“How did they find me?” Tobie asked Gunner.
They were walking through the long grass of City Park, deep in the area beyond the stables where the trees were thick and the leafy canopy overhead whispered relentlessly with the early afternoon breeze. Gunner squinted up at the sunlight filtering down through the moss-draped live oaks. “You say you noticed them after you left Byblos?”
“Yes.” She crossed her arms at her chest and hugged herself. There was a fine trembling going on inside her that wouldn’t seem to stop. Even her voice was shaky. “Why?”
“Do you eat there much?”
“Yes. But how could they know that?”
“It wouldn’t be hard if they ran your credit card records.”
“How could they get that kind of information?”
“Depending on who they are, they either hacked into your credit card company’s records or they simply ordered the company to turn them over.”
Tobie was silent for a moment. “Can the Government do that?”
“Are you kidding? With the Patriot Act, they can do anything they want. As long as they say it’s for national security reasons, no one is going to complain or try to stop them. In fact, it’s a federal offense even to tell anyone the Government requested the information.”
Tobie watched the oak leaves flutter in the breeze, watched a white ibis take off from the calm green water of the bayou. She’d known that, of course, but it hadn’t particularly worried her. She was a good, law-abiding American citizen; how could she ever imagine someone might use those Draconian powers against her?
“Of course, it doesn’t even have to be the Government doing this,” Gunner was saying. “All that information collection has been contracted out to private companies.”
“Do you know who?”
“I think Keefe is one of them. There are supposed to be safeguards, but, well, you know how that goes.”
“Oh, God. How do you fight someone who has the power to lay their hands on every little detail of your life?” she asked, her voice a whisper.
“You can’t. Not openly. And not by yourself. Maybe if you find out what’s behind all of this, you can go to someone in Congress.”
“Oh, right. Someone like that congressman you were telling me about? The one who ended up dead in a plane crash?”
Gunner held out a thick manila envelope. “I looked up the Keefe Corporation on the Internet. You wouldn’t believe the shit they’re into. And God knows what they’re up to that isn’t public information. Especially these days.”
Tobie took the envelope and shoved it in her messenger bag. “Thanks, Gunner. I never should have contacted you. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to put you in danger.”
“I just wish there was more I could do to help. There didn’t seem to be anything on an Archangel Project. If I find something, I’ll call you.” He hesitated, then said, “Have you thought about getting out of New Orleans?”
“You’re the second person who’s suggested that to me. The trouble is…where am I supposed to go?”
Gunner stared off across the treetops, toward the shattered neighborhoods that stretched between the park and the grassy levees of the lake. Afternoon thunderheads were starting to build, although here in the park the sun still blazed down bright and hot. “I don’t know. But you need to stay away from anything and anyone familiar.” Bringing his gaze back to hers, he put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “I’m worried about you, October.”
She gave him a wry smile. “I’m worried about myself.”
Hadley was on his laptop at the Sheraton, trying to run down some nonexistent guy named Jason Aldrich, when the call came in from Lance Palmer.
“Our girl has a new license plate,” said Palmer, giving him the number.
“You lost her?”
“That’s right.” Palmer’s voice was tight. “Along with two of the Suburbans.”
Hadley glanced over at Fitzgerald, who just shrugged.
“Where are you?” Hadley asked.
“Emergency room. Lopez had a slight run-in with a streetcar. They think he’s going to be all right, but they want to keep him under observation for a few hours.”
“You all right?”
“Me? Yeah. I just need to change into some dry clothes.”
“Dry clothes?”
“Don’t ask.”
“And the girl?”
“She’ll surface again,” said Palmer. “And when she does, we take her out. Forget about trying to make it look like a suicide or an accident. I just want this girl dead. Understood?”
“Got it.”