by Child, Lee
“MO?”
“Exactly identical to the first two.”
“Evidence?”
“Not a damn thing, so far. They’re still looking, but I’m not optimistic.”
Reacher was focusing on the picture of the hallway. It was a long narrow space leading past the mouth of the living room, back to the bedrooms. On the left was a narrow shelf at waist height, crowded with tiny cactus plants in tiny terra-cotta pots. On the right were more narrow shelves, fixed to the wall at random heights and in random lengths. They were packed with small china ornaments. Most of them looked like dolls, brightly painted to represent national or regional costumes. The sort of things a person buys when she’s dreaming of having a home of her own.
“What did the cleaner do?” he asked.
Blake looked all the way down the table. “Screamed a bit, I guess, and then called the cops.”
“No, before that. She has her own key?”
“Obviously.”
“Did she go straight to the bathroom?”
Blake looked blank and opened a file. Leafed through it and found a faxed copy of an interview report. “Yes, she did. She puts stuff in the toilet bowl, leaves it to work while she does the rest of the house, comes back to it last.”
“So she found the body right away, before she did any cleaning?”
Blake nodded.
“OK,” Reacher said.
“OK what?”
“How wide is that hallway?”
Blake turned and examined the picture. “Three feet? It’s a small house.”
Reacher nodded. “OK.”
“OK what?”
“Where’s the violence? Where’s the anger? She answers the door, this guy somehow forces her back through the hallway, through the master bedroom, into the bathroom, and then carries thirty gallons of paint through after her, and he doesn’t knock anything off those shelves.”
“So?”
Reacher shrugged. “Seems awful quiet to me. I couldn’t wrestle somebody down that hallway without touching all that stuff. No way. Neither could you.”
Blake shook his head. “He doesn’t do any wrestling. Medical reports show the women probably aren’t touched at all. It’s a quiet scene, because there is no violence.”
“You happy with that? Profile-wise? An angry soldier looking for retribution and punishment, but there’s no uproar?”
“He kills them, Reacher. The way I see it, that’s retribution enough.”
There was silence. Reacher shrugged again. “Whatever. ”
Blake faced him down the length of the table. “You’d do it differently?”
“Sure I would. Suppose you keep on pissing me off and I come after you. I don’t see myself being especially gentle about it. I’d probably smack you around a little. Maybe a lot. If I was mad with you, I’d have to, right? That’s what being mad is all about.”
“So?”
“And what about the paint? How does he bring it to the house? We should go to the store and check out what thirty gallons looks like. He must have a car parked outside for twenty, thirty minutes at least. How does nobody see it? A parked car, or a wagon, or a truck?”
“Or a sport-utility, rather like yours.”
“Maybe totally identical to mine. But how come nobody sees it?”
“We don’t know,” Blake said.
“How does he kill them without leaving any marks?”
“We don’t know.”
“That’s a lot you don’t know, right?”
Blake nodded. “Yes, it is, smart guy. But we’re working on it. We’ve got eighteen days. And with a genius like you helping us, I’m sure that’s all we’re going to need.”
“You’ve got eighteen days if he sticks to his interval, ” Reacher said. “Suppose he doesn’t?”
“He will.”
“You hope.”
Silence again. Blake looked at the table, and then at Lamarr. “Julia?”
“I stand by my profile,” she said. “Right now I’m interested in Special Forces. They’re stood down one week in three. I’m sending Reacher to poke around.”
Blake nodded, reassured. “OK, where?”
Lamarr glanced at Reacher, waiting. He looked at the three black flags on the map.
“Geography is all over the place,” he said. “This guy could be stationed anywhere in the United States.”
“So?”
“So Fort Dix would be the best place to start. There’s a guy I know there.”
“Who?”
“A guy called John Trent,” Reacher said. “He’s a colonel. If anybody’s going to help me, he might.”
“Fort Dix?” Blake said. “That’s in New Jersey, right?”
“It was last time I was there,” Reacher said.
“OK, smart guy,” Blake said. “We’ll call this Colonel Trent, get it set up.”
Reacher nodded. “Make sure you mention my name loud and often. He won’t be very interested unless you do.”
Blake nodded. “That’s exactly why we brought you on board. You’ll leave with Harper, first thing in the morning.”
Reacher nodded, and looked straight at Lorraine Stanley’s pretty face.
YES , MAYBE IT’S time to throw them a curve. Maybe tighten the interval, just a little bit. Maybe tighten it a lot. Maybe cancel it altogether. That would really unsettle them. That would show them how little they know. Keep everything else the same, but alter the interval. Make it all a little unpredictable. How about it? You need to think.
Or maybe let a little of the anger show, too. Because anger is what this is about, right? Anger, and justice. Maybe it’s time to make that a little clearer, a little more obvious. Maybe it’s time to take the gloves off. A little violence never hurt anybody. And a little violence could make the next one a little more interesting. Maybe a lot more interesting. You need to think about that, too.
So what’s it to be? A shorter interval? Or more drama at the scene? Or both? How about both? Think, think, think.
