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“Tony will know we’ve stopped again.”
“I don’t care,” she repeated.
“Okay. We’ll stop the next time we come across a place that has other cars.”
We continued to drive.
Vee had set the cell phone on the dashboard, and we both continued to check the screen for any missed calls. In a couple of places we lost coverage, but then it popped back up again. Another twenty minutes passed when another roadside café appeared up ahead. It was on a junction, and was busier than the last. I wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing.
Without checking if this was the best option, Vee pulled into the parking lot.
She opened the truck door and jumped out, with me following.
“So where are these things normally put?” she asked. The sky was losing light, so she switched on the flashlight app on the phone.
“Around the wheel arch, or other exterior parts of the vehicle hidden from view. Trackers tend to link to GPS satellites and they won’t work if they’re too deep under the car where the metal blocks the connection.”
She shone the light from the phone toward the car. “Okay, and tell me what I’m looking for.”
“A small box, possibly with an antenna. If you see something suspicious, give it a tug. They’re normally attached with magnets, so it should detach fairly easily.”
Vee nodded. “Got it.”
I stopped, staring at the cell phone in her hand, filled with indecision. I still had my slim-line cell phone in my back pocket—something Vee didn’t know about yet. I wasn’t sure how she’d react when she saw it, especially as the reason I’d had it on me in the first place was to take a photograph of her dead body to use as proof for her father that I had completed the job. But I needed a light to be able to see anything, and she’d find out I had a phone eventually, so I slipped it from my back pocket.
Vee saw me doing so and stopped, her eyes wide. “Is that what I think it is?”
“Yeah.”
“And you’ve had that the whole time?”
Again, I nodded.
I switched the phone on and the screen flashed. I wondered if any messages would come through, asking if I’d completed the job, but I had the advantage of Vee’s father being in prison, so his access to a phone was limited. Perhaps he could have gotten one of his men to contact me, but I guessed ordering a hit on your own daughter wouldn’t be taken too lightly.
Vee was still staring at the phone. “Have you heard from him?”
I shook my head. “No. Not yet. He’s waiting to hear from me, which obviously isn’t going to happen now.”
“Good. I want to know if he does. Let’s get on with this, then.”
I was pleased she hadn’t made a bigger deal of it. Part of me had been worried she’d freak out, but it seemed she was more level headed than that. It wasn’t as though she didn’t know exactly what I was.
I switched on the light on the phone to allow me to search the vehicle.
She took one side of the truck, while I searched the other. The movements didn’t help the pain in my thigh, but I did my best to ignore it. It hadn’t started bleeding again, so I figured it must have at least started the healing process. We must have looked strange, both of us crouching down, Vee almost on her back, as we searched beneath the vehicle. I checked the wheel arches on my side first, peering under the plastic guards, paying extra attention to see if they were lose or bent, which would signal them having been tampered with. I didn’t find anything, and I moved onto the gas tank and then the bumper.
“Got anything?” I called out to Vee, though I was sure she would have said something if she had.
She straightened and shook her head. “Nope, nothing.”
I exhaled a sigh of frustration. It made total sense to me that the truck was being tracked. It was the only thing I could think of.
The cell phone Vee was using as a flashlight began to vibrate in her hand. She stared at me from over the hood of the truck. “Shit, it’s him.”
“He knows you’ve stopped. He’s calling to find out why. You need to make something up.”
She nodded and quickly answered the phone. “Make it quick, Tony,” she said, her voice with a slight rasp and quiver. “I’ve just thrown my guts up. Must have eaten a bad burger.”
