Bad Luck and Trouble

“We go out again after dark. We pay New Age a visit. We’re not getting anywhere with surveillance, so it’s time to go proactive.”
    He left ten bucks on the table for the waitress and paid the check at the register. Then they all stepped outside to the sunshine and stood blinking in the lot for a moment before heading back to the Dunes.

    Reacher fetched the suitcase and they gathered in O’Donnell’s room and checked over the stolen Glocks. Dixon took the 19 and said she was happy with it. O’Donnell sorted through the remaining six 17s and picked out the best three among them. He paired them with the magazines from the rejects so that he and Neagley and Reacher would have fast reloads the first time around. Dixon would have to reload manually after her first seventeen shots. Not a huge issue. If a handgun engagement wasn’t over inside seventeen shots, then someone wasn’t paying attention, and Reacher trusted Dixon to pay attention. She always had, in the past.
    Reacher asked, “What kind of security can we expect around their building?”
    “State of the art locks,” Neagley said. “An intruder alarm on the gate. I imagine the door opener at reception will be wired as a proximity sensor at night. Plus another intruder alarm, probably. Plus motion sensors all over the place inside. Plus intruder alarms on some of the individual office doors, maybe. All hard-wired out through the phone lines. Possibly with wireless backup, maybe even a satellite uplink.”
    “And who’s going to respond?”
    “That’s a very good question. Not the cops, I think. Too low-rent. My guess is it will all pipe straight through to their own security people.”
    “Not the government?”
    “That would make sense, for sure. The Pentagon is spending zillions there, you’d think the government would want to be involved. But I doubt if they are. Not everything makes sense nowadays. They gave airport security to private contractors. And the nearest DIA office is a long way away. So I think New Age’s security will be handled in-house, however cool Little Wing is.”
    “How long will we have after we breach the gate?”
    “Who says we’re going to? We don’t have keys and you can’t pick a lock like that with a rusty nail. I don’t think we’ll be able to beat any of the locks.”
    “I’ll worry about the locks. How long will we have, after we’re inside?”
    “Two minutes,” Neagley said. “A situation like that, the two-minute rule is the only thing we can rely on.”
    “OK,” Reacher said. “We’ll go at one in the morning. Dinner at six. Get some rest.”
    The others headed for the door. He followed them out, with the keys to the captured Chrysler in his hand. Neagley looked at him, quizzically.
    “We don’t need it anymore,” he said to her. “I’m going to give it back. But first I’m going to have it washed. We should try to be civilized.”

    Reacher drove the Chrysler back to Van Nuys Boulevard, north of the Ventura Freeway. The auto strip, where there were car-related enterprises of every kind lined up side by side, one after the other. Dealers, obviously, new and used, cheap and expensive, gaudy and restrained, but also tire shops, wheel shops, paintless dent repair, lube franchises, muffler-and-shock shops, and accessory stores.
    And car washes.
    There was a huge choice. Machine washing, brushless hand washing, underbody steam cleaning, three-stage waxing, full service detailing. He drove a mile up and a mile back and picked out four places that offered everything. He stopped at the first of them and asked for the total treatment. A swarm of guys in coveralls took over and he stood in the sun and watched them work. First the interior was vacuumed out and then the whole car was dragged through a glass tunnel on a moving chain and was sprayed by a sequence of nozzles with water and all kinds of foams and fluids. Guys with sponges washed the sheet metal and guys on plastic steps lathered the roof. Then the car passed under a roaring air dryer and was driven out to the apron, where other guys waited to attack the interior with aerosols and rags. They went over every inch and left it gleaming and immaculate and damp with oily residue. Reacher paid and tipped and pulled his gloves out of his pocket and put them on and drove the car away.
    He stopped a hundred yards farther on, at the second place he had picked out, and asked for the whole process to be repeated all over again. The receptionist