his kitchen. That’s when he got the call from the agency. They had something for him that might help his search, but he needed to come and get it. He showered, gunned up, and was on his way.
He arrived at a CIA facility that Reel had used during her mission before killing Doug Jacobs. It was about an hour outside of D.C. There was a locker there with a few possessions that Reel had left behind. Considering the redactions and the policed crime scenes, Robie held no hope that the locker would offer any useful details, but he had to check them out regardless.
He was processed through the facility’s security and escorted to the locker. It was opened for him and he was left alone with the contents. They were few, and Robie had no way of knowing if these were the only ones that had been in the locker. Right now he trusted no one.
There were only three items: a photo, a book on World War II, and a nine-millimeter Glock 17 semiautomatic pistol with custom sights. The photograph was of Reel standing next to a man whom Robie did not recognize.
He collected all the items and made the hourlong drive back to his apartment to go over them.
Robie was feeling out of his depth. His specialty was preparing, in a scorched-earth way, to kill another human being and then successfully exiting that situation to live to kill another day. Sleuthing, painstakingly going over minutiae looking for clues, traveling here and there, questioning people simply wasn’t his thing. He wasn’t a detective. He was a professional trigger, but they were expecting him to investigate and so he would.
He laid the photo, the book, and the gun on the table and looked at them one by one as the rain once more picked up and banged against his window.
He disassembled the gun and found it to be simply a gun. From the ease with which the elements came apart and went back together, Robie concluded that the agency had already taken it apart looking for clues as well. He had already checked the mag. It was a super-high-capacity configuration, thirty-three rounds. It was standard ammo that Robie had seen a million times, although the elongated mag wasn’t typical.
Thirty-three rounds to do the job, Reel? Who would have thought?
There was also a titanium safety plunger. It reduced friction, made the trigger pull lighter, and increased your accuracy. Robie used one on his own weapon, although it was probably overkill.
Still, Reel clearly paid attention to the details.
The grip was stippled for better tackiness. It wasn’t merely a slip-on; the frame had been altered with the embossed pattern etched right into the hardware.
Robie figured a soldering iron had been used to make the stipple on the Glock’s polymer frame. He had done the same with his weapons early on. In fact, he and Reel had learned how to stipple from a senior field agent named Ryan Marshall, who swore by the process.
He next looked at the customized sight. It was a nice piece of engineering. Robie squinted to see the name on it. It bore the initials PSAC.
He Googled it and came up with the Pennsylvania Small Arms Company. He’d never heard of them, but there were lots of such companies. Obviously, Reel had not been happy with the Glock sight for some reason. Again, details.
He laid the gun aside and studied the photo. Reel was standing next to a large man, easily six-four. He looked about fifty, built like an athlete going to pot. There was an edge of red next to the man. It might have been another person dressed in that color or a sign or a car, Robie couldn’t be sure. And unless he had the negative or the photo card it came from he couldn’t see if there was anything there that could be enlarged.
He studied Reel’s image. She was tall even in flats. And unlike her companion, there was not an ounce of fab on her. Her gaze was pointed straight at the camera. This was of course not the first image Robie had seen of the woman. But each time he did see her picture, it was like he was looking at a different person.
We were all chameleons to a certain extent.
Yet he felt like he was coming to understand Reel better each time he saw her likeness or learned a new bit of information about her. It was like layers of an onion being peeled