‘They won’t.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Because you’re going to give him a ride out of trouble.’
‘The hell I am!’ Lopez shot back. ‘This is your goddamned mess and if you think I’m going to dig your sorry ass out of—’
‘You’ve got about three minutes,’ Ethan said, ‘to park up near his house and wait for him to come out.’
‘Why don’t you do it?’ Lopez demanded.
Ethan stood up and tossed her the keys to his Suburban. ‘Because he likes Latino girls, not ex-marines from Chicago. That’s half the reason he holed up in Mexico. Let’s go.’
Lopez caught the keys and followed Ethan out of the office. As she headed for the Suburban she cast Ethan a final indignant look.
‘What am I going to be waiting for?’
‘The house I called the break-in for is directly behind the one Sedgewick’s hiding in. He’ll see the cop cars from inside. Judging by his profile and history, my guess is that he’s a narcissist, a moral coward and prone to rash decisions based on self-preservation. The first mistake he’ll make when he sees those cops pouring into the house behind his is to run for the front door. He’ll think the cops are there for him.’
Lopez blinked.
‘You better be right about this. And why’s he going to get into my car?’
‘Just be ready.’
Ethan slipped his headphones on and jogged back down toward Jackson Avenue as Lopez drove out of the lot and away in front of him. Ethan made good time, running hard down Jackson and then swinging two rights to bring him back up the block on the other side just as he heard sirens screaming inbound along West North Avenue.
Ethan ran harder as he saw, in the distance, Lopez’s black Suburban pull into Lathrop and ease in alongside the sidewalk. Lopez got out, opened the rear passenger door and pretended to fiddle with something in the back.
The sirens got louder, and between the big houses ahead Ethan glimpsed an occasional flash of red and blue lights as several squad cars screeched to a halt outside. Distant shouts of armed cops echoed between the trees of the expansive lawns stretching between the two houses as he jogged closer.
Moments later, Ethan got lucky.
The front door to the colonial opened and Ethan saw a portly man hurry out. He shut the door behind him, glanced up and down the street, then blundered down the front path as he pulled a baseball cap down low over his eyes. Even from fifty yards away Ethan could tell it was Sedgewick, his ill-fitting pants and hastily pulled-on jacket doing little to conceal his bulging belly and awkward, shambling gait.
Sedgewick reached the sidewalk and cast a long glance at the Suburban before turning toward Ethan. Ethan stopped running, yanked off his earphones and pointed at Sedgewick as he shouted out at the top of his voice in the direction of the cops.
‘He’s here! I can see him! It’s him!’
Sedgewick’s eyes flared beneath the rim of his baseball cap as he looked up and stared at Ethan in horror. The fat man whirled on the spot, searching desperately for someplace to hide, and in an instant he loped across the street toward the Suburban.
Ethan watched as Sedgewick hurtled around the side of the vehicle and straight into the path of Lopez. Lopez swung an open palm across Sedgewick’s face with a sharp crack that made Ethan wince. The fat man yelped in shock as he came to a tumbling halt and staggered against the side of the vehicle. In an instant, Lopez had one of his wrists wrapped in a steel cuff as she twisted Sedgewick’s arm up behind his back and shoved him headfirst into the rear of the Suburban.
Ethan jogged neatly alongside the Suburban as Lopez slammed the rear door shut, then he climbed into the driver’s side and slipped the vehicle into gear. Moments later, they were turning right toward the office.
Ethan said nothing, but glanced in the rear-view mirror to see Lopez looking at him.
‘Slick,’ she admitted with a wry grin.
Sedgewick’s pallid features blanched as he looked at them in turn with wide eyes.
‘Who the hell are you?’
Lopez, her hands still pinning Sedgewick’s behind his back, clicked the second cuff into place and smiled sweetly at him. ‘Bail bondsmen,’ she informed him. ‘Guess where you’re headed.’
Sedgewick’s eyes brimmed with tears that spilled down his florid cheeks.
‘Don’t send me to Cook County,’ he begged. ‘I’ll pay you anything.’
‘Or sell us one of your worthless Ponzi schemes?’ Ethan asked rhetorically. ‘No thanks, buddy, we’ll take the state’s check.’
Sedgewick’s bloated features imploded in grief as he banged his head against the window and sobbed quietly. Ethan ignored him as he drove into the parking lot and pulled in alongside a pair of dark-blue sedans. A knot of apprehension formed somewhere in the pit of his belly as he noted the government plates on both cars. Lopez’s eyes narrowed in his rear-view mirror as she, too, spotted the vehicles.
‘Jarvis?’
Ethan nodded but said nothing as he killed the engine and climbed out.
Douglas Jarvis was a former United States Marine officer who had commanded Ethan’s rifle platoon during the second Gulf War through operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Jarvis had long since retired from the corps, serving his country instead from within the shadowy halls of the Defense Intelligence Agency and hiring Ethan and Lopez to conduct investigations into cases that the Pentagon rejected as un worthy of attention. So far, their work had uncovered conspiracies that were beyond anything that Ethan could ever have previously imagined.
Lopez manhandled Sedgewick out of the Suburban as Ethan saw that the security door to their office was already open, a pair of DIA agents standing guard inside. Lopez shook her head.
‘Jesus, what’s that guy’s problem with doors?’
Ethan couldn’t remember a time when Jarvis had simply knocked on a door and waited for somebody to open it. He just walked in, picked the lock or had his people bust their way in.
Ethan led the way into the office, the two agents allowing him through. Jarvis was waiting inside, sat behind Lopez’s desk and leafing through a series of documents detailing their recent busts.
‘Good morning,’ he greeted them with a smile, and then caught sight of Sedgewick’s face. ‘Looks like you’ve had a busy one, street cleaning.’
‘He’s worth a fortune,’ Lopez snapped, holding Sedgewick like a leashed dog in the office doorway. ‘No way you’re pulling this one off us.’
Jarvis held up his hands.
‘I’m not here to snatch your prize, Nicola, believe me. I’ve got more work for you, if you can fit it in.’
Lopez slammed Sedgewick down into a plastic chair that creaked under the strain. She glanced at Jarvis as she pinned the fugitive to the chair.
‘What makes you think we want any more work from you?’
‘Because you’re hungry for it and because you enjoy it.’
‘Son of a bitch…’
Lopez reached out for Jarvis’s throat. Ethan blocked her and put himself between them, looking down at Lopez as he gripped her shoulders.
‘Easy. Don’t go there.’
‘He killed Scott,’ Lopez shot back, pointing at Jarvis. ‘We got a pay check and a pat on the back. All he cares about is the goddamned DIA, not us.’
Scott Bryson had been a retired Navy SEAL who had helped them on their last investigation. A colorful character with far more personality than sobriety, he had nonetheless sacrificed himself to protect Lopez. The covert nature of their work meant that nobody would ever know of what he had done, and along with his death the injustice had poisoned Lopez with a deep-rooted hatred of government work.
‘Doug didn’t kill anybody,’ Ethan replied. ‘The government did. The Pentagon did. National Security did. Why don’t you take Sedgewick here down to Cook County Jail and get him processed, okay?’