Spectre Black Read Free Page B

drove, the 2000 Subaru Outback, fit the mold. He rented a seventies-era bungalow on Avenida De La Estrella, a short walk up the hill from the main drag and the pier and the ocean.
    San Clemente was easygoing and forgiving. He had plenty of time for his new pastime-bordering-on-passion: paddleboarding.
    Del Mar was a short drive up the freeway. He could watch his brother’s racehorses run, although he missed being on the backside in the mornings. But he couldn’t drive in through the horsemen’s gate. He did not have a license. To apply for one, he would have to be fingerprinted.
    Worse, he would be recognized right away.
    Landry walked up the steps to his bungalow. He scanned the pocket yard, looking at every potential hiding place, his roof and the roof next door, his door and the door next door. Finally, he ducked under the banana tree and, key ready, eyeballed the small pebble he’d set on the middle of the doorstep. It was still in place. Only then did he unlock the door. He pushed the door open and stood to the side. SOP—Standard Operating Procedure.
    Inside the bungalow, Landry’s gaze made a visual sweep of the room—the configuration of the furnishings. Everything looked the same. He eyeballed the kitchen alcove. Nothing had been touched.
    He took the hallway to his bedroom, opened the walk-in closet and reached into the jacket pocket of his navy suit for his other cell phone. Walking back into the living room, he punched in the number for the answering service and entered the security code.
    As he waited, he stood inside the doorway looking out at the patch of ocean off to the north. The air, redolent of the ocean, blew past him, fluttering the banana tree leaves. The sky had turned the color of a red plum. It would be a nice night to sit out on the terrace with a beer.
    The message played.
    “It’s Jolie. I’m at an old Circle K outside Branch, New Mexico. Mile Marker 138. I need you to come. Hurry.”
    He made a note of the time, date, and number, so the phone company could track the location, then punched it in. The phone rang but there was no answer.

Chapter 3
    Bill Cannaly, a former Special Forces helo pilot and one of the good guys, connected Landry with a pilot friend of his in LA who agreed to fly him in to the Las Cruces International Airport. The first thing he’d said when Landry contacted him was, “You have a pink sheet? ’ ”
    After 9/11, passengers carrying a firearm on every plane in the United States, private or commercial, required a permission sheet also known as a “pink sheet.”
    A few months ago, when he’d had a little free time, Landry had devoted a day to producing a stack of twenty pink sheets. They had to look official, so he’d taken his time to do it right. He’d manufactured pink sheets for every occasion: military, paramilitary (mostly police), private security—you name it. It was intricate but mind-numbing work. By the end of the day he had twenty pink sheets, and all of them would pass muster as legitimate.
    The big problem was the hologram that appeared on every sheet. It wasn’t easy making a fake look like the real thing.
    The gold-leaf holograms were difficult to reproduce. Landry had fudged a little and used a combination of zinc and some pieces of gold leaf cut from one-hundred-dollar bills.
    For this flight, Landry chose the dummy company he had christened Secret Circle Security. He went through the security area, producing his H&K MP5, and a .32 Automatic Colt Pistol so small it could fit inside the span of his hand.
    Tom, the pilot, was a good guy—solid. He’d been in Iraq around the same time Landry had. All the way to Las Cruces he recounted harrowing stories of near misses and fellow pilots now dead.
    Landry said nothing of his own exploits.
    They arrived in Las Cruces just past eight o’clock in the morning.
    It was already a scorcher.
    Using the alias Chris Keeley, Landry rented a white Nissan Versa. No one would look twice at a modest compact