Rudd scanned the parking area in front of Starbucks, expecting to see a black SUV backing out or driving in the opposite direction. Instead, a silver sedan drove by on the other side of the double row, its movement matching one of the trackers. The other still hadn’t moved.
“Shit,” he muttered.
“What’s wrong?” asked his wife.
“Stop behind that white SUV. I think he gave us the slip.”
“How? The tracker is moving, right?” she said.
“One of the trackers is moving, and it just passed us,” said Rudd.
He hopped out the moment she stopped and followed the tracker to a parked minivan. The tracking app put the transmitter inside the vehicle. Or under it. He lowered himself to the pavement and searched underneath, spotting the garage remote–size, black rectangular box lying in the middle of the parking space. He pressed his body into the gap between the asphalt and metal chassis, stretching his arm until his fingertips grazed the tracker. After a few more tries, one of them nearly dislocating his shoulder, he retrieved the tracker. He stood up a little too quickly, a sense of light-headedness and vertigo overtaking him.
“You okay?” asked Jolene.
He nodded, leaning against the car parked next to the minivan to keep his balance. An SUV pulled into the empty space on the opposite side of the van, which he surmised had moments before been occupied by the silver sedan. Gray had placed one tracker on the sedan and tossed the other under his own SUV before backing out—carefully so he didn’t run it over. He could have put them both on the silver sedan and let the owner of the car lead them around for a while, but that diversion could have ended at an office just down the street.
Instead, he’d split the trackers, keeping one in place in an attempt to convince them he’d found only one. Ten minutes after the silver sedan took off, he could have slapped the other one on any car leaving the strip mall and sent them on a second pursuit. Rudd looked around, wondering if Gray was watching him.
He could have removed the trackers and parked his SUV around the block. For all Rudd knew, he could be sitting in the Starbucks right now, taking pictures of him. Shit. He should never have gotten out of the SUV. What had he been thinking? He hadn’t, because he was fifty-six years old and getting rusty. While he stood there feeling like an idiot, a woman burst out of Starbucks—headed directly for him. She wore hospital scrubs and carried a purse in one hand and a large to-go cup in the other.
“Excuse me, sir?” she said, slowing as she approached.
“Yes?” he said, feeling stable enough to stand on his own.
“Are you all right? It looked like you took a knee. I work in the ER at Doctors Community Hospital,” she said.
“No. I’m fine. Thank you,” he said, holding up the tracker—partially concealed. “My garage door opener fell out of our car somehow. We’d parked here about an hour ago, so I figured I’d take a look. Bingo. Except I stood up a little too fast. Got a little woozy.”
“Does that happen to you often?” she asked.
“No. Not really,” he said.
“Honey. We have to get going!” yelled Jolene. “We’re already late.”
“Sorry. I have to go,” he said. “The boss is calling.”
The woman laughed. “Smart man. If that happens again, you should schedule a checkup with your doctor. Could be the start of something more serious. Or maybe nothing at all. Better safe than sorry.”
“Absolutely. I appreciate the advice,” he said. “Oh. I do have a crazy question if you don’t mind. Not medical related.”
“Sure,” she said.
“How long have you been in this parking space?” asked Rudd.
The woman looked understandably perplexed by his out-of-left-field question, but answered anyway.
“I’d say almost twenty-five minutes,” she said, looking at him a little less trustingly than before. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine. Thank you,” he said before hurrying back to the SUV.
As soon as he shut the car door, Jolene sped away.
“Slow down. We’re in no hurry. He’s either long gone or he’s watching us from somewhere nearby,” he said. “Either way, we’re done until he resurfaces at his apartment, or CONTROL gets a hit on a credit card.”
“He won’t use a credit card,” said Jolene. “Not this guy.”
“Yeah. We may have underestimated him,” said Rudd.
“I’m thinking it might be in CONTROL’s best interest to take him out sooner than later,” said Rudd, checking the time. “Our mobile surveillance lasted a grand total of forty-two minutes, at least twenty-five of them spent sitting in the car watching tracker signals that had already been spoofed. Two of them smiling for countersurveillance photos.”