Ten Two Jack

by Diane Capri

  She headed toward the front entrance of the hotel and Gaspar followed, shaking his head. The driver pulled away from the curb.

  Gaspar hurried to catch up, limping on his right leg as he often did when he’d been inactive for several hours. “Just be prepared to knock on every door in the place. And hope we find her before they call security.”

  “The thing we really need to hope is that Reacher is sitting there holding her hand when we find her.”

  He frowned. “Why would you want that?”

  “Because I don’t think he’ll make a scene in a place like this,” Otto said. “If he’s here, we can have a reasonable conversation with him. Figure things out.”

  “What things?”

  She shook her head. “Hell if I know. One thing at a time, Cheech. Let’s find Rose and Jane first. We’ll deal with everything else as it happens.”

  “You’re the boss,” he said equably. But he oozed disapproval.

  The front entrance of the Segovia Alcazar Hotel was covered by a striking blue awning that ran from the curb. A uniformed doorman wearing white gloves opened the door to admit them to an expansive lobby decorated in Spanish marble.

  Otto looked around the awe-inspiring lobby. Perhaps the building had been a thriving hotel at one time before the booming medical tourism business became more profitable. A long reception desk stood off to the right side.

  “Wait here. I’ll be right back.” Otto said, placing a hand on his arm like a wife would do. He stopped to admire a six-foot floral display as if he found it fascinating.

  Otto moved purposefully toward the reception desk where a young woman was working at a computer. Her brass name badge over her pocket identified her as Maria.

  “May I help you?” Maria asked in accented English, with a large helping of concern in her voice that matched the sympathy in her large brown eyes.

  “Oh, I hope so,” Otto said, practically pleading. “I’m looking for my cousin. She had surgery, and I was supposed to be here with her. My little boy was sick, and then my plane was delayed, and I am so very late. I wasn’t able to be there with her, and I’m just devastated. I need to find her right away, and I’m not even sure which room she’s in.”

  Maria nodded her understanding. “I can find the room number for you. What is your cousin’s name?”

  Otto glanced furtively around the lobby. She lowered her voice. “Her real name is Rose Sanderson.”

  Maria’s eyes widened and her nostrils tensed. Her internal battle between the desire to maintain Rose’s privacy while providing the utmost in patient care required by her employer played across her sweet features.

  “Let me see,” Maria said, typing Rose Sanderson’s name into the computer.

  That search would turn up no results. Otto had already tried.

  Maria shook her head slowly. “I’m not finding her in our system under that name. I’m sorry.”

  Otto nodded, glanced right and left to be sure no one could overhear, and lowered her voice. “She’s not using her real name here. The surgery is a surprise for her husband. She doesn’t want anyone to know.”

  “When did she check in? Maybe I can find it that way,” Maria said.

  Otto replied, “I’m not sure exactly. Within the past two weeks.”

  Maria gave her another soulful look and shook her head slowly. “I don’t know how to help you. Our guests are registered by names and arrival dates….”

  “Oh, dear,” Otto wrung her hands as a distraught cousin would do. “Have you had a lot of patients checking in recently from the US?”

  “I’m afraid so. At least half our guests are Americans,” Maria replied.

  “I see.” Otto took a deep breath. “Her sister’s with her. Jane Mackenzie. Do you have her registered, maybe?”

  Maria typed the name into her system and came up empty again. She shook her head once more. “I’m so sorry.”

  When people chose fake names in situations like this, they often selected the name of a person they knew. Otto had scoured Rose’s files and made a list of names. Until she had access to the computer files, she couldn’t try them herself.

  Maria had been helpful so far, but she’d become suspicious and give up soon. Otto thought Maria might try one more name. Maybe two more. But that was probably her limit before one of Maria’s supervisors came to stop her.

  If Otto knew Rose at all, she might have been able to make an educated guess. As it was, she knew she’d be taking a shot in the dark.

  One name had come up in Rose’s VA hospital records. A soldier she’d been close to, according to the charts. They’d dated awhile after they were both discharged. He’d died around the same time Noble claimed Reacher appeared on the scene.

