Page 9 of The Secret

“OK.” Stamoran paused. “The eighth person? It’s me.”

Chapter4

Reacher did not just hearHall’s bathroom window open. He also saw it.

The moment her bedroom door closed he jumped up from the couch and moved silently down the hallway. He opened the front door. Left it open to avoid making a sound. Hurried along the front of the house until he got to the left-hand corner. Lined up so that the reflection in the driver’s window of his borrowed car gave him a clear view down the side of the house. And waited. A moment later Hall’s head appeared. She glanced both ways then stretched for the drainpipe that ran down just to the side of the casement. Gripped it with one hand. Then the other. She wriggled out backward until she was sitting on the sill, facing the wall. Pulled her right foot up so she was squatting on it. Did the same with her left. Braced herself, pushed back, and stepped her right foot across to the other side of the pipe. Then she started to lower herself, hand over hand, soles flat against the wall, leaning out almost horizontally, like she was rappelling down a rigid iron rope.

Reacher let her get halfway down before he moved. He stepped around the corner and started in toward her. She spotted him right away. Changed direction. Tried to climb up. To dive back through the window. But before she got close Reacher stretched out and grabbed her belt.

“Want to come here, nice and slow and secure?” he said. “Or risk falling on your head?”

Hall climbed down. Her feet hit the path and she slumped back against the wall.

Reacher stepped in close and said, “It’s safe to say the confession phase of this interview is done, yes?”

“Asshole. What happens now?”

“Depends on you.”

“What do you want?”

“You took the lower receivers?”

“Obviously.”

“How many?”

“Forty-eight.”

“Hear that?”

Hall looked left and right. “No. What?”

“That’s the sound of the window for you helping yourself slamming shut.”

“Wait. Ninety-six.”

“You sold them?”

“I didn’t take them as souvenirs.”

“Who did you sell them to?”

Hall shook her head and sighed. “Be honest with me. How much trouble am I in?”

Reacher said, “My guess? A lot.”

“Anything I can do to improve the forecast?” Hall pushed awayfrom the wall and looked Reacher in the eye. “Anything you need? Any way to make the outlook a little sunnier?”

“Maybe,” Reacher said.

—

“Wait a minute.”Kasluga stepped back, away from the kitchen counter. She was holding her right hand out in front, palm upright, like a cop stopping traffic. “You were at the Mason plant in India in ’69? The same time as me? No way. I would have known. I would have seen you.”

Stamoran shook his head. “I didn’t say I was there, in India. I was based in the States. At Langley. I was in charge of the program those seven guys were working on at Mason Chemical. And five other projects kind of like it in other countries.”

Kasluga’s hands switched to her hips. “You were in charge? So it’s down to you that I got hung out to dry?”

---