“Tell her I want to see her,” Reacher said. “Right away.”
“I’ll pass that message on,” the voice said.
Then the line went dead. Reacher swung his feet to the floor and sat on the edge of the bed, facing the door, waiting.
sJ1
H^ee, o’clock in the morning in Virginia was midnight on the Pacific coast, and midnight was Rita Scimeca’s habitual bedtime. She followed the same routine every night, partly because she was naturally an organized person, and partly because that aspect of her nature had been rigorously reinforced by her military training, and anyway when you’ve always lived alone and always will, how many ways are there of getting yourself to bed?
She started in the garage. Turned off the power to the door opener, slid the bolts into place, checked the car was locked, turned off the light. Locked and bolted the door througli to the basement, checked the furnace. Walked upstairs, turned off the basement light, locked the door out to the hallway. Checked the front door was locked, did the bolts, put the chain on.
Then she checked the windows. There were fourteen windows in the house, and all of them had locks. Late fall and cold, they were all closed and locked
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anyway, but still she checked each one of them. It was her routine. Then she returned to the front parlor with a rag for the piano. She had played four hours, mostly Bach, mostly half speed, but she was getting there. Now she had to wipe down the keyboard. It was important to remove the acid from the skin of her fingers. She knew the keys were actually some kind of sophisticated plastic and were probably impervious, but it was a devotional thing. If she treated the piano right, it would reward her.
She wiped the keyboard vigorously, rumbling down at the bass end, tinkling all the way up to the top of the eighty-eight keys. She closed the lid and turned out the light and returned the rag to the kitchen. Turned out the kitchen light and felt her way in the dark up to her bedroom. Used the bathroom, washed her hands, her teeth, her face, all in her usual strict order. She stood at an angle to the sink, so she didn’t have to look at the tub. She hadn’t looked at the tub since Readier had told her about the paint.
Then she stepped through to her bedroom and slid under the covers. Pulled her knees up and hugged them. She was thinking about Reacher. She liked him. She really did. It had been good to see him. But then she rolled the other way and put him out of her mind, because she didn’t expect ever to see him again.
4t
ile waited twenty minutes before the door opened and Harper came back. She didn’t knock, just used her key and walked right in. She was in shirtsleeves, rolled up to the elbows. Her forearms were slim and tanned. Her hair was loose. She wasn’t wearing a bra. Maybe it was still in the motel room in Trenton.
“You wanted me?” she asked.
“You still on the case?” he asked.
She stepped into the room and glanced at herself in the mirror. Stood next to the dresser and turned to face him.
“Sure,” she said. “Advantage of being a plain-vanilla agent, you don’t get the blame for other people’s crazy ideas.”
He was silent. She looked at him.
“What did you want?” she said.
“I wanted to ask you a question,” he said. “What would have happened if we’d already known about the paint delivery and we’d asked Alison Lamarr about it instead of the UPS guy? What would she have said?”
“The same as he said, presumably. Poulton told us the guy is solid.”
“No,” Reacher said. “He’s solid, but she would have lied to us.”
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