Tripwire

get to Miami?” she asked. “This time of night?”
    He smiled back at her. Confidently.
    “You’re going to drive me,” he said.
    “Do I have time to get dressed?”
    “Just shoes,” he said.
    He walked her around to the garage where her old Porsche was hidden. He rolled the door open and she slid into the car and fired it up. She drove him the half mile north to his motel, taking it slowly, waiting until the oil warmed through. The big tires banged on broken pavement and thumped into potholes. She eased to a stop opposite his neon lobby and waited, the motor running fast against the choke. He opened his door, and then he closed it again, gently.
    “Let’s just go,” he said. “Nothing in there I want to take with me.”
    She nodded in the glow from the dash.
    “OK, buckle up,” she said.
    She snicked it into first and took off through the town. Cruised up North Roosevelt Drive. Checked the gauges and hung a left onto the causeway. Switched on the radar detectors. Mashed the pedal into the carpet and the rear end dug in hard. Reacher was pressed backward into the leather like he was leaving Key West on board a fighter plane.
    SHE KEPT THE Porsche above three figures all the way north to Key Largo. Reacher was enjoying the ride. She was a great driver. Smooth, economical in her movements, flicking up and down the box, keeping the motor wailing, keeping the tiny car in the center of her lane, using the cornering forces to catapult herself out into the straightaways. She was smiling, her flawless face illuminated by the red dials. Not an easy car to drive fast. The heavy motor is slung out way behind the rear axle, ready to swing like a vicious pendulum, ready to trap the driver who gets it wrong for longer than a split second. But she was getting it right. Mile for mile, she was covering the ground as fast as a light plane.
    Then the radar detectors started screaming and the lights of Key Largo appeared a mile ahead. She braked hard and rumbled through the town and floored it again and blasted north toward the dark horizon. A tight curving left, over the bridge, onto the mainland of America, and north toward the town called Homestead on a flat, straight road cut through the swamp. Then a tight right onto the highway, high speed all the way, radar detectors on maximum, and they were at Miami Departures just before five o’clock in the morning. She eased to a stop in the drop-off lane and waited, motor running.
    “Well, thanks for the ride,” Reacher said to her.
    She smiled.
    “Pleasure,” she said. “Believe me.”
    He opened the door and stared forward.
    “OK,” he said. “See you later, I guess.”
    She shook her head.
    “No you won’t,” she said. “Guys like you never come back. You leave, and you don’t come back.”
    He sat in the warmth of her car. The motor popped and burbled. The mufflers ticked as they cooled. She leaned toward him. Dipped the clutch and shoved the gearshift into first so that she had room to get close. Threaded an arm behind his head and kissed him hard on the lips.
    “Good-bye, Reacher,” she said. “I’m glad I got to know your name, at least.”
    He kissed her back, hard and long.
    “So what’s your name?” he asked.
    “Crystal,” she said, and laughed.
    He laughed with her and lifted himself up and out of the car. She leaned across and pulled the door behind him. Gunned the motor and drove away. He stood by himself on the curb and watched her go. She turned in front of a hotel bus and was lost to sight. Three months of his life disappeared with her like the haze of her exhaust.
    FIVE O’CLOCK IN the morning, fifty miles north of New York City, the CEO was lying in bed, wide awake, staring at the ceiling. It had just been painted. The whole house had just been painted. He had paid the decorators more than most of his employees earned in a year. Actually, he hadn’t paid them. He had fudged their invoice through his office and his company had paid them. The expense was hidden somewhere in the secret spreadsheet, part of a seven-figure total for buildings maintenance. A seven-figure total on the debit side of the accounts, pulling his business down like heavy cargo sinks a listing ship. Like a straw breaks a camel’s back.
    His name was Chester Stone. His father’s name had been Chester Stone, and his grandfather’s. His grandfather had established the business, back when a spreadsheet was called a ledger and written by hand with a pen. His