Lee Child - One Shot

There was a television set in the Marriott’s coffee shop. It was mounted high in the corner, on a black articulated bracket bolted to the wall. The sound was off. Reacher watched an advertisement that featured a young woman in a filmy summer dress romping through a field of wildflowers. He wasn’t sure what product was being advertised. The dress, maybe, or makeup, or shampoo, or allergy medicine. Then a news banner popped up. Noon Report . Reacher checked his watch. Twelve exactly. He glanced toward the reception desk in the lobby. He had a clear view. No sign of Hutton. Not yet. So he glanced back at the television. Ann Yanni was on. She seemed to be live on location, downtown, out on the street. In front of the Metropole Palace Hotel . She talked silently but earnestly for a moment and then the picture cut to tape of dawn twilight. An alley. Police barriers. A shapeless form under a white sheet. Then the picture cut again. To a driver’s license photograph. Pale skin. Green eyes. Red hair. Just under the chin a caption was superimposed: Alexandra Dupree .

Alexandra. Sandy.

Now they’ve gone too far , Reacher thought.

He shivered.

Way too far.

He stared at the screen. Sandy’s face was still there. Then the picture cut again, back to tape of the early hours, to a head-and-shoulders shot of Emerson. A recorded interview. Yanni had her microphone shoved up under Emerson’s nose. He was talking. Yanni pulled the microphone back and asked a question. Emerson talked some more. His eyes were flat and empty and tired and hooded against the bright light on the camera. Even without the sound Reacher knew what he was saying. He was promising a full and complete investigation. We’ll get this guy , he was saying.

“I saw you from the desk,” a voice said.

Then it said, “And I thought to myself, don’t I know that guy?”

Reacher looked away from the TV.

Eileen Hutton was standing right there in front of him.

Her hair was shorter. She had no tan. There were fine lines around her eyes. But otherwise she looked just the same as she had fourteen years ago. And just as good. Medium height, slim, poised. Groomed. Fragrant. Feminine as hell. She hadn’t put on a pound. She was wearing civvies. Khaki chino pants, a white T, a blue oxford shirt open over it. Penny loafers, no socks, no makeup, no jewelry.

No wedding band.

“Remember me?” she said.

Reacher nodded.

“Hello, Hutton,” he said. “I remember you. Of course I do. And it’s good to see you again.”

She had a purse and a key card in her hand. A rolling carry-on with a long handle at her feet.

“It’s good to see you again, too,” she said. “But please tell me it’s a coincidence that you’re here. Please tell me that.”

Feminine as hell, except she was still a woman in a man’s world, and you could still see the steel if you knew where to look. Which was into her eyes. They ran like a stock ticker, warm, warm, welcome, welcome, with a periodic bright flash: Mess with me and I’ll rip your lungs out .

“Sit down,” Reacher said. “Let’s have lunch.”

“Lunch?”

“It’s what people do at lunch time.”

“You were expecting me. You’ve been waiting for me.”

Reacher nodded. Glanced back up at the TV set. Sandy’s driver’s license picture was on the screen again. Hutton followed his gaze.

“Is that the dead girl?” she asked. “I heard it on the radio, driving down. Sounds like a person should get combat pay, coming here.”

“What did the radio say? There’s no sound in here.”

“Homicide. Late last night. Local girl got her neck broken. A single blow to the right temple. In an alley outside a hotel. Not this one, I hope.”

“No,” Reacher said. “It wasn’t this one.”

“Brutal.”

“I guess it was.”

Eileen Hutton sat down at the table. Not across from him. In the chair next to him. Just like Sandy, at the sports bar.

“You look great,” he said. “You really do.”

She said nothing.

“It’s good to see you,” he said again.

“Likewise,” she said.

“No, I mean it.”

“I mean it, too. Believe me, if we were at some Beltway cocktail party I would be getting all misty and nostalgic with the best of them. I might still, as soon as I find out you’re not here for the reason I think you’re here.”

“What reason would that be?”

“To keep your promise.”

“You remember that?”

“Of course I do. You talked about it all one night.”

“And you’re here because the Department of the Army got a subpoena.”

Hutton nodded. “From some idiot prosecutor.”

“Rodin,” Reacher said.

“That’s the guy.”

“My fault,” Reacher said.

“Christ,” Hutton said. “What did you tell him?”

“Nothing,” Reacher said. “I didn’t tell him anything. But he told me something. He told me my name was on the defense’s witness list.”

“The defense list?”

Reacher nodded. “That surprised me, obviously. So I was confused. So I asked him if my name had come from some old Pentagon file.”

“Not in this lifetime,” Hutton said.

“As I found out,” Reacher said. “But still, I had said the magic words. I had mentioned the Pentagon. The type of guy he is, I knew he would go fishing. He’s very insecure. He likes his cases armor-plated. So I’m sorry.”

“You should be. I get to spend two days in the back of beyond and I get to perjure myself from here to breakfast time.”

“You don’t need to do that. You can claim national security.”

Hutton shook her head. “We talked about it, long and hard. We decided to stay away from anything that draws attention. That Palestinian thing was very thin. If that unravels, everything unravels. So I’m here to swear blind that James Barr was GI Joe.”

“You OK with that?”

“You know the army. None of us is a virgin anymore. It’s about the mission, and the mission is to keep a lid on the KC thing.”

“Why did they delegate you?”

“Two birds with one stone. No good to them to send someone else and still have me out there knowing the truth. This way, I can’t talk about it ever again, anywhere. Not without effectively confessing to perjury one time in Indiana. They’re not dumb.”

“I’m surprised they still care. It’s practically ancient history.”

“How long have you been out?”

“Seven years.”

“And clearly you don’t have a subscription to the Army Times .”

“What?”

“Or maybe you never knew.”

“Never knew what?”

“Where it went back then, up the chain of command.”

“Division, I supposed. But maybe not all the way to the top.”

“It stopped on a certain colonel’s desk. He was the one who nixed it.”

“And?”

“His name was Petersen.”

“And?”

“Colonel Petersen is now Lieutenant General Petersen. Three stars. Congressional liaison. About to get his fourth star. About to be named Vice Chief of Staff of the Army.”

That could complicate things , Reacher thought.

“Embarrassing,” he said.

“You bet your ass embarrassing,” Hutton said. “So believe me, this is one lid that is going to stay on. You need to bear that in mind. Whatever you want to do about your promise, you can’t talk about what happened. Any more than I can. They would find a way to get to you.”

“Neither of us needs to talk about it. It’s a done deal.”

“I’m very glad to hear it.”

“I think.”

“You think?”

“Ask me how they really got my name.”

“How did they really get your name?”