Cruel World(137)

He knelt beside Ty and gently touched his shoulder.

“Hey, buddy.”

“Hey.”

“Having fun?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you upset?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re leaving, aren’t you?” Ty turned his face up, and his blue eyes were unfocused, looking past him. But there was so much in them that it overwhelmed him.

“I’m sorry, I have to.”

“You don’t. You could stay. Mom likes you; I know she does. She came back for you, remember?”

“Yes, she did, and so did you.” Quinn put his hand on the back of Ty’s neck and drew him to his chest squeezing him tight. The boy stretched an arm around his back. “Thank you for being so brave all this time.” They sat that way for a long span, the wetness of Ty’s tears soaking through the front of his shirt.

“Will you come back?” Ty asked, his voice muffled.

“Yes. I promise.”

“Don’t get lost.”

“I won’t.”

Quinn released him and wiped the tears from his small face before ruffling Denver’s ears. “Keep them safe,” he said to the dog. He stood and walked out of the room.

Alice wasn’t in the front area, and he hadn’t expected her to be. Collincz and Holtz waited by the door.

“You’re sure Wexler will give me a vehicle?” he asked as he donned a poncho.

“He’d better. We have more Humvees than people now,” Collincz said. She put out a hand and he shook it, doing the same with the doctor.

“I hope you find what you’re looking for,” Holtz said, giving his hand a final squeeze.

“Me too,” Quinn said, and stepped out the door into the gentle rain.

He walked quickly with his head down, focusing on the muddy ground and the sluicing water that ran the opposite way toward the pit. He watched the streams flow past, taking sediment away to be deposited somewhere new.

When he made it to the front of the enclosure, he saw that Thomas stood on his perch. He was looking through a set of powerful binoculars at something beyond the barriers. The soldier didn’t turn toward him as he headed for the tent Wexler had brought them to initially. He glanced around for Murray, but the other man was nowhere in sight. When he ducked beneath the tent’s enclosure, he saw that Wexler was sitting at the table with his head tipped to one side, his back to him, fast asleep. Quinn hesitated but continued on, he couldn’t wait any longer.

“Lieutenant? Sorry to wake you. I was wondering if I could ask a favor. I need to borrow—”

Quinn’s words died in his throat as he came even with the other man.

The left side of Wexler’s face was missing.

Shattered bone and shredded tissue hung from a ragged exit wound beside his nose. He’d been shot point blank.

“Fuck,” Quinn said, stumbling back. His hand grasping the back of a chair and sliding off. Vomit geysered to the back of his throat, but he swallowed the nausea down, the world tipping beneath his boots. It was Murray, it had to be.

Quinn ran out of the tent, head swiveling, searching for some sign of the murderer. The fog was empty save for the infinite rows of tents stretching into oblivion and the steady tap of rain.

“Hey. Hey, Thomas,” Quinn hissed as he neared the narrow staircase that led to the sniper’s perch. Thomas turned toward him, eyebrows drawn together in a scowl. “It’s Wexler, he’s dead,” Quinn said as he reached the top of the stairs.

“I know. I killed him,” Thomas said, and kicked Quinn in the chest.

Gravity ceased.

There was a blessed moment of weightlessness and then the savage bite of steel stairs in his back. He rolled once, feeling his scalp tear above his ear then his feet hit the ground, legs buckling as he collapsed to his side.

His vision roiled as if stirred from within his skull. A tattoo of pain throbbed in his back. When he managed to raise himself onto an elbow, the wet ground tilted beneath him.

Thomas’s footsteps clanged down the stairs as another sound built in the air. It was a deep revving layered by other throaty grumbles. The noise climbed and climbed until it overshadowed Thomas’s approach. The soldier stopped a foot away and looked down at him.

“Man, you are f*ckin’ ugly. Think I improved your looks by booting your ass down those stairs.”

The sound outside the walls slowly died, one by one, and he realized it was engines, many engines all growling together. Footsteps came from behind him, and he had enough strength to turn his head and see Murray moving toward the steel door set in the concrete.