NINETY

NINETY

"WHERE IS SHE?" BLAIR shouts into his earpiece. "Do you see her?"

Blair creeps forward as a mass of people spill out of the bank, stopping briefly on the sidewalk outside, then moving farther down the sidewalk, away from the bank.

Then sirens — from both directions, east and west. Police squad cars screeching to a halt in front of the bank, a fire engine pulling up right in front, blocking the bank completely from Blair's view.

"Do you see her? Her car's still there. Do you see her?"

"I don't see her," he hears back.

"Shit. Shit ." Blair runs across the street, holding out his badge. "FBI!" he shouts.

A firefighter, decked out in heavy coat and helmet, turns to Blair. "Someone called in a bomb threat."

Dammit. That was Marcie. She's ghosting him.

But she couldn't have gone far.

Keeping his credentials up, Blair works his way through the crowd.

"Sir, you can't go in here," says a uniformed officer.

"FBI. I have to go inside."

"You can't, sir."

"I can and I will — unless you want to obstruct an FBI investigation."

The officer steps aside. "There might be a bomb in there, sir, but you're the FBI, I guess."

Blair rushes into the bank. He looks around frantically. The vault should be downstairs. He takes the first set of stairs, winding around in the center of the ground floor, but no — it's not the vault. It's a bunch of damn offices.

He runs back up the stairs. "Where's the vault?" he shouts to an officer.

"What?"

"The vault. The — the safe-deposit boxes!"

"I have no idea."

Great. Blair finds the back hallway. Runs down the hall and finds a flight of stairs. He takes them down in double time, landing with a hard thud.

The vault. He finds the private viewing room. Five safe-deposit boxes. All of them empty.

Nothing. Not a single dollar.

Only one piece of paper that he finds lying under the long table. He picks it up and reads it. Just one sentence, all of six words.

"Oh, no," he says. "No, no, no !"

Blair stuffs the paper in his pocket and runs back up the stairs. Looks to his left down the hallway. An emergency exit.

He pops through and looks around outside. He jogs over to the side of the lot and sees Marcie's vehicle, still there. He cups his hand against the window and looks inside.

No duffel bags, no money. No way she got very far on foot with all that weight.

Did she have another car waiting? Has she been playing him all along?

Either way, she's adiosed. Probably with a good ten minutes' head start.

He pulls out his cell phone and dials the number for Marcie's phone carrier.

"This is Special Agent Francis Blair, FBI, Chicago field office," he says. He reads out his authorization number. "I need a domestic real-time location on a cell number. The subject is a fugitive and a material witness. This is an exigent circumstance."

Those magical words at the end, meaning he doesn't have time for paperwork — he'll do it later. Just track the damn subject for me now, and I'll justify it afterward.

He waits. Wherever Marcie is, if her cell phone's on, he'll be able to track her.

She won't get far.

His phone buzzes again. He's still waiting for the cell-tracking operator, but he looks at his phone. The new caller isn't listed. Which means it's Tommy Malone.

Also known as Silas Renfrow.

Blair answers the phone. "She's in the wind," he tells Silas. "But we'll find her."