“Here’s the buy,” Carpenter said. “Get me Mason.” Somebody handed her a cellphone. “Mason? Close on the following map coordinates.” She read them off.
“We’ve got a problem here,” Plumber said, pointing at the map. Everybody gathered around him. “There are three roads out of the clearing, in different directions.”
“Dammit,” Carpenter said. She spoke into the cellphone again. “Mason, check the coordinates; there are three exits from the clearing; you’ve got to cover them all. I don’t care, pull your men off Morgan’s house and get them out there; I am not going to lose the device, and I am not going to lose Cabot. Do it!”
Stone went and stood behind the tech. “Are you having any luck locating Morgan?”
“Not yet,” the young man said.
“I think it’s very important that you find his car.” He turned to the other screen. “What’s Carroll doing?”
“See for yourself,” Carpenter said. Carroll and the man she had met were embracing. “Looks as though Cabot gives this lady a lot of personal attention. Any luck on Morgan’s car?”
“Not yet.”
“Zero in on Morgan’s house,” she said. “Let’s see if he returned home.”
“That’s easy,” the tech replied, tapping his keyboard. “Here we are; all is quiet.”
“Work outward from the house in circles; see if you can find him in the neighborhood. Maybe he stopped at the pub, or for groceries.”
“Will do,” the tech replied.
Carpenter moved back to Carroll’s screen. She stared at it for a moment, then laughed. “I don’t believe it!”
“What?” Stone asked.
“They’re fucking.” She pointed at the screen. They had spread out a blanket, and the principal view was of a man’s bare back.
Then the tech widened the view. “Here come our people,” the tech said. Cars could be seen approaching the copse from three directions.
Mason drove the lead car, and he was moving fast up the unpaved lane. Ahead, the trees beckoned, and inside them, the clearing. He was going to make this bust himself, he thought; it was going to be the high point of his career. He entered the trees, and ahead, he could see the clearing in the evening light. Simultaneously, three cars entered the clearing from each access road. A couple were lying on a blanket, naked, and they looked up. “Oh, God,” he moaned. He picked up the cellphone.
Carpenter’s eyes widened. “I don’t believe it. He’s who?” She snapped the phone shut. “Carroll is fucking her immediate superior at Eastover.”
“Then Morgan is our man,” Stone said.
“Find him!” Carpenter said to the tech.
“He’s not in the neighborhood,” the young man replied.
“Get somebody over to Morgan’s house,” Carpenter snapped at Plumber.
“We don’t have anybody; they’re all on Carroll.”
She picked up the cellphone. “Mason? It’s Morgan, no doubt, and we’ve lost him. Get over to his house and arrest him. Report back.”
“How long will it take him to get there?” Stone asked.
Plumber spoke up. “Four, five minutes.”
“I don’t believe it,” Carpenter was saying. “All this bike ride was in aid of was fucking her boss!”
“They couldn’t meet at either of their houses,” Plumber said. “These facilities frown on extramarital relationships.”
“Carroll is married?”
Plumber was checking a list. “Divorced, but her boss is married.”