Page 4 of Cold Target

The shell company, Estrella Holdings S.A., had been flagged by the DEA six months ago as a possible cartel front. The Miami accounts belonged to a car dealership, a restaurant supplycompany, and a real estate LLC. On paper, everything looked clean.

But paper lied.

He was reaching for his coffee—cold now, had been cold for an hour—when his phone rang.

"Reacher."

"Joe, it's Jenkins. You got a minute?"

Donald Jenkins was Director of Treasury. A man with thirty years in, a mortgage in Bethesda, and a daughter at Georgetown.

He heard it now.

"Can you come to my office?"

Reacher glanced at his watch. 2:17 PM. "On my way."

He stood, grabbed his coffee out of habit, then set it back down. Jenkins's office was three doors down, past the cubicles where junior analysts sat hunched over their own spreadsheets, past the break room where someone had burned popcorn again, past the bulletin board covered in memos about parking validation and the upcoming holiday party.

Jenkins's door was open, but the man himself was standing at his window, looking out at the gray November sky. He turned when Reacher knocked on the doorframe.

"Close the door," Jenkins said.

Reacher closed it.

Jenkins didn't sit. Neither did Reacher. They stood there in the small office, surrounded by filing cabinets and framed certificates and a photo of Jenkins's daughter in her graduation cap and gown.

"I got a call about you," Jenkins said. "About an hour ago."

"From whom?"

"I don't know. Not exactly." Jenkins picked up a Post-it note from his desk, looked at it, set it back down. "Guy wouldn't give me his name. Said he was calling from 'the office of special projects.' No department, no agency. Just that."

Reacher waited.

"He knew things about you," Jenkins continued. "Your service record. Your time in Army Intelligence. Specific cases you worked. Things that aren't in your personnel file here. Things that would be classified."

"What did he want?"

"You. He wants to meet with you. Today. This afternoon." Jenkins finally met Reacher's eyes. "I got the impression this wasn't a request."

"Did he say what it was about?"

"No. Just gave me an address and said you should be there at 1600 hours." Jenkins picked up the Post-it note again and handed it to Reacher. "He used military time. Figured you'd appreciate that."

Reacher looked at the note. An address in Arlington, Virginia. No suite number, no floor, just a street address. Below it, Jenkins had written: "4:00 PM - don't be late."

"You know this address?" Reacher asked.

"I looked it up. It's an office building. Generic commercial real estate. The kind of place with a dozen different businesses, mostly contractors and consultants. Nothing special."

"But?"

Jenkins shrugged. "But the guy on the phone didn't sound like a contractor or a consultant. He sounded like someone who was used to giving orders and having them followed. And he knew too much about you. About your background."

"CIA?"

"Maybe. Or NSA. Or something else. Something without a name." Jenkins sat down finally, heavily, like the conversation had tired him. "Look, Joe, I don't know what this is about. Maybe it's nothing. Maybe it's something. But I got the sense that saying no wasn't an option. For you or for me."