Liars & Thieves by Stephen Coonts Page B

agency. These killers may even have been agency employees—I don’t know yet.”
    “Talk to the FBI.”
    “That’s probably good advice, but now I know too much. If there are some rotten apples at the agency, they could set me up to take this fall and there wouldn’t be much I could do about it. Watch your back, Sal, and stay out of the line of fire.”
    I severed the connection before he could reply.
    The rain outside had slackened to a gentle drizzle, almost a mist. Standing in the middle of the Wal-Mart parking lot with the cell phone in my hand, I got a little damp, but not wet. I stood there soaking up the liquid sunshine while I wondered how the FBI got onto me so quickly.
    I had been the unexpected glitch, the witness who sees too much and doesn’t drop dead on command.
    It seemed logical to assume that one of the killers must have given the license plate number from my car to that someone in the agency or the FBI, and that person had decided to frame me. Or permanently shut me up.
    Or, more than likely, do both. If you’ve murdered eight or ten people to hide guilty secrets, what’s one or two more?
    Sitting in an FBI office in Staunton jabbering into a tape recorder didn’t appeal to me much, not while there were still bad guys running around with silenced MP-5s.
    I put the cell phone back in my pocket and went back to the pay phones. My next call was to my lock shop partner, Willie the Wire. I dialed his cell number and got him on the third ring.
    “Hey, man, I need some help.”
    “I’ve been telling you that for years and you still haven’t been to see a shrink.”
    “A woman ripped off my wheels. I don’t want to call the cops, but I want the Mercedes back. Don’t you have a friend who works for Lojack?” Lojack was an antitheft system that allowed the police to locate stolen cars. I had had a Lojack beacon installed in my car when I acquired it.
    “Yeah. Been a while since I talked to him, so I don’t know if he’s still working there.”
    “Give him a call, will ya? Tell him I need to find the car and don’t want the police notified. A lover’s spat. See if he can turn on the beacon and get a location.”
    “Ain’t nobody love you, Carmellini.”
    “A lot you know. I’ve got hot women stashed in cities and towns, villages and farms, all across the length and breath of this great land.”
    “Right! Washington, you think?”
    “Somewhere in the suburbs, I’ll bet. Her name is Kelly Erlanger.” I spelled it for him. “The spelling is just a guess. See if she’s in the telephone book.”
    “Okay.”
    “One more thing. Today sorta went sour. The FBI is looking for me. If they show up at the shop we haven’t had this conversation and you have no idea where I am.”
    A low, dry chuckle. “What the hell you been into now, Tommy?”
    “You wouldn’t believe it if I told you. As you know, I live a quiet, holy life, studying the scriptures and praying. My cell phone is off. I’ll call you this evening from a pay phone.”
    “Luck, fella.”
    My cell phone felt heavy in my pocket. I had it off so the feds couldn’t use the cellular network to locate it, once they figured out who I was and learned my cell phone number. Once the phone was turned on, it only took a few seconds for the phone to log on to the network, and then they would have me. With the power switch off, the telephone should be unable to talk to a network if queried. Theoretically. But with the techno-wizards marching bravely on to God knows where, who the hell knew? I ditched the phone in the trash can by the main entrance of Wal-Mart.
    Now to get to Washington. There was a car dealership a few hundred yards from where I stood, so I walked over and inquired about renting a car.
    An hour later I was on the way to Washington in a four-year-old sedan with seventy grand on the odometer that a local entrepreneur brought to the front door of the dealership. The only cool thing about the car was the bumper sticker: FREE THE