Lee Child - One Shot

“We’ve been through all of this.”

“But how did the puppet master get my name? How did he even know I was in town? How did he know there was a guy here who was a potential problem?”

“Someone told him.”

“Who knew, early in the day on Monday?”

Helen paused a beat.

“My father,” she said. “Since early on Monday morning. And then Emerson, presumably. Shortly afterward. They’d have talked about the case. They’d have communicated immediately if there was a danger that the wheels were coming off.”

“Correct,” Reacher said. “Then one of those two guys called the puppet master. Well before lunch on Monday.”

Helen said nothing.

“Unless one of those two guys is the puppet master,” Reacher said.

“The Zec is the puppet master. You said so yourself.”

“I said he’s Charlie’s boss. That’s all. We’ve got no way of knowing whether he’s actually at the top of the tree.”

“You’re right,” Helen said. “I don’t like this line of thinking at all.”

“Someone communicated,” Reacher said. “That’s for damn sure. Either your father or Emerson. My name was on the street two hours after I got off the bus. So one of them is bent and the other one won’t help us either because he already likes the case exactly the way it is.”

The room went quiet.

“I need to get back to work,” Ann Yanni said.

Nobody spoke.

“Call me if there’s news,” Yanni said.

The room stayed quiet. Reacher said nothing. Ann Yanni crossed the room. Stopped next to him.

“Keys,” she said.

He dug in his pocket and handed them over.

“Thanks for the loan,” he said. “Nice car.”

Linsky watched the Mustang leave. It went north. Loud engine, loud exhaust. It was audible for a whole block. Then the street went quiet again and Linsky dialed his phone.

“The television woman is out of there,” he said.

“The private detective will stay at work,” the Zec said.

“So what if the others leave together?”

“I hope they don’t.”

“What if they do?”

“Take them all.”

Rosemary Barr asked, “Is there a cure? For Parkinson’s disease?”

“No,” Reacher said. “No cure, no prevention. But it can be slowed down. There are drugs for it. Physiotherapy helps. And sleep. The symptoms disappear when a person is asleep.”

“Maybe that’s why he wanted the pills. To escape.”

“He shouldn’t try to escape too much. Social contact is good.”

“I should go to the hospital,” Rosemary said.

“Explain to him,” Reacher said. “Tell him what really happened on Friday.”

Rosemary nodded. Crossed the room and went out the door. A minute later Reacher heard her car start up and drive away.

Franklin went out to the kitchenette to make coffee. Reacher and Helen Rodin were left alone in the office together. Reacher sat down in the chair that Rosemary Barr had used. Helen stepped to the window and looked down at the street below. She kept her back to the room. She was dressed the same as Rosemary Barr. Black shirt, black skirt, black patent-leather shoes. But she didn’t look like a widow. She looked like something from New York or Paris. Her heels were higher and her legs were long and bare and tan.

“These guys we’re talking about are Russians,” she said.

Reacher said nothing.

“My father is an American,” she said.

“An American called Aleksei Alekseivitch,” Reacher said.

“Our family came here before World War One. There’s no possible connection. How could there be? These people we’re talking about are low-life Soviets.”

“What did your father do before he was the DA?”

“He was an assistant DA.”

“Before that?”

“He always worked there.”

“Tell me about his coffee service.”

“What about it?”

“He uses china cups and a silver tray. The county didn’t buy them for him.”

“So?”

“Tell me about his suits.”

“His suits?”

“On Monday he was wearing a thousand-dollar suit. You don’t see many public servants wearing thousand-dollar suits.”

“He’s got expensive tastes.”

“How does he afford them?”

“I don’t want to talk about this.”

“One more question.”

Helen said nothing.

“Did he pressure you not to take the case?”

Helen said nothing. Looked left. Looked right. Then she turned around. “He said losing might be winning.”

“Concern for your career?”

“I thought so. I still think so. He’s an honest man.”

Reacher nodded. “There’s a fifty percent chance you’re right.”

Franklin came back in with the coffee, which was a thin own-brand brew in three nonmatching pottery mugs, two of them chipped, on a cork bar tray, with an open carton of half-and-half and a yellow box of sugar and a single pressed-steel spoon. He put the tray on the desk and Helen Rodin stared at it, like it was making Reacher’s point for him: This is how coffee is served in an office .

“David Chapman knew your name on Monday,” she said. “James Barr’s first lawyer. He’s known about you since Saturday.”

“But Chapman didn’t know I ever showed up,” Reacher said. “I assume nobody told him.”

“I knew your name,” Franklin said. “Maybe I should be in the mix, too.”

“But you knew the real reason I was here,” Reacher said. “You wouldn’t have had me attacked. You’d have had me subpoenaed.”

Nobody spoke.

“I was wrong about Jeb Oliver,” Reacher said. “He isn’t a dope dealer. There was nothing in his barn except an old pickup truck.”

“I’m glad you can be wrong about something,” Helen said.

“Jeb Oliver isn’t Russian,” Franklin said.

“Apple pie,” Reacher said.

“Therefore these guys can work with Americans. That’s what I’m saying. It could be Emerson. Doesn’t have to be the DA.”

“Fifty percent chance,” Reacher said. “I’m not accusing anybody yet.”

“If you’re right in the first place.”

“The bad guys were all over me very fast.”

“Doesn’t sound like either Emerson or the DA to me, and I know them both.”

“You can say his name,” Helen said. “His name is Alex Rodin.”

“I don’t think it’s either one of them,” Franklin said.

“I’m going back to work,” Helen said.

“Give me a ride?” Reacher asked. “Let me out under the highway?”

“No,” Helen said. “I really don’t feel like doing that.”

She picked up her purse and her briefcase and walked out of the office alone.

Reacher sat still and listened to the sounds out on the street. He heard a car door opening and closing. An engine starting. A car driving away. He sipped his coffee and said, “I guess I upset her.”

Franklin nodded. “I guess you did.”

“These guys have got someone on the inside. That’s clear, right? That’s a fact. So we should be able to discuss it.”

“A cop makes more sense than a DA.”

“I don’t agree. A cop controls only his own cases. Ultimately a prosecutor controls everything.”

“I’d prefer it that way. I was a cop.”

“So was I,” Reacher said.

“And I have to say, Alex Rodin kills a lot of cases. People say it’s caution, but it could be something else.”

“You should analyze what kind of cases he kills.”

“Like I don’t have enough to do already.”

Reacher nodded. Put his mug down. Stood up.

“Start with Oline Archer,” he said. “The victim. She’s what’s important now.”

Then he stepped to the window and checked the street. Saw nothing. So he nodded to Franklin and walked down the hallway and out the door to the top of the outside staircase.