I guess Fenton was right when she said people were freaked out by anything to do with wounds or injuries. Mansour certainly was. Enough not to find out if anything else was in the bag.
* * *
—
I left Mansour to walk back to the house and started out following Dendoncker’s directions. They led me through the final few mazy streets on the outskirts of the town and onto the long straight road that went past The Tree. The spot where I first met Fenton. No one was staging an ambush there that day. No one was there at all. Alive. Or dead.
I drove slowly and steadily, like an old geezer taking his antique car for its weekly outing. I was mindful of the cargo in the back of the truck. I didn’t want it blowing up if I hit a pothole. And I didn’t want to get pulled over with it on board. I figured it was unlikely there would be any police patrols around those parts. But it’s the things you don’t expect that bite you in the ass.
I kept an eye on my mirrors the whole time. I wanted to know if I was being followed. I couldn’t see anyone. No black Lincolns. No worn-out Jeeps. So I also scanned the sky. For small planes. Or helicopters. Or drones. And again I came up blank. Which wasn’t a surprise. I believed Mansour when he said they’d be monitoring me. But it was more likely they’d have put a GPS chip in the bomb. Or in the truck. Or both. Which would be fine. That wouldn’t hurt me at all. In fact, I was relying on it.
Chapter 45
The small roads led me through scrub and desert for forty minutes, then I merged onto the highway. Traffic was light. I let the truck settle down to a steady fifty-five. I checked the mirrors. I checked the sky. No one was following. Nothing was watching. After twenty minutes I came to a truck stop. I pulled in. Topped off the truck’s tank. Then headed into the little store to pay. I filled a to-go cup with coffee. Hot, this time. With no milk. And I asked the clerk for change for the pay phone. The guy looked like I’d asked for a date with his mother. He must have been in his early twenties. I guess it wasn’t a request he heard very often. Maybe it was a request he’d never heard at all.
There were two pay phones. Both were outside, attached to the end wall of the building. They were covered with matching, curved canopies made out of translucent plastic. Maybe for protection from the weather. Maybe for privacy. Either way, I wasn’t too concerned. It wasn’t too hot. It wasn’t raining. And there was no one around to overhear anything I said.
I ducked under the nearer canopy. The wall beneath it was plastered with business-card-sized pieces of paper and cardboard. Adverts for escort services, mainly. Some were subtle. But most, not so much. I ignored them, picked up the handset, and dialed Wallwork’s number. Nothing happened. The phone was dead. So I tried the second one. I was in luck this time. It had a dial tone. I tapped the digits in again and Wallwork answered on the second ring.
“Sorry, Reacher,” he said. “The map of the drainage system? I’ve tried, but there’s nothing.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “The research phase is over.”
I brought him up to speed with how I came to have the truck. Its cargo. And my destination for the night.
“My ETA is around 2100, local,” I said. “Can you meet me there?”
Wallwork was silent for a moment. “It won’t be easy. I’ll have to pull some strings. But to secure the device? Sure. I’ll find a way.”
“You’ll fly out?”
“I’ll have to. I’m in the middle of Tennessee. Too far to drive to Texas in time.”
“OK. When you land, make sure the chopper doesn’t leave right away. And tell the pilot to refuel. Fill the tanks to the brim.”
“Why?”
“I’m going to need a ride someplace.”
“Can’t do that, Reacher. You’re a civilian. The Bureau’s not a taxi service.”
“I don’t need a taxi. I need to get to Fenton before Dendoncker kills her.”
Wallwork went silent again.
“And I need to get Dendoncker. I’m the only one who can. Unless you’d rather he walks?”
“There might be a way,” Wallwork said, after a long moment. “On one condition. When you get Dendoncker, you hand him over to me. Alive.”
“Understood. Now, two other things. You can’t move the truck until the morning. That’s critical. Fenton’s life depends on it. And there are some items I need you to bring for me. Five, altogether.”
* * *
—
Wallwork wrote down my list then hung up. I refilled my coffee, climbed into the truck, and got back on the road. The truck wasn’t fast. It wasn’t fancy. But it was surprisingly relaxing to drive. It just did what it was designed to do. Ate up the miles, hour after hour, no fuss, no drama. I rolled along, nice and steady. Arizona gave way to New Mexico. New Mexico gave way to Texas. The pavement stretched away in front of me. It seemed to go on forever. The sky above was vast. Mainly blue, with occasional smudges of wispy white clouds. An ocean of gray-green scrub extended all around. Sometimes flat. Sometimes rising up or falling away. Sometimes with jagged peaks on the horizon, never coming closer, never getting farther away.