“Why?”
“His briefcase had an old sandwich, a few private-sector business cards, and a couple of magazines. The only report in there wasn’t even classified.”
“And the laptop?”
“A little porn and a whole lot of nothing else. I mean, he had work stuff on there, but nothing that would have caused the collapse of Western civilization as we know it if the bad guys got hold of it.”
“DIA know this?”
“Of course. They’re DIA. They had someone come to the lab.”
“Porn, huh?”
“We find that on military laptops all the time, you know that. And this stuff wasn’t hardcore. Just crap you can watch in your hotel room and not see the title on the bill the next morning. Barely titillating with awful production values. But then I
’m not a guy.”
“Women have far higher standards. So why all the sirens going off from SecArm?”
“Hey, I’m just a tech; you’re the investigator,” she said in a playful tone.
He clicked off, pondered this; glanced down at the note, pondered that.
He waited for Cole to call him back. She didn’t.
He locked the motel room door on his way out.
He fired up the Malibu, popped the address he’d been given into his GPS, and drove off.
CHAPTER
35
ONE RUSTED, leaning mailbox.
Puller passed by the mailbox and the dirt road that it fronted.
Woods on both sides.
He was surprised a place like this had an address that could be found on his GPS. Big Brother really did have all the info.
He parked a quarter of a mile down, got out, and entered the woods. He worked his way back west. He eyed the small house from behind a stand of trees. In the distance he could hear the distinct sound of a rattlesnake warning someone of its presence.
Puller didn’t move. He just squatted there, eyeing the place.
There was an old truck out front. The guts of another truck rested on the far side of the house. There appeared to be a garage behind the house. Its single door was closed. The place didn’t look like it had been recently inhabited. It wasn’t dark enough yet for lights to have to be on in the house, though the surrounding woods threw everything into a jumble of shadows.
No sounds. No people.
He continued to squat, continued to contemplate what to do.
It was apparent that someone who lived this far away from the murders probably had not seen anything. But they might know something. Like the note had said.
So the analysis came down to a possible lead or someone looking to do him harm. Either revenge from Dickie and company, or a counterattack from someone looking to derail his investigation.
He had put his phone on vibrate. It did.
He looked at the screen, answered it in a low voice.
“Where are you, Puller?” Cole asked.
“At the address. In the woods to the east of the house. Where are you?”
“West of it in the woods.”
“Great minds. See anything? I’ve got zip over here.”
“No.”
“Do you know who lives in the place?”
“No.”
“There wasn’t a name on the mailbox.”
“What do you want to do?”
“Find out why we’re here.”
“How do you want to do this?”
“How about we keep it simple. I come in from the east and you come in from the west. Stop at the tree line and check back in.”
He put his phone away and moved forward. His M11 was out and pointing the way. He assumed Cole’s Cobra was doing the same to the west.
A minute later his phone vibrated.
“In place,” Cole said. “What now?”
Puller didn’t respond right away. He was taking in what he was looking at grid by grid. The Taliban and al-Qaeda had been very clever about leading American soldiers into traps. They could find ways to make something actually very deadly look entirely innocuous. Children, women, pets.
“Puller?”
“Give me a minute.”
He took a few steps forward. He called out. “Hello? Anybody in there?”
No answer. He hadn’t really expected one.
He took two more steps forward until he was clear of the tree line. But he kept the old truck between him and the house.
He spoke into his phone. “Can you see me?”
“Yes. But just barely.”
“See anything on your side?”
“No. I don’t think this place is lived in. Hell, it looks ready to fall in.”
“Ever been down this way?”
“Only going somewhere else. Never even noticed this road before. What do you think is going on?”
“Stay put. I’m going to try something.”
He slipped the phone into his pocket and edged forward until he had a sightline on the front porch. He looked up and then down, side to side. Then he looked down again. From his jacket pocket he pulled a scope that he’d taken from his rucksack.
He looked through it, adjusting the optics until he had a clear look at the front porch. He looked up, down, side to side. And then he came back to the down part.
He slipped out his phone, wedged it against his ear. “Sit tight and keep down.”
“What do you see? What are you going to do?”
“You’ll hear it loud and clear in about five seconds if it is what I think it is.”
“Puller—”
But he’d already put the phone away.
He attached the scope to the top of his M11.
He gave one more look around. “Hello, it’s John Puller. You asked me to come here. I’d like to talk.”
He waited five more seconds. Did they think he was just going to walk right up to the front door?
He lifted his gun and took aim through the scope. His muzzle was pointed at the front-porch floorboards.
He fired three times in rapid succession. Pieces of the decking shot into the air. He heard the ping of metal on metal.
That could only mean one thing. He’d been right. He crouched down.
The front door blew open. The shotgun blast ripped the old fragile wood cleanly. Anyone standing in front of it would have been obliterated.
Anyone being me, thought Puller.
“Jesus!”