Maybe that would be enough.
Maybe sending the federal government after the people who’d killed everyone at Bayliss, and who’d kidnapped Claire, would save her life. There was no question the government would go after those people, whoever they were. This kind of technology, showing up out of nowhere—the government’s first priority would be to clamp down on it, get control, contain the situation. Maybe in the course of doing that, they would find Claire Dunham alive and well.
Maybe.
Or maybe the official action against these people would be less than perfectly choreographed. Maybe at the first sign of trouble, whoever was holding Claire would get a panicked call. Get rid of her, burn everything, get out.
The higher you stacked a pile of maybes, the less likely it was to fall the way you wanted.
7:24.
Of all these considerations, one eclipsed the rest: the fact that Claire herself had chosen not to go to the authorities. For three days she had been in hiding, in possession of the machine, and she hadn’t taken it to the FBI or anyone else. She must have had her reasons.
Dryden watched his house, the Zeiss scope ready, and waited for another course of action to present itself.
*
At 7:27 a blue compact car slowed in front of his house.
Dryden steadied the scope and trained it on the driver. A woman, middle-aged, short blond hair. She took something from her passenger seat and flung it out the window onto his driveway.
A newspaper in an orange plastic sleeve.
She rolled on to the next house and did the same.
Dryden exhaled and lowered the scope. Watched the street as the delivery car made its way along, one house after another.
At 7:29 another vehicle turned onto his street, coming on slow and tentative. A white Chevy Tahoe.
Neighbors heard gunfire and afterward saw a black sedan and a white SUV leave the scene.
Dryden put his eye to the scope again.
The driver was male and young, maybe five years out of college. Short hair, light brown. Glasses. He coasted along, looking at street numbers on mailboxes.
The kid stopped in front of Dryden’s house, then pulled in and parked and got out. He was tall and lanky, his body language full of hesitation. For five seconds he just stood there beside his SUV, his hands at his sides. He raised one and rubbed his forehead with it.
He was wearing khaki pants and a gray T-shirt, which was tucked in. There was no weapon stowed in his waistband, or anywhere else Dryden could see.
Dryden lowered the scope and scanned the street.
Halfway down the block, a black Taurus angled into a space at the curb. Even with unaided eyes, Dryden could see the driver pick up a pair of binoculars and aim them at the white Tahoe.
Dryden raised the Zeiss and took a better look.
There were two men in the black Taurus. The passenger he could only see from the jaw down, but the driver’s face was in full view. A stocky guy, fortyish, dark hair cropped close to the scalp.
Both of them watching the kid.
Tailing the kid—that much was clear. These men had not been anywhere in the vicinity of Dryden’s house until just now, when the kid arrived. Wherever the young man had come from, the guys in the Taurus had followed him from there. They had not been watching the house itself.
Dryden swung the scope back to his house. The kid was still standing there beside his vehicle, unsure of himself. Five seconds passed. Then he crossed to the front door and pressed the button for the doorbell. He stood waiting.
Dryden pictured the way it would have played out if Claire had never called him. He would have been up by 6:45, because he always was. Breakfast, a bowl of cereal, would have been done by 7:00, and he would have been out of the shower and dressed by now, ready to head back up to the cottage and get started for the day. He would have answered the doorbell right away.
The kid on the porch waited fifteen seconds and pushed the button again. He looked fidgety. He paced. He checked his watch and rang the bell a third time.
Dryden aimed the scope at the Taurus again.
The men inside were talking, nodding. The driver cut the wheel to the left, angling the front tires to pull away from the curb. Getting ready to accelerate toward the house, where the kid stood waiting on the porch.
The man in the passenger seat raised a pistol and worked the slide. His free hand went to the door handle and pulled it. He pushed the passenger door open just slightly.
The Taurus eased forward in starts and stops, a few inches at a time. Prepared to move. Like a big cat, low in the weeds, tensed and ready.