Quinn by D. B. Reynolds

Author:D. B. Reynolds
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BelleBooks Inc.
Published: 2018-05-15T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

THE NEXT NIGHT found Quinn once again seated at a huge desk— though this time the desk was real, not a dining table making do. He had a laptop in front of him and far too many piles of paperwork stacked around him. In this case, however, the files he was studying were the result of some of Garrick’s world-class hacking skills . . . which meant Quinn wasn’t supposed to be reading any of them. Garrick had managed to crack Sorley’s security, which he’d derided as “pitiful,” and Quinn now had an open invitation to peruse any of Sorley’s computer files that interested him. He was making good use of it, mostly on his laptop. The paper copies were only backup, in case the Irish lord unexpectedly discovered he’d been invaded and managed to block them. Garrick assured Quinn that it wasn’t likely to happen, and, if it did, there’d be no way to trace it back to them.

Quinn’s deep dive into Sorley’s finances was turning up what he’d expected. Sorley’s businesses throughout Ireland were just as illegal as the smuggling operation in Howth. In fact, he had several other very similar ops, including a substantial smuggling business moving through Dublin’s main port. Even worse, from Quinn’s point of view, was that Sorley’s partner in the Dublin venture was one of the city’s most violent gangs.

On the good news front, the Irish lord’s various businesses brought in plenty of money, even though he didn’t seem to share it with the Irish vampire community at large. Sorley had to be paying his accountant a substantial bribe to keep that particular fact from the other vampires, including the lord’s inner circle, most of whom lived in the big house in the Donnybrook section of Dublin. Sorley paid them a modest salary, but he could have afforded to pay them much more. He should have. A good vampire lord shared the wealth with his subjects. Sure, the lords lived better than regular vampires, but that was because they were the ones taking all the risks and fighting all the battles. But they also invested in their own people, their own territory.

Sorley wasn’t doing any of that. He wasn’t only a bad lord, he was a bad businessman. The latter indictment might have offended Quinn even more than the first. In his world, there was no excuse for sloppy financial management. His fingers itched to draw up a vicious memorandum and shoot it off to Sorley and his accountant, but he reined in the impulse, just as the sound of raised voices drew his attention to something happening outside.

He slid his chair back and stood, all of his senses going on alert. Sorley had given Quinn permission to take over Howth, with the implicit understanding that he would remain there. Quinn had pretended to go along, but he’d had no intention of doing that. Howth had never been more than stepping stone, a way to test Sorley’s mettle. What he’d learned had moved up his timetable substantially.

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