  Her sister probably didn’t know the guy. Maybe Rose had feelings for him back then. Perhaps she still did. It was worth a shot.

  Otto leaned closer to Maria and lowered her voice even further. “She told me she might use the name of an old friend. Maybe that’s what she did. Do you have her registered under the name of Porterfield?”

  Maria took a deep breath and nodded. “I’ll check.”

  She typed the name into her system. Almost instantly a big smile lit her face from lips to eyes. She was really a beautiful girl. Natural beauty not supplied by the surgeons at El Megor Clinic.

  Maria pulled a small square of notepaper from a cubbyhole and wrote “S. R. Porterfield” and the suite number on it. Otto took the note and thanked her profusely. She didn’t dare request a room key.

  “I’m glad to help,” Maria said because she truly was. She gave directions to the elevators, and Otto walked toward them, turning left at the first corner.

  Gaspar joined her at the elevator. His hands hung in his pockets. “Where are we going?”

  “Suite 706.”

  “Is she up there alone?” Gaspar asked.

  Otto replied, “Let’s find out.”

  CHAPTER 41

  Saturday, February 12

  9:45 p.m.

  Guadalajara, Mexico

  Otto tapped her foot as the elevator lifted ever so slowly to the seventh floor. The doors opened at a pace only a snail would love. They exited into a wide, tiled corridor leading left and right of the elevator.

  Like any good hotel, the suite numbers were posted with arrows directing visitors. Suite 706 was on the left about halfway down the hallway.

  They walked side-by-side. Gaspar unbuttoned his jacket.

  “You think you’re going to need your weapon?” she asked.

  “Rose knows her way around a gun. Jane does, too, probably. They both grew up in Wyoming. If they’re armed, we need to be prepared, even if Reacher’s not in there with them,” he replied. “Better safe than sorry.”

  Otto nodded and unbuttoned her jacket as well. When they reached Suite 706, Gaspar stood to one side. She pressed the doorbell and waited on the other side of the door.

  After two full minutes, she raised her hand to push the bell again.

  “Just a moment,” a female voice said.

  Otto heard the deadbolt slide. The handle turned, and the door opened.

  Jane Mackenzie stood on the other side dressed in the same expensive casual style Otto had seen in all the customs videos. Even without makeup, she was startlingly beautiful.

  She was maybe five-two and a hundred pounds, which made her slightly taller and heavier than Otto. Her long, thick hair was heaped and wild and tangled. The color would have been called strawberry blonde if she’d bought it at the drugstore, which Otto was fairly certain she didn’t. Pale, perfect skin over delicate, superb bones, as if every minuscule imperfection had been airbrushed.

  She might have been expecting a visitor, but she was surprised to see Otto and Gaspar standing across the threshold. Her eyes were startlingly green but guarded, even as her pupils dilated in surprise. Radiant but composed. And puzzled.

  Otto pulled out her badge wallet and showed her ID. “I’m FBI Special Agent Otto, and this is my partner, Carlos
Gaspar. May we come in, Mrs. Mackenzie?”

  “What’s this about?” she asked, still blocking the entrance.

  Otto replied, “It’s complicated. We need to talk with you and your sister.”

  “Rose? Why?”

  “You really don’t want to discuss this out here in the hallway, do you?” Gaspar said. “Let’s go inside.”

  Jane finally decided to let them walk through. She closed the door behind them.

  “Rose is sleeping. She had surgery ten days ago, and she’s tired a lot,” she said. She led the way to a small sitting room and gestured them into chairs while she perched on the loveseat across. “Tell me why you’re here. Is it Rex? Has something happened?”

  “You and your sister have been reported missing,” Otto said. “Your husband doesn’t know where you are.”

  “With any luck, we can keep it that way.” A second voice, eerily the same tone, and timbre as Jane’s, replied from the bedroom doorway. Rose walked into the room and joined her sister on the loveseat.

