“After we have a vehicle and an address.”
“And if we don’t?”
“Then we’ll save it for tomorrow.”
***
Collins was already at the Mobil when we pulled in, parked at the far edge of the lot in a navy SUV with municipal plates.
I’d taken Storrow west out of Cambridge at a steady five over. The radio was on low, a Bruins recap from the previous night’s loss to Tampa.
It was nine-thirty-one a.m. Collins’s wadded Dunkin’ bag from two days ago was still in the cup holder. The cab smelled like my cherry vanilla cologne I’d put on in the bedroom and the gun oil on Dane’s sidearm.
I pulled in two spaces from Collins and killed the engine.
I’d been considering speaking out for the entire drive. I looked at Dane.
“I’m going to say something. Just so you know it’s coming.”
“Now?”
“Today.”
He exhaled. “Okay.”
I reached across the console and rested two fingers against the back of Dane’s hand where it sat on his thigh. His skin was warm. He didn’t move.
Collins got out and walked over. He wore a charcoal coat, collar up, hair pulled back, and gloves on.
Dane rolled his window down.
“Drove past the unit ten minutes ago,” Collins said. “Roll-up’s closed. Gray Toyota Corolla parked thirty feet from the unit, occupied. It could be surveillance, or it could be a guy waiting for his wife.”
“Let’s go,” I said.
It was nine minutes from the Mobil to the Pleasant Street complex. We took surface streets. I drove at five under, only using the turn signal when it mattered. A salt truck passed us, spraying slush on the windshield.
I took the next turn and slowed down.
Collins was on the comm. “East tree line in a hundred yards. Gap in the brush about twenty feet ahead of where I’m parking.”
I pulled into a gravel verge along the back of a closed pizza place and killed the engine. It was nine-fifty-one.
Dane answered Collins, “In position.”
I handed Dane binoculars. He lifted them and adjusted the focus.
“Corolla’s not Maria’s,” Dane said after thirty seconds. “He’s on a continuous call. The body language is wrong. He’s relaxed, not scanning.”
He lowered the binoculars. I had my hands on the lower curve of the wheel and my eyes on the courtyard. Two hours of nothing was the most likely outcome, sitting in the vehicle watching a closed door.
A pickup pulled into the courtyard from the north entrance, drove past the unit without slowing, and parked four bays down. A man in a Carhartt jacket got out. He was broad-shouldered, in his mid-forties, and wrong.
Dane lifted the binoculars.
“Farrow.”
“I see him.”