Ли Чайлд - The Sentinel

‘Come on,’ Sands said. ‘I have a bad feeling about this. Let’s get it over with before anyone else shows up.’

They climbed out together and Reacher hauled up the door to E6. Only it didn’t open on to a space the size they’d seen before. This time four units had been knocked together. Two on the even side. Two on the odd side.

Rutherford hit a switch on the wall which caused a dozen fluorescent tubes to flicker into life. ‘Holy mother of God.’

Shelves had been installed throughout in rows about two yards apart. They held pretty much every kind of electronic gadget Reacher had ever heard of. Domestic. Commercial. Industrial. Even some low-grade military. But whether the servers were part of the cache, he had no idea.

‘I could live here for the rest of my life.’ Rutherford stepped inside and made his way slowly along the first shelf, scanning each item and muttering quietly to himself. Then something caught his eye a little further ahead. He raced forward six feet, dropped to his knees, and threw his arms around a stack of black boxes on the lowest level. ‘I don’t believe it. They’re here. We’ve found them.’

‘Do they work?’ Reacher said. ‘Have they been wiped? Can we test them?’

‘Not here,’ Rutherford said. ‘They’re not like laptops. You can’t just turn them on and see. You have to connect them to a network. Then you can use a computer to check what’s on them. Think of them as giant external hard drives.’

‘We’ll show you how, later,’ Sands said. ‘Networking them’s easy. Right now we need to get them in the van. Take them somewhere safe. Work on them there.’

Rutherford and Sands carried two servers each. Reacher carried four. They loaded them into the narrow cargo area behind the rear bench seat. Sands took another minute to make sure they were secure. Then she made for the driver’s seat.

‘Hold on,’ Reacher said. ‘If you want to copy what’s on a server, what do you need? Another server?’

Rutherford nodded. ‘And a network and some software. But basically, yes.’

‘Are there any other servers here? That would be the right kind?’

‘Sure. There’s a whole bunch.’

‘You used eight servers altogether. But only one from the archive project?’

‘Correct. The rest I scrounged from other places.’

‘OK. Let’s grab a couple we could copy on to. No. Let’s make it four.’

‘Why? What are we going to copy?’

‘Maybe nothing. I’ll explain once we’re out of here.’

There were five words on Reacher’s mind as they headed back to town.

Need to know. And Forty hours.

Five words rather than six. Because eight hours were gone. But the same two concepts remained. Along with a single question. Which begged a one-word answer. Had the servers been wiped? Yes, or no? Either way Reacher would have two things to do. If the data was intact he would have to persuade Rutherford to duplicate it, and get a copy to the FBI. If the data was gone, he would have to break the news to Agent Fisher and persuade Rutherford to leave town. He knew which was preferable. But he had no idea which would be easier.

Reacher looked at Sands and Rutherford in the front seats. They were different people from the ones who had entered the storage unit. Their fatigue was gone. And their worry. He could feel their excitement now. Their enthusiasm. Their certainty that with the servers successfully recovered, everything else was bound to fall into place. Reacher himself was feeling less confident. He was the only one who knew what was at stake. And he was the only one who had no experience with computers. He had no idea how to extract their secrets. Or how to find out if they even held any secrets. He would rather be dealing with humans, any day of the week.

Their first port of call was the apartment building so that Rutherford and Sands could pick up some clothes and toiletries and grab their laptops and all the cables and connectors they would need to hook the servers together. Next they collected Marty’s car, which Reacher drove. Then they headed north again, in tandem, back to the truck stop. Not for fuel or supplies this time. But because of its two motels. One in particular had caught Reacher’s eye. He figured it was the oldest part of the whole complex. The design was very traditional. He had seen similar places all across the country. It had a blue and red neon sign out front depicting some kind of mythical bird. The building was a single storey high. It was clad with strips of dark wood. It started at its south-west corner with an office, which had a covered entryway and machines outside for soft drinks and ice. Then it continued around three sides of a square with a regular pattern of window and door, window and door. Thirty-six pairs altogether. Each with a parking space outside. Leaving no distance to walk from your vehicle to your room. Making it easy to carry your luggage inside. And reducing the chances of anyone seeing what you had brought. However unusual it might be. Or incongruous. Such as three mismatched suitcases and a dozen sleek black boxes.

The layout suited Reacher very well. As did the fact that of the thirty-six parking spaces only four were occupied. Three were taken by ancient sedans, their paint bleached and blistered by years of sun. The other by a bright yellow Toyota SUV with red mud sprayed right up to its roof. Two of the sedans were on the office side of the courtyard. The third sedan and the Toyota were on the opposite side. Leaving one section completely vacant.

Sands pulled up next to the vending machines, climbed out, and headed into the office. Reacher parked next to the minivan and went inside with her. The space was long and narrow. The reception counter was immediately to the right, followed by a tall freezer with double glass doors and a table with a microwave and a drip coffee machine. Three white plastic tables were lined up along the left-hand wall. Each had four white plastic chairs. And a vase with a red plastic flower.

Reacher rapped on the counter and after a moment a door opened and a guy came through. He looked about nineteen. His hair was shoulder length, he had round glasses, and he was wearing a baggy white T-shirt and a pair of faded, baggy jeans. He plonked himself down in the receptionist’s chair and peered at Reacher.

‘We need to talk about the price of your rooms,’ Reacher said.

The guy pointed to a sign on the wall behind him: Rooms $95+ / night .

‘Those are your standard rates, I guess,’ Reacher said. ‘I’m not interested in those.’

‘No discounts,’ the guy said. ‘Ninety-five plus tax. Take it or leave it.’

‘I’m not looking for a discount. I need something else. A special arrangement.’

‘No special arrangements, either. Whatever they are.’

‘Don’t be hasty. You haven’t heard what I have in mind. Do you want to miss out on a good thing?’

The guy paused. ‘Go on.’

‘Two rooms,’ Reacher said. ‘A week in advance. One at ninety-five a night, on a credit card, as normal. The other at one fifty a night, in cash, directly into your pocket.’

‘Go on,’ the guy said.

‘Three conditions. First, the rooms must be together in the centre of the vacant block facing out across the courtyard, and they must have a connecting door.’

‘Can do.’

‘Second, we register for one of the rooms as normal. The other you enter in your system as not available for occupancy.’

‘I don’t know what that is. I don’t think we have it here.’

‘Sure you do. All hotels have it. Or some version of it. For when a customer dies and you have to wait for the coroner to sign off. Or someone gets busted for drugs and you have to wait for the police to clear the scene. Or even if the plumbing breaks down and you have to wait to get it fixed. Look in your employee handbook. It’ll be there.’