Page 13 of Exit Strategy
‘What, like, in the morning?’
‘What’s wrong with right now?’
‘At this time? It’s late. Are you sure?’
‘Why not? Buses run all night.’
‘Don’t you want to get some sleep?’
‘I’ll sleep on the bus.’
‘Are you in a hurry to get someplace?’
‘No.’
‘So where are you headed?’
Reacher paused for a moment, like he was surprised by the question. Then he said, ‘Wherever the first bus takes me.’
TEN
Every time Strickland hauled himself up the ladder that was in the shadows at the far corner of the section of the cavern with the highest ceiling, he asked himself the same question.Why?
Strickland knew the answer, in theory. It was so the controller could look down at the four training zones and visually track what was happening without relying on screens or infrared sensors. But the theory wasn’t everything. He couldn’t help but think that the cameras would have been enough. If so, the control room could have been at ground level, and he would have been a happier man.
Strickland reached the top of the ladder and eased himself onto the gantry that ran diagonally above the border between the urban and jungle zones. He knew no one was down there but he still moved as quietly as he could.He slid each foot along the mesh, slowly and smoothly, until he reached the control room door. He had his own code, of course, but he tapped the administrator’s into the keypad instead. He stepped inside, closed the door softly, then hit the light switch. The room filled with a red glow. It was the kind of light they used in old-school photographic darkrooms. It gave him a weird sensation. It felt eerie, like he was trapped inside a fairground haunted house. He knew that the setup was necessary, though. The glass in the sloping windows was made to prevent that particular frequency from passing through so that no light could spill onto the ground below.
The equipment in the room was divided into four banks, one for each training zone: urban and jungle, which he’d passed over, along with mountain and desert. He selected urban, fired up one of the computers, clicked on the main menu, then on the option for operational parameters. He knew the correct settings well because they’d been designed to his own specifications. Partly based on his experiences in Iraq, and partly on what he had drawn from his imagination. That evening, everything was set as it should have been, under normal circumstances. He nodded to himself. His staff were well trained. Then he went to work with the keyboard and mouse. He had a feeling that circumstances the next morning were going to be far from normal.
The next bus scheduled to leave Baltimore after Gilmour dropped Reacher off outside the Greyhound station was headed to New York an hour and six minutes later. New York was as good a place to go as any, Reacher thought.And he hadn’t been there for a while. He went in through the glass door, dodged a drip from an overhead HVAC duct, bought a ticket from one machine and a cup of coffee from another, then took a seat in the waiting area. He picked the one at the far end of the last row, by the window. That gave the best view of the entrance, which was a bonus, because the ones at the end had only one armrest. That made them the only kind he could comfortably fit in.
The bus showed up four minutes early. Reacher peered through the doorway to make sure there were no Rides-R-Us cabs loitering in the area, then made his way to the bus’s designated stand. No one got off. No one else was waiting to get on. Reacher was ten feet from its door when he heard footsteps behind him. Fast-moving, but not too heavy. Someone clearly in a hurry. A passenger concerned about getting left behind, Reacher guessed, but he glanced over his shoulder anyway to be sure.
It wasn’t another traveler who was running down the platform. It was Gilmour. His eyes were wide and his face was bone white in the artificial light. He called out, ‘Reacher, stop. I need to talk to you.’
Reacher slowed to let him catch up, then nodded toward the bus. ‘Make it quick.’
‘No. Stop. Please.’ Gilmour glanced around in all directions then lowered his voice. ‘I’m in trouble. I need help.’
‘What kind of trouble?’
Gilmour shook his head. He said, ‘Not here. Come back to my car.’
‘There’s no time. The bus leaves in three minutes.’
‘There will be other buses. This is important. It’s life ordeath. I’ll get you another ticket, if that’s what you need. But hear me out first. Please.’
Gilmour’s rented Chevy was on the street outside the station. It was jutting out from the curb at a crazy angle, looking more like it had been abandoned by a drunk joyrider than deliberately parked. Gilmour hurried toward it, unlocked the doors with the remote, and climbed in behind the wheel. Reacher strolled around to the other side and got in alongside him. For a minute neither of them spoke, then Reacher said, ‘Are you going to talk to me or am I supposed to read your mind?’
Gilmour took two slow, deep breaths, then said, ‘Okay. This is what happened. After I left you here I drove back to my apartment. I made sure no one was following. I parked a block away. But when I walked into the building, two men were already there waiting for me. One of them’ – Gilmour paused and even more color drained out of his face – ‘one of them showed me a photo. On his phone. It was my nephew. He’s four years old. He was playing on his scooter outside my brother’s house. In St Louis. The man said if I didn’t do what they told me, they would blind the kid. Gouge his eyeballs out with a spoon. Send one to me and one to my brother.’
‘Who were these guys?’
‘I don’t know their names. They were sent by the guy I’m … involved with. The one who texted about rescheduling the meeting at the coffee shop.’
‘Why send guys to your place when you already have a meeting set up?’
‘One of them was pissed. He said they’d been theresince three in the afternoon. I guess the guy sent them to stake the place out when I didn’t reply after the first meeting went south. Then he forgot to call them off when I finally did get in touch.’
