No Plan B (Jack Reacher, #27)(65)

Jed still had no idea how he was going to get to the summit. He could barely stand. He felt like someone had stolen his leg bones and replaced them with modeling clay. His stomach was hurting. He couldn’t look at any object without the thing’s edges blurring and its colors twisting and dancing like it was on fire. He was a hot mess. He knew that. And he knew one other thing. He had come too far to be defeated by a hill.

Jed figured he had a couple of factors on his side. Time. And trees. There were more than twelve hours before he had to be in Winson. All he needed was rest. And someplace where he couldn’t be seen from the road. He hobbled across to the bike, which was still lying on its side. Heaved it up onto its wheels. Pushed it over to the long grass at the edge of the shoulder. Set it down. Took another couple of steps. And stopped.

Jed needed rest. But he also needed to be safe. He was heading into a forest. There could be wolves lurking around. Maybe alligators. Maybe coyotes. Maybe in giant bloodthirsty packs. Jed didn’t know what kinds of predators they had in Mississippi. And he didn’t want to find out the hard way. So he was going to have to pick his refuge with extra care.





Chapter 33


Hannah was the one with a credit card so she took care of the check-in process at the Winson Garden. Reacher was the one with the suspicious nature so he kept watch over the parking lot. The cop was the one with the orders to observe the stranger so he parked where he had a good view of the hotel’s entrance. Where he could make sure the stranger and his unexpected companion did go in. And didn’t come back out.

When she was done with the form filling and the bill paying, Hannah wheeled her suitcase across the reception area and handed a card key in a little cardboard wallet to Reacher. He took it and slipped it into his back pocket. Almost immediately a phone rang on the counter behind them.

The desk clerk answered it after one ring. “Winson Garden, Winson’s premier guest accommodations. How may I be of assistance today?” He listened for a moment then said in a much quieter voice, almost a whisper, “Yes, Officer. The woman did. The name on her card is Hannah Hampton. Her home address is in Gerrardsville, Colorado. She paid for two people. Two rooms. One night.” Then he nodded to no one in particular and dropped the receiver back into its cradle.

Reacher could feel the desk clerk staring at him. He could practically hear what the guy was thinking. He was wondering why the police were interested in these particular guests. Whether he would have a story to tell in the morning. And whether there would be any kind of a mess to clear up.



* * *



—

It took the Minerva IT guy ten seconds to get Bruno Hix’s computer display set up the way he wanted it.

The guy had been forced to leave his cats to eat their dinner alone. He had been made to come back to the prison on his own time. And he had still brought his A game. No one could have solved the problem more quickly or efficiently. That was for sure. So he couldn’t understand why the big boss seemed even more annoyed when the job was finished than he had been at the start.

The guy was part offended, part confused. He had done a great job, which wasn’t appreciated, but he must also have committed some kind of appalling faux pas. Hix’s attitude made that obvious. The problem was, he had no idea what he’d done that was so bad. He started to summon the courage to ask Hix what the problem was, but before he could speak one of his mother’s favorite expressions started to echo in his head: When you’re in a hole, stop digging. He figured that meant the smart move would be to get out of the office before he made things any worse, so he muttered a vague apology and hurried to the door. He pulled it open, glanced back at Hix, and almost blundered straight into Damon Brockman, who was heading the opposite way.

Brockman waited for the IT guy to scurry off down the corridor then said, “Good news. We just dodged a bullet.”

Hix switched off his computer monitor and said, “We did? How?”

“Our guys not intercepting Reacher at the truck stop? Or at the construction zone? That was a blessing in disguise. Turns out Reacher’s not working alone. He has a partner. A woman. If our guys had put Reacher on ice the way we told them to, we wouldn’t know anything about her. She’d still be out there, invisible, free to do who knows what tomorrow.”

“How did you find out?”

“One of Moseley’s guys spotted the truck Reacher was using. Just outside of town. He pulled it over, expecting to find Reacher on his own, but a woman was driving. Reacher was in the passenger seat.”

“The cop found Reacher? Where is he now?”

“At the Winson Garden. With the woman.”

“You sure?”

Brockman nodded. “The cop directed them there. Followed them. Confirmed they checked in.”

Hix drummed his fingers on the desktop, then said, “What about this woman? Who is she? What do we know about her?”

“The cop got her ID. Her name’s Hannah Hampton. She’s Sam Roth’s ex-wife. She told the cop they were still close. Before he died. That she had permission to use his truck.”

Hix got up, crossed to the window, and looked out through the fence toward the curved parking lot. “I don’t get it. We thought Reacher was only involved because of some fluky chance encounter.”

“Right.”

“We bought into the idea he just happened to be in Gerrardsville. Saw what happened to Angela St. Vrain. Stuck his nose in where it wasn’t wanted.”