Alex POV

I didn't think that Bobby was going to leave the lobby once he saw how close Quarles sat next to me on the couch, but I gave him a look. And Barek shoved him. And he finally got his feet moving. I was proud of him for being able to stick with this altered-version of the plan.

I discreetly adjusted myself on the couch so that there was once again a few inches in between us. I was thanking God for my days in Vice, because not only had it taught me how to spend hours in stilettos but it also provided me with the vital skill of feigning interest in a man who repulsed me. And Quarles repulsed me.

I also knew from the get-go that the plan was a wash. Quarles gave me a wolfish grin and leaned in even closer to whisper in my ear.

"So, did you draw the short straw to get stuck with me?" he asked. I had to force myself not to shudder in disgust as his breath fell across my neck.

"What do you mean?"

"You're supposed to get me to confess? I'm supposed to be overtaken with your subtle, sexy come-ons and then I'll just open up to you?"

"What is it that you need to confess? You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, weren't you?" I encouraged.

"Come on, Detective. I know you didn't miss my slip about the Secret Service. You know I'm involved with the counterfeiting. Your buddy Logan was right. I'm not stupid."

Okay, time to switch tactics. When sweet-talk doesn't work, piss them off.

I forced out a laugh, and said, "You invited Carolyn down here. I'd say that makes you pretty stupid. You had to know she would figure you out."

"Once upon a time, Carolyn was in love with me," he stated boldly. "I thought I could rekindle that emotion."

"You thought you could either convince her to look the other way or what…that she would be so smitten with you that she would forget how to conduct a proper investigation?" I laughed again and shook my head. "I've got a news flash for you, Jack. Carolyn considers you the biggest mistake of her life. She never loved you, and she would never let her emotion override her professionalism."

Well, my plan to piss him off was working great. His face darkened and he put an arm along the back of the couch, grabbing the back of my neck with his hand. He squeezed and pulled me closer to him. I started to pull away, but then I noticed a family come into the lobby. Damn.

"We're going to stand up and you're going to walk calmly with me to the stairwell. Got it?"

"I got it."

"And you could smile a little. If you call any attention to us, I'll pull out my gun and start shooting."

For the first time, I started to worry. Everything we knew about Quarles said that he wasn't violent.

Even if he was involved in the counterfeit business, that didn't make him a killer.

Were we wrong about him?

"You got to the Haywood sheriff's department pretty fast," I told him, changing strategy again. Up to this point, I hadn't felt any real physical threat from him, but now the mood had changed.

"I didn't go to the damn sheriff's department," he replied as we hustled through the lobby. "And you guys say I'm stupid. James and Buddy were supposed to bring Carolyn to me. To me. It shouldn't have been that fucking hard. I guess she didn't forget her Marine Corps training, even after being out for so long."

"So you killed them?" I asked casually as though I didn't care either way. By now we were entering the stairwell.

"Give me your gun," he told me, ignoring my question. I carefully pulled back my jacket to reveal my holster and he promptly pulled out my weapon. He shoved it against my ribcage and pulled me up the stairs.

"James and Buddy?" I asked again. I really needed to know the answer.

"Yeah, I killed them. I dumped them on the reservation. It never hurts to throw a little multi-jurisdictional cog in the wheels of justice."

He pulled out his phone then and made a call.

"I'm at the hotel with them now…yeah, I got the blonde…we're going up to the room to get it…you coming?...okay."

I continued slowly up the stairs, pondering my next move. Quarles was a stone cold killer. It was unusual for Bobby to be wrong, about anything, ever, but this time he was. Quarles had snowed us all over. Did the others realize it yet? Had Wheeler's background check uncovered anything? I wasn't sure. And I wasn't sure what I would do if they went down the elevator while we were going up the stairs.

Quarles had a hold of me by my right arm, which was plastered against his left side. This left his right arm free to hold the gun on me, but it also left my left arm free. I inched my hand toward my jeans pocket as he kept pulling me up the stairs.

LOGAN POV

Goren hit the stairwell door going ninety miles an hour and I was right on his heels. So when he slammed through the door and then pulled up short, I nearly ran him over.

"My, my, aren't we in a hurry?" Quarles asked. He stood at the landing, down one flight from where we stood. Eames was pulled tightly to him and he had a gun jammed into her ribs.

"What do you want, Quarles?" Goren asked.

And damn was he cool under pressure.

They both were.

Eames was standing perfectly still, not breaking a sweat, and Goren had slipped right into his hostage-negotiator voice.

Carolyn eased around me and we let the stairwell door close behind us.

