17 A Wanted Man

from them?’
    ‘You probably have,’ Reacher said. ‘But not personally. Right now it’s probably still one on one, in some back room in Washington. Two old white guys in suits. With cigars.’
    The clock in Reacher’s head and the mileage boards counting down towards Kansas City showed they were going to beat their two-hour target by a decent margin. The trip was going to take an hour forty, or an hour forty-five, max. Not that there wouldn’t be a few extra miles at the end. The bad guys were unlikely to be hiding out in whatever the highway people took to be the exact centre of the city. Reacher didn’t expect them to be holding their meetings in the lobby of a downtown hotel.
    ‘It’s a suburban house,’ Delfuenso said, like she could hear him thinking. ‘South of the city, and a little east.’
    ‘How far out of town?’
    ‘Maybe twelve miles.’
    An hour fifty-three, he thought, door to door.
    He said, ‘What kind of neighbourhood?’
    ‘Decent. And crowded.’
    ‘That’s awkward.’
    ‘Potentially.’
    ‘But well chosen, I suppose.’
    Delfuenso nodded at the wheel. ‘Wadiah is smarter than most of what we see.’
    The Paris of the Plains got a mile closer every forty seconds, and Sorenson asked, ‘What do you know about Peter King?’
    Delfuenso said, ‘Where did you hear that name?’
    ‘Reacher heard Alan King say it.’
    Delfuenso glanced at Reacher in the mirror and nodded.
    ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I remember that. And then he made the slip about a million and a half people living where he lived. Right after claiming he was based in Nebraska. Right after claiming he’d been driving three hours despite a full tank and bottles of cold water.’
    Sorenson said, ‘We know Peter King moved from Denver to Kansas City, seven months ago.’
    ‘You know more than you should.’
    ‘Was his move a coincidence?’
    ‘There are no coincidences. Not in law enforcement. You know that.’
    ‘Is he a cop or an agent?’
    ‘Why would he be?’
    ‘I’m just trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. That’s all. He served his country.’
    ‘Then sadly no, Peter King is not a cop or an agent.’
    ‘Is he connected to Wadiah?’
    ‘We think so.’
    ‘How closely connected?’
    ‘We think he might be their leader.’
    ‘I see.’
    ‘Because in terms of their organizational chart there’s only a couple of roles we can’t put a name to, and there’s only a couple of names we can’t assign a role to. One of those roles is leader, and one of those names is Peter King. So to connect the two seems like a fairly logical assumption.’
    ‘With a brother he doesn’t talk to in the ranks?’
    ‘He doesn’t talk to anyone in the ranks. Not if he’s the leader. That’s not how these cells operate. The leader talks to his trusted lieutenants only, two or three of them at the most. Then there’s a chain of command, rigorously compartmentalized, for security.’
    ‘Even so, it’s still weird.’
    Delfuenso nodded. ‘McQueen got to know Alan King pretty well. There’s some kind of strange sibling dynamic going on there. Alan is the kid brother. Or was, I should say now. Very needy guy. Always craving his big brother’s approval. Obsessed by the guy. Which is why he mentioned him last night, I guess. There was no other reason to. Apparently there was some unspoken issue, stretching back more than twenty years. Peter was holding Alan accountable for something. Some kind of lapse or betrayal or disgrace. In return Alan was always trying to prove himself. And McQueen got the impression Peter
wanted
Alan to prove himself. Like a redemption thing. Tough love, but love none the less. You know how it is with family. Blood is thicker than water, and all that kind of shit. From what we know about him, Peter is going to be mighty pissed that Alan is dead.’
    ‘Which must be why McQueen is in trouble. Tonight of all nights.’
    Delfuenso nodded again.
    ‘Exactly,’ she said. ‘Let’s hope he’s managing to convince him it was Reacher who did it, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.’
    The plain west-east Interstate that had run so serenely all the way through the state of Kansas splintered into a whole mess of beltways and expressways about ten miles short of the line. Delfuenso turned south, still on the Kansas side, and then she headed east again on a federal road with a new number, and they entered Missouri in the overtaking lane at ninety miles an hour, following a sign to a