a blue tie knotted neatly in place and rising gently over her small mobile breasts, men’s trousers with big darts taken out of them to curve in around her tiny waist. Tanned face, white teeth, great cheekbones, blue eyes, the long blond hair.
“Is there a camera in my room?” he asked.
“A what?”
“A camera,” he said again. “You know, video surveillance. ”
“Why?”
“I’m just wondering if this is a backup plan. In case Petrosian doesn’t pan out.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why isn’t Poulton looking after me? He doesn’t seem to have much else to do.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Yes you do. That’s why Blake assigned
She blushed. “I wouldn’t do a thing like that.”
“But he asked you to, right?”
She was quiet for a long time. Reacher looked away and drained his coffee, staring at his own reflection in the glass.
“He practically challenged me to try,” he said. “Told me you’re the bitch from hell, if anybody puts the moves on.”
She was still silent.
“But I wouldn’t fall for it, anyway,” he said. “Because I’m not stupid. I’m not about to give them any more ammunition.”
She was quiet another minute. Then she looked at him and smiled.
“So can we relax?” she said. “Get past it?”
He nodded. “Sure, let’s relax. Let’s get past it. You can put your jacket back on now. You can stop showing me your breasts.”
She blushed again. “I took it off because I was warm. No other reason.”
“OK, I’m not complaining.”
He turned away again and watched the dark through the window.
“You want dessert?” she asked.
He turned back and nodded. “And more coffee.”
“You stay here. I’ll get it.”
She walked back to the serving counter. The room seemed to fall silent. Every eye was on her. She came back with a tray bearing two ice cream sundaes and two cups of coffee. A hundred people watched her all the way.
“I apologize,” Reacher said.
She bent and slid the tray onto the table. “For what?”
He shrugged. “For looking at you the way I’ve been looking at you, I guess. You must be sick of it. Everybody looking at you all the time.”
She smiled. “Look at me as much as you like, and I’ll look at you right back, because you aren’t the ugliest thing I ever saw either. But that’s as far as it’s going to go, OK?”
He smiled back. “Deal.”
The ice cream was excellent. It had hot fudge sauce all over it. The coffee was strong. If he narrowed his eyes and cut out the rest of the room, he could rate this place about as highly as he had rated Mostro’s.
“What do people do here in the evenings?” he asked.
“Mostly they go home,” Harper said. “But not you. You go back to your room. Blake’s orders.”
“We’re following Blake’s orders now?”
She smiled. “Some of them.”
He nodded. “OK, so let’s go.”
SHE LEFT HIM on the side of the door without the handle. He stood there and heard her footsteps recede across the carpet outside. Then the thump of the elevator door. Then the whine of the car going down. Then the floor fell silent. He walked to the nightstand and dialed Jodie’s apartment. The machine cut in. He dialed her office. No answer. He tried her mobile. It was not in service.
He walked to the bathroom. Somebody had supplemented his toothbrush with a tube of toothpaste and a disposable razor and a can of shaving cream. There was a bottle of shampoo on the rim of the tub. There was soap in the dish. Fluffy white towels on the rack. He stripped and hung his clothes on the back of the door. Set the shower to hot and stepped under the water.
He stood there for ten minutes and then shut it off. Toweled himself dry. Walked naked to the window and pulled the drapes. Lay down on the bed and scanned the ceiling. He found the camera. The lens was a black tube the diameter of a nickel, wedged deep in a crack in the molding where the wall met the ceiling. He turned back to the phone. Dialed all the same numbers again. Her apartment. He got the machine. Her office. No reply. Her mobile. Switched off.
10
HE SLEPT BADLY and woke himself up before six in the morning and rolled toward the nightstand. Flicked on the bedside light and checked the exact time on his watch. He was cold. He had been cold all night. The sheets were starched, and the shiny surfaces pulled heat away from his skin.
He reached for the phone and dialed Jodie’s apartment. He got the machine. No answer in her office. Her mobile was switched off. He held the phone to his ear for a long time, listening to her cellular company telling him so, over and over again. Then he hung up and rolled out of bed.
He walked to the window and pulled the drapes open. The view faced west and it was still dark night outside. Maybe there was a sunrise behind him on the other side of the building. Maybe it hadn’t happened yet. He could hear the distant sound of hard rain on dying leaves. He turned his back on it and walked to the bathroom.
He used the toilet and shaved slowly. Spent fifteen minutes in the shower with the water as hot as he could stand it, getting warm. Then he washed his hair with the FBI’s shampoo and toweled it dry. Carried his clothes out of the steam and dressed standing by the bed. Buttoned his shirt and hung his ID around his neck. He figured room service was unlikely, so he just sat down to wait.
He waited forty-five minutes. There was a polite knock at the door, followed by the sound of a key going into the lock. Then the door opened and Lisa Harper was standing there, backlit by the brightness of the corridor. She was smiling, mischievously. He had no idea why.
“Good morning,” she said.
He raised his hand in reply. Said nothing. She was in a different suit. This one was charcoal gray, with a white shirt and a dark red tie. An exact parody of the unofficial Bureau uniform, but a whole lot of cloth had been cut out of it to make it fit. Her hair was loose. There was a wave in it, and it hung front and back of her shoulders, very long. It looked golden in the light from the corridor.
“We’ve got to go,” she said. “Breakfast meeting.”
He took his coat from the closet as he passed. They rode down to the lobby together and paused at the doors. It was raining hard outside. He pulled his collar up and followed her out. The light had changed from black to gray. The rain was cold. She sprinted down the walkway, and he followed a pace behind, watching her run. She looked pretty good doing it.
Lamarr and Blake and Poulton were waiting for them in the cafeteria. They were in three of five chairs crowded around a four-place table by the window. They were watching him carefully as he approached. There was a white coffee jug in the center of the table, surrounded by upside-down mugs. A basket of sugar packets and little pots of cream. A pile of spoons. Napkins. A basket of doughnuts. A pile of morning newspapers. Harper took a chair and he squeezed in next to her. Lamarr was watching him, something in her eyes. Poulton looked away. Blake looked
