Persuader Part 14

"Your car's parked outside," I said.

He nodded.

"OK," he said.

He didn't ask about my day. The new guy with the scanner must have described it already. Now he was just standing there, looking straight at me. He was younger than Beck. Younger than Duke. Younger than me. He was maybe thirty-five. He still looked dangerous. He had flat cheekbones and dull eyes. He was like a hundred bad guys I had busted in the army.

"Enjoy the drive?" I asked him.

He didn't answer.

"I saw you bring the scanner in," I said. "I found the first bug. Under the seat."

"Why did you look?" he asked.

"Habit," I said. "Where was the second?"

"In the back," he said. "You didn't stop for lunch."

"No money," I said. "n.o.body gave me any yet."

The guy didn't smile.

"Welcome to Maine," he said. "n.o.body gives you money here. You earn it."

"OK," I said.

"I'm Angel Doll," he said, like he was expecting his name to impress me. But it didn't.

"I'm Jack Reacher," I said.

"The cop-killer," he said, with something in his voice.

He looked at me for a long moment and then looked away. I couldn't figure out where he fit in. Beck was the boss and Duke was his head of security but this junior guy seemed very relaxed about talking right over their heads.

"We're in a meeting," Beck said. "You can wait out by the car."

He ushered the other two back inside the room and shut the door on me. That in itself told me there was nothing worth hunting for in the secretarial area. So I wandered outside and took a good look at the security system on my way. It was fairly rudimentary, but effective. There were contact pads on the door and all the windows. They were small rectangular things. They had wires the size and color of spaghetti tacked all along the baseboards. The wires came together in a metal box mounted on the wall next to a crowded notice board. The notice board was full of yellowed paper. There was all kinds of stuff about employee insurance and fire extinguishers and evacuation points. The alarm box had a keypad and two small lights. There was a red one labeled armed and a green one labeled unarmed. There were no separate zones. No motion sensors. It was crude perimeter defense only.

I didn't wait by the car. I walked around a little, until I had gotten a feel for the place.

The whole area was a warren of similar operations. There was a convoluted access road for trucks. I guessed it would operate as a one-way system. Containers would be hauled down from the piers to the north and unloaded into the warehouses. Then delivery trucks would be loaded in turn and take off south. Beck's warehouse itself wasn't very private.

It was right in the middle of a row of five. But it didn't have an outside loading dock. No waist-high platform. It had a roller door instead. It was temporarily blocked by Angel Doll's Lincoln, but it was big enough to drive a truck through. Secrecy could be achieved.

There was no overall external security. It wasn't like a naval dockyard. There was no wire fencing. No gate, no barriers, no guards in booths. It was just a big messy hundredacre area full of random buildings and puddles and dark corners. I guessed there would be some kind of activity all around the clock. How much, I didn't know. But probably enough to mask some clandestine comings and goings.

I was back at the Cadillac and leaning on the fender when the three of them came out.

Beck and Duke came first and Doll hung back in the doorway. I still had my hands in my pockets. I was still ready to go for Duke first. But there was no overt aggression in the way anybody was moving. No wariness. Beck and Duke just walked over toward the car.

They looked tired and preoccupied. Doll stayed where he was in the doorway, like he owned the place.

"Let's go," Beck said.

"No, wait," Doll called. "I need to talk to Reacher first."

Beck stopped walking. Didn't turn around.

"Five minutes," Doll said. "That's all. Then I'll lock up for you."

Beck didn't say anything. Neither did Duke. They looked irritated, but they weren't going to object. I kept my hands in my pockets and walked back. Doll turned and led me through the secretarial pen and into the back office. Through another door and into a gla.s.s-walled cubicle inside the warehouse itself. I could see a forklift on the warehouse floor and steel racks loaded with rugs. The racks were easily twenty feet high and the rugs were all tightly rolled and tied with string. The cubicle had a personnel door to the outside and a metal desk with a computer on it. The desk chair was worn out. Dirty yellow foam showed through at every seam. Doll sat down on it and looked up at me and moved his mouth into the approximate shape of a smile. I stood sideways at the end of the desk and looked down on him.

"What?" I said.

"See this computer?" he said. "It's got taps into every Department of Motor Vehicles in the country."

"So?"

"So I can check license plates."

I said nothing. He took a handgun out of his pocket. A neat move, fast and fluid. But then, it was a good pocket gun. It was a Soviet-era PSM, which is a small automatic pistol built as smooth and slim as possible, so it won't snag on clothing. It uses weird Russian ammunition, which is hard to get. It has a safety catch at the rear of the slide.

Doll's was in the forward position. I couldn't remember whether that represented safe or fire.

"What do you want?" I asked him.

"I want to confirm something with you," he said. "Before I go public with it and move myself up a rung or two."

There was silence.

"How would you do that?" I asked.

"By telling them an extra little thing they don't know about yet," he said. "Maybe I'll even earn myself a nice big bonus. Like, maybe I'll get the five grand they earmarked for you."

I pressed the Glock's trigger lock in my pocket. Glanced to my left. I could see all the way through to the back office window. Beck and Duke were standing by the Cadillac.

They had their backs to me. They were forty feet away. Too close.

"I dumped the Maxima for you," Doll said.

