Page 126 of Chain Reaction

“Sleep when you can, eat when you can. You’ll like the diner. They give you vegetables with everything.”

Turner and Elwood put their phones in their pockets and they all climbed back in the truck. Elwood drove into the diner’s lot and parked near the door, nose out, ready for a fast departure if necessary. They went inside and all three individual choices led them to the same table Reacher had chosen before. They were all MPs. They liked corners, their backs to the wall, and clear lines of sight. They got coffee and ordered. Steak and eggs for Reacher, something similar for Elwood, something delicate for Turner.

Elwood looked at Reacher and said, “When are you going to tell us what you’re thinking?”

“You should be thinking it too. You know what I know. You saw what I saw. You heard what I heard.”

“Give me an example of something I missed.”

“Most recently we heard that the kid from the motel spent his lunch breaks watching the curb being laid, but he didn’t get to see the rest of the work because they did it at night when his dad was on duty.”

“What does that tell us?”

“I think it tells us all we need to know. Although I wanted to confirm it with Julia first. In private, if possible, so I don’t look like an idiot if I’m wrong.”

Turner took out her phone and tried Julia again.

No answer.

“Hennessy could be here in two and a half hours,” she said. “How do we see this unfolding?”

“They’ll be in two cars,” Reacher said. “We should set up for enfilade fire from the two shotguns, with three submachine guns standing by. We should load the shotguns with the solid slugs. Roadblockers, we used to call them. We should watch for two cars driving in convoy, we should disable the cars with the shotguns, and we should neutralize the survivors with the submachine guns as they exit the crippled vehicles.”

“Negative,” Turner said. “We need a positive ID before we open fire. Two cars together could be anyone. And I want Hennessy alive. I want to talk to him.”

“About what?”

“If Julia hasn’t answered her phone by then, I’ll want to know why.”

Their food arrived, and they started eating.

—

Forty minutes later they drove back across the two-lane to the motel and parked in front of Elwood’s room. They hauled the bags out of the load space and set them down on Elwood’s bed. They spilled the contents out and claimed an empty bag each and refilled it with the items they wanted. Reacher packed a shotgun, the marksman rifle, an unsuppressed submachine gun, and a handgun, all with his fair share of spare magazines and boxed ammunition. Elwood took the second shotgun and the same mix of smaller arms. Turner chose two pistols and two submachine guns, one suppressed, one not. They stashed the leftovers in the fourth bag.

Turner checked her watch.

“Ninety minutes minimum,” she said.

Elwood studied the map on his cell phone. He pinched, and scrolled, and expanded, and moved his finger around, up and down, side to side.

“There’s no guarantee they’ll come in from the east,” he said. “There are general aviation airports west of here too. About the same distance. They could come in from either direction.”

“It doesn’t matter which,” Reacher said. “We know they’re heading for their data center. That’s what they’re paid to protect. We should set up behind it. If we see two cars stop on the curb out front, we should take that as a positive ID. Agreed?”

Turner held up a finger. Wait. She took out her phone. She dialed Julia’s number. They all heard the ring tone.

They all heard no answer.

“Agreed,” Turner said. “Two cars on the curb is a positive ID. But remember I want Hennessy alive.”

“I don’t know what he looks like.”

She pulled out her work phone. She selected her previous searches. Julia Bisley, freelance coder, Matthew Hennessy, retired first sergeant. She clicked on Hennessy and his photo came up. Head and shoulders. A formal pose. A solid head, cropped black hair, a fleshy face, a black beard trimmed short.

“This is fifteen years old,” Turner said. “His last file photo. He was six feet and two hundred thirty pounds. So now he could be five-eleven and two-fifty, if the muscle turned to fat. His hair will be gray. I’m sure he kept the beard. He has a face like a potato. He grew the beard to give it definition. The beard will be gray, too.”

“Got it,” Reacher said.