Personal

by Lee Child

  Then our food arrived, and I forgot all about pills, legit or otherwise. The beans were beans, and the Coke was Coke, but the meat was sensational. Just a no-name clearing in the North Carolina backwoods, but right then there was nowhere I would have rather been. Casey Nice looked like she shared my opinion. She was sucking the meat off her ribs and smiling and licking her lips. All good, until her phone rang.

  She wiped her fingers and answered and listened and hung up. She said, ‘We have to go back. Something just happened in London.’

  TWENTY-TWO

  WHAT HAD HAPPENED in London was that someone had died. Which was not news in itself. London’s population was about eight million, and the UK’s death rate was over nine per thousand per year, so on any given day a couple hundred Londoners would breathe their last. Old age, overdoses, degenerative illnesses, cancers of every kind, car wrecks, fires, accidents, suicides, heart attacks, thromboses, and strokes. All normal.

  Getting shot in the head by a high-powered rifle, not so much.

  We chugged back to Bragg in the ancient patched-up Bronco, and we found O’Day and Shoemaker and Scarangello waiting for us in the upstairs room. Shoemaker gave us the facts. There was a big-deal Albanian gang leader in London, name of Karel Libor, very rich, very brutal, very successful, running drugs and girls and guns. Like most very rich and very successful big-deal gang leaders, he was also very paranoid. He had a lot of guys looking after him, and would go nowhere unless his destination had been checked and secured. Even the trip from his door to his car was protected. But apparently not from a .50-calibre round fired from a thousand yards away. Mr Libor’s head had exploded and splashed all over the armoured Range Rover he was getting into.

  ‘Conclusions?’ O’Day asked.

  Shoemaker sat back, as if the question wasn’t aimed at him, and Scarangello glanced at Casey Nice, who shrugged and said nothing. I said, ‘Kott and Carson are in London already. They’re hiring local support. But not with money. Apparently the help wanted payment in kind this time. As in, the elimination of a rival.’

  O’Day nodded. ‘A rival otherwise very difficult to get to, at street level. But raise your eyes, and London’s skyline is densely developed now. Lots of opportunities at a thousand yards, one imagines. And a thousand yards is nothing to Kott. Practically point-blank range.’

  ‘Or Carson,’ I said.

  ‘Or Datsev,’ he said. ‘Carson is only your opinion. We must keep an open mind.’

  ‘Did anything like this happen in Paris?’

  O’Day nodded again. ‘I think it did. Not that we ever put two and two together, because there was no rifle involved. About a week before the attempt on the president, an Algerian gang leader was knifed to death in Montmartre. A very big cheese, as the French might say. And looking back at it now, you’d have to say the Vietnamese were plausible beneficiaries.’

  Casey Nice asked, ‘Who benefits in London?’

  ‘I’m awaiting a definitive report,’ O’Day said. ‘But ballpark estimates put two in the frame. A Serbian outfit in the west of London, and an old-fashioned English gang in the east. Karel Libor was a thorn in both their sides, according to MI5.’

  I said, ‘Where exactly is the G8 location?’

  ‘In the east of London.’

  ‘Then if local really means local, they’re palling up with the old-fashioned Brits.’

  ‘For what exactly?’ Scarangello asked.

  Shoemaker said, ‘Part of the payment in kind would be considered an old-fashioned tribute, to be allowed to operate there at all. Like a toll or a tax, almost. The rest will be for logistics, places to stay, places to hide, and then on the day itself, sentries and other security close up, and a cordon out at a distance. Like we just saw in Paris.’

  ‘That makes it harder for us.’

  I shook my head.

  ‘It makes it easier,’ I said. ‘We’re not looking for two guys any more. We’re looking for about fifty-two guys. They say local support, I say breadcrumbs.’

  O’Day said, ‘You were right about Kott’s neighbour, by the way. The FBI found most of ten thousand dollars in cash. But not in the back of his closet.’

  ‘Where, then?’

  ‘In the washing machine in his front yard.’

  ‘Smart,’ I said. ‘I should have checked. Who gave it to him?’

  ‘He won’t say. And waterboarding is out of fashion at the moment.’

  ‘He’s too scared to say. Which might be significant.’

  ‘And the French found the bullet that killed Khenkin. From this morning. Badly deformed against the wall of the apartment house, but the chemistry is the same as the fragments you brought back from Arkansas. The same batch, quite possibly.’

  I nodded. ‘Which raises questions about travel. He didn’t fly commercial, or you’d have a paper trail. He couldn’t check a fifty-calibre rifle and a box of bullets without someone noticing.’

