was realizing not much got by McRyan. “What’s the significance of 422?”
Mac shrugged, “Nothing really. My high school football and baseball number was four and my hockey number in high school and college was twenty-two, so I tend to notice those numbers for some reason. Why did you notice it?”
“Maybe I’m getting a little paranoid,” Wire answered. “I’m certain there were at least two two-man teams watching Montgomery’s apartment in DC when I was scoping the area and then after what happened in St. Paul, I seem to constantly be looking back to see if anyone is following.”
“Me too,” McRyan replied casually, his right hand draped loosely over the wheel. If they were being watched, might as well look relaxed and unsuspecting. “I operate on the theory these days that only the paranoid survive. I had a case where it turned out the people we took down had been following us for a while. Shit, they’d bugged Sally’s house as it turned out so Lord only knows what they heard us doing, Sally can be … kind of loud,” he said with a devilish grin.
Wire just laughed.
“Anyways, I’m always a little paranoid now when I get on a murder case with some complexity to it. I figure someone is watching from somewhere.”
Wire nodded, having done undercover work while in the bureau. “I noticed it when Ring first explained how the Suburban took out Martin. I looked back that way and saw the Traverse. Then a minute later I took another look and noticed the two guys sitting in the front seat and I got a feeling, you know.”
McRyan nodded. “Women’s intuition.”
“Why if it’s a woman does it have to be intuition?” Wire asked, mildly perturbed.
“Just is.”
“What is it for a man, then?”
“Spidey Sense,” Mac answered. “Ring’s taking a right turn here so let’s see if we’re right and the Traverse follows.”
McRyan followed Ring west on Wells Street as they crossed the Milwaukee River, heading into an area of older warehouse buildings. Ten seconds after the turn, the Traverse came around the corner. “Do you have the full plate now?” McRyan asked, checking his rearview mirror.
“I do,” Wire answered. “I’ll have Ring run it when we get to DataPoint.”
“Looks like we’re there.”
DataPoint was located west of the Milwaukee River in a non-descript four-story warehouse building with a simple DataPoint sign on the front. Mac dropped the Acadia into a guest parking space in the front next to Ring.
Ring led them through the front doors into DataPoint’s offices. Once inside, to their immediate right was a waiting area. To the left was a rounded reception desk unmanned since it was Saturday. Standing at the reception desk was a short and stocky woman dressed in a black pant suit and navy blue open collar blouse. She had a Milwaukee police badge on her belt. Ring walked up to her, spoke briefly and turned to them, “Detective McRyan, Ms. Wire, meet my partner Jill Brosel.”
“Hello,” Brosel said as she shook hands. “Let’s step over here.” The four moved into the small conference room to the left of the reception desk. It was likely a conference room used for job interviews as it was small, maybe ten feet by eight feet, with a small round conference table and four chairs and a little mini-fridge in the corner with a glass door. Inside was water and sodas. “Water,” Wire uttered with some desperation as she helped herself to an Ice Mountain and handed one to Mac. She then moved to the window and peeked through the shades and scanned the area. She looked back to McRyan and nodded. The silver Traverse was still lingering.
Ring, ever observant, saw the look the two of them shared and asked, “What’s out there?”
“We’ve got ourselves a tail,” Mac replied as he walked over to the window to look for himself. The Traverse was parked across the street in the second row of the parking lot for the company across the street at about ten o’clock. Two men sitting in the front seat of the SUV. Mac pulled out his cell phone and focused on the Traverse, zooming as best he could with the camera function on his cell phone. The best he could do was two white men in dark coats and baseball hats pulled down low over their eyes.
Mac showed the picture to Ring. “Look familiar?”
Ring snorted and shrugged. Two white men, baseball caps pulled down low. They looked kind of generic. “Could be the guys who took out