“That’s why I came to you,” Lauren said. “You know Jane Grey, the station secretary, well, don’t you?”
“Sure, Jane was my secretary when I was chief.”
“Will you call her? Hurd doesn’t want to do it for some reason.”
“And tell her what?”
“Tell her to tell Jimmy that his car is scheduled for service, and she’ll give him another. Then we can take the car into a shop and get the work done. If she gets his keys the night before and returns it two mornings later, we’ll have plenty of time.”
“Sure, I’ll do that. Do you know when you want the car?”
“I’ll let you know when everything’s set.”
“Okay, I’ll wait for your call. One other thing, though.”
“What?”
“I don’t think you should carry a weapon; he’s liable to notice. I think it should be concealed in the car. In fact, I think there should be two weapons concealed, say, one under the dash and one under the seat, and you ought to be there when they’re planted, so you’ll know exactly where they are.”
“Good idea,” Lauren said. “Anything else?”
Holly thought about it. “No, but I’ll probably think of something. I’ll call you when I do. And Lauren?”
“Yes?”
“I want to be in a chase car,” Holly said. “Clear it with Hurd.”
“I will.”
“And, Lauren, does your boyfriend know about this?”
“No, Holly, and I’m not going to tell him until it’s over.”
52
Teddy Fay picked up the new, stick-on aircraft registration numbers at the design shop and drove home. He was working through a checklist of things he had to do before he and Lauren departed Vero Beach for good.
This was a different kind of escape for Teddy. Ordinarily when abandoning a location, he also abandoned his identity, his appearance and everything else about himself-he burned all his bridges-but he had made a decision not to tell Lauren who he really was, and that entailed becoming Jack Smithson permanently.
Teddy had been working for much of the day on fleshing out the identity: creating a better credit report, adding information to his pre-Vero Beach existence in north Georgia, creating the kind of past a real person would own. He had even fabricated the record of a past speeding ticket from Dalton, Georgia, with the fine paid on time.
Back at the beach house he had one last task: change the aircraft registration number on his airplane. It wasn’t hugely important, but it would make him a little more difficult to trace if anybody tried. He finished the job on the computer and logged out of first the FAA computer, then the Agency mainframe. The phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Hi, it’s me,” Lauren said.
“Hey, kiddo.”
“Have you started cooking dinner yet?”
“Not yet, but soon.”
“Why don’t we go out tonight? You like barbecue?”
“Yeah, sure; every Georgia boy does.”
“There’s a great little joint on 1A that does wonderful things to a pig. Want to meet me there after work? Say, six?”