Never Go Back: (Jack Reacher 18)

gotten out of a cab and was walking into the motel driveway. She was luminous. She was young and blonde, and fresh and energetic, and somehow earnest, as if she was determined to use all the many years ahead doing nothing but good in the world. She looked like a grade-school teacher, about a year out of college.

FORTY-NINE

    THE KID WALKED past the motel office, and then she stopped, as if she didn’t know where to go. She had a name but no room number. Turner buzzed her window down and called out, ‘Are you Emily?’
    Which was something she and Reacher had rehearsed. No question it was weird to be approached in a motel parking lot by a woman in a car, ahead of what was clearly going to be a bizarre threesome. But a similar approach by a man would have been weirder still. So Turner got to ask the question, which the kid answered by saying, ‘Yes, I’m Emily.’
    Turner said, ‘We’re your clients.’
    ‘I’m sorry. They didn’t tell me. It’s more money for couples.’
    ‘You’ve probably heard this before, or not, possibly, but all we want to do is talk. We’ll give you two thousand dollars for an hour of your time. Clothes on throughout, all three of us.’
    The kid came nearer, but not too close, and she lined herself up with the open window, and she stooped an inch, and she looked in and said, ‘What exactly is this about?’
    Reacher said, ‘An acting job.’

    They talked out in the open, to keep it unthreatening, Reacher and Turner leaning on the side of the car, with Emily completing the triangle four feet away, where she was free to turn and run. But she didn’t. She ran Lozano’s Amex through a slot in her iPhone, and as soon as she saw an authorization number she said, ‘I don’t do porn.’
    Reacher said, ‘No porn.’
    ‘Then what kind of acting job?’
    ‘Are you an actor?’
    ‘I’m a call girl.’
    ‘Were you an actor first?’
    ‘I was an intending actor.’
    ‘Do you do role-play?’
    ‘I thought that’s what I was doing today. The naive young idealist, prepared very reluctantly to do whatever it takes to get extra funding for her school. Or possibly I want to borrow a lawnmower from one of the PTA dads. But normally it’s about interviewing for a job. How can I show I’m really committed to the company?’
    ‘In other words, you’re acting.’
    ‘All the time. Including now.’
    ‘I need you to go see a law firm receptionist and act your way into her good books.’ Reacher told her what he wanted. She showed no curiosity as to why. He said, ‘If there’s a choice, pick a motherly type. She’ll be sympathetic. This is about a struggling mother getting some help. Tell her Ms Dayton is a friend of your aunt, and she loaned you some money when you were in college, and it got you out of a hole, and now you can repay the favour. And you want to see her again anyway. Something like that. You can write your own script. But the receptionist is not supposed to give up the location. In fact she’s prohibited from doing so. So this is your Oscar moment.’
    ‘Who gets hurt here?’
    ‘No one gets hurt. The opposite.’
    ‘For two thousand dollars? I never heard of that before.’
    ‘If she’s for real, she gets helped. If she’s not for real, I don’t get hurt. It’s all good.’
    Emily said, ‘I don’t know if I want to do it.’
    ‘You took our money.’
    ‘For an hour of my time. I’m happy to stand here and talk. Or we could get in the car. I’ll get naked if you like. That’s what usually happens.’
    ‘How about an extra five hundred in cash? As a tip. When you get back.’
    ‘How about seven hundred?’
    ‘Six.’
    Emily said, ‘And the Oscar goes to … Emily.’

    She wouldn’t let them drive her. Smart girl. Words were cheap. The long preamble could have been nothing but a hot-air fantasy, ahead of her unclothed body being found dead in a ditch three days later. So they gave her the address and twenty bucks and she caught a cab instead. They watched it out of sight, and then they turned back and got in the Range Rover and waited.
    Turner said, ‘Man up, Reacher. A.M. 3435 is Emal Zadran, who has a documented history of buying and selling United States ordnance in the hills of the tribal areas. Whereas Peter Lozano and Ronald Baldacci have a documented history of being part of a company tasked to get that very same United States ordnance in and out of those very same hills. Is that deafening noise I hear the sound of the pieces falling into