‘In which case why not arrest them all and interrogate them properly?’
‘Because three of the four are innocent. Where there’s smoke there’s fire, and so on. Their careers would be hurt.’
‘That never stopped you before.’
‘We never had fast track people before. Not like this. Going places. We wouldn’t cripple them all. One of them would survive, and she’d get her revenge.’
Reacher said, ‘I’m just trying to establish the rules of engagement.’
‘Anything that wouldn’t get thrown out of court for blatant illegality.’
‘Blatant?’
‘Flashing red with a siren. That kind of blatant.’
‘That bad?’
‘We can’t tolerate this kind of thing. Not with a foreign manufacturer. We have politicians to please, and they have donors to protect. American donors.’
‘Who like a rigged game.’
‘There’s two different kinds of rigged. Our kind, and their kind.’
‘Understood,’ Reacher said.
‘There’s no danger,’ Christopher said again. ‘It’s all just talking.’
‘So what are the difficulties? What’s not going to be easy?’
‘That’s complicated,’ Christopher said.
The front-wheel-drive car joined the traffic stream on the highway. It became just one of thousands, all heading the same way, all fast and focused and linear and metallic, like giant rounds fired from giant chain gun barrels somewhere far behind them. Which was a mental image the driver liked very much. He was a bullet, implacable and relentless, singular in his purpose. He was heading for his target. His aim was true.
Across the barrier no one was heading in the other direction. The morning flow was all one way, high speed and crowded, towards the distant city.
Christopher did the thing with his hands again, clearing metaphorical clutter off his desk, and out of the conversation. Ready for a new topic. The difficulties. He said, ‘It’s a speed issue. We have to be quick. And at the same time we have to keep things normal for the Marine Corps. We can’t let them suspect we have a leak. So we can’t stop talking, or they’ll guess. But we can’t let much more stuff go overseas. So you can’t waste time.’