Free High Heat: A Jack Reacher Novella by Lee Child

admitting to the bribe, and hinting at the size of it.
    She said, “You have his keys?”
    Reacher said, “Right here in my hand.”
    “Open the safe doors.”
    Which he did, starting next to the empty armory, working away from the window, until all of the safes stood open. All of them were full of smooth-packed plastic-wrapped bricks, some brown or green in color, most white or yellow.
    She said, “Can you get his keys back in his pocket?”
    He did, and said, “What next?”
    “Does his phone work?”
    He tried it, and said, “Yes.”
    She gave him a number and said, “It’s our internal credible threat hotline.”
    He called it in, the exact address, without giving his name, and then the call ended, and she said, “Their response time will be more than five minutes but less than ten.”
    She put her plastic cassette recorder on the floor near Croselli’s feet. She said, “We should go. My car is not close.”
    Reacher said, “Is this enough?”
    She said, “More than enough. Medellin is toxic. And the evidence is right here. It’s a photograph, Reacher. This is a photogenic prosecution. It doesn’t matter who he bribed. No one is ever going to say a word against this one. It’s a tidal wave.”
    “One last thing,” Reacher said, and he turned back to Croselli, and he said, “Slapping women is not permitted. You’re supposed to be a man, not a pussy.”
    Croselli said nothing.
    Reacher raised his hand. “How would you like it?”
    Croselli said, “You wouldn’t hit a guy tied to a chair.”
    Reacher said, “Watch me,” and slapped the guy in the face, hard, a real
crack
, wet or not, and the chair went up on its side legs, and balanced, and balanced, and tottered,and then thumped down on its side, with its casters spinning and Croselli’s head bouncing around like a pinball.
    Then they hit the bricks, and Hemingway’s prediction of five-to-ten came true, in that they saw hurrying cars about six minutes out, and then a pair of heavy trucks. A lot of firepower. And why not, for a credible threat?
    *     *     *
    Hemingway’s car was four blocks away, on Sullivan. It was the mid-blue Granada Reacher had seen before, with the vinyl roof and the toothy grille. He said, “You sure this gets you off the hook?”
    She said, “Count on it, kid. Being right afterward is a wonderful thing.”
    “Then give me a ride out of town.”
    “I should stay.”
    “Give them time to grieve. Give them time to figure out how it’s really their own idea. I’ve seen this shit before. All organizations are the same. You need to lay low for a day. You need to be out of the spotlight.”
    “West Point?”
    “Take the Thruway and the Tappan Zee.”
    “How long will I be gone?”
    “They’re going to roll out the red carpet, Jill. Just give them time to find it first.”
    *     *     *
    They drove a long, long time in the dark, and then they hit neighborhoods with power, with traffic lights and street lights and the occasional lit room. Billboards were bright, and the familiar nighttime background of orange diamonds on black velvet lay all around.
    Hemingway said, “I have to stop and call.”
    Reacher said, “Call who?”
    “The office.”
    “Why?”
    “I have to know whether it worked.”
    “I’m sure it did.”
    “I have to know.”
    “So stop. We could get a cup of coffee.”
    “It’s a hundred degrees.”
    “Got to be less than ninety now.”
    “Still too hot for coffee.” She pulled over to the right-hand lane, and then she took an exit road to what Reacher imagined was a superpower version of the standard type of highway facility, with multiple restrooms, and gas big enough for trucks, and motel rooms for weary drivers, and not just something to eat, but a restaurant big enough to feed Syracuse. And payphones. There was a long line, right outside the restaurant’s extensive and brightly-lit windows. Hemingway used one, and hung up smiling, and said, “It’s working.