Hardbingers

6

Shit!

Jack wanted to kick something, but he drew the line at kicking a helpless man. Even if it was Miller.

He'd planned to leave one yeniceri alive—for questioning. Had to find out where they'd taken Diana, had to talk to her. She was Gia and Vicky's last hope. Maybe. An infinitely long shot, but a shot.

He hadn't wanted the survivor to be Miller. He'd been pretty sure he could get one of the others to crack, but sensed Miller would be too tough.

On the other hand, he'd wanted to go mano a mano with Miller, wanted—needed—to make it personal.

And he had.

Miller's pockets had been virtually empty; his wallet hadn't yielded a clue. Jack still had no idea where they were hiding their new 0.

Okay, try the others. A grisly task, and no more fruitful than Miller. The only thing of interest was a dark blue doodad hanging from a lanyard around Gold's neck. It was lozenge-shaped, a couple-three inches long, imprinted with PRE-TEC and 8GB.

Looked like a flash drive.

He hurried over to his laptop and plugged it into a USB port. But when he accessed the drive, all he found was gibberish. Maybe the explosion had scrambled its memory. Maybe Russ Tuit could unscramble it.

He pocketed the drive and the car keys Jolliff had been carrying. One place left to search.

Outside, he combed through the Suburban's interior, emptying the glove compartment, checking all the storage pockets. He hit pay dirt atop the driver's visor: a round-trip Steamship Authority ferry ticket for a car and three extra passengers from and to Nantucket.

Okay. That had to be it. The new safe house was on Nantucket. But where on Nantucket? All he knew about the place was that it was an island off the Massachusetts coast, somewhere near Martha's Vineyard. But he'd know more real soon.