CHAPTER
18
THE MAN TURNED into the alleyway, stopped, cleared the lane by sight, and moved forward. Ten yards in he stopped again, looked left, right, and then ahead. He kept moving, his rifle swinging in precise, controlled arcs. He did this two more times. He was good, but not good enough, because he hadn’t yet looked up.
When he finally did it was just in time to see the bottom of Robie’s feet rushing at him.
Robie’s size twelves smashed into the man’s face and drove the rest of the attached body violently to the asphalt. Robie landed on top of the man, rolled, and came up in an attack posture. He kicked the rifle away and looked down. He didn’t know if the man was dead. But he was certainly unconscious. He took a few seconds to search him.
No ID.
No phone.
No surprise.
But no official credentials either. No gold badge.
He did find an electronic device with a blinking blue light in the man’s pocket. He crushed it underfoot and threw it into the Dumpster. He felt near the man’s ankle and pulled out a .38 S&W throwaway. He slipped it into his jacket pocket, turned, and leapt on top of the plywood. He grabbed the rope, made his way up, snagged the rung of the ladder, freed and pocketed the rope, and climbed.
Julie was already near the top of the building when he reached her.
“Is he dead?” she asked, looking downward.
She had obviously been watching.
“I didn’t check. Let’s go.”
“Where? We’re at the top.”
He pointed upward, to the roof. It was about ten feet farther up.
“How?” she asked. “The stairs don’t go that far. They stop at the top floor.”
“Wait here.”
He found a handhold on a windowsill, and then another in a crack in the brick. He climbed. A minute later he stood on the roof. He lay on his stomach, uncoiled the rope, and fed it down to her.
“Tie it to your backpack straps, like before, lock your arms together again, and close your eyes.”
“Don’t drop me,” she said, her voice panicky.
“I’ve already lifted you once. You weigh nothing.”
A minute later she was beside him on the roof.
Robie led her across the flat, graveled terrain, reached the opposite side, and looked down and then around. There was another fire escape on this side. He used the rope to lower Julie down, then slipped over the side, hung from the building for a few seconds, and let himself drop. He hit the metal of the fire escape, grabbed her hand, and they started down.
“Won’t we have the same problem if someone is out there?” said Julie.
“We would if we were going all the way down.”
They reached the third floor of the building and Robie stopped and peered in. He used a knife he carried in an ankle holder to defeat the simple locking mechanism.
He lifted the window.
“What if someone lives here?” hissed Julie.
“Then we’ll politely leave,” answered Robie.
The apartment was empty.
They slipped through quietly and ran down the hall to the interior stairwell. A minute later they hustled down the street in the opposite direction from where they had come.
Robie finally pulled up and said, “They were tracking you. You must have a bug on you somewhere.”
“How do you know that?”
“Piece of equipment I found on the guy. I busted it up, but we have to cut off the source. Open your bag.”
She did and Robie quickly went through it. There were some clean clothes, a toiletry bag, a camera, some textbooks, an iPod Touch, a small laptop, notebooks, and pens. He popped the back off the iPod and examined the laptop but didn’t find anything that shouldn’t have been there. The pens were clean too. Robie looked through the toiletries methodically but found nothing. He closed the bag up and handed it back to her.
“Nothing.”
“Maybe you’ve got a bug on you,” she said.
“That’s not possible,” Robie said.
“Are you sure?”
He started to say yes, but then stopped. He pulled out the pinhole camera he’d thrown into his pocket. He popped the cover and underneath was the second blinking blue light he’d seen tonight.
“See, it was you. I was right,” Julie said triumphantly.
He tossed it and the earwig and power pack in a garbage can.
“Yeah, you were,” he conceded.
They did not see a single cab. In fact, a cab was not on his wish list right now. He didn’t want a third party whom someone could interrogate to find out where his safe house was.
Robie broke into and then artfully sparked the ignition of an ancient pickup truck parked in front of a gas station. He got in the driver’s seat. Julie did not follow. He looked at her across the width of the front seat.
“You decide to go it alone?” he asked.
She didn’t answer. She fiddled with the straps on her backpack. He reached in his pocket, pulled out something, and handed it to her.
It was the pepper spray.
“You might need this, then.”
She took it but then climbed in the truck, shutting the door firmly.
He put the truck in gear and drove off slowly. Squealing tires in the middle of the night could attract attention he did not want or need right now.
“Why the change of heart?” he asked.
“Bad guys don’t give weapons back.” She paused. “And you saved my life back there. Twice.”
“Fair enough.”
“So people are after me. Who’s after you?” she asked.
“Unlike you, I know who they are,” he said. “But I don’t have to tell you. And I won’t. It would not be good for your future.”
“I’m not sure I have much of that anyway.”
She settled back in her seat and grew silent, staring ahead.
“You thinking about somebody?” asked Robie quietly.
She blinked back tears. “No. And don’t ask me again, Will.”
“Okay.”
Robie now drove fast.
As shockingly bad as tonight had been, he had a strong feeling it was only going to get worse.