Ли Чайлд - Without Fail

She didn’t answer. Just got out of the car and started walking. He followed after her. It was cold and damp on the street. The night air was heavy. He could smell the river, and jet fuel from somewhere. They reached her house. She unlocked the door. They stepped inside.

There was a sheet of paper lying on the hallway floor.

It was the familiar high-white letter-size sheet. It was lying precisely aligned with the oak flooring strips. It was in the geometric center of the hallway, near the bottom of the stairs, exactly where Reacher had dumped his garbage bag of clothes two nights previously. It had a simple statement printed neatly on it, in the familiar Times New Roman computer script, fourteen point, bold. The statement was five words long, split between two lines in the center of the page: It’s going to happen soon . The three words It’s going to made up the first line on their own. The happen soon part was alone on the second line. It looked like a poem or a song lyric. Like it was divided up that way for a dramatic purpose, like there should be a pause between the lines, or a breath, or a drum roll, or a rim shot. It’s going to … bam!.. happen soon . Reacher stared at it. The effect was hypnotic. Happen soon. Happen soon .

“Don’t touch it,” Froelich said.

“Wasn’t going to,” Reacher replied.

He ducked his head back out the door and checked the street. All the nearby cars were empty. All the nearby windows were closed and draped. No pedestrians. No loiterers in the dark. All was quiet. He came back inside and closed the door slowly and carefully, so as not to disturb the paper with a draft.

“How did they get it in here?” Froelich said.

“Through the door,” Reacher said. “Probably at the back.”

Froelich pulled the SIG Sauer from her holster and they walked through the living room together and into the kitchen. The door to the backyard was closed, but it was unlocked. Reacher opened it a foot. Scanned the outside surroundings and saw nothing at all. Eased the door back wide so the inside light fell onto the exterior surface. Leaned close and looked at the scratch plate around the keyhole.

“Marks,” he said. “Very small. They were pretty good.”

“They’re here in D.C.,” she said. “Right now. They’re not in some Midwest bar.”

She stared through the kitchen into the living room.

“The phone,” she said.

It was pulled out of position on the table next to the fireside chair.

“They used my phone,” she said.

“To call me, probably,” Reacher said.

“Prints?”

He shook his head. “Gloves.”

“They’ve been in my house,” she said.

She moved away from the rear door and stopped at the kitchen counter. Glanced down at something and snatched open a drawer.

“They took my gun,” she said. “I had a backup gun in here.”

“I know,” Reacher said. “An old Beretta.”

She opened the drawer next to it.

“The magazines are gone too,” she said. “I had ammo in here.”

“I know,” Reacher said again. “Under an oven glove.”

“How do you know?”

“I checked, Monday night.”

“Why would you?”

“Habit,” he said. “Don’t take it personally.”

She stared at him and then opened the wall cupboard with the money stash in it. He saw her check the earthenware pot. She said nothing, so he assumed the cash was still there. He filed the observation away in the professional corner of his mind, as confirmation of a long-held belief: people don’t like searching above head height .

Then she stiffened. A new thought.

“They might still be in the house,” she said, quietly.

But she didn’t move. It was the first sign of fear he had ever seen from her.

“I’ll check,” he said. “Unless that’s an unhealthy response to a challenge.”

She just handed him her pistol. He turned out the kitchen light so he wouldn’t be silhouetted on the basement stairs and walked slowly down. Listened hard past the creaks and sighs of the house, and the hum and trickle of the heating system. Stood still in the dark and let his eyes adjust. There was nobody there. Nobody upstairs, either. Nobody hiding and waiting. People hiding and waiting give off human vibrations. Tiny hums and quivers. And he wasn’t feeling anything. The house was empty and undisturbed, apart from the displaced telephone and the missing Beretta and the message on the hallway floor. He came back to the kitchen and held out the SIG, butt-first.

“Secure,” he said.

“I better make some calls,” she said.

Special Agent Bannon showed up forty minutes later in a Bureau sedan with three members of his task force. Stuyvesant arrived five minutes after them in a department Suburban. They left both vehicles double-parked in the street with their strobes going. The neighboring houses were spattered with random bursts of light, blue and red and white. Stuyvesant stood still in the open doorway.

“We weren’t supposed to get any more messages,” he said.

Bannon was on his knees, looking at the sheet of paper.

“This is generic,” he said. “We predicted we wouldn’t get specificity. And we haven’t. The word soon is meaningless as to time and place. It’s just a taunt. We’re supposed to be impressed with how smart they are.”

“I was already impressed with how smart they are,” Stuyvesant said.

Bannon looked up at Froelich. “How long have you been out?”

“All day,” Froelich said. “We left at six-thirty this morning to meet with you.”

“We?”

“Reacher’s staying here,” she said.

“Not anymore, he’s not,” Bannon said. “Neither of you is staying here. It’s too dangerous. We’re putting you in a secure location.”

Froelich said nothing.

“They’re in D.C. right now,” Bannon said. “Probably regrouping somewhere. Probably got in from North Dakota a couple hours after you did. They know where you live. And we need to work here. This is a crime scene.”

“This is my house,” Froelich said.

“It’s a crime scene,” Bannon said again. “They’ve been here. We’ll have to rip it up some. Better that you stay away until we put it back together.”

Froelich said nothing.

“Don’t argue,” Stuyvesant said. “I want you protected. We’ll put you in a motel. Couple of U.S. marshals outside the door, until this is over.”

“Neagley, too,” Reacher said.

Froelich glanced at him. Stuyvesant nodded.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I already sent somebody to pick her up.”

“Neighbors?” Bannon asked.

“Don’t really know them,” Froelich answered.

“They might have seen something,” Bannon said. He checked his watch. “They might still be up. At least I hope so. Dragging witnesses out of bed generally makes them very cranky.”

“So get what you need, people,” Stuyvesant called. “We’re leaving, right now.”

Reacher stood in Froelich’s guest room and had a strong feeling he would never come back to it. So he took his things from the bathroom and his garbage bag of Atlantic City clothes and all of Joe’s suits and shirts that were still clean. He stuffed clean socks and underwear into the pockets. Carried all the clothes in one hand and Joe’s cardboard box under the other arm. He came down the stairs and stepped out into the night air and it hit him that for the first time in more than five years he was leaving a place carrying baggage. He loaded it into the Suburban’s trunk and then walked around and climbed into the backseat. Sat still and waited for Froelich. She came out of her house carrying a small valise. Stuyvesant took it from her and stowed it and they climbed into the front together. Took off down the street. Froelich didn’t look back.