  ‘Two possibilities,’ Shoemaker said. ‘A cargo ship out of Mobile or Galveston, or a private plane out of practically anywhere. Customs checks at private fields in Europe are basically nonexistent.’

  ‘Private plane for sure,’ O’Day said. ‘These people are throwing money around. I mean, ten grand for a toothless hillbilly in Arkansas? That’s way over the odds. The guy would have been happy with a couple hundred, surely. They’re not looking for value. They’re looking for easy solutions, and they have the budget to make them happen.’

  Casey Nice asked, ‘How did they get to London today?’

  Scarangello said, ‘Train, probably. Through the tunnel. There’s a passport check in Paris, but apart from that it’s fast and easy, city centre to city centre.’

  ‘How did they transport their rifles?’

  ‘Golf bags, maybe. Or ski bags. Lots of people carry weird luggage.’

  ‘How did they know who to hook up with in London, in terms of local support?’

  ‘Prior research, I assume. Prior negotiation, perhaps.’

  ‘We’ll know more in the morning,’ O’Day said. ‘Take the rest of the evening off, and we’ll reconvene at breakfast tomorrow.’

  I went down the stairs and headed out the red door, but once again I heard the click of good shoes and the swish of dark nylons behind me. I turned around and found Joan Scarangello coming after me. She was looking at me with some kind of bleak emotion in her eyes. She said, ‘We need to talk.’

  I said, ‘About what?’

  ‘You.’

  ‘What about me?’

  ‘I don’t want to talk out here.’

  ‘Where, then?’

  ‘Your quarters. They feel unoccupied. Like neutral space.’

  So we walked over together and I opened up and we sat like we had before, with me on the sofa and her in a chair, with our angles adjusted, so that we were looking at each other face to face. She asked, ‘Did you enjoy your dinner?’

  ‘Not bad,’ I said. ‘You?’

  ‘I spent it arguing with generals O’Day and Shoemaker.’

  ‘About the quality of the food?’

  ‘No, about your role in London.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘London won’t be the same as Paris. The Brits are different. They’ll be running their own show. They’ll accept advice and information, but they won’t let us actually do anything. Not on their turf. And we have to respect that. They’re important to us in many ways.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘My position is you should go as an acknowledged asset.’

  ‘But O’Day argued against that, because then I wouldn’t be able to do anything.’

  Scarangello nodded. ‘He wants you there as a private citizen. Not acknowledged by us. Which means if you get caught choking some random senior on the sidewalk, there will be absolutely nothing we can do to help you.’

  ‘I’ll be careful.’

  ‘I’m serious,’ she said. ‘General O’Day is talking about things that are blatantly illegal. Your being there in the first place will
be blatantly illegal. A very dim view is taken of unacknowledged assets inside an ally’s jurisdiction. If you screw up, you’ll be a common criminal, nothing more. Worse than that, in fact. The embassy checks up on common criminals, but no one will check up on you. They’ll run a mile in the opposite direction. Because we’ll tell them to.’

  ‘I’ll be careful,’ I said again.

  She said, ‘I read into the John Kott file.’

  I said, ‘And?’

  ‘You did a very nice job with the interrogation.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You gave him the rope and he hung himself. He was arrogant, and he couldn’t bear to be challenged.’

  I nodded. ‘That was about the gist of it.’

  She said, ‘I think you’re just as bad as he was.’

  I said nothing.

  She said, ‘This is where you tell me you never cut anyone’s throat.’

  ‘I would if I could.’

  ‘I think it’s too big a risk to send you to London in any capacity.’

  ‘Then don’t.’

  ‘Meaning you’ll get yourself there anyway?’

  ‘Free country.’

  ‘I could take your passport back.’

  ‘It’s right here in my pocket. Come and get it.’

  ‘I could cancel it in the computer. You’d be arrested at the airport.’

  ‘Your decision,’ I said. ‘No skin off my nose. Kott will come home sooner or later. I’ll get him then. Amid all the paralysis, and the crashing markets, and the recession, and the people starving, and the wars starting, and the whole world falling apart. None of which will bother me in the least. I can look after myself. And I don’t have a real big portfolio.’

  She said nothing.

  I said, ‘You need the best help you can get. Anything else would be negligent. I seem to remember those words from somewhere.’

  ‘And you’re the best help?’

  ‘That remains to be seen. Either someone will get the job done, or not. That someone might be me, or not. The future’s not ours to see. But my track record is reasonable, and I don’t see how I could hurt.’

