The speed didn’t have anything to do with the guard’s alertness. The cart simply didn’t go much faster. A cigarette flared briefly, giving the guard’s face a ruddy glow against the sodium vapor lights that flooded the lot with an odd yellow color. Now there’s a real sentry, Kirby thought in disgust. Just in case a sniper couldn’t find him driving under the lights, he sticks a cigarette in his mouth like a frigging laser tracker. Even worse, the guard was as predictable as an atomic clock. Every twenty-four minutes he made another tour of the employee lot. And every twenty-four minutes he found the same thing—a two-thirds empty lot with small cars and light trucks crowded close to the nearest hotel employee entrance, and a handful of motor homes and travel trailers parked wherever a newly transplanted tree offered thin shade against the heat of day. Purcell’s road-weary home on wheels was huddled next to a palm tree like a fat man trying to hide behind a telephone pole. Kirby glanced from the motor home to the FBI’s rolling strike force headquarters parked less than a hundred feet away.
