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“I’m in charge,” Edilio said, with a shy grin.
“If I were any less tired, I’d do the happy dance,” Quinn said. “I stil
l may.”
Edilio stuck out his hand and Quinn took it.
“I hear you’re having a hard time getting anything in exchange for your fish,” Edilio said.
Quinn nodded. “Pretty much.”
“Give me twenty-four hours to figure it out?”
“You got it. So, where’s His Highness?”
Edilio, straight-faced, said, “His Highness is off with Sam.”
“Are they killing each other?”
“Not as far as I know,” Edilio said. “They’re looking for Gaia.”
That wiped the grin off Quinn’s face. “Oh.”
“Yeah. And I’m the one who asked them to do it, not that I had to twist their arms much. Have a seat, if you have the time.”
Quinn took a seat. Virtue had a notebook. He was writing notes, like an administrative assistant taking minutes of a meeting.
“The island,” Edilio said.
Quinn sighed heavily. Oh, man. “Yeah?”
“Have you seen anything going on there?”
“You mean like Albert up on the cliff watching us through a telescope?”
“Yeah, like that. And also like him trying to talk to you.”
Quinn shook his head. “No, not that. Me and Albert are not friends, not anymore. And he’s got those missiles out there.”
“You think he got them up the cliff to where he can use them?”
“I know he did. I have a pretty good pair of binoculars. I’ve seen him and his girls training. He wanted me to see.”
“Has he ever warned you off? Like threatened you?”
“He doesn’t have to. No reason for me to go in there and look for trouble.”
Edilio considered this and nodded. “It sucks. You guys used to work well together. By now Albert must realize he made a dumb mistake in panicking.”
“Edilio, ask me anything, but don’t ask me to go and try to sweet-talk Albert. He stabbed us all in the back.”
“Caine’s done worse, far worse, and Sam is out there with him now.”
“Albert wouldn’t listen to me anyway, Edilio. Albert thinks he’s far above me. I’m just a working guy who smells like fish. He’s the brains. He’s the big organizer. He’d probably shoot me out of the water.”
Edilio sighed and leaned forward, elbows on the desk. “Quinn, listen, man. We need stuff back to normal. We need the market open and we need people working, or we’re all in big trouble. Kids are gonna die of hunger watching their mom or dad eating a pizza three inches away. Kids are acting like everything is all over; it’s not all over. Just because they can see out doesn’t mean they’re getting out. Kids who ought to be harvesting and planting are sitting there up against the barrier watching TV shows because some network put up a big monitor with captions on. Those lookers out there don’t know what damage they’re doing here. They might as well be giving those kids drugs or something.”
Quinn didn’t disagree. He’d lost two of his own people that way. The rest stayed out of personal loyalty to him, not wanting to let him down.
