Olen Steinhauer - The Tourist

She didn't know how long it took, though it couldn't have been more than seven or eight minutes, her staring at the empty bedroom doorway, numbed by everything she didn't understand. She heard noises outside-faint footfalls on the unnaturally green Disney grass-then silence. She slipped into her robe. Then the sharp sound of a fist on the front door. She ran to get it before Stephanie woke. A woman stared back at her-sort of, because one eye seemed focused elsewhere-and held out an unfolded ID. "Where is he?" the woman asked.

With remarkable fortitude, Tina grabbed the corner of the woman's ID so she could read department of homeland security and the name SIMMONS, JANET beside her photograph. She started to say something about how they better have some kind of a warrant, but it was too late. Janet Simmons and a large man who'd shown no papers at all were already in the apartment, opening doors.

That's when she heard Stephanie, sounding stone-cold awake: "Cut it out! I'm trying to sleep!"

He kissed his wife again, went to the door, then turned back. She looked tiny in that big Disney bed. "Give Stef my love. Tell her it's business." He realized how often he said this kind of thing. "She's used to it."

He galloped down the outdoor stairs, heading for the parking lot. Through the cricket songs he heard them in the cool night air-two engines, approaching.

He hit the ground leaning low and padded over tended grass toward the parked cars. Headlights splayed across the resort. It was after ten by now, the vacationers either at nearby family-friendly clubs or dozing off the fatigue of standing in hot lines all day. Nothing would wake them up.

Squeezing between a Subaru from Texas and a Florida Mazda, he heard the cars park, doors flung open, and voices. A woman's voice, familiar. He looked through the driver's side window of the Subaru and watched them cross the grass. Special Agent Janet Simmons, in one of her blue Homeland Security suits, took the lead, followed by three men clutching Homeland-issue SIG Sauers. Simmons mounted the steps, George Orbach right behind her, while the other two men remained on the ground, spreading out to check escape paths.

Riverrun, past Eve.

And Adam's. Go, Milo.

Now? But I'm with-

Simmons is coming to get you. She's nearly there. Go.

Milo looked up the height of the resort and spotted his bedroom terrace, where Tina had left the light on. As he watched, he took out his cell phone, popped out the battery, and removed the SIM card, then pocketed everything, thinking through his next steps.

The window to the right of their terrace brightened. That was the living room. Simmons had decided to knock first, which he appreciated. On the grass before him, one of the agents stepped back to get a better look at the terrace, to be sure no one was climbing out. Through the window, Milo saw silhouettes-Tina, Janet Simmons, and George Orbach. He waited, listening for any sign that his daughter had woken. All he caught was crickets, and the indistinct murmur of adult voices. Then the silhouettes moved through the apartment.

Still crouching, he padded farther away, weaving through cars until he had reached the edge of the lot. He unzipped his knapsack and unraveled the wire hanger as the figures on the grass moved, finally convinced he wasn't up in the apartment. With the hanger straightened, he formed a small hook at the end, then searched for an older-model car. It was difficult-this was the midrange resort, full of middle-class families who changed their cars every four years-but he finally spotted the one eyesore: a rusted late-eighties Toyota Tercel. He began to wedge the hanger down between the window and the door.

Fifteen minutes later, he was heading southwest on 1-4. If Janet Simmons was on the ball, she'd send men to nearby Orlando International to search for him, so he would instead leave from Tampa. He still didn't know where he was going, but he needed to get out of Florida. This state would not give him answers.

He pulled to the side of the road by a closed barbecue restaurant and put the phone together again. SIM card, battery, then he pressed the power button. It gave him a Nokia welcome, then started to ring-private number. He knew who that was. Milo pressed the hangup button; then, before Simmons could dial again, he typed 411. He asked an operator for the American Airlines desk at Orlando International. As she connected him, his phone beeped, signifying another incoming call. He ignored it, then asked the woman at the airport for their next flight to Dallas. "That leaves at 6:00 a.m., sir."

"I'd like to reserve a seat."

"Do you have a credit card?"

He tugged out his wallet. "The name is Milo Weaver, and I'll be putting this on my MasterCard."

Five minutes later, he'd settled the reservation, and Simmons had tried three more times to get in touch. He disassembled the phone again and continued southwest, away from Orlando.

Outside Polk City, he found a mall with a few cars in the lot. It took two minutes for him to break into an annoying-looking Ford Tempo, then another two minutes to use a shirt from his knapsack to wipe down the Tercel.

He stopped again after Lakeland, took three hundred dollars from an ATM using the Dolan card, then used that money to fill up the tank at an all-night station. In the convenience mart, he bought cigarettes, a padded envelope, a book of stamps, a spiral notebook, and a black marker. Back in the car, he scribbled in the notebook:

Miguel & Hanna-Please Burn this Note

and Hold these for T & S in Safe Place

Very Important

No One Should Know

Thanks for your Trust-M.

He folded the page into the envelope, then went through his knapsack, coming up with three passports. He slipped Laura Dolan and Kelley Dolan into the envelope and put the Lionel Dolan passport into his own pocket. He sealed the envelope and addressed it to Tina's parents in Austin, Texas, pasting on more stamps than necessary.

Nearly two hours had passed by the time he reached Tampa International. Milo parked in the short-term lot a little after midnight, wiped down the steering wheel, and took his knapsack with him into the north entrance.

Once he'd passed the sliding glass doors, he grabbed a complimentary airport map and settled on a bench. There was a mail drop one floor up on the transfer level. From his seat, he read the monitors listing departure cities and times. It turned out that the "International" in the airport's name was a little misleading, since the best they could manage was a single London flight each day and a couple of Canadian destinations. Not that it mattered; he wasn't planning on leaving the country just yet.

There-Delta could take him to JFK at 7:31 a.m., an hour and a half after Simmons would realize he wasn't on the Orlando flight. He hoped that would give him time.

At the Delta counter, three other people stood in front of him-a father, mother, and teenaged son, also heading to New York.

That's when it caught up with him, and he felt dizzy, thinking of Janet Simmons back in that apartment, interrogating his family. He should have stayed. He'd spent six years shielding Tina from his job, and in a matter of days all that work had been undone. He'd told her too much about Angela's murder, and now she was in the middle of something she had no way of understanding, because Milo didn't understand it either. Why did he have to run?

He had to run because the old go-code had been used, and even after six years it was still hardwired to his feet. Grainger would only have used it if there was no other way.

"Sir?" said the Delta clerk. "You wanted to go somewhere?"

His 747 touched down at JFK just after 10:00 a.m.-the pilot apologized to everyone for being nine minutes late. The large woman who'd been squeezing Milo tight against the window turned out to be afraid of flying, and told him in a manic southern accent that she didn't care how late they were, just as long as she could walk on solid earth again. He said he could see her point. Her name was Sharon; he said his was Lionel. She asked if he was from the city, and, sticking to the original Dolan's particulars, he told her he was from