Read The Collected (A Jonathan Quinn Novel) for Free Online Page B

to her that he wouldn’t be there.”
    Daeng was silent.
    “Are you still there?” Quinn asked.
    “Yeah. I was just thinking.”
    When Daeng didn’t continue, Quinn said, “Thinking what?”
    Daeng hesitated, then said, “Not important.”
    Quinn let the silence hang for a moment. “When did you leave L.A.?”
    “Five days ago.”
    “Do you know if he was going to be working on a job while you were gone?”
    “Yeah. He had something lined up.”
    “Who hired him?”
    “He didn’t tell me. The gig came in after I booked my flight, so he knew I wouldn’t be helping him.”
    Which meant Nate’s ethics would keep him from sharing the information, a habit Quinn himself had drilled into his former apprentice.
    “Any idea who he got to replace you?”
    “He was making some calls, but not having any luck at the time. He did say the broker offered to set him up with someone if he couldn’t find anyone.”
    “He said a broker? Not a client direct hire.”
    “He said broker.”
    “Okay, that’s something. Can you think of anything else?”
    Daeng said nothing for several seconds. “No. That’s it as far as I can remember.”
    “Thanks. If you do come up with something, call me,” Quinn said. “Doesn’t matter what time.”
    “I will.”
    Quinn hung up, and looked at Orlando. “Not Daeng. But Nate did have a job set up through a broker. That’ll narrow things a bit.”
    She nodded without looking up from her laptop. After a moment, the printer whirled to life and spit out two sheets of paper. Once it was done, she closed her computer and stood up.
    “All right, we’d better hurry,” she said.
    She handed him one of the printed pieces of paper. As often happened, they were on the same wavelength again.
    In his hand was one of two tickets for a flight to Los Angeles.

CHAPTER 7
     
    BANGKOK, THAILAND
     
    W HAT DAENG HADN’T told Quinn was that the thing he’d come home to deal with turned out to be nothing. The message he’d received from Ton a week earlier had concerned a Burmese refugee kid, one Daeng had personally helped get onto the right path. According to the note, the boy had been arrested by the Bangkok police for drug trafficking, an offense punishable by death.
    When Daeng couldn’t get ahold of Ton right away to get more details, he had caught a flight home the next day, knowing the arrest had to be some kind of mistake because there was no way the kid would get mixed up in something like that. And he was right. Only it wasn’t the police who’d made the mistake, it was Ton. The kid was not in jail and had no idea what Daeng was talking about when Daeng tracked him down.
    Relieved but frustrated, Daeng had called Ton to try to figure out where the miscommunication had occurred, but Ton was still not answering his phone. Daeng had then checked around and learned that the man had gone northeast to Issan to visit family. That didn’t explain why he wasn’t answering his mobile, though. As a member of Daeng’s loose organization of misfits, Ton was expected to have his phone on him at all times. Not about to travel out to the countryside himself, Daeng wasn’t going to do much about it until Ton called him back.
    Over the following few days, Daeng had become so preoccupied with checking in on his network of people and businesses, and making sure everything was still running smoothly, that he’d shoved all thoughts about Ton to the far reaches of his mind. He knew they’d get things cleared up soon enough.
    Maybe that had been a mistake.
    He headed into the bathroom with his mobile phone, turned on the speaker function, and tried Ton once more. As the line began to ring, he applied shaving cream to his face. Receiving no response, he punched DISCONNECT , finished his shave, and jumped in the shower.
    In less than five minutes, he was dressed and making another call as he walked through the house.
    This time the line was answered with a grunt.
    “Yai, wake up,” Daeng said.
    Another