"Where?"

"Doesn't matter," he said. Then he smiled again.

"What?" I said again.

"You stole it, right? At random, from a shopping mall."

"So?"

"It had Ma.s.sachusetts plates," he said. "They were phony. No such number has ever been issued."

Mistakes, coming back to haunt me. I said nothing.

"So I checked the VIN," he said. "The vehicle identification number. All cars have them.

On a little metal plate, top of the dash."

"I know," I said.

"It came back as a Maxima," he said. "So far, so good. But it was registered in New York. To a bad boy who was arrested five weeks ago. By the government."

I said nothing.

"You want to explain all that?" he said.

I didn't answer.

"Maybe they'll let me waste you myself," he said. "I might enjoy that."

"You think?"

"I've wasted people before," he said, like he had something to prove.

"How many?" I said.

"Enough."

I glanced through the back office window. Let go of the Glock and took my hands out of my pockets, empty.

"The New York DMV list must be out-of-date," I said. "It was an old car. Could have been sold out of state a year ago. You check the authentication code?"

"Where?"

"Top of the screen, on the right. It needs to have the right numbers in it to be up-to-date. I was a military cop. I've been in the New York DMV system more times than you have."

"I hate MPs," he said.

I watched his gun.

"I don't care who you hate," I said. "I'm just telling you I know how those systems work.

And that I've made the same mistake. More than once."

He was quiet for a beat.

"That's bulls.h.i.t," he said.

Now I smiled.

"So go ahead," I said. "Embarra.s.s yourself. No skin off my nose."

He sat still for a long moment. Then he swapped the gun from his right hand to his left and got busy with the mouse. He tried to keep one eye on me while he clicked and scrolled. I moved a little, like I was interested in the screen. The New York DMV search page came up. I moved a little more, around behind his shoulder. He entered what must have been the Maxima's original plate number, apparently from memory. He hit search now. The screen redrew. I moved again, like I was all set to prove him wrong.

"Where?" he asked.

"Right there," I said, and started to point at the monitor. But I was pointing with both hands and all ten fingers and they didn't make it to the screen. My right hand stopped at his neck. My left took the gun out of his left. It dropped on the floor and sounded exactly like a pound of steel hitting a plywood board covered with linoleum. I kept my eyes on the office window. Beck and Duke still had their backs to me. I got both hands around Doll's neck and squeezed. He thrashed around wildly. Fought back. I shifted my grip.

The chair fell over under him. I squeezed harder. Watched the window. Beck and Duke were just standing there. Their backs to me. Their breath was misting in front of them.

Doll started clawing at my wrists. I squeezed harder still. His tongue came out of his mouth. Then he did the smart thing and gave up on my wrists and reached up behind him and went for my eyes. I pulled my head back and hooked one hand under his jaw and put the other flat against the side of his head. Wrenched his jaw hard to the right and smashed his head downward to the left and broke his neck.

I stood the chair upright again and pushed it in neatly behind the desk. Picked up his gun and ejected the magazine. It was full. Eight bottle-necked 5.45 millimeter Soviet Pistol sh.e.l.ls. They're roughly the same size as a.22, and they're slow, but they're supposed to hit pretty hard. Soviet security forces were supposed to be happy enough with them. I checked the chamber. There was a round in it. I checked the action. It had been set to fire.

I rea.s.sembled the whole thing and left it c.o.c.ked and locked. Put it in my left-hand pocket.

Then I went through his clothes. He had all the usual stuff. A wallet, a cell phone, a money clip without much money in it, a big bunch of keys. I left it all there. Opened the rear personnel door to the outside and checked the view. Beck and Duke were now hidden from me by the corner of the building. I couldn't see them, they couldn't see me.

There was n.o.body else around. I walked over to Doll's Lincoln and opened the driver's door. Found the trunk release. The latch popped quietly and the lid rose an inch. I went back inside and dragged the body out by the collar. Opened the trunk all the way and heaved it inside. Latched the lid down gently and closed the driver's door. Glanced at my watch. The five minutes were up. I would have to finish the garbage disposal later. I walked back through the gla.s.s cubicle, through the back office, through the secretarial pen, through the front door, and outside. Beck and Duke heard me and turned around.

Beck looked cold and annoyed by the delay. I thought: so why stand still for it? Duke was shivering a little and his eyes were watering and he was yawning. He looked exactly like a guy who hadn't slept for thirty-six hours. I thought: I see a triple benefit in that.

"I'll drive," I said. "If you want."

He hesitated. Said nothing.

"You know I can drive," I said. "You just had me driving all day. I did what you wanted.

Doll told you all about it."

He said nothing.

"Was it another test?" I asked.

"You found the bug," he said.

"Did you think I wouldn't?"

"You might have acted different if you hadn't found the bug."

"Why would I? I just wanted to get back here, fast and safe. I was exposed, ten straight hours. It was no fun for me. I've got more to lose than you, whatever you're into."

He said nothing to that.

"Your call," I said, like I didn't care.

He hesitated a fraction more and then exhaled and handed me the keys. That was the first benefit. There's something symbolic about handing over a set of keys. It's about trust and inclusion. It moved me closer to the center of their circle. Made me less of an outsider.