Page 57 of The 9th Man

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LUKE DROVE THE RANGE ROVER AND CROSSED THE BORDER FROMLuxembourg into Belgium. Traffic was light for a late afternoon. They’d fled the hangar and used one of Persik’s vehicles to speed away. Not the best choice. The only choice. He’d also retrieved the two pistols and spare magazines he’d dropped in the hangar. Jillian remained irritated, unsure of Jack Talley, lumping him in with all of the other undesirables. He hadn’t said much, just listened, trying to make his own assessments. But he’d definitely made a decision.

“We’re going back to Genappe.”

She tossed him a puzzled look. “For what?”

“There’s a lot more to Benji than you knew. All the time you lived with him he played at being a Luddite. We now know that’s not true. He either rigged, or had rigged, that early warning system back at the storage locker. Then there’s the hermetically sealed rifle. You don’t see that every day. He was keeping a big secret.”

“Are you suggesting he did something wrong?”

“I don’t know. And neither do you.”

“He was a good man, Luke.”

“I know that. Not a doubt in my mind. But delirium brings everything out of the well, to the top. Benji never let something go. And that rifle may be the key to it all.”

“You think it’s safe where we left it?”

A good question. “Better there than with us. Luckily, Persik and his men are dead, so there’s no one to steer Talley back into those woods. What we need to be sure about is that there’s nothing left to find in Benji’s house.” He added what he hoped was a disarming smile. “Heck, third time’s the charm, right?”

“Third time could be jail.”

“Not the way we’re going to do it.”

“I’m listening.”

He kept speeding down the highway. “First thing we do is ditch this vehicle. We then take a bus to Genappe and walk to Benji’s house. We see the crime scene tape and call the police. We’ve been on a mini vacation to Brussels, Luxembourg, and Bruges and just returned.”

“Would they not already have searched the house?What’s to say there’s anything left for us to find?”

“That lockbox was still there. I have faith in Benji’s tradecraft. There may be more things hidden. Worst case, we have a murder investigation hanging over our heads. The police surely know about you by now.”

“That’s a risky game you’re playing, Ranger.”

“They’re going to connect you to the house and then start looking for you. We don’t need the press or attention. The sooner we get ahead of this, the better. We can be there in two hours.”

She took a full minute to digest his plan then said, “You believe Talley?”

“About the threat, or all of it?”

“Both.”

“Absolutely. Save one thing. His boss will want our asses. No matter what.”

And he’d already done the math. Their odds of winning a fight against Talley’s mystery puppet master were not good. The question was, did they fight like lambs or lions? He knew his choice.

“Here’s the thing about untouchable types,” he said. “A man older and wiser than me once said, Cocky asses get complacent and complacency is—”

“Vulnerability,” she said.

“I see you heard the same advice.”

“I’ve missed you, Luke Daniels. We had quite the time in Hawaii. A shame neither one of us followed up on that.”

“Where’d that come from?”

“It just needed to be said.”