Nowhere to Hide (15 page)

I'm in the lobby with MJ to talk about working for Mr. Pajamas. Call or text if you need me
.

Although King was tired, he was glad to be doing something. Because for Moore's granddaughter Amanda, the clock was ticking.

CHAPTER 35

King chose the lobby so his conversation with MJ wouldn't wake up his parents.

They sat on a couch across from the front desk. It seemed safe. Hidden speakers played soft, classical musical. The clerk had seen them come and go a few times and gave them a tired wave. King was glad the clerk was there as a witness to prevent anyone—if anyone was so inclined—from forcing them to leave the hotel.

“Did I wake you up?” King asked.

“You kidding?” MJ said. “I feel like I've had fifty cans of cola. I don't know if I'll ever sleep. Think about it. POTUS!”

“Potus?”

“Did you put that in all caps in your mind as you said it?”

“Huh?” King said. MJ's thoughts were often difficult to follow.

“Capital ‘P', capital ‘O', capital—”

“I get that part,” King said. “POTUS?”

“Exactly. Those of us close to him use that term. President Of The United States.”

“Ahh,” King said. “And others just call him Mr. Pajamas. Happy to see his briefs.”

Finally, that silenced MJ enough for King to begin where he'd wanted to start.

“I don't know if I entirely trust what happened,” King said, kinking his neck first one way and then another. The pullout bed of the couch in the suite had not been too comfortable.

“We went through that with all our parents,” MJ said. “It would be impossible to fake the president's part of the conversation.”

“Not disputing that,” King said.

Immediately after the FaceTime conversation, Mr. Watt had wondered if what they had seen had been based on some kind of special effects, like in movies. They had decided that in movies, the digital actors were scripted. But in their FaceTime conversation, the president had responded to questions and to movement. No one could have anticipated what MJ would have been wearing, and yet the president noted MJ's pajamas and said, “I see you are dressed for the occasion.” Only an actual person on the other end of the FaceTime conversation could have seen MJ in those pajamas. And only an actual person could have seen each one raise his or her hand and then address that person by name.

“What's bothering me,” King said, “is that the president called you Michael, and he called me William. If he was working with Evans, he would have called me King and you MJ. Like when Don Mundie pretended he was picking me up for Evans and didn't call me King.”

“Maybe the president was being formal,” MJ said.

“Yeah, that's a possibility. That's why I didn't say anything in front of our parents during the group conversation.”

“So you called me down to the lobby to bring up something that doesn't even worry you?”

King snorted. “No. But add those doubts to something else…”

MJ was rocking back and forth where he sat, hyped with energy. “Talk to me, Kinger,” MJ said, as if this were part of a movie and MJ a cool intelligence agent.

King let that slide and said, “Look, we all watched the replay of the conversation two or three times, right?”

MJ nodded. “That's one of the reasons we agreed it had to be the president.”

Blake's iPad was jailbroken, and he had dozens of apps that weren't available at iTunes, including an app that recorded FaceTime conversations.

“What's the first thing the president said to us?” King asked.

“I need the help of your three sons,” MJ said. “The president!”

“No, that's not what he said,” King closed his eyes and did his best to hear it again in his mind. “Thanks for taking the time to meet with me. Parents, I hope I can change your minds because I need the help of your sons.”

“The help of your
three
sons. Three. You missed the word ‘three.' ”

“MJ,” King said, trying not to show his frustration. “What about the entire sentence you missed. ‘
Parents, I hope I can change your minds
.' ”

“Need to get the ‘three' part right, wouldn't you say?”

“Of course,” King said, reminding himself the fastest way to end an argument with MJ was to agree. “I should have remembered.”

“Okay then.” MJ nodded in satisfaction. “Knew it. Absolutely knew it.”

“Here's what's really bothering me,” King said. “How did the president know our parents had decided not to let us stay involved?”

MJ wasn't stupid, King thought, as he watched his friend's eyes widen in understanding.

“How did the president know we had come clean with our parents and told them that Evans and Moore wanted us to help?” MJ said in an excited voice of comprehension. “And how did he know our parents had said no way would they give us permission? That conversation happened only a couple hours earlier. In the hotel room. A private conversation.”

“Yeah,” King said. “Think about the time line. Our parents tell us no. We eat in our hotel rooms because we called for room service. A courier knocks on Blake's door and delivers an Apple TV box and cables and says to expect a FaceTime call.”

“It would be like someone else had been in the room, hearing our parents tell us no.”

“Or?” King asked.

“Face-palm,” MJ said. “Or someone had the room bugged. Room 1010. Where MJ and I had already been a couple of days.”

King nodded.

“How about we send Blake a text to see if he's awake,” MJ said. “Whatever is happening, we need to figure it out before the five o'clock briefing.”

King looked at the lobby clock. Three thirty-five.

That gave them less than an hour and a half.

CHAPTER 36

King and MJ stood in the lobby until the headlights of a taxi swung into the drive of the hotel, and then they hit the cool, early morning air. It would be a couple hours before the sun brightened the sky.

They opened the rear doors of the taxi, one on each side, and swung themselves inside. The seats were plastic and sticky, and the interior smelled like cigarette smoke.

MJ jabbed his fingers at a No Smoking sign on the window.

