Page 166 of Hidden Tide
Ben looks at me.
“We stop reacting to Simon.”
His hand closes around mine.
“Now we make him come to us.”
17
CALLE
“Aman who believes he controls the current rarely notices when the tide begins carrying him toward shore.”
—James Sinclair
“You’ve been investigating Simon Vail,” Ben says. “We’re going to start hunting him.”
Agent Marquez studies him across the conference table.
“This is a federal investigation.”
“And Simon is holding at least two people.”
“We don’t know that he has Peter Lang.”
“Peter disappeared from Ivy’s gallery during the same operation Simon used to steal the winding key. Elliot Bell was taken before he could be questioned. Simon has both of them.”
“You can’t prove that.”
“No. But I can recognize a coordinated extraction.”
Commander Keating folds his arms. “What are you proposing?”
Ben looks toward the monitor showing Hazel’s apartment.
“We give Simon what he thinks he wants.”
“My trunk,” Hazel says.
“A copy of it.”
Marquez shakes her head. “We already discussed two decoy transports.”
“Those were designed to draw surveillance. Simon is expecting that.”
“So you don’t think he’ll follow either vehicle?”
“I think he’ll make us believe he did.”
Ben walks to the map on the wall.
“He has been directing us since Elliot entered Ivy’s studio. We watched Elliot run to the roof because Simon wanted him caught. While every available officer responded to the studio, Simon sent us a recording from Hazel’s apartment.”
“He couldn’t know we would connect to her security system,” Keating says.
“He knew the system would alert her when it came online. He wanted Hazel to watch the recording.”
I remember Simon raising the music box.
