Page 46 of No Plan B

“Oh. Yeah. OK.”

“You know you were sent out here to look for me.”

“I guess.”

“So you know who sent you.”

The guy shook his head.

“You know. Who was it?”

The guy didn’t answer.

Reacher prodded the body on the ground with his toe.

The guy closed his eyes for a moment. “Our boss sent us.”

“Name?”

“Mr. Brockman.”

“Organization?”

“Minerva Correctional.”

“You work at the prison in Winson?”

The guy nodded.

Reacher said, “How did Brockman know I’d be here?”

“He didn’t. He sent guys to a bunch of places. Just in case.”

“How many guys?”

“I don’t know. Eight? Ten? It wasn’t like a regular team briefing. We got given our orders in pairs. Word filtered out between us later.”

“Which places?”

“I only know one place for sure. The Greyhound station in Jackson. One of the guys who got sent there is my brother-in-law. He called me. A few minutes ago. They just caught a couple of punks trying to kidnap a homeless kid who’d come in from California. Said he wanted to see if we were having any fun like that. Which was horseshit. Really he wanted to break my balls because he knew we would be totally bored.”

“Guess his call was a little premature. What were you supposed to do if you saw me?”

“Verify your ID.”

“And then?”

“Stop you.”

“From doing what?”

“Getting to Winson.”

“Why?”

“So you couldn’t cause any trouble.”

“Why would I cause trouble in Winson?”

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