Lee Child - A Wanted Man

‘I know,’ Reacher said. ‘I heard you the first time. No contacts, no support, no help, no back-up, no budget, no facilities, no lab, no computers. No nothing. But what else do you want to do? The guys who have all that stuff are ignoring this whole thing. So we’ll have to manage without.’

‘How? Where do we start?’

‘With Karen Delfuenso’s autopsy. The initial results. We’ll know more when we get those.’

‘How will those help?’

‘Wait and see. You could hustle them along, if you like.’

‘I don’t need to. I know those guys. They’ll be working as fast as they can.’

‘Where?’

‘Des Moines, probably. The nearest decent morgue. They’ll have walked in and commandeered it. That’s how we work.’

‘When will we hear from them?’

‘You know something, don’t you?’

‘Get some sleep,’ Reacher said. ‘Answer your phone if it’s your tech guys, and don’t if it isn’t.’

Reacher used the living room sofa. It was a compact three-seater with low arms, and it was upholstered in flowery yellow fabric. It was worse than a bed and better than the floor. He stretched out on his back and got his head comfortable and pulled his knees up to fit. He set the clock in his head for two hours, and he breathed in once, and he breathed out once, and then he fell asleep, almost instantly.

And then he was woken again almost instantly, by the phone. Not Sorenson’s phone, but the house phone in the kitchen. Delfuenso’s landline. It had a traditional metal bell, and it pealed slow and relaxed, six times, patient and unknowing, and then it went to the answering machine. Reacher heard Delfuenso’s voice on the greeting, bright and alive, happy and energetic: ‘Hi, this is Karen and Lucy. We can’t come to the phone right now, but please leave us a message after the tone.’

Then came the tone, and then came another woman’s voice. She said something about making a play date with Lucy, and then the call ended, and Reacher went back to sleep.

He woke up for the second time right on his two-hour deadline. His knees were numb and his back felt like it had been hit with hammers. He sat up and swivelled and put his feet on the floor. There was no sound in the house. Just still air. Far from anywhere, in the middle of winter.

He stood up and stretched and put his palms flat on the ceiling. Then he found the bathroom and rinsed his face and brushed his teeth with dinosaur toothpaste he guessed was Lucy’s. Then he checked the guest room.

Sorenson was fast asleep on the bed. Her face was turned towards him and a lock of hair was across one eye, just like it had been behind her gun. One arm was up above her head and the other was folded defensively across her body. Half secure, and half insecure. An active subconscious. A conflicted state of mind. He was wondering how best to wake her when her phone rang and did it for him. The plain electronic sound, thin and accusing. One ring. Two. She stirred and her eyes opened wide and she sat bolt upright. She fumbled for the phone with sleep-numbed hands and checked the window.

‘Omaha,’ she said.

Three rings.

She said, ‘I can’t ignore it any more.’

Four rings.

She said, ‘I’m kissing my career goodbye.’

Five rings.

Reacher stepped over to the bed and took the phone from her. He pressed the green button. He raised the phone to his ear. He said, ‘Who is this?’

A man’s voice in his ear said, ‘Who are you?’

‘I asked first.’

‘Where did you get this phone?’

‘Take a wild-ass guess.’

‘Where is Special Agent Sorenson?’

‘Who’s asking?’

There was a long pause. Maybe the guy was hooking up a recording device or setting up some kind of a GPS locator. Or maybe he was just thinking. He said, ‘My name is Perry. I’m the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s special agent in charge at the field office in Omaha, Nebraska. In other words I’m a very senior federal law enforcement officer and I’m also Agent Sorenson’s boss. Who are you?’

Reacher said, ‘I’m the guy who was driving the car in Iowa. And right now Agent Sorenson is my prisoner. She’s a hostage, Mr Perry.’

SORENSON WAS GOING a mute kind of crazy on the bed. The guy in Reacher’s ear was breathing hard. Reacher said, ‘I have very modest demands, Mr Perry. If you want to get Agent Sorenson back safe and sound, all you have to do is precisely nothing. Don’t call me, don’t try to track me, don’t try to find me, don’t hassle me, don’t interfere with me in any way at all.’

The guy said, ‘Tell me what you want.’

‘I just did.’

‘I can help you. We can work together on this.’

Reacher asked, ‘Did you take the hostage negotiator’s course?’

‘Yes, I did.’

‘It shows. You’re not listening. Just stay away from me.’

‘What are you planning to do?’

‘I’m planning to do your job.’

‘ My job?’

Reacher said, ‘You’ve got dead people here, and a missing kid. You should have told the CIA and the State Department to sit down and shut up, but you didn’t. You caved instead. So stay out of my way while I fix things for you.’

‘Who the hell are you?’

Reacher didn’t answer that. He just clicked off the call and tossed the phone on the bed.

‘You’re crazy,’ Sorenson said.

‘Not really,’ Reacher said. ‘This way he’s blameless and you’re blameless but the job still gets done. Everyone wins.’

‘But he’s not going to do what you told him. I know this guy, Reacher. He’s not going to just sit there and take it. He’s not going to let you embarrass him in front of the CIA. He’s going to come after you. He’s going to start a full-on manhunt.’

‘Let the best man win,’ Reacher said. ‘I’ve been hunted before. Many times. And no one ever found me.’

‘You don’t get it. It’ll be easy. He can track my phone.’

‘We’ll leave it right there on the bed. We’ll buy another one.’

‘He can track my car , for God’s sake.’

‘We’re not going to use your car.’

‘What, we’re going to walk?’

‘No, we’re going to use Sheriff Goodman’s car. It’s right here. And he doesn’t need it any more, does he?’

Goodman’s car was still there on the crown of the road. The keys were still in it, which was what Reacher had expected. City cops usually took their keys with them. Country cops, not so much. There was nothing more embarrassing than having some street kid steal a patrol car during an urban melee, but that kind of danger was rare in the boonies, so habits were different.

And there was an added bonus, too. They didn’t need to buy a new phone. Goodman’s cell was right there, charging away in a dashboard cradle identical to Sorenson’s own Bureau issue. The screen was showing two missed calls. One from Sorenson’s cell, and the other from the department’s dispatcher.

Post-mortem calls.

Reacher racked the driver’s seat back and fired up the engine. The car was a police-spec Crown Vic, under the skin exactly the same as Sorenson’s more discreet version. But it was older and grimier inside. The seat had been crushed into Goodman’s unique shape by many hours of use. Reacher felt like he was putting on a dead man’s clothes.

Sorenson asked, ‘Where are we going?’

Reacher said, ‘Anywhere with cell reception. We need to wait until we hear from your tech guys. About the autopsy. You need to call them and give them the new number.’

‘We’re basically stealing this car, you know.’

‘But who’s going to do anything about it? That idiot Puller?’

Reacher turned around in Delfuenso’s empty driveway and headed back south and west towards the crossroads. He got less than half a mile before Goodman’s phone rang in its cradle. A loud electronic squawk. Urgent, and nothing fancy.