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Six days left…

Munich, Germany

25 February

Sunday, 3:00 pm local time

Philip Banks didn’t look like the retired MI6 agent that he was, nor like the crackerjack investigator who now comprised one of Zermatt’s core four No, this afternoon, dressed in his orn jeans and half-zipped parka,over his shoulder and cell phone poised for candids, he looked like a tourist visiting Munich, totally fascinated by Hofbräuhaus, the city’s largest and most historic pub

Precisely the i for

Brows knit in apparent concentration, he refocused his phone, appearing to be snapping pictures in a Snapchat frenzy In fact, he was actually running a special app that Terri had created, which mapped the visual, telemetric, and Wi-Fi data of the entire area around him The data was captured and streamed real ti her coan to immediately search for nearby businesses, Wi-Fi networks, and security cameras Philip ell aware that the process would take hours, but by penetrating the local networks, accessing the security and router logs, Terri would be able to tell exactly who had been present when Lauren was kidnapped

He’d spent the past day and a half conducting fieldwork—casually engaging employees, patrons, and even passersby to see if any of thehter” who’d been at Hofbräuhaus Friday afternoon with friends No luck And he had to be careful to keep his questions light and offhanded He couldn’t come off as a creeper, and he couldn’t tip his hand and alert anyone to a “tons, no one knew about Lauren’s kidnapping, including and especially law enforcement Philip intended to keep it that way

Fro Maxi her junior year abroad The caun, but Philip was determined to check out some of the names Terri had plucked off Lauren’s cell history—names of friends she’d texted anted her to visit the her hiatus from academia If any of them had yet to leave campus, Philip would find them And if any of them were already at home, he’d find them, too

After two hours of searching…nothing

The sand in the hourglass continued to trickle doard And Lauren Pennington’s ti out

6

Zere

25 February

Sunday, 3:15 pm local time