  Other than her voice, nothing about Rose was identical to Jane. She was dressed in pajamas, a robe, and slippers. Her hair was pulled back into a low ponytail. Her green eyes were dull and listless. Her face looked like it had been scrubbed hard with an abrasive cleanser. Several layers of her skin had been debrided. Faint scars, probably from prior surgeries, were still visible.

  “It’s impolite to stare,” she said.

  “Yes, of course. I’m sorry,” Otto replied. She cleared her throat. “I’ve met Rex Mackenzie. I can’t say I blame you for leaving him.”

  “Rex Mackenzie’s a son of a bitch,” Rose replied. “He can live with his mistress in his mansion and leave us the hell alone.”

  Otto nodded.

  Gaspar said, “You mean Brooke Bavolsky, I assume?”

  “Yes.” Jane shuddered. Her magnificent green eyes clouded. Her chin quivered as if she might cry.

  Rose placed her hand over Jane’s and squeezed reassuringly. Then she cleared her throat again.

  Jane said, “I’ll get you some water.”

  When she left the room, Rose took the chance to speak quietly. “Jane married Rex while I was deployed. She seemed happy with him initially and he was good to her at first. By the time I moved in there, he was far from the kind of man I wanted my sister to be married to.”

  “In what way?”

  Rose took a breath. “You have no jurisdiction here. You can’t arrest me or return me to the States. Is that what you’ve come for?”

  “No,” Otto said. Rose was right. There was nothing they could do without miles of red tape and clearing mountains of bureaucracy.

  Rose nodded and said, “The same goes for Jane. There’s nothing you can do to her, either.”

  Gaspar replied, “It would be a lot of work, but we could probably manage to get you back to the States if we wanted to. You explain your side of things and then we’ll make a decision.”

  Rose looked pointedly at Gaspar’s West Point ring. She said, “I have one of those.”

  He nodded. “I know.”

  She paused another few moments before she said, “You know I was seriously wounded in combat. When I came home, I was a mess. You’ve probably seen the files, so you know. Jane found me. She picked me up, dusted me off, and took care of me until I was almost as good as new.”

  “Almost?” Gaspar said.

  “Everything functioned again. Doctors cleared up my infections. For a while, I was addicted to opioid painkillers, but I got clear of that, too.” Rose paused for a steadying breath. “But I was horribly disfigured. From my injuries. And scars. I needed expensive, complicated plastic surgery on my face if I had any hope of living a normal life. I’ll never be as beautiful as Jane again, but doctors promised I can look like a woman instead of a monster.”

  Otto began a gentle protest, but Rose held a palm flat out to stop her. “The VA couldn’t do the job and I couldn’t pay for those expensive Beverly Hills surgeons.”

  “So you came here,” Otto said.

  Rose nodded. “Eventually, after a lot of research, yes. By that point, Rex and Jane were barely speaking to each other. Jane was determined to help me pay for medical care and she didn’t want to ask Rex for money.”

  “They were married. She’d be entitled to half their marital assets if they divorced. The money was hers,” Otto said.

  “That’s what she decided. Over a period of months, she liquidated some assets and withdrew funds from accounts she thought he might not notice. And we searched for the right place to go,” she said.

  “Didn’t Rex ask about all that traveling you two were doing?” Gaspar asked. “Wasn’t he at least curious? Or even suspicious?”

  Rose shrugged. “By that point, I don’t think he cared where Jane went or why. He just wanted her out of the way. He had bigger problems.”

  “What kind of problems?” Otto asked.

  She took a deep breath. “We don’t know the full extent of it. We found out that Rex was involved with a Chicago crime ring. His girlfriend? Brooke? She’s married to the head of the Polish mob. They call him Big Mike Bavolsky.”

  Gaspar nodded but said nothing.

  Rose continued, angrily. “Turns out Rex had been laundering money for Bavolsky for years. He was skimming money, too. That’s how he could afford that mansion. It was only a matter of time until Big Mike found out. Rex was a walking dead man. I didn’t want Jane caught in the middle of all that.”

  “Okay.” Otto shook her head. “But something happened, didn’t it?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Why did you leave now? Why not last month or next year?” Otto asked.

