Morrison hadn't snagged one of the Victorian homes, but a more modest
stone house built in the 1920s. It hadn't been cheap, according to his
operative's research, but it wasn't outrageously expensive, since he'd
bought it just before the big real estate boom hit here. Houses that
had been going for two hundred thousand three years ago now went for
half again that much. The town was in the Olympic rain shadow, and
while they did get some rain and wind, it was a lot less wet than much
of northern Washington state. A lot of the baby boomers had decided
this was a good place to retire and enjoy their golden years.
After his reconnaissance patrol, Ventura found a restaurant still open
and had a late supper. He took his time, and when he was done, he
parked downtown and located a busy pub. He bought a beer and nursed
it, killing more time. It was after ten-forty-five p.m. when he left,
having spoken to nobody but the waitress.
At this time of night, given the lack of traffic--there was almost
none--Ventura didn't drive past Morrison's house even once. If the
Chinese had people watching, or if some laggard fed had hung around, a
car passing by would certainly be an object of interest if it was the
only one they'd seen for an hour or two. He knew where the house was,
knew how to get there, and he would be a lot harder to spot on foot, as
long as he didn't walk down the middle of the road waving a light.
He had made some purchases when he'd gotten here.
There was a big grocery-department store complex on the highway into
town, not quite a Wal-Mart, but big enough.
He stopped there and bought black jeans, a black long-sleeved T-shirt,
and a navy blue windbreaker, as well as a pair of thin-soled black
wrestling shoes. He'd changed clothes in a public rest room downtown
after he left the bar, putting the new clothes on under his pale gray
slacks and white shirt. The rest room was not far from the police
station, which appeared to have all of two people manning it.
He parked the car five blocks away from Morrison's, in a line of other
cars at the curb. If some sharp-eye local patrol cop happened to
notice a vehicle that didn't belong to anybody he knew on the street,
likely he would think it was somebody visiting. A rental car with
Washington plates wouldn't exactly scream 'trouble.'
He had the Coonan under the windbreaker--it was chilly enough to
justify a light jacket, if not two shirts and two pairs of pants--and
he carried a set of lock picks and spare magazines in one windbreaker
pocket, a small flashlight in the other. Probably nobody would notice
him at this hour. In his mind, he was B. W. Corona, married, two kids,
up to meet his family for a holiday. He was staying at a local B&B
down in town--he couldn't remember the name, but it was that big
Victorian place on the corner, you know?--and he was out walking
because he couldn't sleep.
Subterfuge was in the attitude. A cop might stop somebody skulking
from shadow to shadow if he spotted him, but a tourist out walking had
a different look, a different feel to him. Until he got closer to his
destination, that was what Ventura was going to be, a tourist. A local
cop would see nothing more. And when the bars started to close, that
