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They got out of the car. Reacher looked back and waved at the acupuncture office. He was too far away to see for sure, but he assumed his new friends were watching behind their window. Probably with their binoculars. He joined Turner and Elwood on Lazarus Lorenzo’s stone path. The building was silent. The door was closed and locked. They rang the bell, but no one came. They stepped off the path and crossed the lawn. They peered in the front window. An office. No one there. Drawers and cabinets were standing open and empty. The desktop was bare. They moved on to the next window. Same thing. They checked down the side of the building, and across the back. They saw the same sight through every window. A hasty evacuation.
“Cut loose, cast adrift and thrown under the bus,” Reacher said. “I guess the main office didn’t buy the burglary story. They must have had a sense of what really happened. So they shut this place down immediately. Deniability in action.”
They came back around to the front of the building and found the acupuncture ladies standing on the path. Satin scrubs, Chinese patterns. The talkative one stood silent and waited. Reacher wasn’t sure what for. Then he realized she hadn’t met Turner before. She was waiting for an introduction. Reacher said Turner’s name.
The acupuncturist shook Turner’s hand and asked, “Are you this man’s boss?”
“Temporarily,” Turner said.
“I wish you the best of luck.”
“What happened here?” Reacher asked.
“No one came to work. At ten o’clock a shredder truck came and took away piles of paper. Then another truck came and took away computers and telephones. Then nothing.”
“Good to know.”
“I must thank you very much,” the woman said.
“For what?”
“You promised that whatever the lawyer was doing, he wouldn’t be doing it for long. You kept your word.”
“Happy to help.”
The woman looked at Turner. “And thank you, ma’am, for training him so well, and assigning him to this task.”
“My pleasure.”
“You have a demanding occupation.”
“Relatively, I suppose.”
“You look to be in good health and good spirits.”
“Thank you.”
“But you experience high levels of stress.”
“Comes with the territory, I’m afraid.”
“We can help with that, if you like.”
“I would like,” Turner said. “But I have no time. Maybe in the future.”
“Tomorrow never comes,” the woman said. “Old Chinese proverb.”
“I’ll make sure it does,” Turner said.
The acupuncture ladies nodded, as if satisfied, and they backed away a step and turned and set out walking down toward their office.
Turner and Elwood got their phones from the car and they all went around to the back door, which opened from some kind of office kitchenette and let out to the yard. Turner sat on the step and Elwood leaned on the wall. They lit up their phones. The long code numbers, the fingerprints on the squares. Their screens lit up.
“Shit,” Turner said.
“Damn,” Elwood said.
“What?” Reacher said.
