Page 44 of Kill For Me Kill For You
Scott’s vision narrowed. He moved faster, but everything around him seemed to slow down.
The man drew his key card from his pocket, raised it toward the sensor lock on the door. He placed his other hand on the handle. There was a beep as the door unlocked and he pushed the handle down.
The man paused, perhaps sensing movement.
Room 1246 must’ve been celebrating something. On a tray outside stood two wine glasses, a silver ice bucket and an empty wine bottle. As he passed, Scott bent low, swept up the bottle by the neck.
Then he swung it at the man’s head as hard as he could.
20
Amanda
Amanda spent two hours with Naomi, going over Quinn’s routine and the layout of the back of his house. Naomi had a plan. One that would work. One that Naomi had carefully choreographed by staking out Quinn’s house, watching his movements.
‘I don’t have a gun either,’ said Naomi. ‘If you’re going to kill someone bigger and stronger than you without a gun, or poison, you need a weapon that will deliver massive damage. You need to take them by surprise . . .’
That was hours ago. Amanda sat now in her car, parked three blocks away from Quinn’s house. She drank some more coffee. It was two hours old, and thoroughly chilled. She didn’t care. She needed the caffeine hit.
In fact, she needed a hit of something stronger than caffeine – but she knew she couldn’t risk it. A Jack on the rocks would help calm her nerves. But it might be her undoing. Instead she lit a cigarette.
The streetlights were on and no one was on the sidewalk. Too cold tonight. A fog shrouded the moon, as if it was hiding behind a thin silk veil. Cars lined both sides of the street for the next four blocks. She had already driven past the front of Quinn’s home. A three-story brick townhouse in one of the oldest parts of Greenwich Village. She had made the run twice. Once to check out the house – see if lights were on and whether the neighbors were home. On that run, she saw drapes were drawn, dimming the lamp that burned inside Quinn’s home. A low, warm light. He was probably watching TV.
The second drive-by was to check for foot traffic. It was a quiet residential area. High-class real estate. However Quinn was paying for this place, it wasn’t with a teacher’s salary. Maybe he came from old New York money.
As Amanda followed her route, around ten miles per hour, she saw someone looking right at her. A man’s face reflected in the side mirror of his car. He was parked on the right, sitting in the driver’s seat of a dark-colored Chevy Escalade. She saw his face only for a second, reflected in some kind of internal light in the car – maybe a cell phone.
She drove on, checked her rearview.
The man watched her car move on up the street. The Escalade was parked around fifty feet from Quinn’s front door, on the opposite side of the street.
Amanda wasn’t too concerned about the guy. Probably a neighbor, checking his cell phone before he got out of the car and went home. Amanda wasn’t going in the front anyway – she was just making sure there wasn’t a cop car right outside the house.
She drove three blocks before she found a parking space. It was nine thirty, and Naomi would be at her support group. She had another half hour before Naomi was on the street again and her alibi useless.
Thirty minutes to kill a man.
Amanda took another sip of coffee, threw the cigarette butt in the street and thought about Wallace Crone. Naomi had taken him out. Put him out of this world with a cold blade. Amanda was beyond the initial shock of this news.
She had imagined this moment many times. There was an odd sense of peace. As if something had been given back to her. The world, struck from its course, was slowly righting itself.
Once she’d gotten over the bombshell of Naomi’s actions, she was thankful. Truly thankful. She sat in the car, thinking of her girl. Her husband. And for the first time in months, she felt hot tears on her cheeks. Her grief had been contained by a dam of hatred and fury and now there was nothing to hold it back.
She wiped her face and knew then that there was no way she could deny this to another person. Especially not a mother. And a mother who had given her this very same release.
There was a job to be done. She would do this one thing for Naomi. She would kill another monster, and then part of this nightmare would be over. But it wasn’t just for Naomi. It was also for Naomi’s daughter. Just as Naomi had killed Crone for Jess and Luis.
She looked at the picture of Frank Quinn from the news article she’d printed out. He was tall, but well-built all the same. Good-looking. Quinn looked physically powerful. She would need to be quick, and pray the plan worked.
Amanda put on a pair of gloves, got out of the car, closed the door and locked it. She headed south along the street for three blocks, then saw the alley on her right.
Naomi’s instructions were just hours old. They had gone over and over this. She remembered Naomi’s plan word for word.
It’s an old block. There’s a gated alley, but the gate is never locked. You go in through the back yard. Quinn doesn’t have a gun permit. He’s not armed. There are no dogs in the house, but two houses further up the street there’s a German shepherd. It mostly stays indoors. Approach from the south and you’ll be unlikely to set the dog barking.
Naomi had scouted the property very well. She had planned this meticulously. All Amanda had to do was follow Naomi’s instructions.
There’s no way to get to him from the front. You have to get over the backyard wall from the alley. The wall is eight feet high. There’s a dumpster on the corner that you can use to climb over it.
