At the front door of the house, the kid rubbed his forehead again, nervous as hell.
It crossed Dryden’s mind only briefly to consider that the kid might be working with the men in the Taurus. That he might be willing bait, a harmless-looking figure to make Dryden open his front door and let his guard down. It didn’t fly. If the kid was working in concert with the men, the two of them would have been standing right against the siding next to the front door, ready to move against Dryden as soon as he opened it.
They were halfway down the block because they were hiding from the kid, too. It was clear he had no idea they were watching him.
Dryden took in the geometry of the scene. The dynamics waiting to play out—the dynamics that would have played out. He imagined himself opening the front door, the kid turning to him, just beginning to speak. Imagined the Taurus angling out from the curb and simply rolling the hundred yards to his driveway—not fast, not revving or screeching, not doing anything unusual at all. It would have escaped his attention like any random car moving down his street, until the moment the passenger door opened and a man with a gun stepped out, thirty feet away.
Neighbors heard gunfire …
… saw a black sedan and a white SUV leave the scene.
Maybe the gunman would have tried to force both Dryden and the kid into the Tahoe. Maybe the kid would have panicked and done something stupid. Maybe the guy would have just started shooting from the outset. The news report had not mentioned a second murder victim—just Dryden. Maybe the kid would have ended up forced back into his Tahoe at gunpoint.
However it played out, it would have done so in seconds, brutal and unexpected. All Dryden’s training would have done nothing for him. You could prepare for some things. Others you couldn’t.
Down at the house, the kid tried the doorbell one last time.
The men in the Taurus traded looks, a few words. More nods.
The pistol dropped back out of sight.
The kid turned from the front door and went back to his Tahoe. He got in and reversed out of the driveway and drove off toward downtown.
The black Taurus pulled out and followed.
Dryden set the Zeiss on the passenger seat and started the Explorer.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Apparently the kid was hungry. He parked at a restaurant off the main drag, got a booth by the window and ordered, and when his meal showed up it looked like he’d asked for about a dozen pancakes and half a plate of eggs.
Dryden watched from a Walmart lot a hundred yards away; he was parked in its outer reaches but concealed well enough by a cluster of vehicles there.
The two men in the black Taurus had been less cautious; they were right at the edge of the restaurant’s lot. Dryden could see the passenger better now, a blond guy roughly the same age as the driver.
Dryden moved the Zeiss back and forth between the Taurus and the kid in his booth. The kid was mostly done with his meal now. He somehow pulled off looking nervous even while stuffing his face.
In the Taurus, more quick discussion. More nods.
The passenger’s gun came back into view.
Then the man shoved open his door and got out and closed it again, tucking the gun into his rear waistband and letting his shirt fall over it.
He crossed the lot to a bank of newspaper boxes just beside the restaurant’s entrance, no more than twenty feet from where the kid had parked his Tahoe. He paid for a USA Today and leaned his back against the brick wall of the building, two paces from the door where the kid would come out.
In his booth, the kid called the waitress over and asked her something. A tight sequence of words. Maybe Can I get the check?
The waitress nodded and moved off.
Dryden lowered the scope and took in the layout of the restaurant’s lot. The entrance, the Tahoe, the Taurus, the man with the newspaper.
The geometry of the scene.
The dynamics waiting to play out.
He saw himself standing in his own doorway, entirely unprepared for these men.
About as unprepared as they were for him, right now.
The whole thing had a kind of nasty symmetry he could almost enjoy.
Inside the restaurant, the waitress walked past the kid’s booth again. She gave him a little gesture, an extended index finger, like Wait one, I haven’t forgotten.
There would be a minute at least before the kid stepped out the restaurant’s front door.
Time enough for Dryden to roll into the restaurant’s lot and get in position. Not revving. Not screeching. He had his hand on the ignition key, about to lower the Zeiss from his eye, when movement in the restaurant caught his attention.
The kid was standing partly from his seat, feeling both his back pockets, then his front ones. Then turning to stare out at his Tahoe in the parking lot, mouthing something that had to be Shit.
He’d left his wallet in the vehicle.
“Oh hell,” Dryden said.
The kid caught the waitress’s eye and said something fast. She smiled and nodded. No problem.
Like that, the kid was heading for the door.