LISA HARPER TOOK Reacher up to ground level and outside into the chill air just after six in the evening. She led him down an immaculate concrete walkway toward the next building in line. There were knee-high lights set on both sides of the path, a yard apart, already turned on against the gloom of evening. Harper walked with an exaggerated long stride. Reacher wasn’t sure if she was trying to match his, or if it was something she’d learned in deportment class. Whatever, it made her look pretty good. He found himself wondering what she’d look like if she was running. Or lying down, with nothing on.
“Cafeteria’s in here,” she said.
She was ahead of him at another double set of glass doors. She pulled one open and waited until he went inside in front of her.
“To the left,” she said.
There was a long corridor with the clattering sound and the vegetable smell of a communal dining room at the end of it. He walked ahead of her. It was warm inside the building. He could sense her at his shoulder.
“OK, help yourself,” she said. “Bureau’s paying.”
The cafeteria was a big double-height room, brightly lit, with molded-plywood chairs at plain tables. There was a service counter along one side. A line of personnel, waiting with trays in their hands. Big groups of trainees in dark blue sweats, separated by senior agents in suits standing in ones and twos. Reacher joined the end of the line, with Harper at his side.
The line shuffled up and he was served a filet mignon the size of a paperback book by a cheerful Spanish guy with ID around his neck. He moved on and got vegetables and fries from the next server in line. He filled a cup with coffee from an urn. He took silverware and a napkin and looked around for a table.
“By the window,” Harper said.
She led him to a table for four, standing empty by the glass. The bright light in the room made it full dark outside. She put her tray on the table and took her jacket off. Draped it on the back of her chair. She wasn’t thin, but her height made her very s
lender. Her shirt was fine cotton, and she wore nothing underneath it. That was pretty clear. She undid her cuffs and rolled her sleeves to the elbow, one by one. Her forearms were smooth and brown.
“Nice tan,” Reacher said.
She sighed.
"FAQs again?” she said. “Yes, it’s all over, and no, I don’t especially want to prove it.”
He smiled.
“Just making conversation,” he said.
She looked straight at him.
“I’ll talk about the case,” she said. “If you want conversation. ”
“I don’t know much about the case. Do you?”
She nodded. “I know I want this guy caught. Those women were pretty brave, making a stand like that.”
“Sounds like the voice of experience.”
He cut into his steak and tasted it. It was pretty good. He’d paid forty bucks for worse in city restaurants.
“It’s the voice of cowardice,” she said. “I haven’t made a stand. Not yet anyway.”
“You getting harassed?”
She smiled. “Are you kidding?” Then she blushed. “I mean, can I say that without sounding big-headed or anything?”
He smiled back. “Yes, in your case I think you can.”
“It’s nothing real serious,” she said. “Just talk, you know, just comments. Loaded questions, and innuendo. Nobody’s said I should sleep with them to get promotion or anything. But it still gets to me. That’s why I dress like this now. I’m trying to make the point, you know, I’m just the same as them, really.”
He smiled again. “But it’s gotten worse, right?”
She nodded, “Right. Much worse.”
He made no reply.
“I don’t know why,” she said.
He looked at her over the rim of his cup. Egyptian cotton button-down, pure white, maybe a thirteen-inch collar, a blue tie knotted neatly in place and rising gently over her small mobile breasts, men’s trousers with big darts taken out of them to curve in around her tiny waist. Tanned face, white teeth, great cheekbones, blue eyes, the long blond hair.
“Is there a camera in my room?” he asked.
“A what?”
“A camera,” he said again. “You know, video surveillance. ”
“Why?”
“I’m just wondering if this is a backup plan. In case Petrosian doesn’t pan out.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why isn’t Poulton looking after me? He doesn’t seem to have much else to do.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Yes you do. That’s why Blake assigned you, right? So you could get real close to me? All this vulnerable little-girl-lost stuff? I don’t know why? So maybe if Blake wants to stop banging on about Petrosian, he’s got something else to twist my arm with, like a nice intimate little scene, you and me in my room, on a nice little videocassette he can say he’ll send to Jodie.”
She blushed. “I wouldn’t do a thing like that.”
“But he asked you to, right?”
She was quiet for a long time. Reacher looked away and drained his coffee, staring at his own reflection in the glass.
“He practically challenged me to try,” he said. “Told me you’re the bitch from hell, if anybody puts the moves on.”
She was still silent.
“But I wouldn’t fall for it, anyway,” he said. “Because I’m not stupid. I’m not about to give them any more ammunition.”
She was quiet another minute. Then she looked at him and smiled.
“So can we relax?” she said. “Get past it?”
He nodded. “Sure, let’s relax. Let’s get past it. You can put your jacket back on now. You can stop showing me your breasts.”
She blushed again. “I took it off because I was warm. No other reason.”
“OK, I’m not complaining.”
He turned away again and watched the dark through the window.
“You want dessert?” she asked.
He turned back and nodded. “And more coffee.”
“You stay here. I’ll get it.”
She walked back to the serving counter. The room seemed to fall silent. Every eye was on her. She came back with a tray bearing two ice cream sundaes and two cups of coffee. A hundred people watched her all the way.
“I apologize,” Reacher said.
She bent and slid the tray onto the table. “For what?”