“Like I can't see you back there?” the cabdriver said. He was nearly bald, with fringes of hair over his ears that looked like wisps of straw. “I smoke when I don't have passengers. Get over it or get another cab.”

With time ticking, they weren't going to wait for another cab. This one had taken ten minutes.

“We're over it,” King said. “We need to get to a Walmart. Bellevue's the nearest one.”

“Bellevue?” the driver said. “That's going to be at least forty bucks. Good thing traffic is light this time of night, or it might cost you sixty. I'll be wanting that money before I drive you out there.”

King found some bills in his pocket. There was a protective plate of Plexiglas between the passenger seat and the front seat. King pushed forty dollars in fives and tens through a small slot.

The driver made a big deal out of counting it twice. He folded it and tucked it into the front pocket of his shirt.

Still, the driver left the cab parked.

“We're in a bit of a hurry,” King said.

“Yeah, well it's forty bucks each way.”

“And I'll be happy to pay it when we get back to the hotel,” King said. “We're going to need you to wait while we do a bit of shopping.”

“I'm happy to wait here until I get another forty bucks.”

“MJ,” King said, “can you use the flashlight on your phone and get the number on that No Smoking sign?”

“Whatever,” the driver grumbled. He threw the cab into gear and headed down the quiet streets of downtown Seattle.

One hour remained before the arrival of the president's representative. And about twenty-four hours before a tunnel chamber was flooded with water.

CHAPTER 37

Because of the situation, something was comforting to King about the familiarity of the interior of the Walmart—the bright fluorescent lights, the long line of carts, the checkout stands, and the endless aisles that were empty at this hour.

It was too early for a greeter in a light-blue vest to be waiting for them. Ahead, a janitor was riding a floor-polishing machine, leaving a light sheen of water on the tiles.

“Electronics section,” MJ said. “This shouldn't take long. Blake said he went online and confirmed they have the radio in stock.”

King heard the whoosh of the automatic door open and close behind him. He saw a woman in blue jeans and a hooded sweatshirt with the Oregon Ducks logo on it. She had short brown hair and no makeup.

Her eyes swept over them, and she grabbed a cart and pulled it loose with the usual clanging. The carts always seemed to stick together.

Something bothered King about what he'd seen, but MJ was pulling on his arm.

“Time's wasting,” MJ said. “The cab driver is charging us a buck a minute to wait.”

King didn't care about the money. It came from a slush fund and it wasn't his. He wasn't going to waste it, but he was going to do what was necessary to save as much time as possible. Even arguing with the cabdriver over the fare would have taken a precious minute or two.

King followed MJ. He wanted them to run, but that would draw attention. Nobody ran in a Walmart unless it was to chase a two-year-old who escaped from a cart.

Still, they managed a fast pace. They reached the electronics at the back of the store. The flat-screen televisions were dark. King couldn't help but wonder what time the manager decided it was worthwhile to turn them back on again.

The store had a hush to it, something King liked. It felt peaceful. Even though he didn't like the process of shopping, he wished that a girl wasn't about to die and that he could just amble up and down the aisles.

As MJ squatted in front of a shelf full of portable radios, King saw the woman again.

Her cart was half full with assorted items.

That was fast
, King thought with admiration. He and Mack avoided shopping with Ella partly because she was so deliberate and picky about her purchases. She'd look at every shirt in the men's department, going back and forth until she found exactly what she felt Mack should wear.

That
was
fast
, King thought again. Not only how quickly the woman had put stuff in the cart, but how she'd managed to cover the distance from the front of the store to the electronics department.

As King glanced over again, the woman had her eyes on some candles. She grabbed a couple and threw them in the cart.

And then King realized what had bothered him at the front of the store.

No purse.

He realized full well that it was a stereotype to assume that all women carried purses. He also realized it was a stereotype to assume that all women shopped as carefully as Ella did.

On one hand, it did make sense that a woman who preferred the
efficiency of carrying a driver's license and credit card and some cash in her pocket would be likely to shop as if she were in a race. On the other hand, how many women who wore jeans as tight as this woman did would put stuff in their pocket if they were conscious about curves?

Then again, maybe she didn't care about fashion. And maybe King was overthinking things.

Any other time, King would have been prepared to dismiss his overactive imagination. But this wasn't any other time. It was too logical that the CIA would have wanted to keep an eye on the situation. After all, the hotel had plenty of surveillance cameras, and it wouldn't have been too difficult to assign a couple of agents for a night.

King just wished he would have thought of that earlier instead of now. He and MJ had just waltzed out of the hotel and into a cab that was easy to follow. And no doubt Mundie would want to know why King and MJ were in a Walmart at this early time of the morning.

King walked to another aisle and began loading up on DVDs. He didn't care what movies he picked—he just wanted the woman to see them shopping for movies.

“Cool,” MJ said, behind him. “Good idea. Make the government pay for that. But really,
Mary Poppins
?”

King ignored MJ. “We need duct tape. But first, cookies.”

Anything to make it look like the radio wasn't the most important thing. King also wanted to see if the woman would follow them.

Which she did—far enough behind that she didn't appear to be tailing them. But a coincidence, King thought, should only go so far.

“Make sure you get chocolate chip,” King said in a light tone. King wasn't about to say, “Don't look now, but we're being followed.” Because if he did, MJ would be sure to gawk, and they'd lose the element of surprise.