Page 140 of Chain Reaction

Turner said the time she had spent on her work phone in the car had been about arranging a therapeutic layover right there at Moffett Field, for Julia and Amanda, before the long haul east. Someone from 7th Psyops had gone out for baby food and diapers. A shower and a bath had been arranged. Restaurant delivery was available. The pilots had no objection. Elwood was happy to wait with them. All figured out, everyone gladly cooperating.

“It’s good to be king,” Reacher said.

“I could get used to it,” she said.

She hoisted her shoulder bag. It looked big and heavy.

“I kept the MPX,” she said. “The one with the suppressor. Plus four spare magazines.”

“Outstanding,” he said. “If the North Koreans invade tonight we can take care of them ourselves.”

“Fail to prepare, prepare to fail.”

“Hope for the best, plan for the worst.”

“So what was your plan for the worst?”

“To rely on you. You carry a bag. I knew you would bring the MPX. I figured you would give it to me just before I got off the plane. But I figured two magazines, maybe three, but not four. Are you nervous?”

“We don’t know what we’re walking into.”

“It will be something weird,” Reacher said. “That’s for damn sure.”

—

A guy from 7th Psyops drove them to the airfield gate. He took it slow and narrated as he went. Hangar One was one of the largest freestanding structures in the world. Its floor area measured eight acres. Built in 1931. Hangar Two was one of the largest wooden structures in the world. To house airships, for coastal defense during World War Two.

They got out at the gate. The psyops guy turned around and drove back. They set out walking. EEF’s building looked to be a half mile away, thirty degrees right of dead ahead. They were looking at its side. Just ordinary rooms, not giant red letters. All lit up. The map on Turner’s cell phone showed they were walking a long S-bend. It would turn them left and then right and curl them around to the front of the lobby.

They stopped fifty yards before they got there.

Not what they were expecting.

Below the giant red letters were bright lights inside the lobby, spilling out across the sidewalk. The doors were wide open. There were limousines on the curb. People were getting out, taking champagne from wait staff in black cocktail dresses, being greeted by hostesses, being shown inside. The empty cars hissed away and new cars showed up to take their place. Maybe twenty people total went inside. Mostly men, some women. All of them scruffy. No better dressed than Reacher himself.

Reacher and Turner walked on, fast and confident, like they had every right to be there. They stopped outside the lobby. Wait staff stepped up with trays of champagne in tall flutes dewy with chill. Inside the lobby was a small gaggle of people waiting for the elevator. On an easel in the center of the space was a hokey old sign that said Welcome Investors! But it had been altered with a marker to say Welcome Smart Investors Only!

Turner took a glass of champagne.

Reacher followed suit. A hostess showed them into the lobby with gestures so expansive she could have been strewing rose petals at their feet. The last bunch of investors held the elevator, very politely. Reacher and Turner got in with them. Someone hit a button and the doors closed. Everyone looked at them. Openly curious. A guy about forty in a Brooklyn Dodgers shirt looked at Reacher and said, “Have we met?”

“I’m her bodyguard,” Reacher said.

Which caused minor consternation. They all glanced at Turner. Reacher watched their faces. They were running through possibilities. Was she paranoid, or really so rich she needed to be, or were they themselves missing out on a new must-have fashion accessory? Or was it strategic? Did it increase dominance in meetings? They still hadn’t decided when the elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Ahead of them was an open space with more black cocktail dresses and a small milling crowd of people sipping drinks and talking.

They all got out of the elevator. The others went ahead to join the fray but Reacher hung back. He leaned on the wall. He wanted to observe. Turner stopped ten feet away, looking exactly like she belonged. How does a billionaire walk? Any way she wants. Beyond her the crowd was clustered around two young men. They were maybe twenty-five years old. One was thick-necked and slope-shouldered, like a high school wrestler. His face had an open and friendly look, full of charm, full of warmth and trust and guileless charisma. He was looking people in the eye and smiling and twinkling. Axel Brill, without a doubt. The perfect face for a conman. No such thing as an unfair advantage.

So the other kid was Saxby Cameron, presumably. The super-elite hacker. He was taller and thinner than Axel Brill. He was unkempt and disheveled in a way that looked organic, not performative. He didn’t look people in the eye. He seemed nervous and distracted. He kept pointing at a desktop computer set up on a waist-high table standing against the wall-to-wall window. Taped to the glass above it was another hokey old sign. Maybe from the same curio store as the lobby card. It said Ask Me Anything!

Turner walked over to take a look. Reacher joined her there. The computer screen said I’m listening! Turner asked it, “How many times more powerful was the biggest explosion in history than the first atomic bomb?”

Think, think, answer.

Axel Brill’s face appeared on the screen. Friendly, helpful, trustworthy. He nodded sagely and said, “The Mount Tambora volcanic eruption on April tenth 1815 in Indonesia was between sixty and seventy thousand times more powerful than the first atomic bomb, which was exploded over Hiroshima, Japan, a hundred thirty years later, on August sixth, 1945. Thanks for the question!”

Brill’s face disappeared and was replaced by Ask Me Another!

Reacher squared up to the screen and asked it, “What’s my name?”