He shrugged. “For looking at you the way I’ve been looking at you, I guess. You must be sick of it. Everybody looking at you all the time.”
She smiled. “Look at me as much as you like, and I’ll look at you right back, because you aren’t the ugliest thing I ever saw either. But that’s as far as it’s going to go, OK?”
He smiled back. “Deal.”
The ice cream was excellent. It had hot fudge sauce all over it. The coffee was strong. If he narrowed his eyes and cut out the rest of the room, he could rate this place about as highly as he had rated Mostro’s.
“What do people do here in the evenings?” he asked.
“Mostly they go home,” Harper said. “But not you. You go back to your room. Blake’s orders.”
“We’re following Blake’s orders now?”
She smiled. “Some of them.”
He nodded. “OK, so let’s go.”
SHE LEFT HIM on the side of the door without the handle. He stood there and heard her footsteps recede across the carpet outside. Then the thump of the elevator door. Then the whine of the car going down. Then the floor fell silent. He walked to the nightstand and dialed Jodie’s apartment. The machine cut in. He dialed her office. No answer. He tried her mobile. It was not in service.
He walked to the bathroom. Somebody had supplemented his toothbrush with a tube of toothpaste and a disposable razor and a can of shaving cream. There was a bottle of shampoo on the rim of the tub. There was soap in the dish. Fluffy white towels on the rack. He stripped and hung his clothes on the back of the door. Set the shower to hot and stepped under the water.
He stood there for ten minutes and then shut it off. Toweled himself dry. Walked naked to the window and pulled the drapes. Lay down on the bed and scanned the ceiling. He found the camera. The lens was a black tube the diameter of a nickel, wedged deep in a crack in the molding where the wall met the ceiling. He turned back to the phone. Dialed all the same numbers again. Her apartment. He got the machine. Her office. No reply. Her mobile. Switched off.
10
HE SLEPT BADLY and woke himself up before six in the morning and rolled toward the nightstand. Flicked on the bedside light and checked the exact time on his watch. He was cold. He had been cold all night. The sheets were starched, and the shiny surfaces pulled heat away from his skin.
He reached for the phone and dialed Jodie’s apartment. He got the machine. No answer in her office. Her mobile was switched off. He held the phone to his ear for a long time, listening to her cellular company telling him so, over and over again. Then he hung up and rolled out of bed.
He walked to the window and pulled the drapes open. The view faced west and it was still dark night outside. Maybe there was a sunrise behind him on the other side of the building. Maybe it hadn’t happened yet. He could hear the distant sound of hard rain on dying leaves. He turned his back on it and walked to the bathroom.
He used the toilet and shaved slowly. Spent fifteen minutes in the shower with the water as hot as he could stand it, getting warm. Then he washed his hair with the FBI’s shampoo and toweled it dry. Carried his clothes out of the steam and dressed standing by the bed. Buttoned his shirt and hung his ID around his neck. He figured room service was unlikely, so he just sat down to wait.
He waited forty-five minutes. There was a polite knock at the door, followed by the sound of a key going into the lock. Then the door opened and Lisa Harper was standing there, backlit by the brightness of the corridor. She was smiling, mischievously. He had no idea why.
“Good morning,” she said.
He
raised his hand in reply. Said nothing. She was in a different suit. This one was charcoal gray, with a white shirt and a dark red tie. An exact parody of the unofficial Bureau uniform, but a whole lot of cloth had been cut out of it to make it fit. Her hair was loose. There was a wave in it, and it hung front and back of her shoulders, very long. It looked golden in the light from the corridor.
“We’ve got to go,” she said. “Breakfast meeting.”
He took his coat from the closet as he passed. They rode down to the lobby together and paused at the doors. It was raining hard outside. He pulled his collar up and followed her out. The light had changed from black to gray. The rain was cold. She sprinted down the walkway, and he followed a pace behind, watching her run. She looked pretty good doing it.
Lamarr and Blake and Poulton were waiting for them in the cafeteria. They were in three of five chairs crowded around a four-place table by the window. They were watching him carefully as he approached. There was a white coffee jug in the center of the table, surrounded by upside-down mugs. A basket of sugar packets and little pots of cream. A pile of spoons. Napkins. A basket of doughnuts. A pile of morning newspapers. Harper took a chair and he squeezed in next to her. Lamarr was watching him, something in her eyes. Poulton looked away. Blake looked amused, in a sardonic kind of a way.
“Ready to go to work?” he asked.
Reacher nodded. “Sure, after I’ve had some coffee.”
Poulton turned the mugs over and Harper poured.
“We called Fort Dix last night,” Blake said. “Spoke with Colonel Trent. He said he’ll give you all day today. ”
“That should do it.”
“He seems to like you.”
“No, he owes me, which is different.”
Lamarr nodded. “Good. You need to exploit that. You know what you’re looking for, right? Concentrate on the dates. Find somebody whose stand-down weeks match. My guess is he’s doing it late in the week. Maybe not exactly the last day, because he’s got to get back to base and calm down afterward.”
Reacher smiled. “Great deduction, Lamarr. You get paid for this?”
She just looked at him and smiled back, like she knew something he didn’t.