a threat?
At 5:57 a.m., he still had no answers.
At 5:57 and five seconds, the floorboard behind him creaked.
__________
P ULLMAN STOOD NEAR his couch, staring at the wall, a cannon of a gun dangling from his hand. Quinn and Orlando, having already checked the rest of the apartment and confirming there
In the hours after the call, he’d moved through his apartment, sitting down on the couch or the bed or a kitchen chair, but never for more than a few seconds before his nerves made him stand back up and walk around again.
Fucking money , he thought. You’re an idiot, idiot, idiot!
He should have never taken this job. He should have thought about it more when it was offered to him, but he hadn’t been able to see through the piles of cash, and the dangled possibility it would lead to more.
Lead to more. What a joke .
While his client had dutifully come through with the payment, the man had also conveniently fallen off the map. The timing of which, incidentally , coincided with the job going to shit.
The hit hadn’t been the problem. The target was dead. There was no question of that.
But the cleanup?
Something had gone seriously askew, and Quinn—who Pullman had been hearing for years was the cream of the crop—had disappeared without a trace. That might not have been so bad if police hadn’t discovered the body in an abandoned van just outside Monterrey. And that might not have been so bad if the body had been unidentifiable. Unfortunately, with the exception of a well-placed bullet hole and a few burn marks from a fire that had been quickly extinguished, the dead man was apparently in perfect condition. The police had no problem identifying him as a powerful Mexican senator, and former United Nations official.
If word got around about how disastrously things had gone, Pullman would have a hell of a time drumming up any new business. But it wasn’t business, or even the potential lack thereof, that had kept him awake all night.
It was the phone call.
“I was given your number by a cleaner named Quinn,” the woman had said.
Whoever she was, she wasn’t some broker waiting for Quinn to show up. Pullman was sure about that now. So who, then? Probably more importantly, who did she represent?
His biggest fear was that the senator had ties to the northern Mexican drug cartels. It hadn’t been mentioned in any of the news reports, but he knew all those political types, especially in that part of the world, had to have their hands in someone’s pocket. What if the senator’s cartel friends had already discovered that Pullman had been involved in the assassination?
Perhaps they had captured Quinn, and tortured Pullman’s name and number out of him. That stopped him pacing for a moment.
Jesus. If that were true, he was toast.
Those bastards weren’t just dangerous, they were unrelentingly vicious, and wouldn’t be content to just kill Pullman.
Not long after midnight, he’d retrieved his Colt .45 pistol from the safe in his room. Being on the administrative end of projects, and never having to go out into the field himself, he’d only used the gun a few times at a firing range, with less than spectacular results. But he felt better having it in his hand as he continued carving a path across his floor.
He next wondered if there was a way they could figure out where he lived.
He’d always been careful never to let anyone know where his place was. Even his family had no clue. And when he craved companionship, he paid for a few hours of Jessica’s time in a cheap motel room across town.
The phone call. Could they pinpoint his location through that?
He didn’t think so. He’d paid good money for some equipment that was supposed to prevent anyone from doing that. Granted, it wasn’t quite top of the line, but the guy who sold it to him promised it was more than adequate.
More pacing, more questions.
Run?
Don’t run?
Threat?
Not a threat?
At 5:57 a.m., he still had no answers.
At 5:57 and five seconds, the floorboard behind him creaked.
__________
P ULLMAN STOOD NEAR his couch, staring at the wall, a cannon of a gun dangling from his hand. Quinn and Orlando, having already checked the rest of the apartment and confirming there
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