by Lee Child
The pale guy was at the back table on Reacher’s left. The same as before. Luminescent in the gloom. Glittering hair. Thick white wrists, big white hands, a thick black ledger. The same black suit, the same white shirt, the same black silk necktie. The same tattoo.
Abby stepped in the street door. She stood still as it closed behind her. Performance art. Every eye was on her. She was softly backlit by the dull neon in the windows. Petite and gamine, neat and slender, dressed all in black. Short dark hair, lively dark eyes. A shy but contagious smile. A stranger, dropping by, hoping for a welcome.
She didn’t get one. All five customers looked away. But the barman didn’t. Neither did the pale guy. She set out walking and they watched her all the way.
Reacher took a step. He was six feet behind the pale guy, and six feet to the side, no doubt in the corner of his eye, but hopefully Abby was filling all of it. She kept on coming, and he took another step.
The barman called out, “Hey.”
He had been in the corner of the barman’s eye, too. Six feet behind, six feet to the side. All kinds of things happened next. Like a complex ballet. Like a triple play in baseball. The pale guy glanced back, started to get up, Reacher stepped away, toward the bar, where he grabbed the barman’s fat head in both hands, and jumped up and thrust it down and smashed it on the mahogany, like dunking a basketball from way high in the air, and he used the bounce of his landing to pivot back to the pale guy, one step, two, and he hit him with a colossal straight right, all his moving mass behind it, center of the guy’s face as he rose up from his chair, and the guy disappeared backward like he had been shot out of a cannon. He slid and sprawled on the floor, flat on his back, blood coming out of his nose and his mouth.
All five customers got up and hurried out the door. Maybe a traditional local response, in such situations. In which case Reacher applauded the habit. It left no witnesses. There were blood and teeth on the bar top, but the barman himself had fallen backward out of sight.
“I guess he didn’t watch me all the way,” Abby said.
“I told you,” Reacher said. “He’s an asshole.”
They crouched next to the pale guy and took his gun and his phone and his car key and what looked like about eight thousand dollars from his pockets. His nose was badly busted. He was breathing through his mouth. Flecks of blood were bubbling at the corners of his lips. Reacher remembered him tapping his glittering head with his bone-white finger. Some kind of a threatening implication. He thought, how the mighty are fallen.
He said, “Yes or no?”
Abby was quiet a beat.
Then she said, “Yes.”
Reacher clamped his palm over the guy’s mouth. Hard to keep it there, because it was slippery with blood. But he prevailed. The guy wasted time scrabbling for his pocket, looking for his gun, which was no longer there, and then he wasted the rest of his life drumming his heels and clawing uselessly at Reacher’s wrist. Eventually he went limp, and then still.
* * *
—
They took the pale guy’s Lincoln, because its trunk was empty. It rode much better. They drove downtown and parked on a hydrant around a corner from the Shevicks’ hotel. Abby checked the new phone. No new texts. Nothing since the conspiracy theory from Gregory.
“Was it from his own number?” Reacher asked.
Abby compared it with previous texts.
“I guess,” she said. “It isn’t the usual number.”
“We should call him again. Keep him updated.”
Abby dabbed a shortcut from the text screen and put the phone on speaker. They heard it ring. They heard it answered. Gregory said a word, short and urgent, probably not hello. Probably shoot, or yes, or what.
“Speak English,” Reacher said.
“You.”
“You just lost two more. I’m coming for you, Gregory.”
“Who are you?”
“Not from Kiev.”
“Then from where?”
“The 110th Special MP.”
“What is that?”
“You’ll find out, pretty soon.”
“What do you want from me?”
“You made a mistake.”
“What mistake?”
“You crossed a line. So get ready. Payback time is here.”
“You’re American.”
“As apple pie.”
Gregory paused a long moment. No doubt thinking. No doubt about his wide network of bribes paid, and palms greased, and backs scratched, and favors owed, and hair-trigger early warning tripwires carefully set in place. Any or all of which should have alerted him long ago. But he had heard nothing. From anywhere.
“You’re not a cop,” he said. “You’re not a government man. You’re on your own. Aren’t you?”
“Which I’m sure will make it all the harder for you to take, when your organization is in ruins, and all your men are dead, except for you, because you’re the last one alive, and then I step in through the door.”
“You won’t get near me.”
“How am I doing so far?”
No answer.
“Get ready,” Reacher said. “I’m coming for you.”
Then he clicked off the call and threw the phone out the window. They drove on, around the corner, and they parked in a ten-minute bay outside the Shevicks’ hotel.
Chapter 42
Reacher and Abby rode the elevator up to the Shevicks’ floor, which was low to medium by New York or Chicago standards, but by local standards it was probably the highest point for a hundred miles around. They found the right door. Maria Shevick looked at them through the peephole, and let them in. The room was a suite. It had a separate living room. It was bright and fresh and new and clean. There were two huge floor to ceiling windows, set at a right angle in the corner. It was early afternoon and the sun was high and the air was clear. The view was spectacular. The city lay spread out below. Like the hotel map Reacher had studied, now come to life.
