Lee Child - Without Fail

The engine noise built and the plane moved out to the runway. By the time it took off and leveled out almost everybody except those at Reacher’s table was fast asleep. They all just shut down like professionals do when they’re faced with a window between periods of intense activity. Froelich was accustomed to sleeping on planes. That was clear. Her head was tucked down on her shoulder and her arms were folded neatly in her lap. She looked good. The three agents around her sprawled a little less decorously. They were big guys. Wide necks, broad shoulders, thick wrists. One of them had his foot shoved out in the aisle. It looked to be about size fourteen. He assumed Neagley was asleep behind him. She could sleep anywhere. He had once seen her sleep in a tree, on a long stakeout. He found the button and laid his chair back a fraction and got comfortable. But then the reporters started talking. To Armstrong, but about him.

“Can we get a name, sir, for the record?” one of them said.

Armstrong shook his head.

“I’m afraid identities need to remain confidential at this point,” he said.

“But we can assume we’re still in the national security arena here?”

Armstrong smiled. Almost winked.

“I can’t stop you assuming things,” he said.

The reporters wrote something down. Started a conversation about foreign relations, with heavy emphasis on military resources and spending. Reacher ignored it all and tried to drift off. Came around again when he heard a repeated question and felt eyes on him. One of the reporters was looking in his direction.

“But you do still support the doctrine of overwhelming force?” the other guy was asking Armstrong.

Armstrong glanced at Reacher. “Would you wish to comment on that?”

Reacher yawned. “Yes, I still support overwhelming force. That’s for sure. I support it big time. Always have, believe me.”

The reporters both wrote it down. Armstrong nodded wisely. Reacher laid his chair back a little more and went to sleep.

He woke up on the descent into Bismarck. Everybody around him was already awake. Froelich was talking quietly to her agents, giving them their standard operational instructions. Neagley was listening along with the three guys in her row. He glanced out Armstrong’s window and saw brilliant blue sky and no clouds. The earth was tan and dormant, ten thousand feet below. He could see the Missouri River winding north to south through an endless sequence of bright blue lakes. He could see the narrow ribbon of I-94 running east to west. The brown urban smudge of Bismarck where they met.

“We’re leaving the perimeter to the local cops,” Froelich was saying. “We’ve got forty of them on duty, maybe more. Plus state troopers in cars. Our job is to stick close together. We’ll be in and out quick. We’re arriving after the event has started and we’re leaving before it finishes.”

“Leave them wanting more,” Armstrong said, to nobody in particular.

“Works in show business,” one of the reporters said. The plane yawed and tilted and settled into a long shallow glide path. Seat backs came upright and belts were ratcheted tight. The reporters stowed their notebooks. They were staying on the plane. No attraction in open-air local politics for important foreign-relations journalists. Froelich glanced across at Reacher and smiled. But there was worry in her eyes.

The plane put down gently and taxied over to a corner of the tarmac where a five-car motorcade waited. There was a State Police cruiser at each end and three identical stretched Town Cars sandwiched between. A small knot of ground crew standing by with a rolling staircase. Armstrong traveled with his detail in the center limo. The backup crew took the one behind it. Froelich and Reacher and Neagley took the one in front. The air was freezing, but the sky was bright. The sun was blinding.

“You’ll be freelancing,” Froelich said. “Wherever you feel you need to be.”

There was no traffic. It felt like empty country. There was a short fast trip over smooth concrete roads and suddenly Reacher saw the familiar church tower in the distance, and the low surrounding huddle of houses. There were cars parked solid along the side of the approach road all the way up to a State Police roadblock a hundred yards from the community center entrance. The motorcade eased past it and headed for the parking lot. The fences were decorated with bunting and there was a large crowd already assembled, maybe three hundred people. The church tower loomed over all of them, tall and square and solid and blinding white in the winter sun.

“I hope this time they checked every inch of it,” Froelich said.

The five cars swept onto the gravel and crunched to a stop. The backup agents were out first. They fanned out in front of Armstrong’s car, checking the faces in the crowd, waiting until Froelich heard the all-clear from the local police commander on her radio. She got it and instantly relayed it to the backup leader. He acknowledged immediately and stepped to Armstrong’s door and opened it ceremoniously. Reacher was impressed. It was like a ballet. Five seconds, serene, dignified, unhurried, no apparent hesitation at all, but there had already been three-way radio communication and visual confirmation of security. This was a slick operation.

Armstrong stepped out of his car into the cold. He was already smiling a perfect local-boy-embarrassed-by-all-the-fuss smile and stretching out his hand to greet his successor at the head of the reception line. He was bareheaded. His personal detail moved in so close they were almost jostling him. The backup agents got close, too, maneuvering themselves so they kept the tallest two of the three between Armstrong and the church. Their faces were completely expressionless. Their coats were open and their eyes were always moving.

“That damn church,” Froelich said. “It’s like a shooting gallery.”

“We should go check it again,” Reacher said. “Ourselves, just to be sure. Have him circulate counterclockwise until we do.”

“That takes him nearer the church.”

“He’s safer nearer the church. Makes the downward angle too steep. There are wooden louvers up there around the bells. The field of fire starts about forty feet out from the base of the tower. Closer than that, he’s in a blind spot.”

Froelich raised her wrist and spoke to her lead agent. Seconds later they saw him ease Armstrong to his right, into a wide counterclockwise loop around the field. The new senator tagged along. The crowd changed direction and moved with them.

“Now find the guy with the church keys,” Reacher said.

Froelich spoke to the local police captain. Listened to his response in her ear.

“The church warden will meet us there,” she said. “Five minutes.”

They got out of the car and walked across the gravel to the church gate. The air was very cold. Armstrong’s head was visible among a sea of people. The sun was catching his hair. He was well out in the field, thirty feet from the tower. The new senator was at his side. Six agents close by. The crowd was moving with them, slowly changing its shape like an evolving creature. There were dark overcoats everywhere. Women’s hats, mufflers, sunglasses. The grass was brown and dead from night frosts.

Froelich stiffened. Cupped her hand over her ear. Raised the other hand and spoke into her wrist microphone.

“Keep him close to the church,” she said.

Then she dropped her hands and opened her coat. Loosened her gun in its holster.

“State cops on the far perimeter just called in,” she said. “They’re worried about some guy on foot.”

“Where?” Reacher asked.

“In the subdivision.”

“Description?”