Page 69 of The Midnight Lock (Lincoln Rhyme 14)

Douglass adjusted his black beret. He didn’t know why more people didn’t wear them. Comfortable. Stylish. Easily stashed.

“You need an app or have to go online and find out where particular trucks will be. It’s kind of a game.”

“That right?”

This was one of the ten trucks that Viktor Buryak ran, making some money from the food, but that wasn’t the point, of course. Everybody in the organization knew that Buryak was always looking for smart ways to collect information he could broker, and Douglass had scored big-time by coming up with the idea.

You think of that yourself? You are fucking brilliant in the head …

Yeah, Douglass was—at least with this. Food trucks were perfect for espionage and intelligence gathering. No one ever paid attention to the presence of a food truck. Drivers could suck up all sorts of information and take pictures to their heart’s content.

Douglass enjoyed doing this particular job for Buryak—handling security and collecting intelligence at the trucks—because he loved to eat. He made the rounds of the trucks in the city, collecting information that was too sensitive to be sent via phone, and taking care of any risks to the drivers. And he was always comped dishes. He must have had five meals a day.

“There she is.”

Amelia Sachs, and the oversize guy with her—also in aMatrixdark suit—were walking out of Whittaker Tower. He was carrying a large folder. They were stopped by a skinny guy with a grin that Douglass thought was phony. They had a brief conversation and Detective Amelia and the companion continued down the sidewalk.

“Got a good look at her?”

“Yeah. Who’s the big guy?”

“Don’t know.”

Douglass finished the food and wiped his face. Doing the dishes, for him, was wrapping everything up and dropping it in the nearest waste container. He fished a bottle of water from his pocket and sipped. He supposed eating this way wasn’t healthy, always on the run. But this was the least unhealthy thing about his life.

Detective Amelia started the car and spun it one eighty, went right past the food truck without glancing at it. Everybody did this. Unless of course they were hungry.

“And I get five K for it?” Arnie asked.

“Five K.”

The man appeared uncertain. “What you told me, it sounds risky.”

“Life’s risky. Maybe I’ll get salmonella from that sandwich. I’m not negotiating.”

A sigh. Arnie said, “Okay.”

“And I need a complete loss of memory when this’s over with.”

“I sometimes forget my mother’s birthday.”

“I’m not joking.” Five Gs buys you the right to crack the whip occasionally.

“I got it, I got it. Everything’ll go away after. When and where?”

“I don’t know yet. It’ll have to be deserted and we can’t have witnesses.”

“She didn’t look like a cop.”

“No, she doesn’t. Here’s a down payment.” He handed the man an envelope. “A thousand. And another thousand for a beat-up van. And score some other plates for it. Don’t put ’em on now. You do that just before the job.”

“I’ve done this before. How big?”

Douglass supposed it didn’t matter, and he said this. Then: “You clear the deck for the next two days. You don’t take any other jobs.”

“What if—”

“You don’t take any other jobs.”