Abby unveiled the money. The banded ten grand from the charnel house in back of the lumber yard, and close to eight from the moneylending bar. So much it thumped and bounced on the table, and some of it fluttered to the floor. The Shevicks practically laughed with joy. Today’s problem solved. Aaron decided he would pay it in at the bank, and then send a wire to the hospital in the normal businesslike way. A last shred of dignity. Abby offered to walk with him, to the downtown branch. Just for the company. No other reason. No need for one. By that point Aaron was walking much better, and east of Center was now safe as houses. So just for fun. They left together, and Reacher went back to the windows. Back to the view. Maria sat on a narrow sofa behind him.
She said, “Do you have children?”
“I don’t think so,” Reacher said. “None that I know of, anyway.”
He was looking at the city below him. The fat part of the pear shape. The corner windows showed him the whole of the northwest quadrant. From about nine on a clock face, to twelve. He could see Center Street more or less directly below. Close by beyond it, to his half left, were two office towers and another high-rise hotel. They looked brand new. They speared bravely upward from a uniform and spreading carpet of three- and four-story buildings, mostly old, mostly brick, mostly dowdy. They had flat roofs, patched and painted silver. Most had air conditioning units sitting on angle-iron frames. There were metal exhaust chimneys coming up from restaurant kitchens, and satellite dishes the size of trampolines, and parking garages with open top decks. The streets were narrow, in some places choked with traffic, in others empty and quiet. There were tiny people walking, turning left, turning right, going in and coming out of doorways. The vista continued into the hazy distance.
Could be any basement in town, Vantresca had said.
Maria asked, “Are you married?”
“No,” Reacher s
aid.
“Don’t you want to be?”
“The decision is only fifty percent mine,” he said. “I guess that would explain it.”
He turned back and looked at the view. Like he had looked at the map. Where would a competent commander hide a secret satellite operation? What kind of place? Security, accommodations, power, internet, isolation, easy supply and resupply. He looked for possibilities. The carpet of small brown buildings. The winking roofs. The traffic.
“Abby likes you,” Maria said.
“Maybe,” Reacher said.
“You don’t want to admit it?”
“I agree she’s putting in some hard time here. I assume there’s a reason.”
“You don’t think you’re it?”
Reacher smiled.
He said, “What are you, my mother?”
No answer. Reacher kept on looking. As always the answer depended. If the southwest quadrant was the same as the northwest, then there were either fewer than ten or more than a hundred possible places. It depended on standards. It depended on what part of security, accommodations, power, internet, isolation, and easy supply a person didn’t understand.
He said, “What’s the news on Meg?”
She said, “The mood is still good. The scan tomorrow should confirm it. Everyone thinks so. Personally I feel like we’re gambling. Surely now this has to be it. It’s either a huge, huge win, or it’s a devastating loss.”
“I would take those odds. Win or lose. I like the simplicity.”
“It’s brutal.”
“Only if you lose.”
“Do you always win?”
“So far.”
“How can you?”
“I can’t,” Reacher said. “I can’t always win. One day I’m going to lose. I know that. But not today. I know that, too.”
“I wish you were a doctor.”
“I don’t even have a postgraduate degree.”
She paused a beat, and said, “You told me you could find him.”
“I will,” Reacher said. “Today. Before the close of business.”
* * *
—
They all met back at Frank Barton’s house, deep in what used to be Albanian territory. There was still smoke in the sky, from the lumber yard fire. Barton and Hogan were back from their gig, and Vantresca was hanging out, and Reacher and Abby were fresh from their visit with the Shevicks. They all crowded in the front parlor. Once again it was full of gear. It couldn’t stay in the van. It would get stolen.
Hogan said, “The key to this thing is first you got to figure out are you second-guessing a smart guy, or a really smart guy, or a genius? Because that’s three different locations, right there.”
“Gregory seems smart enough,” Reacher said. “I’m sure he has a certain degree of rat-like cunning. But I doubt that this was his decision. Not if it was an official contract, worth tens of millions of dollars, with the government of a foreign country. I would guess that’s pretty much a seller’s market. I bet there were all kinds of clauses and conditions and inspections and approvals. Moscow would have wanted the very best. And they ain’t dumb over there. They know a bad idea when they see one. So in terms of location, I suggest we start second-guessing at the genius level.”
Vantresca said, “Security, accommodations, power, internet, isolation, ease of supply.”
“Start at the end,” Reacher said. “Ease of supply. How many blocks from their office is easy?”
“More about what kind of block,” Hogan said. “I would guess the whole of downtown. The business district. Anywhere with commercial zoning. Weird things come and go all the time. No one pays attention. Not like in a residential neighborhood. I would say the edge of downtown is the natural limit. West of Center Street.”
“That’s not isolated,” Barton said. “It’s right in the hustle and the bustle.”