  Rose narrowed her eyes and gazed steadily at Otto for a full minute. “Rex is a mean bastard. He was acting like a cornered animal. He must have known Big Mike was coming after him.”

  “He had to have been expecting that?”

  Rose took another deep breath and exhaled loudly. “I mentioned I had been addicted to opioids for a while, right? When I weaned off, I had a stockpile. Rex stole them. He must have thought he could barter with Bavolsky.”

  Gaspar said, “And that didn’t work?”

  She shook her head slowly. “You probably know there’s a big investigation going on in Chicagoland. Somebody put a tap on Rex’s phones. They must’ve heard him talking with Bavolsky about the drugs. He must have told Bavolsky the drugs were mine.”

  Otto said, “Which means your name is now a part of the investigation.”

  “I’ve got friends. I was told that both Jane and I were going to be indicted. They hoped to pressure us into testifying against Rex. They want to use Rex to put Big Mike and his crew away forever.” She paused and looked directly from Otto to Gaspar. “Jane didn’t deserve any of that. All she did was marry a scumbag and help her sister. I couldn’t let her go to prison, could I? No way.”

  “So you packed up and slipped away when Rex couldn’t stop you.”

  “Not that he’d have wanted to stop us. He stole my drugs. That should get him out of the hole with Bavolsky. He doesn’t want Jane, either. He’s a fool. He can live happily ever after with little Miss Brooke,” she sneered.

  “Except he won’t be able to do that,” Gaspar said.

  “Why not? Jane’s out of his way, and she’s never going back there.” Rose jutted her chin defiantly.

  “Because Brooke Bavolsky was murdered on Friday afternoon,” Gaspar replied. “In Rex Mackenzie’s house. Which I’m guessing Big Mike isn’t going to be all that happy about.”

  Jane came in from the kitchenette. If she heard any of their conversation, she gave no indication.

  Otto looked up. “You’ve been gone a long time. Was someone else back there with you?”

  Rose shook her head. “We had a visitor earlier. He left about half an hour ago.”

  “Why?” Gaspar asked.

  Jane said, “He gets uneasy. He likes to move around.”

  Otto asked, “Was your visitor Jack
Reacher?”

  Jane said, “You know Reacher?”

  “Where did he go?” Gaspar asked.

  In the haughtiest of tones, Rose replied, “What possible business of yours could that be?”

  CHAPTER 42

  Saturday, February 12

  10:30 p.m.

  Guadalajara, Mexico

  The jet Scorpio hired touched down at the airport in Guadalajara without incident, after a long and grueling day of travel. The moment he set foot on the tarmac at the base of the jet stairs, the weight and pressures were left behind. He was both exhausted and energized. He felt like slapping Thorn a high five, but he settled for a big grin instead.

  The warm night breeze bathed his skin comfortably. He had managed to sleep a couple of hours. He needed a shower and a meal. After that, he’d be ready to face the future. He took a deep breath of free air, perhaps the first freedom he’d breathed in many years.

  He already felt more comfortable here than in Rapid City, and he’d lived there for a decade. Guadalajara was going to be his home for the rest of his life. Perfect.

  Thorn collected the bags and they walked into the terminal, which was busier than he had expected so late in the evening. Guadalajara had a significant population and quite a bit of tourism. Everything in the airport was open and crowded.

  “Do you want to eat here or wait until we arrive at the hotel?” Thorn asked, standing near a busy restaurant entrance.

  Diners lined up at the door. All the tables were full, both inside and outside. Others were crowded around the bar waiting.

  “If we leave now, we’ll reach the hotel in about twenty minutes. We can get room service, or find a restaurant nearby,” Scorpio replied.

  “Ten-four, boss. Ground transportation is this way.” Thorn inclined his head toward the exit. He waited for Scorpio to walk in front.

  Scorpio moved slowly under the best of circumstances, but he quickened his pace. As they stepped onto the escalator to ride down to the ground floor, two men caught his attention. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and opened them again for a better look.