Blue Moon

In his head he heard Dino’s voice. We have a guy at the car crushing plant. He owes us money, too. Out loud he said, “He’s making it four for two. Not two for two. He must have lost his mind.”

His guy said, “The restaurant block is worth less than the moneylending. Perhaps that’s the message.”

“What is he now, a CPA?”

“He can’t afford to look weak.”

“Neither can I. Four for two is bullshit. Put the word out. I want two more of his by morning. Make it decorative this time.”

—

Reacher made the right and the left and came up on a sturdy triangle of three high-rise hotels, all national mid-market chains, two of them east of Center Street, and one of them west. He picked one out at random, and spent five whole minutes of his life at its front desk, using his passport as his photo ID, and his ATM card as his preferred method of payment, and then signing his name two times, in two different places, on two different lines, for two different reasons. He had gotten into the Pentagon easier, back in the day.

He took a city map from the lobby and rode up to his room, which was a plain bland space with nothing to commend it, but it had a bed and a bathroom, which were all he needed. He sat on the bed to look at the map. The city was shaped like a pear, gridded out with streets and avenues, pulling upward at the top toward the distant highway. The Ford dealer and the agricultural machinery would be right at the tip, where the stalk would be. The hotels were plumb in the middle of the fat part. The business district. There was an art gallery and a museum. The development with the Shevick house was halfway to the eastern limit. On the map it looked like a tiny squared-up thumbprint.

Where would a very smart and very rich guy choose to lie low?

Nowhere. That was Reacher’s conclusion. The city was big, but not big enough. The guy had been famous. He had employed a Senior Vice President for Communications. Everyone was talking about him. Presumably his picture had been in the paper all the time. Could such a person become an instant overnight hermit? Not possible. The guy had to eat, at least. He had to go out and get food, or have it brought to him. Either way people would see him. They would recognize him. They would talk. A week later there would be bus tours to his house.

Unless the guys who brought him food didn’t talk.

The population of Ukraine was about forty-five million. Some of them had come to America. No reason to believe they all knew each other. No reason to assume a connection. But a connection was the only way for a person to hide, in a city that size. The only guarantee of success was to be concealed and protected and catered to by a loyal and vigilant force. Like a secret agent in a safe house. Staring longingly out a window, while discreet couriers came and went.

Seven chances before the week is over, he thought.

He folded the map and jammed it in his back pocket. He rode down to the lobby and stepped out to the street. He was hungry. He hadn’t eaten since lunch with the Shevicks. A chicken salad sandwich, a bag of potato chips, and a can of soda. Not much, and a long time ago. He turned and walked on Center Street, and within a block and a half he realized that in terms of food service, most places were already closed. It was already too late in the evening.

Which was OK. He didn’t want most places.

He walked north on Center, to where in his mind’s eye the fat part of the pear began to thin, and then he turned back south and sat on a bus bench and watched the ebb and flow in front of him. It was a slow motion exercise. Mostly the place was empty. There were long quiet gaps between vehicles. Pedestrians came and went, often in groups of four or five, which based on age and appearance were sometimes the last restaurant parties letting out and heading home, and sometimes the first fashionably late arrivals at whichever establishments were newly cool. Which seemed to be split about fifty-fifty east and west of Center, judging by the general drift. Which was actually more than a drift. There was some energy in it. Some attraction.

Also heading in one direction or the other was the occasional loner. A man, every time, some of them looking down at the sidewalk, some of them staring rigidly ahead, as if embarrassed to be seen. All of them anxious to get where they were going.

Reacher got up off the bus bench and followed the drift to the east. Up ahead he saw a glamorous quartet pass through a door on the right. When he got there he saw a bar dressed up to look like a federal prison. The bartenders were wearing orange jumpsuits. The only staff member not in costume was a big guy on a stool inside the door. He was wearing black pants and a black shirt. He had black hair. Albanian, almost certainly. Reacher knew that part of the world. He had spent time there. The guy looked like a recent transplant. He had a smug look on his face. He had power, and he enjoyed it.