Never Go Back

‘Some things you need to understand. We’ve been in Afghanistan more than ten years now, and in that context 3435 is a relatively low number. Currently we’re well over a hundred thousand. Which means the data on this man was created some time ago. About seven years ago, I think, as far as I can tell. And there have been no significant updates. Nothing beyond the routine minimum. Because this is a fairly ordinary guy. Boring, even. At first glance he’s a meaningless peasant.’

‘What’s his name?’

‘Emal Gholam Zadran. He’s now forty-two years old, and he’s the youngest of five Zadran brothers, all of them still alive. He seems to be the black sheep of the family, widely regarded as disreputable. The elder brothers are all fine upstanding poppy growers, working the family farm, like their ancestors did for a thousand years before them, very traditional, small time and modest. But young Emal didn’t want to settle for that. He tried his hand at a number of things, and failed at them all. His brothers forgave him, and took him back, and as far as anyone knows he lives near them in the hills, does absolutely nothing productive, and keeps himself to himself.’

‘What was he written up for seven years ago?’

‘One of the things he tried out, and failed at.’

‘Which was?’

‘Nothing was proved, or we’d have shot him.’

‘What wasn’t proved?’

‘The story is he set up as an entrepreneur. He was buying hand grenades from the 10th Mountain Division and selling them to the Taliban.’

‘How much did he get for them?’

‘It doesn’t say.’

‘Not proved?’

‘They tried their best.’

‘Why didn’t they shoot him anyway?’

‘Reacher, you’re talking to an army lawyer here. Nothing was proved, and we’re the United States of America.’

‘Suppose I wasn’t talking to an army lawyer.’

‘Then I would say nothing was proved, and right then we were probably kissing Afghan butt and hoping they would set up a civilian government of their own at some point in the not-too-distant future, so we could get the hell out of there, and in that atmosphere shooting indigenous individuals against whom nothing had been proved, even by our own hair-trigger military justice system, would have been regarded as severely counterproductive. Otherwise I’m sure they would have shot him anyway.’

‘You’re pretty smart,’ Reacher said. ‘For an army lawyer.’

And then he clicked off, because he was watching a kid who had gotten out of a cab and was walking into the motel driveway. She was luminous. She was young and blonde, and fresh and energetic, and somehow earnest, as if she was determined to use all the many years ahead doing nothing but good in the world. She looked like a grade-school teacher, about a year out of college.

FORTY-NINE

THE KID WALKED past the motel office, and then she stopped, as if she didn’t know where to go. She had a name but no room number. Turner buzzed her window down and called out, ‘Are you Emily?’

Which was something she and Reacher had rehearsed. No question it was weird to be approached in a motel parking lot by a woman in a car, ahead of what was clearly going to be a bizarre threesome. But a similar approach by a man would have been weirder still. So Turner got to ask the question, which the kid answered by saying, ‘Yes, I’m Emily.’

Turner said, ‘We’re your clients.’

‘I’m sorry. They didn’t tell me. It’s more money for couples.’

‘You’ve probably heard this before, or not, possibly, but all we want to do is talk. We’ll give you two thousand dollars for an hour of your time. Clothes on throughout, all three of us.’

The kid came nearer, but not too close, and she lined herself up with the open window, and she stooped an inch, and she looked in and said, ‘What exactly is this about?’

Reacher said, ‘An acting job.’

They talked out in the open, to keep it unthreatening, Reacher and Turner leaning on the side of the car, with Emily completing the triangle four feet away, where she was free to turn and run. But she didn’t. She ran Lozano’s Amex through a slot in her iPhone, and as soon as she saw an authorization number she said, ‘I don’t do porn.’

Reacher said, ‘No porn.’

‘Then what kind of acting job?’

‘Are you an actor?’

‘I’m a call girl.’

‘Were you an actor first?’

‘I was an intending actor.’

‘Do you do role-play?’

‘I thought that’s what I was doing today. The naive young idealist, prepared very reluctantly to do whatever it takes to get extra funding for her school. Or possibly I want to borrow a lawnmower from one of the PTA dads. But normally it’s about interviewing for a job. How can I show I’m really committed to the company?’

‘In other words, you’re acting.’

‘All the time. Including now.’