"There's a BMW, too," he was saying. "Eight-series coupe. It's up in Pound Ridge right now. I'll take fifty cents on the dollar for cash in a bag, tomorrow."
He stopped and listened to the guy sucking in air through his teeth, like car guys always do when you talk to them about money.
"Call it thirty grand for the both of them, cash in a bag, tomorrow."
The guy grunted a yes, and Hobie moved on down his mental list.
"There's a Tahoe and a Cadillac. Call it forty grand, you can add either one of them to the deal. Your choice."
The guy paused and picked the Tahoe. More resale in a four-wheel-drive, especially some way south, which is where Hobie knew he was going to move it. He clicked the phone off and went inside through the sliders to the living room. He used his left hand to open his little leather diary and kept it open by flattening it down with the hook. He clicked the button again and dialed a real estate broker who owed him serious money.
"I'm calling the loan," he said.
He listened to the swallowing sounds as the guy started panicking. There was desperate silence for a long time. Then he heard the guy sit down, heavily.
"Can you pay me?"
There was no reply.
"You know what happens to people who can't pay me?"
More silence. More swallowing.
"Don't worry," he said. "We can work something out. I got two properties to sell. A mansion up in Pound Ridge, and my apartment on Fifth. I want two million for the house, and three-point-five for the apartment. You get me that and I'll write off the loan against your commission, OK?"
The guy had no choice but to agree. Hobie had him copy down the bank details in the Caymans and told him to wire the proceeds within a month.
"A month is pretty optimistic," the guy said.
"How are your kids?" Hobie asked.
More swallowing.
"OK, a month," the guy said.
Hobie clicked the phone off and wrote five million five hundred forty thousand dollars on the page where he had scored out three automobiles and two residences. Then he called the airline and inquired about flights to the coast, evening of the day after tomorrow. There was plenty of availability. He smiled. The ball was soaring right over the fence, heading for the fifth row of the bleachers. The outfielder was leaping like crazy, but he was absolutely nowhere near it.
WITH HOBIE GONE. Marilyn felt safe enough to take a shower. She wouldn't have done it with him out there in the office. There was too much in his leer. She would have felt he could see right through the bathroom door. But the one called Tony was not such a problem. He was anxious and obedient. Hobie had told him to make sure they didn't come out of the bathroom. He would do that, for sure, but nothing more. He wouldn't come in and hassle them. He would leave them alone. She was confident of that. And the other guy, the thickset one who had brought the coffee, he was doing what Tony told him. So she felt safe enough, but she still had Chester stand by the door with his hand on the handle.
She leaned in and set the shower running hot and stripped off her dress and her shoes. She folded the dress neatly over the curtain rail, out of the water stream, but near enough for the steam to take the creases out. Then she stepped into the stall and washed her hair and soaped herself from head to foot. It felt good. It was relaxing. It took away the tension. She stood faceup and soaked for a long time. Then she left the water running and stepped out and took a towel and changed places with Chester.
"Go ahead," she said. "It'll do you good."
He was numb. He just nodded and let the door handle go. Stood for a second and stripped off his undershirt and his boxers. Sat naked on the floor and took off his shoes and socks. She saw the yellow bruise on his side.
"They hit you?" she whispered.
He nodded again. Stood up and stepped into the stall. He stood under the torrent with his eyes closed and his mouth open. Then the water seemed to revive him. He found the soap and the shampoo and washed himself all over.
"Leave the water running," she said. "It's warming the place up."
It was true. The hot water was making the room comfortable. He stepped out and took a towel. Dabbed his face with it and wrapped it around his waist.
"And the noise means they can't hear us talking," she said. "And we need to talk, right?"
He shrugged, like there wasn't much to talk about. "I don't understand what you're doing. There are no trustees. He's going to find that out, and then he'll just get mad."
She was toweling her hair. She stopped and looked at him through the gathering cloud of steam. "We need a witness. Don't you see that?"
"A witness to what?"
