Deep Sleep (Devin Gray #1)(55)

“Sounds like a plan. Same comms arrangement?” asked Graves.

Gupta reached behind the seat and retrieved a headphone set attached to a heavy-duty-looking coiled cord. He handed them over to Graves.

“Same. Same,” said Gupta. “Right ear is the primary communications channel. We’re using one channel. Left ear is whatever you want. I currently have it tuned to the local police frequency. You can change it through the computer interface. If for some reason we need to leave the vehicle, there’s a handheld radio preset with the same frequencies and an earbud headset in the seat pocket directly in front of you.”

Graves didn’t like the sound of that at all, but it came with the job, along with a wide variety of other possible unpleasantries—like getting shot in the leg and walking with a slight limp for the rest of your life. Unfortunately, things like that didn’t go away like tensed shoulders. He knew that from experience, which led to his next question.

“What’s our security situation?”

“Rich and Scott will be across the street until the extraction,” said Gupta. “Other than that, there’s a loaded Sig Sauer compact pistol with two spare magazines in each door pocket.”

“Wonderful,” said Graves.

“Back into the frying pan, man,” said Gupta. “Just like old times.”

“It wasn’t that long ago,” said Graves, suddenly remembering just how much he didn’t miss this.





CHAPTER 26


Devin Gray drove up and down the streets east of the town house for close to twenty minutes before a parking space opened on South Belmore Avenue. He spent the next few minutes trying to squeeze his car into the opening left by a Prius. The end result wasn’t pretty—the back end of his car protruded about a foot into the street—but it would have to do. Berg’s people were anxious to offload their gear and get started. From what he had gathered, most of them would remain at the town house overnight, while the team leaders joined Devin and Berg at Helen’s apartment to examine the evidence.

Before they set off down the street, Berg grabbed his arm. “Are you sure there’s no way to convince Marnie to leave the keys in the mailbox and get out of there? Right now. Her insistence on staying at the town house isn’t sitting well with the crew. I don’t want to give them any reason to back out of this.”

“She’s a good friend and a combat-decorated Marine. Completely trustworthy,” said Devin. “All she wants to do is make sure I’m not being put up to something or being forced to do something against my will. I know how that sounds, given the fact that I came to you with this, but she’s not going to let this go. She’s doing what a good friend would do. The harder I try to get her to leave, the less likely she will. She made that clear. You heard the phone call.”

“Yeah. Well, she’s getting in the way,” said Berg, sliding his satchel’s strap over a shoulder.

“She won’t stick around for long. She’ll see everything’s fine with me, and that’ll be it.”

Berg shook his head and started walking, almost mumbling to himself. They got to the corner of Foster Avenue, where Berg stopped. “I need you to remember what we discussed earlier today,” he said. “About doing this my way.”

“I remember,” said Devin. “I simply can’t force Marnie to leave without making her even more suspicious than she already is. She’ll just hang around in her car all night. I know her.”

“That would be even worse,” said Berg, looking somewhat exasperated.

“What?” asked Devin, thinking he might have misspoken.

“Nothing. Let’s go,” he said.

They walked the two blocks to South Glover Avenue, Berg checking his phone every minute or so for texts and immediately assuring Devin that everything was on schedule. They didn’t encounter much foot traffic on the way. A college-age student with a backpack bopping along to whatever music was pumping through his headphones. A thirtysomething-looking couple headed in the opposite direction, probably on their way to a cozy dinner in one of a number of Canton neighborhood restaurants. He’d pictured the streets here to be a little busier, due to the proximity to the waterfront, but it was still early by city standards. Just a little past ten.

South Glover was packed with cars, like every street in the area. He imagined having a dedicated garage or parking space behind your town house in the alley was important if you owned a place here. The parking situation around his mother’s apartment was bad enough, but nothing like this. While they walked down the street, he scanned the vehicles without being obvious.

“Karl. Would it be fair to assume that your friends are already watching the town house?” asked Devin.

“It’s possible,” said Berg. “Why do you ask?”

“We either passed by two friends or two hostiles a few cars back,” said Devin. “One close to the intersection. The second on the other side of the street. Both sedans. The car windows are cracked open for air, which means they’ve probably been there for a while. I also saw some movement in the back seat of one of the cars. Very subtle, but definitely movement.”

“They’ve been here for a few hours,” said Berg. “To make sure Marnie hadn’t been followed.”

“They need to work on their surveillance fieldcraft,” said Devin.