Page 36 of Remote Access

Gareth suddenly pulled Quincy into a hug, whispering into his ear. “You stay safe and if you need us, for anything, you call and we’ll be there. You know it, right?”

“You be careful, too. Letsen knows we have his files so he’s going to be ruthless.”

“We’ve got a few tricks up our sleeves.” Isaac flashed a rare grin and climbed into his truck. “Come on, Gareth. Lock up the place and let’s hit the road. The sooner we get this stuff stashed, the better I’ll feel.”

“You going to start feeding all that into electronic files, right?” Quincy asked.

“You know it,” Isaac said. “And nobody knows about my room, so it’s all good. By the time you get to Maine and back, we should be ready to send Rawlins’s ass to prison.”

Lane walked up to them and Gareth turned and held out his hand. “It was nice to meet you, Lane. Do us a favor and keep an eye on this guy for us. We happen to be pretty attached to him.”

“I will.” Lane shook his hand.

“Oh wait, I nearly forgot.” Isaac jumped out of the car and handed Quincy a wad of cash.

“What the hell? No way!” Quincy tried to hand it back.

“Don’t give me that. You can’t possibly stay in that junker all the way to Maine, so pick up another one on the way.”

He started to argue again and stopped because the logic was sound. He nodded and pocketed the cash. “I’ll get this back to you.”

Isaac just rolled his eyes. “Then you’ll be getting it back to Gareth, Liam and Carter, too. We all chipped in.”

His gaze flashed to Gareth, who just shrugged. Quincy held his tongue, unwilling to bring up Gareth’s money problems in front of the others. So, he merely glared but kept the cash. Gareth winked and grinned.

When they finally hit the road, Quincy had no idea what to expect. They had a couple of days ahead of them with the plan to stop in Ohio. It would be a long drive and normally, he’d suggest they take turns driving, but he wanted them to be well-rested when they finally reached Rockland, Maine.

He also wanted another night alone in a hotel room with Lane.

Chapter Twelve

“Quincy? How did you manage to convince Hayrick you were dirty?” Lane took a bite of his roast beef sandwich and leaned against the headboard of the bed. They’d traded out the car for a cheap SUV in Indiana, then stopped in a small town outside Akron, Ohio and picked a nicer hotel than the one they’d been using in Oklahoma. This one had one king-sized bed with a fluffy, striped comforter and extra wide, big pillows. He liked the warm, earth-toned decor and thought about how his mother had always filled their home with the look and feel of autumn.

Sadness tugged at him, but this time he was able to push it aside. Her loss would always be with him and he knew his grief would hit hard and strong often, but he was caught up in worry about what was coming. Lane had used his Becker identity to sign them into this hotel and the whole time, he thought about the years of setting up himself as Lane, the work he’d done and had planned to do. He still hadn’t told Quincy exactly what he did as Lane and a part of him looked forward to it, but dreaded it at the same time.

Because how he’d gotten through that security system wastechnicallyillegal. More than Quincy even realized. And Quincy, although he was planning to burglarize a home with Lane, was still a good guy through and through.

Which brought him to the question he repeated. “Hayrick is no dummy. How in the world did you fool him because even after a few days, I can tell your integrity runs deep.”

Quincy stared at him so long he thought maybe this…association…didn’t extend to deep talks and an uncomfortable curl of worry settled low in his stomach.

“I was pretending to be on the take, trying to get him to trust me. He grew suspicious because nothing about my life had changed, so I started actually using the money.”

“So, when you lost your job, it was for something you really did—but you did it undercover?”

Quincy nodded. “The chief knew the truth. He went along at first, then ordered me off the case. I kept it up in private and it backfired on me. But by then, I knew he was truly on the take.” He picked at the bread on his sandwich before setting the whole thing onto the wrapper. “I was set up, shot someone and it was a clean shot, but I lost my badge. Gareth did, too. The irony is he never once took any money. It’s all a fucked up mess, but I broke the law often enough after that to get Letsen to trust me. I’m not proud of it.”

“Why do you have such a hard-on for him anyway?”

“My cousin was his cellmate in prison. I believe Letsen killed him.”

“Shit, Quincy. Did you have proof?”

“No. It had been too many years since Gerald’s death, so the case had gone cold. Supposedly he died of an aneurysm in his sleep, but I don’t believe it. Gerald had gone down for robbery, but he’d also picked up a few collectibles that disappeared. When I started digging into Hayrick, I realized the two had to be connected. I could never prove it.”

“So you went after him for the antique shops?”

Quincy nodded. “Fencing stolen goods, using his shops to launder the money. The Chief knew it, too.”

---