“You’re one of them.” She smirked. “What, did you think you were on the side of the angels? Are you that delusional?”
“Of course not. I was just hoping for Average Joe.”
“You’re not him, either.”
“Maybe one day.”
“Sure, why not,” she said, not even bothering to hide her amusement.
She was doing it again, trying to push his buttons.
And, like last time, Reese didn’t bite, and said, “Dwight should have some extra firearms on him when he gets back.”
“How does he get past the background checks?”
“Are you forgetting where we are, Alice? This is America, home of the Second Amendment. Besides, there are always people around the world willing to sell something you need for the right price. I thought you’d know that by now after the last few days.”
“Oh, I haven’t forgotten, Reese.”
“Good to hear.”
“I need to make a phone call.”
“And who would you be calling?”
“None of your business.”
“It is, if it’s law enforcement.”
“It’s not.”
“I don’t think I can believe you, Alice. Sorry.”
“Oh, come on, Reese,” she said, looking over at him, and something that almost looked like a sneer played across her lips. “If you can’t trust your girlfriend, who can you trust?”
He chuckled. Of course she’d heard most of his conversation with Dwight in the car last night. Who knew how long she had been feigning sleep back there? Maybe since they left the truck stop.
“No fair; you were eavesdropping,” he said.
“You two should have gotten your own room if you didn’t want me to overhear. Or put me in the trunk.”
“Now there’s an option,” Reese said.
Dwight came back with more food, along with boxes of bullets and three handguns — all G43 model Glocks — and laid them in a pile on a table while the three of them gathered around. Dwight also pulled out three unopened first-aid kits.
“Such a Boy Scout,” Reese said.
“There’s nothing wrong with preparation,” Dwight said. “I learned that from you.”
“I’m honored.”
“But then you also talked me into this job, so…”
Alice, meanwhile, had reached for one of the Glocks.
Dwight saw, and glanced quickly over at him, as if to say, Are we going to let her do that? Reese nodded back slightly and could see Dwight restraining himself with some effort. If Alice noticed, she didn’t give it away.
“You said five or so?” Alice asked, tightening her fingers around the grip of the handgun to get a feel for it.
“Five or so meatheads, give or take,” Dwight said. He picked up and tossed one of the 9mm boxes to Reese, then another one to Alice.
Reese watched out of the corner of one eye as Alice began loading her empty Glock. The woman knew her way around a weapon and was thumbing rounds into the magazine like someone who had done it many, many times before.
“They’re mostly there for show, to keep the girls in line,” Dwight was saying. “They’ll be armed, but it’s not exactly an action-packed job, so they’ll be lazy and easy to pick off in a stand-up fight.”
“And we have the element of surprise on our side,” Reese said.
“From your lips to God’s ears, dude.”
“What about the customers?” Alice asked.
“There aren’t any,” Reese said. “At least, not at the houses. They’re for breaking in the new girls, then housing and feeding them. After that, they’re sent out to where they need to be.”
“Sent out how?”
“By car, planes, et cetera.”
“Planes?”
“Sometimes a john wants a girl who’s being housed on the other side of the country. When that happens, they put her on a plane with a chaperone and send her over. It’s not very often, but it happens.” He shrugged. “It costs extra, but we’re not talking about hobos for clients here. These are people with very specific tastes, and they can afford it.”
Alice’s shoulders tensed slightly, like those of a child who just found out how the real world works. Except he knew better — Alice wasn’t a child, and she had seen and done more than the average American woman would ever do in her entire lifetime. Knowing that about her, and at the same time knowing so little else, only made Reese more curious.
But if he had any doubts Alice would be able to stomach what was coming, the sight of her jamming the magazine back into the Glock and then whipping it behind her and shoving it into the empty holster back there cured him of it. Other men might have been taken aback, even momentarily disquieted by her natural handling of the weapon, but Reese found it…kind of hot.
“What about those locations?” she asked.
Reese took a folded envelope out from his blazer pocket and handed it to her. “The four that we know about, including the one we’ll be going to.”
She opened the envelope, pulled out a piece of paper, and looked at the contents for a moment. She then put back in and sealed up the flap. “Are these addresses real?”
“Why wouldn’t they be?” Reese said. “I don’t have any reasons to lie about them now. I couldn’t care less what happens to those houses. They tried to kill us last night, remember? We’re not friends anymore.”
She nodded. “I’ll need stamps.”
Dwight took out a stamp booklet from his back pocket and tossed it to her. “First time I’ve bought stamps in… Shit, I can’t even remember.”
“You and the rest of the world,” Reese said. To Alice, “You want me to mail that for you?”
“Gee, thanks, but I think I can handle it.”
“You do realize that you’ll need to tell the mailman where to send it?”
“I’ll write out the address when I give it to the manager and ask him to mail it for me. I won’t be doing that until we leave for the house.”
“Of course, I’ll have to be there when you hand it over to the manager,” Reese said. “Just in case you might be tempted to burden that poor old man with something besides the letter.”
“Of course,” she said, and rolled her eyes.
“And here I thought we were suddenly being all trusty and shit,” Dwight said.
“Never hurts to take precautions,” Reese said. To Alice: “If we’re going to find this Faith girl, we need to know what she looks like.”
“Yeah, that would definitely help,” Dwight said.
“You want me to draw it for you?” Alice said as she tucked the envelope into her back pocket.
“You can do that from memory?” Dwight asked.
“No, genius. I mean I’m going to need that phone now,” she said, and held out her hand toward Reese.
Reese took out the phone. It was cheap and plastic and felt as if it might break if he held it too tightly. “Give me the number, and I’ll call them.”
“Is the screen even color?”
“It retails for forty bucks at a gas station,” Dwight said. “What do you think?”
She ignored him, said, “Can it text?”
“Yeah, but it comes out of the prepaid minutes.”
“Fine,” Alice said, and gave Reese a number to text, adding, “Type ‘It’s Apollo’s best friend.’ Just that, and nothing else.”
“Who’s Apollo?” Reese asked.
“Just do it.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, and typed it into the phone.
Dwight chuckled.
“What’s so funny?” Reese asked.
“Oh, nothing,” Dwight said, and busied himself with reloading the UMP he’d emptied back at the motel parking lot last night.
Reese pressed the send button, then waited.
Five seconds, then ten…
“No one’s responding,” he said.
“Give them a moment,” Alice said.
He smiled to himself. Give them a moment. She wasn’t even going to let him know the sex of the person he was texting.