No Plan B (Jack Reacher, #27)(40)

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Damon Brockman walked into Bruno Hix’s office and sat down on one of the visitors’ chairs that were lined up in front of the big wooden desk.

He said, “I just took a very interesting call. Remember Lawrence Osborn?”

Hix put down his pen. “Pepper Spray Larry? Sure. Good guy. Came with us from Kansas City, then had to retire early. Asthma, right?”

“Right. Well, guess who just knocked on Larry’s door?”

“Tell me.”

“That kid. The journalist who had a bee in his bonnet about drug deaths.”

“Why’s he bothering Larry?”

“Seems he’s going after everyone we fired when we took this place over. Figures some of them might have loyalty deficits. Might be willing to spill some beans.”

“None of those guys know anything.”

“Right.”

“And we didn’t fire Larry.”

“The kid doesn’t know that.”

Hix drummed his fingers on his desk for a moment. “I don’t like this. If the kid’s hunting down our ex-employees, who knows what other kinds of digging he’s doing. I don’t want him here tomorrow. He’s too inquisitive. Too much of a pain in the ass. It’s time to get rid of him.”

Brockman smiled. “Agreed. And I know an easy way to do it.”

“How?”

“Larry told the kid he might be able to get some dirt on us, but he needed time to think. He said he’d get in touch if he wanted to go forward. Then he called me to give us the heads-up. See how we wanted him to play it. So, here’s what I’m thinking. We have Larry contact the kid. Send him on a wild-goose chase.”

“Like where? And to do what?”

Brockman shrugged. “Somewhere far away. I don’t know. San Francisco. Key West. The details don’t matter. We can make something up. It just has to be urgent. So the kid leaves town tonight. Tomorrow morning at the latest.”

Hix picked up his pen and twirled it between his fingers. “OK. I like it. Let’s do it. Just make it something convincing.”





Chapter 23


The only promise Lev Emerson had to make was that he wouldn’t burn the building down.

That was the opposite of the kind of condition Emerson usually signed up to but in the circumstances it made sense. He needed access to some premises. Something secluded. Where no one would hear anything. Or see anything. Or smell anything. Somewhere that was robust. Industrial. He was in a strange city. And he was in a hurry. So he had called the client he had just done the job for in Savannah. The guy owned a vintage warehouse in St. Louis. It was vacant, near the river, with no active businesses close by. Emerson already knew about the place. He remembered it because the guy had once hired him to torch a neighbor’s property.

When Emerson’s contact came around from the chloroform he was lying flat on his back. He was naked. And he was in the middle of a cold concrete floor. He could smell a slight hint of gasoline. He could see walls in the distance. Made of brick. They looked ancient. A pale, chalky coating was flaking off them. The ceiling was high above him. It was stained from water leaks, and it was supported by rusty metal beams.

The guy’s arms and legs were stretched out to his sides. He tried to move them but he couldn’t. Because his wrists and ankles were cable-tied to six-inch stubs of steel that were sprouting from the ground. There were rows and rows of them. They were all that was left of the giant sets of shelves that had been removed and melted down when the storage business which had inhabited the building had been abandoned. The guy pulled with all his might. The plastic strips dug into his skin but the metal stubs didn’t even flex.

Emerson was standing on one side of the guy. Graeber was on the other. Near the guy’s feet there was a large plastic barrel. And lying on the barrel there was a ladle. The kind they use in restaurants to serve out bowls of soup.

Emerson crouched down and waited for the guy to turn his head and look at him. Then he said, “Let’s not beat around the bush. I know about you. I obviously know about your ship. So the purpose of today is for you to fill in the remaining blank.”

The guy’s throat was dry. He managed to say, “What blank?”

Emerson said, “I want to know who your supplier is.”

The guy’s eyes stretched wide. “I don’t know. I can’t tell you.”

Emerson straightened up and crossed to the barrel. He took the ladle in one hand. Removed the lid with the other. Scooped out a big dollop of thick, cream-colored gel. Crossed back to the guy. And poured the gel all over the guy’s genitals.

The guy screamed and bucked and thrashed around. “Stop! What are you doing? What is that stuff?”

Emerson said, “I could tell you its chemical name but it wouldn’t mean anything to you. Have you seen Apocalypse Now?”

“What? Why?”

“Because the name you’ll know it by is napalm.”

“No. Seriously? What the…”

“It’s my own version. Better than the military kind. The key is not skimping on the benzene. The original formula only burns for a few seconds. Mine stays alight for ten minutes. Think about that. Do you feel how it’s sticking to your skin?”