Page 77 of In Too Deep

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The driver turnedright at the end of the block, crossed two streets, then bumped up onto a footpath and parked at the side of a softball field. The agents all piled out. Except one. The one who had driven Reacher that morning. He said, “We’re staying here.” He didn’t sound any happier about the prospect than Reacher was.

It was more than an hour before the other agents returned to the Suburban. By then Reacher had memorized every detail of the trees and walkways that surrounded the softball field. He had calculated the number of trees per acre in the park, assuming the sample he could see was representative. And he had tried to put himself in Vidic’s shoes. He wondered what had spooked him. Caused him to run without collecting the money. And he wondered how much there could have been in one backpack. Everything he heard about the Cone Dynamics report suggested untold riches. That made him think in terms of wheelbarrows full. Not bags. Maybe Vidic was guilty of overpromising, as well as so many other things.

Reacher didn’t need to ask the returning agents about the outcome of their search. It was clear from the looks on their faces that they had been unsuccessful. Vidic had given them the slip. Reacher moved back to the tiny backseat without saying a word. The agents climbed in. No one spoke for a moment. Then Devine clapped her hands. She said, “Come on, people. Chins up. Vidic got away and that’s disappointing, I’m not going to lie. The man who left the backpack will most likely turn out to be a cheap stooge. But let’s focus on what’s important. We have the money, and we have the USB. If we’re lucky, the money will lead us to the buyer and the USB will contain the report.”

Devine gave a signal and the driver backed up onto the street and set out into the evening traffic. No one spoke. The agents sat limp and despondent in their seats. Dejected from the loss of Vidic, Reacher guessed. Regardless of Devine’s brave words. Nine minutes later they pulled up diagonally opposite the Gateway Arch. None of the agents were paying it any attention. Reacher couldn’t take his eyes off it. He had heard you can go inside, which he certainly wouldn’t want to do, but he was mesmerized by the shape. He could only imagine the kind of calculations that went into creating its flawless curves.

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One of theother Suburbans was already there when they arrived and the other two joined them within a minute. The agents climbed out and trudged over the street and into the lobby of a hotel. Reacher saw Knight in the middle of the group. The lobby was plain and sparsely decorated, but that was fine with Reacher. The view of the Arch more than made up for any stylistic deficiencies, which he probably wouldn’t have noticed, anyway. The agents hung around in a loose knot while Devine dealt with the clerk. No one spoke. No one made eye contact with one another. Reacher thought they looked like members of a high school sports team who had just been on the wrong side of a particularly heinous drubbing.

Devine returned to the group a couple of minutes later. She was struggling to hang on to a handful of shiny key-card wallets. She finished distributing them, apparently at random, then said, “OK. That’s a wrap. Eat something. Get some sleep. Get your heads back in the game. Tomorrow’s a new day.”

—

Vidic was inanother hotel, two hundred and thirty miles away. He was propped up in bed. An episode ofBreaking Badhad just finished on his TV. He took a last bite of his room service steak. Drained his wineglass. And picked up his phone. He wanted to check in on Paris. See how her journey had gone. How close she was to stabbing Kane in the head. And most important, to make sure she was ready for the next day.

Vidic had hit the first two digits of Paris’s new number when his phone began to ring. It was Paris, calling him. The universe was winking in his direction again. Clearly he was still doing something right.

Paris opened with “I hate you. I’m going to kill you.”

Vidic smiled to himself. He said, “What’s he done?”

“It’s like traveling with a child. Kane is a complete moron. An actual imbecile. He kept asking me about how the exchange is going to work tomorrow. I gave him an overview. Nothing too specific. And he couldn’t even understand that. He was more interested in making fart jokes and trying to rub up against the flight attendants on the plane. Being around him is so embarrassing.”

“Sounds pretty much par for the course with that guy.”

“And that’s not even the worst of it. We had to change hotels.”

“Why?”

“We were in the bar and—”

“You went for a drink with him? What were you thinking?”

“I didn’t mean to. He asked if I wanted to get something to eat. I said I was getting room service. He said he was going out somewhere so I went to the bar on my own. Then he showed up. I couldn’t get away. He started up with his stupid jokes. Some other guy took offense. So Kane followed him to the bathroom, made him strip naked, apparently, and threw his clothes out of the window. Seriously, it’s like being shackled to a juvenile delinquent. I hate it.”

“Are you in your room now?”

“Yes. Finally.”

“Then relax. Forget about him. Because in twenty-four hours he’ll be on a mortuary slab and we’ll be in paradise. In our own little fortress. With more money than we’ll ever be able to spend.”

Chapter30

The FBI was paying fora lot more bedroom than Reacher needed. That was for sure. The key Agent Devine had handed him belonged to a suite on the eighth floor of the hotel. Reacher had let himself in and explored the space. There was a bathroom with enough gels and liquids to open a store. A living room, full of couches and chairs and cushions, plus a desk and a TV. And the bedroom itself. Reacher walked around the area, then stopped between a pair of ornate king-sized beds near the window. They were giant pieces of furniture but they seemed barely present against the expanse of floor all around. Like islands in an ocean, Reacher thought. He mentally compared them with the army-style cot he had lain on earlier. The contrast was laughable, but he wasn’t about to complain. Anything that offered the opportunity to sleep was OK by him.Sleep when you can so that you won’t need to when you can’t.That was his rule.

Except that when he got into bed he couldn’t sleep. That was very unusual for Reacher. He could generally drop off within a couple of minutes, pretty much anywhere, if he put his mind to it. But thatnight a thought was lurking, indistinct and out of focus, just beyond the boundary of his consciousness. Not just frustration at the lingering gap in his memory. A symptom of some kind of problem. But not something that could be forced into sharpness. Clarity would come. He was sure of that. But it would take time. And until it did, the waiting was evidently going to cost him an unknown number of restless hours.

Reacher was edging closer to pinning down what was bothering him when the room phone rang. It was Knight. She said, “I tried to come find you.”

“I’m in 810.”

“I know. But I couldn’t get off my floor. I’m on seven. The agent from this morning—the one who’s apparently my babysitter now—was lurking in the elevator lobby. He sent me back to my room like I was a naughty freshman on a high school field trip.”

“Shame. I could use the company.”

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