“It’s like hiding in plain sight. Maybe not physically isolated, but very anonymous, all the same. There are all kinds of comings and goings, and no one sees a thing. No one knows anyone else’s name.”
Reacher asked, “What do they need for the internet?”
Vantresca said, “A mechanically robust connection to a cable ISP or a satellite, probably the satellite, because it would be harder to trace.”
“There are plenty of satellite dishes in town.”
“Lots of people use them.”
“What do they need for power?”
“A recent installation, up to code, with excess capacity as a safety margin, and automatic generator back-up in case of an outage on the grid. They can’t afford interruptions. Might screw up their gear.”
“What about accommodations?”
“Bedrooms, bathrooms, a mess hall, maybe a TV room, maybe a rec room. Table tennis, or something.”
“Sounds like federal prison.”
“I think windows,” Abby said. “Not a basement. This could be a long contract. Trulenko is a superstar. Maybe down on his luck right now, but even so, he has standards. He’ll want to live close to normal. He’ll demand it.”
“OK, windows,” Reacher said. “Which brings us to security.”
“Iron bars on the windows,” Barton said.
“Or anonymity,” Hogan said. “There are a million windows. Sometimes the lights are on, sometimes they’re off. No one cares.”
Vantresca said, “They need a single controllable point of entry, probably with an advance screen some way upstream, and a last-chance back-up a little ways downstream. Maybe you have to come in through a basement, and then go up the back stairs. Something like that. Under scrutiny all the way. Like passing through a long tunnel. Metaphorically, if not literally.”
“So where?”
“There are a thousand buildings like that. You’ve seen them.”
“I don’t like them,” Reacher said. “Because they’re all joined together. Because of the Navy SEALs. Hogan laid it all out, back at the beginning. They would look for emergency exits, and delivery bays, and ventilation shafts and water pipes and sewers and so on, but most of all they would look for places where they could gain access by demolishing walls between adjacent structures. You know how that goes down. They wake up some old geezer in the city plans department, and he finds a dusty old blueprint, that shows this guy’s cellar connects to that guy’s cellar, except some other guy bricked it up in 1920, but only single skin, and poor quality mortar. You could breathe on it and it would fall down. Or they could come in sideways, through a first-floor wall. Or window. Or the top floor. Or they could rappel off the roof. Don’t forget, the Moscow government made this decision. It was big business. Maybe the contract would run for years. Therefore they wanted exactly the right location. Which they are more than qualified to judge. They know all our tricks. They know our special forces train all the time in urban environments exactly like this one.”
“But out of town is not easy to supply. Impossible to have both at once.”
“No such thing as impossible. Merely a failure of planning. I think they got what they wanted. Very close at hand, so it’s no problem to drop by with a cup of sugar. But also seriously isolated. Potentially hundreds of feet from the nearest other person. Rock solid infrastructure in terms of wires and cables and automatic generators and mechanically robust connections. Luxurious accommodations flooded with sunshine and natural daylight. Categorically impossible to penetrate from the sides. Or even approach. Or from below. Or from above. Zero significant penetration by water pipes or ventilation shafts. A single controllable entry, plenty of opportunity for upstream early warning, and as many defensive back-ups as they want. I think Moscow specified the place of their dreams, and I think they found it.”
“Where?” Abby said.
“I was looking right at it, through the hotel window. With Maria Shevick. When she asked me if I w
anted to get married.”
“To her?”
“I think generically.”
“What did you say?”
“I said it takes two to tango.”
“Where is Trulenko?”
“It’s a nest, not a hive or a burrow. It’s up in the air. They rented three high floors in one of those new office towers. There are two of them west of Center. They use the top and bottom floors as buffer zones, and they live and work on the middle floor. Can’t get to them up or down or side to side.”
Chapter 43
They discussed the dealbreakers, one by one. Security, accommodations, power, internet, isolation, ease of supply. Three high floors in a brand new downtown office tower met every objection. The elevators could be reprogrammed. No problem for Trulenko. Only one car would be allowed to stop. The other doors could be welded shut. From the outside. Likewise the stairwell doors. The lone functioning elevator could open into a cage. Maybe hurricane fencing, installed inside the hallway. Some kind of padlocked gate. Men with guns. The elevator doors would close behind the visitor, who would then be trapped, behind the wire. Plenty of time for scrutiny.
If the visitor even got that far. There would be guys in the lobby. Maybe leaning up near the elevator buttons. Maybe a lot of them, because of Situation C. They would be on the lookout for unfamiliar faces.
“Which tower?” Abby asked.
“There must be paperwork,” Reacher said. “Some city department. Three floors, leased by an unknown corporation with a bland and forgettable name. Or we could talk to the supers. We could ask them about weird deliveries. Maybe scaffolding components, or a commercial dog run. Something like that. For the cage.”
“Which is going to be a problem,” Hogan said. “I don’t see how we get in.”
“We?”
“Sooner or later your luck will run out. You’ll need the Marines to rescue you. You army boys always do. Much more efficient if I prevent that necessity upfront, by supervising the operation from the get-go.”