Bad Luck and Trouble

inside. The place seemed to be deserted. There were small walled-off offices on the right and a big open-plan work area on the left, behind a floor-to-ceiling plate glass screen. The work area had long laboratory benches and bright lights and complex extraction ducts on the ceiling to control dust and a grounded metal grid on the floor to control static electricity. A sliding door in the screen was open. The air coming out smelled of warm silicon boards. Like a brand-new TV.
    The offices on the right were little more than eight-by-eight cubicles with head-high walls and doors. One was labeled Edward Dean. The development engineer. Now the quality control guy. The next door was labeled Margaret Berenson. The dragon lady. A remote facility, Reacher guessed, for when she had to deal with Human Resources issues without dragging assembly personnel all the way south to the glass cube in East LA. The next door was Tony Swan’s. Same principle. Two centers, two offices.
    The next door was Allen Lamaison’s.
    It was standing open.
    Reacher took a breath. Took his Glock out of his pocket. Stepped into the doorway. Stood still. Saw an eight-by-eight cube, desk, chair, fabric walls, phones, file cabinets, stacks of papers, memos.
    Nothing unusual or out of place.
    Except for Curtis Mauney behind the desk.
    And a suitcase standing against a wall.
    Neagley stepped into the room.
    “Sixty seconds gone,” she said.
    Mauney just sat there at the desk, immobile. Some kind of blank resignation on his face, like a man with a bad diagnosis waiting for a second opinion he knows will be no better. His hands were empty. They were curled together on the desktop like mating crabs.
    “Lamaison was my partner,” he said, like an excuse.
    Reacher nodded.
    “Loyalty,” he said. “It’s a bitch, ain’t it?”
    The suitcase was a dark gray hard-shell Samsonite, set neatly against the wall beside the end of the desk. Not the biggest thing Reacher had ever seen. Nothing like the giants some people wrestle through the airport. But it wasn’t small, either. It wasn’t a carry-on. It had plastic stick-on initials in shallow recesses next to the latches. The initials said: AM.
    “Seventy seconds gone,” Neagley said.
    Mauney asked, “What are you going to do?”
    “With you?” Reacher asked. “Nothing yet. Relax.”
    Neagley aimed her gun at Mauney’s face and Reacher stepped up beside the desk and knelt down and laid the suitcase flat on the carpet. Tried the latches. They were locked. He put his Glock on the floor and jammed the tips of his index fingers under the tips of the latches and braced his thumbs and bunched his shoulders and heaved. Reacher, against two thin pressed-metal tongues. No contest. The locks broke instantly.
    He lifted the lid.
    “Eighty seconds gone,” Neagley said.
    “Payday,” Reacher said.
    The case was full of fancy engraved paper certificates and letters from foreign banks and small suede drawstring bags that felt heavy in his hand.
    “Sixty-five million dollars,” Neagley said, over his shoulder.
    “At a guess,” Reacher said.
    “Ninety seconds gone,” Neagley said.
    Reacher turned his head and looked at Mauney and asked, “How much of this is yours?”
    “Some of it,” Mauney said. “Not much, I guess.”
    Reacher made neat creases and folded the paperwork and handed it to Neagley. He followed it with the drawstring bags. Neagley slid everything into her pockets. Reacher left the suitcase where it was, flat on the floor, empty, the lid up like a clam. He picked up his gun and stood and turned back to Mauney.
    “Wrong,” he said. “None of it is yours.”
    “Two minutes gone,” Neagley said.
    “Your friends are here,” Mauney said.
    “I know,” Reacher said.
    “Lamaison was my partner.”
    “You told me that already.”
    “I’m just saying.”
    “So do they know you here?”
    “I’ve been here before,” Mauney said. “Many times.”
    “Pick up the phone.”
    “Or?”
    “I’ll shoot you in the head.”
    “You will anyway.”
    “I should,” Reacher said. “You gave up six of my friends.”
    Mauney nodded.
    “I knew how this would end,” he said. “When we didn’t get you at the hospital.”
    “LA traffic,” Reacher said. “It can bite you in the ass.”
    “Two minutes fifteen,” Neagley said.
    Mauney asked, “Are we making a deal here?”
    “Pick up the phone.”
    “And what?”
    “Tell the gate guard to open up exactly one minute from now.”
    Mauney