Page 87 of In Too Deep

Devine didn’t respond.

Reacher said, “Second, forget about the flight from Chicago to Alaska. Forget about those aliases I gave you for Vidic. They’re junk. He wants you to think he’ll be on that plane. He wants you on a wild-goose chase.”

“What makes you—”

“Send Gibson’s picture to Albatross’s handler. Pull the airport CCTV. Then you’ll understand.”

“Damn it, Reacher, just tell me.”

“You wouldn’t believe me. You need to join the dots for yourself. Third, I think Vidic is using a different alias. John none Austin. You should check flights, car rentals, hotels. You know the drill.”

“Where did—”

“Finally, someone has shipped a bunch of gold to an airplane hangar in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I’ll send you the address. It’s possible that another section of the Bureau is watching it. You should tell them to be on the lookout for Vidic. It’s a long shot, but we know from past deals he has a preference for gold and is selling something very valuable.”

“What other section?”

“Counterintelligence.”

“I can’t just butt into their investigation, out of the blue, and start making requests.”

“Why not? What’s more important? Retrieving the report or following protocol?”

“Fine. I’ll think about it.”

“Don’t think. Do.”

“Reacher, you’ve done the right thing bringing these issues to me. Don’t think I’m not appreciative. It’s just that there are a lot of moving parts here. I need to keep the machine working efficiently. Not stick a spanner in the works, even if it’s with the best of intentions. Which brings me to a very important point. You need to let me run with it from here. I get that these kinds of things used to be in your wheelhouse. They’re not anymore. Don’t go meddling in areas that are beyond your sphere. Understood?”

Reacher said nothing. He hung up and dialed Wallwork’s number. He wanted to check on flight records for John Austin but got dumped straight into voicemail.

—

Knight took herphone back and said, “What does your gut tell you? Is Devine going to act?”

Reacher shrugged. He said, “It’s fifty/fifty. If she shows Gibson’s picture to the handler, then the dominoes will fall pretty fast. If she soft pedals that, maybe nothing will happen.”

“No luck with Vidic’s plane tickets?”

“No. And we don’t know if he’s planning on flying, anyway. Hey, you had tags in Kane’s guys’ cars that you could track on your phone. Are they still in place?”

“You think those guys are still around? I bet Kane stood them down. He must be trying not to draw attention. The smaller the group, the better in this situation.”

“I’m sure he stood them down. He sent them away in the van full of contraband from the cave. As a reward. As a cover. Who knows. But I think he kept their cars. Vidic needed to get to Oklahoma City so that he could fly here. Kane and Paris needed to drive here with the two million. I want to know where those cars are now.”

“The guys could have found the tags by now and ditched them.” Knight opened her phone then swiped and tapped the screen. “Vidic might be more observant. Wait. No. Here they are. Both of them. The first is at…the Oklahoma City airport. Just as you thought. And the second is…OK. Interesting. It’s at the Indianapolis airport.”

“Pass me your phone? We need Wallwork to factor Indy into his search as the point of origin.”

Reacher got Wallwork’s voicemail again. He left a message then turned back to Knight. He said, “So. Decision time. Stay here and wait for intel, or roll the dice and head to Florida?”

Knight shrugged. “This is a good location. Reasonably central. But I hate sitting still. What do you think?”

“An investigation needs momentum. We should go.”

Chapter33

They were closer to thesouth exit from the park than where they’d come in so Reacher and Knight hustled along the nearest path, which led diagonally to Arsenal Street. Knight used her phone to call an Uber. A car arrived after three minutes. A silver Toyota Camry. The driver was maybe twenty-five. He was from The Gambia and he talked incessantly about trees. His dream was one day to return home with seeds from every species of tree in the United States and plant a whole new forest.Good luck with that,Reacher thought.

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