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“And he hasn’t come back?” he asked.

“Not yet,” the woman said. “I don’t think he will. It’s near the end of the business day. He’ll go home now. He’s a lawyer. Very lazy.”

“Can you describe him?”

“White people all look the same to me.”

“OK.”

“I’m kidding. He’s about forty, probably six feet tall, probably a hundred and eighty pounds, thick dark hair going gray, dark eyes, suntanned face, clean shaven, prominent cheekbones but a weak mouth, always wears tailored flat-front chinos, always a button-down shirt, usually mid-blue, always a dark blue sport coat. Never a necktie, always brown shoes, and socks to match the shirt. Those are the corporeal details. His aura is that of an undergraduate who thinks he’s a terrific fellow so he decides not to change a thing for the next twenty years. But his body changes and betrays him. Behaviors and apparel that once looked appropriate now look awkward.”

“Thank you,” Reacher said. “Would you like to join the military police?”

“No,” the woman said. “I am happily situated in my current position. But thank you for asking. What has this lawyer done?”

“I would rather not tell you,” Reacher said. “This is a nice neighborhood. I wouldn’t want to upset anyone. But rest assured, whatever he’s doing, he won’t be doing it much longer.”

The woman considered his answer for a moment, and then, apparently satisfied, she headed back inside. The pale face disappeared from the window. Reacher stood leaning on the tree another long minute. He was making up his mind. Only one man remains inside. The man who wasn’t Hugo. Should he go pay the guy a visit? Would the guy know who Hugo’s client was? Reacher wasn’t sure. He didn’t know how such people organized themselves. Was it an office-wide team effort? All hands on deck? Or did each lawyer jealously guard a small stable of personal clients?

The latter, Reacher guessed. The walling-off theory, at a granular level. Deniability. Just a single rogue actor. No one else knew. So visiting with not-Hugo would likely be fruitless. Worse than fruitless, almost certainly, because no doubt the office had cameras hooked up to recognition software that would sound some kind of panic alarm. Hugo might be forced underground. Not worth the risk.

Reacher eased off the tree and walked back the way he had come.

Chapter 21

Reacher left the long street with the bungalows and turned toward the busier part of town. He kept half an eye out for a forty-something six-footer in brown shoes, tan pants and a blue sport coat. He saw plenty of forty-somethings, plenty of six-footers, plenty of guys in brown shoes, plenty in tan pants, some in blue coats, but he saw no one who checked all the boxes all at the same time.

It was too early for dinner. He walked randomly, around three sides of some blocks, turning left or right here or there for no real reason, crossing streets on a whim, dodging silent cars, some of which had no drivers. His XXL Carhartt was heavy. It was loaded down with metal. Sometimes it clanked when he stepped down a curb. He walked on, seeing what there was to see. Mostly what he saw looked like the future. Like a time travel movie, where a plain man from the past wakes up one morning to a changed world. There were some things he recognized, still surviving, like hidden archeological remains, half-buried by what had come next.

One such place was a coffee shop, the middle unit in a row of wide storefronts, most of which were flashy and shiny and selling stuff he didn’t want and wouldn’t know how to use. But the coffee shop had endured. Its outside decor might have been original. He looked in the window and saw a wide room with a high ceiling and a full-width counter in back, lined with chrome machines, with a roomful of small plain tables in front of it. All the tables were occupied, some by after-work twos and threes, but most by lone men staring grimly at the screens of silver laptop computers. Some were facing the street. Some had their backs to the window. Some had phones face up beside them, all had cups and saucers, some had empty plates dusted with cake crumbs.

One of the men with his back to the window was wearing a blue sport coat. He had brown shoes and tan pants. He had thick dark hair going gray. He could have been six feet and one-eighty.

Reacher went inside. He walked to the counter, straight ahead, not looking left or right. He watched the room behind him reflected in the chrome machines. Like fun house mirrors. Not good for detail, but enough to know the guy in the blue coat wasn’t jumping up and running away in a panic. Reacher assumed the crew leader had given Hugo a pretty good description, after Hugo had hustled over to the Sequoia Suites. Maybe he had even gotten the story about the brown XXL Carhartt, which was right then about eight feet in front of him, large as life. But the guy wasn’t moving.

Reacher got black coffee, which came in a huge shallow cup on a thick heavy saucer. He turned around and surveyed the room, tentatively, like people do when they’re looking for an empty seat. Straightaway he cooled on the guy in the blue coat. He had pale skin, not tanned. His cheekbones were perfectly normal, and his mouth wasn’t weak. He was wearing a T-shirt under the jacket, not a button-down. His tan pants were pleated, not flat-front, and were stained and creased. His coat looked like he slept in it. Not a lawyer. A working stiff. Older than forty, too. Closer to thirty years out of college, not twenty, His fingers were on his keyboard and his eyes were on his screen.

Then he looked up, and he saw Reacher hovering. He hitched his laptop an inch closer and moved his cup. He gestured with his hand at the seat opposite, with a welcoming and generous expression on his face. Permission, invitation, inclusion. A good neighbor.

Reacher sat down across from him. He said, “Thanks.”

“Hey, no problem,” the guy said. “I’m going crazy here. Trying to write a story. Not going well.”

“A novel?” Reacher asked, politely. He had heard of people writing novels in coffee shops.

“No, a business thing,” the guy said. “An online commission. I’m a journalist. At least I was, back when we had newspapers. Now they call me a content provider.”

“What kind of thing do you cover?” Reacher asked, again politely.

“Technology and money,” the guy said. “Is there anything else in the world these days?”

“Not in these parts, for sure.”

“Not anywhere.”

“True enough,” Reacher said. “I was just in Colorado, in a place with five data centers and two solar fields bigger than most of the countries in Europe.”

“For artificial intelligence, I’m sure. For data acquisition and algorithm training. I’m doing a deep dive online. Could end up a six-part podcast. I’m writing about the thing that wants to replace me.”