"To what happens," she said. "David Forster will send some private detective over here, and what can Hobie do? We'll just admit there is no trust, and then we'll all of us go down to your bank, and we'll hand Hobie the stock. In a public place, with a witness. A witness, and a sort of bodyguard. Then we can just walk away."
"Will that work?"
"I think so," she said. "He's in some kind of a hurry. Can't you see that? He's got some kind of a deadline. He's panicking. Our best bet is to delay as long as we can, and then just slip away, with a witness watching the whole thing and guarding us. Hobie will be too uptight about time to react."
"I don't understand," he said again. "You mean this private dick will testify we were acting under duress? You mean so we can sue Hobie to get the stock back?"
She was quiet for a beat. Amazed. "No, Chester, we're not going to sue anybody. Hobie gets the stock, and we forget all about it."
He stared at her through the steam. "But that's no good. That won't save the company. Not if it means Hobie gets the stock and we've got no comeback."
She stared back at him. "God's sake, Chester, don't you understand anything? The company is gone. The company is history, and you better face it. This is not about saving the damn company. This is about saving our lives."
THE SOUP WAS wonderful and the pork was even better. His mother would have been proud of it. They shared a half bottle of Californian wine and ate in contented silence. The restaurant was the sort of place that gave you a long pause between the entree and the dessert. No rush to get you out and reclaim the table. Reacher was enjoying the luxury. Not something he was used to. He sprawled back in his chair and stretched his legs out. His ankles were rubbing against Jodie's, under the table.
"Think about his parents," he said. "Think about him, as a kid. Open up the encyclopedia to N for 'normal American family' and you're going to see a picture of the Hobies, all three of them, staring right out at you. I accept that 'Nam changed people. I can see it kind of expanding his horizons a little. They knew that, too. They knew he wasn't going to come back and work for some dumb little print shop in Brighton. They saw him going down to the rigs, flying around the gulf for the oil companies. But he would have kept in touch, right? To some extent? He wouldn't have just abandoned them. That's real cruelty, cold and consistent for thirty straight years. You see anything in his record that makes him that kind of a guy?"
"Maybe he did something," she said. "Something shameful. Maybe something like My Lai, you know, a massacre or something? Maybe he was ashamed to go home. Maybe he's hiding a guilty secret."
He shook his head impatiently. "It would be in his record. And he didn't have the opportunity, anyway. He was a helicopter pilot, not an infantryman. He never saw the enemy close up."
The waiter came back with his pad and pencil.
"Dessert?" he asked. "Coffee?"
They ordered raspberry sorbet and black coffee. Jodie drained the last of her wine. It shone dull red in the glass in the candlelight.
"So what do we do?"
"He died," Reacher said. "We'll get the definitive evidence, sooner or later. Then we'll go back and tell the old folks they've wasted thirty years fretting about it."
"And what do we tell ourselves? We were attacked by a ghost?"
He shrugged and made no reply to that. The sorbet arrived and they ate it in silence. Then the coffee came, and the check in a padded leather folder bearing the restaurant logo printed in gold. Jodie laid her credit card on it without looking at the total. Then she smiled.
"Great dinner," she said.
He smiled back. "Great company."
"Let's forget all about Victor Hobie for a while," she said.
"Who?" he asked, and she laughed.
"So what shall we think about instead?" she said.
He smiled. "I was thinking about your dress."
"You like it?"
"I think it's great," he said.
"What?"
"But it could look better. You know, maybe thrown in a heap on the floor."
"You think so?"
"I'm pretty sure," he said. "But that's just a guess, right now. I'd need some experimental data. You know, a before-and-after comparison."
She sighed in mock exhaustion. "Reacher, we need to be up at seven. Early flights, right?"
"You're young," he said. "If I can take it, you sure as hell can."
She smiled. Scraped her chair back and stood up. Stepped away from the table and turned a slow turn in the aisle. The dress moved with her. It looked wonderful from the back. Her hair was gold against it in the candlelight. She stepped close and bent down and whispered in his ear.