Lee Child - Never Go Back

Then they came out on Ventura Boulevard, which was not the same thing as the Ventura Freeway, but was at least wide and straight. The Ventura Freeway lay ahead, and Universal City was to the right, and Studio City was to the left.

Reacher said, ‘Wait.’

Turner said, ‘For what?’

‘The Big Dog’s lawyer was in Studio City. Right on Ventura Boulevard. I remember from the affidavit.’

‘And?’

‘Maybe his locks and his alarm aren’t so great either.’

‘That’s a big step, Reacher. That’s a whole bunch of extra crimes right there.’

‘Let’s at least go take a look.’

‘I’ll be an accessory.’

‘You can have a veto,’ Reacher said. ‘Two thumbs on the button, like a nuclear launch.’

He turned left, and rolled down the road. Then a phone rang. A loud, electronic trill, like a demented songbird. Not his phone, and not Turner’s, but Rickard’s, from the back seat, next to his empty wallet.

FIFTY-FIVE

REACHER PULLED OVER and squirmed around and picked up the phone. It was trilling loud, and vibrating in his hand. The screen said Incoming Call , which was superfluous information, given all the trilling and vibrating, but it also said Shrago , which was useful. Reacher opened the phone and held it to his ear and said, ‘Hello?’

A voice said, ‘Rickard?’

‘No,’ Reacher said. ‘Not Rickard.’

Silence.

Reacher said, ‘What were you thinking? A bunch of ware-housemen against the 110th MP? We’re three for three. It’s like batting practice. And you’re all that’s left. And you’re all alone now. And you’re next. How does that even feel?’

Silence.

Reacher said, ‘But they shouldn’t have put you in this position. It was unfair. I know that. I know what Pentagon people are like. I’m not unsympathetic. I can help you out.’

Silence.

Reacher said, ‘Tell me their names, go straight back to Bragg, and I’ll leave you alone.’

Silence. Then a fast beep-beep-beep in the earpiece, and Call Ended on the screen. Reacher tossed the phone back on the rear seat and said, ‘I’ll ask twice, but I won’t ask three times.’

They drove on, and then Studio City came at them, thick and fast. The boulevard was lined with enterprises, some of them in buildings all their own, some of them huddled together in strip malls, like the place in North Hollywood, with some of the buildings and some of the malls approached by shared service roads, and others standing behind parking lots all their own. Numbers were hard to see, because plenty of storefronts were dark. They made two premature turns, in and out of the wrong parking lots. But they found the right place soon enough. It was a lime-green mall, five units long. The Big Dog’s lawyer was in the centre unit.

Except he wasn’t.

The centre unit was occupied by a tax preparer. Se Habla Español, plus about a hundred other languages.

Turner said, ‘Things change in sixteen years. People retire.’

Reacher said nothing.

She said, ‘Are you sure this is the right address?’

‘You think I’m mistaken?’

‘You could be forgiven.’

‘Thank you, but I’m sure.’ Reacher moved closer, for a better look. The style of the place was not cutting edge. The signage and the messages and the boasts and the promises were all a little dated. The lawyer had not retired recently.

There was a light on in back.

‘On a timer,’ Turner said. ‘For security. No one is in there.’

‘It’s winter,’ Reacher said. ‘Tax time is starting. The guy is in there.’

‘And?’

‘We could talk to him.’

‘What about? Are you due a refund?’

‘He forwards the old guy’s mail, at least. Maybe he even knows him. Maybe the old guy is still the landlord.’

‘Maybe the old guy died ten years ago. Or moved to Wyoming.’

‘Only one way to find out,’ Reacher said. He stepped up and rapped hard on the glass. He said, ‘At this time of night it will work better if you do the talking.’

Juliet called Romeo, because some responsibilities were his, and he said, ‘Shrago tells me Reacher has Rickard’s phone. And therefore also his gun, I assume. And he knows they’re ware-housemen from Fort Bragg.’

Romeo said, ‘Because of Zadran’s bio. It was an easy connection to make.’

‘We’re down to the last man. We’re nearly defenceless.’

‘Shrago is worth something.’

‘Against them? We’ve lost three men.’

‘Are you worried?’

‘Of course I am. We’re losing.’

‘Do you have a suggestion?’

‘It’s time,’ Juliet said. ‘We know Reacher’s target. We should give Shrago permission.’

For a spell it looked like Turner was right, and there was no one there, just a light on a security timer, but Reacher kept on knocking, and eventually a guy stepped into view making shooing motions with his arms. To which Reacher replied with beckoning motions of his own, which produced a standoff, the guy miming I don’t do night-time walkins , and Reacher feeling like the kid in the movie that gets sent to the doctor’s house in the middle of the night, all Come quickly, old Jeb got buried alive in a pile of W9s . And the guy cracked first. He snorted in exasperation and set off stomping up his store’s centre aisle. He undid the lock and opened the door. He was a young Asian man. Early thirties, maybe. He was wearing grey pants and a red sweater vest.

He said, ‘What do you want?’

Turner said, ‘To apologize.’

‘For what?’

‘Interrupting you. We know your time is valuable. But we need five minutes of it. For which we’d be happy to pay you a hundred dollars.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Technically at the moment we work for the government.’

‘May I see ID?’

‘No.’

‘But you want to pay me a hundred dollars?’

‘Only if you have material information.’

‘On what subject?’

‘The lawyer that had this place before you.’

‘What about him?’

‘Congress requires us to verify certain types of information a minimum of five separate ways, and we’ve done four of them, so we’re hoping you can be number five tonight, so we can all go home.’

‘What type of information?’

‘First of all, we’re required to ask, purely as a formality, do you have personal knowledge whether the subject of our inquiry is alive or dead?’

‘Yes, I do.’

‘And which is it?’

‘Alive.’

‘Good,’ Turner said. ‘That’s just a baseline thing. And all we need now is his full legal name and his current address.’

‘You should have come to me first, not fifth. I forward his mail.’

‘No, we tackle the hard ones early. Makes the day go better. Downhill, not up.’

‘I’ll write it down.’

‘Thank you,’ Turner said.

‘It has to be exact,’ Reacher said. ‘You know what Congress is like. If one guy puts Avenue and another guy puts A-v-e, it’s liable to get thrown out.’

‘Don’t worry,’ the guy said.

The lawyer’s full legal name was Martin Mitchell Ballantyne, and he hadn’t moved to Wyoming. His address was still Studio City, Los Angeles, California. Almost walking distance. Turner’s map showed it to be close to the Ventura end of Coldwater Canyon Drive. Maybe where the guy had lived all along.

In which case he had been a lousy lawyer. The address was a garden apartment, probably from the 1930s, which was eight decades of decay. It had been dowdy long ago. Now it was desperate. Dark green walls, like slime, and yellow light in the windows.

Turner said, ‘Don’t get your hopes up. He might refuse to see us. It’s kind of late to come calling.’