“Thanks.”
“Yeah. We don’t have passports, or the authority to pursue Cobbe to wherever the hell we pursue him.”
“I could assist with the first part, though it would involve some less-than-official means. I’d suggest having Abernathy tug some lines.”
“I figured to. I need to keep in contact with the trackers.”
Roarke gestured to another earpiece. “They’ve lost him for now—but anticipating that, they’ve set up POS and bounce teams.”
“What does that mean?”
Roarke spared her a glance. “Do you really want me to explain the technology?”
“No. What does that mean as far as I need to know?”
“They’ll track him off and on—and if I can get a good enough signal from them, hold it long enough, I can set up what you’d call an echo, or bounce, that’ll keep him on my internal tracker more often than not.”
“Feeney said he’s working on something that could track.”
“That would be very helpful.”
“I’ll get the status.” Before she got up, her comm signaled. The tunnel teams reported one split led directly to the shuttle terminal. They found Cobbe’s vehicle at the end of it.
“Smugglers,” Roarke reminded her when she clicked off. “Move what you want to move, in and out, using the tunnels. By water, by air, all underground. It would’ve been quite an expense to build those tunnels, but a very solid investment.”
“Fuck it all.” She got up to relay the information to the team.
“It’s how he got there ahead of us by enough of a margin to access a shuttle, evaded security. Privet’s going down,” she said to Abernathy.
“Yes, and that will be very satisfying.”
“We don’t have passports or local authority, wherever local turns out to be.”
“I’m working on that.” He smiled a little. “It will be helpful, considerably, to know where we need that authority.”
“You’ll know when I know. Are you getting anywhere with the tracking?” she asked Feeney.
He, McNab, and Callendar sat at a table with e-guts, tools, furrowed brows. “We’re jury-rigging a POS box with a bouncer. Don’t ask.”
“Wasn’t going to. Roarke said he just needs a solid signal, and to hold it for—he didn’t say.”
“Yeah, yeah, we got it.”
“Relaying with ground control,” Callendar told her as she worked. “We’ll hook with their spotters once we put this together.” She glanced up at Eve. “Never been on a private. They are plushy-lushy. You think maybe we’re going to Europe?”
“Can’t say.”
“Never been.” The bloodred lettering on the black shirt under her black bibbed baggies read: ASS-KICKING GEEK.
“Been to Mexico and Jamaica for fun and Canada on a family trip that wasn’t so much fun. But never been over the big water. Frosty. You gotta take the frosty when it lands on you. Got a green here, Cap.”
“Good, good, keep it going.”
They sat, working away, Feeney in his saggy shirt—that already had a coffee stain—Callendar in her ass-kicker, and McNab with his glittering earlobe.
The rest of the team, operational black—but she spotted Peabody’s pink coat over a seat.
Is this what they meant by motley crew? she wondered.
“Okay if we hit the galley for some chow?” Baxter asked her.
She threw up her hands. “Who’s going to stop you?”
“Dallas, our search team in Cobbe’s hole found another hidden, secured area. Like a panic room. It has full comm capabilities, with unregistered equipment. They’ve verified it’s been used in the past forty-eight hours,” Peabody added, “and are working with EDD to decrypt.”
“Who they got on it?” Feeney demanded.
“Detective Waver.”
“Okay, good, but have them call in Yin. Waver’s good, Yin’s better.”
“I’ll relay it.”
“Eat if you need to eat, then get some rack time,” Eve advised. “Once we work out his most probable destination, I need everybody sharp. If you’ve got departmentally authorized boosters, fine. Otherwise, it’s coffee.”
Feeney gave a hoot. “We got it, we got the sweet son of a bitch. Tell Roarke we’ve got an in-flight tracker.”
“You tell him. He’ll understand you better. Take the second seat in the cockpit if you want it.”
Feeney elbowed McNab. “Go. Sugar high, Callendar?”
“All day, every day, Cap.”
“I’ll get you a fizzy. How about you put those eyes and ears back together in case we need them?”
He rose, stretched, wandered back to the galley already crowded with cops raiding the AC and friggie.
She walked back to the cockpit and into e-speak. She tuned it out, paced up and down the aisle as she worked on various scenarios.
It all depended on where. Urban setting or rural? Populated or open? Would he have a hole or have to rabbit again?
Did he know how close they were on his tail?
She caught part of the cockpit conversation that sounded like regular English.
“If you can give me a ninety-second hold, I’ll have a lock on him.”
“We think we can give you a full two minutes, if he doesn’t make a sharp change. We’re over the ocean, right? He’s likely to keep cruising. Last echo he was at fifteen thousand, so he’s flying low.”
“And slow compared to us at forty-five thousand. We’ll be on top of him within ten minutes, by my calculations.”
“When you are, we hook with ground control’s POS, boost the bounce, get the steady hold.”
“He could change course, he could do that.” She recognized Roarke’s tone, the one where he spoke more to himself than the person next to him. “Tip south for Italy or Spain, Greece. Or do a fly right over western Europe, Poland, Russia. But as he’s going now with these spot checks? Ireland’s best bet.”
“No place like home?”
“I suppose even he might think so.”
Eve went back to Abernathy, sat. “He’s going to contact his mother if he hasn’t already. He may give her some sort of rendezvous. You need to have her picked up.”
“We’ve no charges.”
“Aiding and abetting. Come on, Abernathy, finesse it. If nothing else, put a shadow on her. She’s selling her house. He’s selling his. She’ll know where to meet him. Box her in.”
She walked back to the cockpit. Peabody walked in behind her.
“Brought you guys some eats. Got you a mocha latte, McNab.”
“My best girl.”
“We got egg san with ham and cheese,” she told Eve. “You want?”
“No, I’m good.” She pointed McNab back down when he started to get up. “Keep the chair. You’re more use to him than I am in here.”
“We should be over him inside two. I’m dropping altitude to get a better lock.”
Eve felt the shuttle dive, simply closed her eyes. Nothing made sense about being thousands of feet over an ocean.
It was insanity. The human race was just bat-shit crazy.