Santa Barbara…Ventura…Malibu…Santa Monica…Long Beach…Huntingdon Beach…Newport Beach…San Juan Capistrano…San Clemente…San Diego…
Interstate 405 would take him up or down the coast to any little rundown, roach-infested, beachfront no-tell motel he cared to check into before he went out and started looking for trouble.
Major John Casey glanced at the empty space where Dr. Ellie Bartowski's BMW was usually parked, glanced at the passenger's seat where he'd tossed the directions and the cash that the kid had given him, then glanced at the latest GPS system installed in the dashboard of the third Crown Victoria he'd been issued since the start of this goddamn glorified goatfuck of a mission.
Said she wanted to be alone, he reminded himself.
His hands tightened on the steering wheel before he reached down and turned over the engine. He moved the gearshift from "park" to "reverse", backed out of the space, moved from "reverse" to "drive" and made his way to edge of the parking lot.
And then he sat there in his car, engine idling as he reviewed his options.
North…?
He had
three sets of identities (driver's license, credit and business
cards, with grocery and library cards for additional authenticity), a
wad of cash, and nowhere to be for the next seventy hours and
twenty-nine minutes.
South…?
He could go anywhere, be anyone, do anything – get drunk, get high, get laid – anything. No one would ever know.
East…?
Why spend his "vacation" staking out his mark's sister, especially if she wanted to be alone?
And then he remembered Chuck's words while reaching for the signal light:
She's been known to make mistakes – bad ones – when she gets like this…
"Fuck it," John muttered as he turned in the direction of Interstate 10 East.
Push comes to shove, he could always backtrack to San Bernardino.