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“What’s up?” Smith asked, turning to me at a red light.
“Did that building just say Quinton Baird & Associates on it?”
“It did,” he agreed.
“But…”
“But?” he prompted as I tried to find a nice way to say what I was thinking.
“But why in this part of town?” I asked, shaking my head. “I mean, with your fees…”
“It was a huge chunk of real estate at a song,” he told me, driving again. “When he first started, he didn’t have a huge client list. He was being smart with the money. Besides, he thought setting up shop right next to the Third Street Gang would be smart. Even if the cops decided to get suspicious, they would be distracted by all their half-assed drug dealing over there.”
“And pimping,” I agreed, seeing the logic there.
“That too,” he agreed. “He actually just bought the building to the left. The team is expanding more than he anticipated. We need to have more room for offices and a group conference area. Jules is gonna shit herself, having to share her job with someone else.”
“She sounded very calm and reasonable.”
“She can be. But she has been micromanaging that office since it first opened. If Quin fucked up and hired someone who kept a messy desk, she’d have a conniption.”
“Is it a big team?” I found myself asking, wanting to keep up the conversation now that it didn’t sound forced.
“It’s pretty extensive already. And we just added one more member a little bit back.”
“Lincoln referred to you as The General,” I said, watching his profile. “Does everyone have a nickname? Do they mean anything?” He paused. Long enough for me to wonder if he wasn’t going to answer. “If I am prying…”
“No, it’s alright. Quin is known as The Fixer, obviously. He fixes things. Gunner is called The Ghost. He helps people disappear. Or find people who disappeared themselves. Kai is The Messenger.”
“As in ‘Don’t shoot the?'”
“Exactly. Lincoln is The Middle Man. He deals with situations that require…”
“Charm,” I supplied when he couldn’t find the word.
“Yes. Miller is The Negotiator. Which is self-explanatory. She’s got the charm like Lincoln, but mixed with this ball-busting, hardass streak. Finn is The Cleaner. He has some pretty severe OCD about cleaning things. So when there is a scene that needs to be cleaned, that is his job.” Like they may have used if my late husband wasn’t who he was. “And then there’s Ranger. He doesn’t come to the office often. He’s The Babysitter. We send him clients when they need to be watched while we deal with their situation, people we can’t trust to do as they are told.”
“Like that guy you and Lincoln were discussing? Fenway.”
“Exactly. Ranger is ready to ban that one we have sent him there so much. And then there is Bellamy, who is new.”
“What’s his title?”
“Don’t think you want to know that one, sweetheart,” he said, shaking his head.
“So, why do they call you The General? I mean, ex-military aside. What do you generally do that got you that title.”
“I kick ass. Literally or figuratively. If Quin needs a strong arm in a situation, he calls me up. Head up covert type operations. Intel gathering. And I’m Quin’s stand-in when he is out of town on a job or personal business.”
“So if Quin had been in town when I called, you likely wouldn’t have been on my case?” I asked, suddenly extremely thankful for timely vacations.
“It likely would have been Quin and Finn that showed up at your door. But had he also needed to insert us in your life in this personal protection guise, he could have assigned whoever didn’t have a serious case going on. It may have still been me.”
“Your job sounds exciting,” I decided, knowing right off that I simply wouldn’t have the countenance to handle it, but glad that there were people like him – and all his coworkers – who could handle it, who were around when people like me were in need.
“It can be. You get used to it, though. Your tolerance for stress and the unexpected gets higher each time until even high energy, crazy situations don’t even raise your heartbeat anymore.”
“I imagine having a military background helps with that too. Are your coworkers ex-military?”
“Some, yeah. That’s how Quin met a few of us.”
Smith flicked on his blinker, driving us down a road that I had thought to be nothing more than a walking path when I had passed it before, the property so wooded that you didn’t see a structure on it at all.
Of course, as we drove and drove, I realized this was because the house was set deep on the land, a charming one-story actual log cabin with a long, low front porch with a deep overhand to keep rain – or the presently falling snow – off of you if you decided to stand out front to watch, have a cup of coffee, enjoy nature.