  ‘You could hurt by getting arrested inside the first five minutes. Then we’ve got a diplomatic incident on top of a security emergency. I’m not sure I can trust you.’

  ‘Then come with me,’ I said. ‘You could sign off on my every move. We could confer, shoulder to shoulder. Not seven feet apart.’

  She nodded. ‘That’s the compromise I agreed with O’Day.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Not me,’ she said. ‘Casey Nice will go with you. Unacknowledged. She’s not on their radar. She’s far too junior. And right now she’s not CIA, anyway. She’s State Department.’

  ‘Rules of engagement?’

  ‘You do exactly what she tells you.’

  Scarangello left after that, leaving the scent of soap and warm skin in the air, and I waited a minute and then headed out too, back to the red door. I went up the stairs to Shoemaker’s office, and found him at his desk. I said, ‘Scarangello told me about your dinner conversation.’

  He said, ‘Happy?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m turning cartwheels.’

  ‘Look on the bright side. You’ll need updates and intelligence. We’ll give them to Nice, she’ll give them to you. You’d be in the dark without her.’

  ‘Has she operated overseas before?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Has she operated anywhere before?’

  ‘Not as such.’

  ‘Do you think this is a good idea?’

  ‘It’s a necessary compromise. It gets you there. You don’t have to listen to what she says.’

  ‘But I have to take care of her.’

  ‘She knows what she signed up for. And she’s tougher than she looks.’

  ‘You said that before.’

  ‘Was I wrong?’

  I thought about her pal Tony Moon, and I said nothing.

  Shoemaker said, ‘Walk away if you want to, Reacher. You don’t owe me shit. The statute of limitations ran out years ago. It was O’Day’s idea to take that route. A psychological insight, he called it. He said it was the only thing likely to work.’

  ‘Was he wrong?’

  ‘Walk away if you want,’ he said again. ‘There are hundreds of people working on this. And the Brits are taking it very seriously. I mean, they already were. It’s a G8 meeting. If you’re in the security business, then that’s your Superbowl right there. So they’re on it. So you won’t be missed. You’re one guy. What difference could you make?’

  ‘Is this another psychological insight?’

  ‘I want you there, sure. I want everyone there. A human wall, if necessary. Whatever it takes. Because if an American shooter turns the G8 into the G4, we’re in real big trouble as a nation.’

  ‘Is that a psychological insight? As in, I’m a patriot, right? What is this, Manipulation 101?’

  ‘Go talk to O’Day,’ he said.

  Which I did, immediately afterwards, by walking past the conference room to the office next to it. O’Day was at his desk, in his black blazer and his black sweater. His head was bent, and when he looked up at me he did it with his eyes only, as if his neck hurt to move.

  I said, ‘This is right up there with the worst ideas of all time.’

  He said, ‘But even so, it’s your best chance to get John Kott. I’ll be feeding Ms Nice everything I know. You’ll have the power of the whole government behind you. And you need to finish this now. You won’t sleep at night until he’s gone.’

  ‘I’m sleeping just fine.’

  ‘Then get over yourself. We all read your file, obviously. Those pages on Kott’s bedroom wall? We know what they say. Our Ms Nice is exactly the same age as one Dominique Kohl, who got her breasts cut off with a kitchen knife, because you sent her to arrest a maniac.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘That’s what those pages say.’

  ‘What are you, superstitious? Everyone is twenty-eight sooner or later. There’s no connection. And you won’t be sending her to arrest anyone. Because no arrests are going to be made. I want you in there, and only you, up close and personal, and I want you to bring me their ears to prove it.’

  ‘Why me? There are hundreds of people on this.’

  ‘And if it’s easy, no doubt one of them will do the job. But it won’t be easy. That’s the truth of it. It might slide right past all of them. That’s what I’m afraid of. I need a backstop. I need someone I can trust.’

  Which was another psychological insight, presumably.

  TWENTY-THREE

  I MET WITH Casey Nice the following morning. She had been told. She was all aglow. She explained the procedures. She said, ‘There’s GPS in our cell phones, so they’ll be watching over us every step of the way. I’ll be getting real-time information by voice, text, and e-mail. We have each other’s numbers pre-programmed in, plus Generals O’Day and Shoemaker, for emergencies. All calls will be encrypted and untraceable.’

  I said, ‘Did they tell you the rules of engagement?’

  ‘Yes, they did.’

  ‘Who told you?’

  ‘All of them.’

  ‘Separately or together?’

  ‘Separately.’

  ‘Did they all say the same thing?’

  ‘No, they didn’t.’

  ‘So which one of them are you listening to?’