"I want my fifties back."

What?

"You want more than that," Goren argued. "You're a police officer. You're holding another cop hostage at gunpoint. And you want a hundred and fifty dollars?"

"I want my evidence back," he clarified. And I knew the big guy knew that. He just wanted to make him say it.

The tape was rolling, after all.

"I can't believe this, Jack," Carolyn said using her sweet-girl voice. She was going to play up the angle of former lover. I wasn't sure if I would be able to stand it. "What are you doing here? This isn't you."

"You don't know shit about me any more, so don't even try."

"I know you're a good man. I know you had a great career and a great life…"

"I was trapped in a horrible marriage that got worse because of you! You seduced me into breaking my vows. My wife never forgave me for that! She made every day a living hell!"

"And so you talked Slater into killing her?" Goren asked. He and Carolyn made a great team with their let's-put-the-gun-down voices, and I decided it would be best if I just kept my mouth shut.

"What? How did you know that?"

"We know everything, Jack," Carolyn continued. "We know about the money. We know about your wife, about Slater's wife, Pete Walker, Scott Hannigan..."

"And we know about James and Buddy," Goren added. "It's gotten out of control, hasn't it? You didn't mean for all of those people to die."

"We were just making money," Quarles said. Eames was still like a stone, and then I noticed that she had something in her left hand. Hmmm.

"That's right," Carolyn encouraged. "What could it hurt to make a little extra money? You gave this country twenty years of your life, and now you're trying to get by on a measly government pension."

"And making the money wasn't hurting anyone. It's a victimless crime," Goren said.

"What happened? Did your wife find out?"

"My wife's greed is what got me started. She wanted me to pay for cheating on her. She wanted me to pay every day for the rest of my life. Nothing I did was good enough for her, and nothing I bought was expensive enough. She always accused me of comparing her to you, even after so many years."

"So it was your wife's fault," Goren said, jumping on that angle. "It was her fault that you got tied up in this. Hers and Slater's. If not for them, you wouldn't be in this mess."

"If not for you, I wouldn't be in this mess," Quarles countered, using his gun to point at Carolyn. "If you had just stayed with me…"

Eames made her move as soon as the gun left her side. She whirled around on Quarles and executed a chop to his Adam's apple. Then she held a pocketknife up to his throat.

"Drop the gun!" she yelled.

Nice move, Eames.

Of course, Goren was down all eight stairs in two strides and took over the man-handling. He grabbed Quarles wrist and slammed it against the wall until he dropped the gun. Carolyn and I both drew our weapons on him as Goren picked up the gun and gave it back to Eames.

"You okay?" he asked her. She gave him that smile, the one she saves just for him. She nodded imperceptibly and he looked at her for another brief moment before turning back to Quarles, who was now held against the wall by Goren's considerable bulk.

"You're never going to get away with this. Slater'll kill all of you," Quarles spat as Goren stepped back and spun him around. He shoved his face into the wall and held out his hand into which Eames quickly placed her handcuffs.

Seamless, those two. It was a thing of beauty to watch.

"Nice touch with the pocketknife," I told her, completely ignoring Quarles. "Did you pick that up at Wal-mart?" She smirked at me and shrugged.

"We need to get back upstairs. I think Slater's on his way over here," she told us. "Jack called him just a couple of minutes ago."

"He's crazier than I am, and he wants his damn money back," Quarles shouted. I figured that Slater must have done a bang-up clean-up job at the casino, because they seemed to think that getting back those three bills was going to be the answer to everything.

"He'll kill all of you to get it," Quarles continued.

"You need to shut the fuck up," I said slowly. Goren turned him back around, so I got up in his face and jammed my finger into his chest.

"If I hear one more word out of your lying, filthy mouth, I won't be able to help myself. I'll have to beat the ever-loving shit out of you."

Quarles gave me a grin and then moved his eyes to Carolyn, who was walking ahead of us up the stairs. He focused in on her ass and then deliberately licked his lips. My tenuous hold on my temper finally snapped.

I grabbed his elbow and threw him forward onto the stairs. With his hands cuffed behind him, he couldn't catch himself, so his face landed hard against the concrete. I kicked him a couple of times and then I felt Goren's hand on my arm.

"Let him up," he said quietly. The cloud of anger cleared somewhat and I reached down to pull the man back to his feet. He had blood coming from his nose and mouth, but even that didn't give me enough satisfaction. I leaned close to him and whispered in his ear.

"And if you even look at my wife again, you'll just be one more body for them to find out in Pisgah."

TBC...