Past Tense (Jack Reacher #23)(41)

Patty stood up and waved.

The truck bumped down off the blacktop into the lot. She had said it would be the shiniest truck you ever saw, purely from the guy’s voice alone, and she had guessed exactly right. It was as bright as a carnival float. The red paint was waxed and polished. It had pinstripes and coachlines painted in gold. There were chrome lids and levers, all polished to a blinding shine. The guy’s name was written on the side, proudly, a foot high, in a copperplate style. It was Karel, not Carol.

“Wow,” Shorty said. “This is great.”

“Sure seems to be,” Patty said.

“Finally we’re out of here.”

“If he can fix it.”

“We’re out of here either way. He doesn’t leave here without us. OK? Either he fixes our car or he gives us a ride. No matter what the assholes say. Deal?”

“Deal,” Patty said.

The truck came to a stop behind the Honda, and it settled back to a grumbling idle. Way up high the door opened and a guy used one step of the ladder and then jumped the rest of the way down. He was medium sized and wiry, bouncing on his toes, full of get-up-and-go. He had a shaved head. He looked like a photo in a war crimes trial. Like a stone-faced lieutenant behind a renegade colonel in a black beret. But he was smiling. He had a twinkle in his eye.

“Ms. Sundstrom?” he said. “Mr. Fleck?”

Patty said, “Call us Patty and Shorty.”

He said, “I’m Karel.”

She said, “Thank you so much for coming.”

He pulled an object from his pocket. It was a dirty black box the size of a deck of cards, with stubs of disconnected wires coming out. He said, “We got lucky with a wreck. Way in back of the junkyard. Same model as yours. Same color, even. Rear-ended by a gravel truck six months ago. But the front part was still OK.”

Then he smiled encouragingly and shooed them toward their door.

“Go inside and pack your stuff,” he said. “This is a two-minute job.”

“We packed already,” Patty said. “We’re good to go.”

“Really?”

“We packed early this morning. Or late last night. We wanted to be ready.”

“Have you not enjoyed your stay?”

“We’re anxious to get going. We should be somewhere else by now. That’s all. Apart from that, it’s a great place. Your friends have been very kind to us.”

“No, I’m the new guy. They’re not my friends yet. I think the last guy they used was their friend. But I think they had a falling out. So they started calling me instead. Which was great. I wanted the business. I’m an ambitious guy.”

Shorty said, “I wouldn’t want to work for them.”

“Why not?”

“I think they’re weird.”

Karel smiled.

“They’re clients on a list,” he said. “The longer the list, the better I get through the hungry months.”

“I still wouldn’t,” Shorty said.

“It’s nine quad-bikes and five cars. Guaranteed work. I can put up with a little weirdness in exchange for that.”

“Five cars?”

“As of now. Plus a ride-on lawnmower.”

“They told us one car,” Shorty said. “We saw it.”

“Which one?”

“An old pick-up truck.”

“That’s the beater they use around the property. On top of that they got Mercedes-Benz SUVs, one apiece.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Totally loaded.”

“Where are they?”

“In the barn.”

Shorty said nothing.

Patty said, “I have a question.”

Karel said, “Go ahead.”

“How long have they been here?”

“This was their first season.”

She said, “Please fix our car now.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Karel said.

He opened the Honda’s hood, with deft and practiced movements. He leaned forward and held the new black box down low, as if trying it for size. Then he backed off an inch and squinted, as if trying to get a better look. He extricated himself and stood up straight.

He said, “Actually your relay is in good shape.”

Patty said, “Then why won’t it start?”

“Must be a different problem.”

Karel put the black box with the disconnected wires back in his pocket. He shuffled around the fender and approached from a different angle.

“Try the key one more time,” he said. “I want to hear how dead it is.”

Shorty got in behind the wheel and flipped the key, on, off, on, off, click, click, click. Karel said, “OK, I get it.”

He shuffled a full 180, all the way around to the opposite fender, and he bent down again, where the battery was bolted into a skeletal cradle. He stuck his face right down and twisted his neck so he could see underneath. He brought his hand down and felt with his fingertip. Then he backed out and straightened up and stood still for a second. He glanced at the woods, and then the other way, at room twelve’s corner. He stepped out until he could see beyond it. To the barn, and the house. He came back and shooed Patty and Shorty up on their boardwalk, over toward their door, looking back all the time as he came, as if checking they were all safely out of some theoretical line of vision.