“Pick one,” Jake said. “Time’s wasting.”
Snell wrung her hands, considering each direction one last time, then headed down the stairs. The heels on her boots clanked with each step.
“So much for being sneaky,” Jake said. “You picked shitty footwear to go stealth mode.”
“Sue me. I left my Reeboks at home.”
The stairs twisted down, ending in a closed door with a lone bulb encased in cobwebbed plastic housing. A gray plastic pad mounted to the wall at the door handle held a blinking red bulb. Snell tried the door. Locked.
“Try the keycard,” she said.
Jake waved the keycard from the dead security guy in front of the keypad. Nothing happened.
“Knew it was too good to be true.”
Snell nabbed the card from him, wiping it on her pants. Noting his quizzical smirk, she shrugged. “Works with hotel keys.”
She waved the card in front of the security pad, this time slower. The bulb remained red and the door locked.
“They must have changed the keys,” Snell said.
“Or the guy didn’t have access to this door. Either way, we’re going to need a new one.”
“Unless we can get in the Security Office. There’s a door leading directly to the labs.”
Jake rolled his hand in the air. “Lead the way.”
They scaled the stairs, past their entry point, to the next level. At the top of the stairs, Snell peered through an eight-inch window inset in the door. She opened it, and they entered an office area. A dozen empty desks backlit by glowing computer monitors, file cabinets stacked along the walls, a meeting room with a long, oval conference table. Toward the far end, the hallway picked up again.
They edged across the office area to the hall and stepped off the carpet to linoleum when a door to the right opened. A lanky security guard emerged, drying his boney hands with a paper towel. Jake threw an elbow and cracked the guard across the jaw before he could utter a sound. As he crumpled to the floor, Snell crunched her face.
“Was that really necessary?”
Jake offered a wry grin. “Better than him getting on the radio. I didn’t think your INS story would work with someone with a brain.”
“What makes you think he has a brain?”
Jake hustled to a desk, disconnected the cord from the desk phone, and jerked the jack from the wall. He hooked the guy around the arms and dragged him into the women’s restroom.
“Hopefully, we’re out before he wakes up.” He held up a white, plastic card. “Bonus, got his keycard.”
They wound through a few more halls, having to back-track a couple of times when Snell got lost. A few minutes later, they rounded a corner and found the Security Office encased in glass. A fat guard with thick glasses leaned back in a chair, eating a donut and reading a magazine, angled away from a door protected by another grey pad.
Jake swept an inviting arm toward the door. “You want the honors or shall I?”
“I’ll do it. I can take him. He doesn’t look like he’s in shape.”
“He’s round. Round is a shape.”
Snell raised her Glock and advanced on the door, Jake following close behind. The Security Office looked out onto the empty lobby. A bank of monitors displayed various sections of the warehouse and the parking lot. A red door stood on the opposite side of the office at the end of a hallway.
Snell waved their new keycard in front of the pad. The mechanism beeped, the light on the pad turned green, and the magnetic lock holding the door closed clicked. Snell pushed open the door and scurried through.
“Jesus, Charlie,” the fat guard said, swiveling toward the door. “Thought you died in there…”
He froze for a moment, scrambled to his feet, and reached for a red, mushroom button on the desk. Snell leapt forward and threw a rigid hand into the guy’s throat and clubbed him on the back with the pistol. The guard dropped to the chipped linoleum floor like a tub of lard, out like a light.
Jake raised his palms at his side. “Was that really necessary?”
She smirked. “I’ve been hanging around you too long.”
“Better him on the floor than the alarms blaring across the building.”
“You going to tie him up?”
“Don’t have to,” Jake said, crossing the office to an opened yellow cabinet mounted on the wall. He nabbed a pair of handcuffs hanging inside.
“Good luck getting his fat arms back far enough to get those on,” she said.
It took both of them, but they managed to cuff the guy. Jake yanked another phone cord loose and wrapped his ankles. They checked the monitor bank, scrolling through cameras. There was little activity. Their buddy Everett was back in his truck. An employee closed the doors to Everett’s trailer, and the remaining two men donned coats and headed toward the exit.
“I don’t see any cameras on this lab of yours,” Jake said.
“Wyatt’s not stupid. He’s not going to have cameras from the labs fed to the general security office.”
“These idiots don’t know anything about what goes through that door?”
“Doubt it. They’re contract guards. Anything high level will go directly through Wyatt’s handpicked guys.”
“Will they be down there?”
“Someone will be. Somebody’s guarding Beth.”
They hurried to the door, waved the keycard in front of the pad. No lock click, no light change.
“Goddamn it,” Snell muttered, smacking the door. “Now what?”
Chapter Forty-Two
Bear paced the hall at Truman Medical Center, rolling his injured shoulder in a small, slow circle. He was tired of getting shot. He was tired of sitting around a hospital. He was tired of being awake for that matter. He stopped at a vending machine set into an alcove and pumped in a few quarters. A Styrofoam cup rattled down and stuck at an angle. The hot, black liquid bounced off the edge, half in the cup and half onto the pitted, white linoleum floor. He flicked the bottom of the cup to set it upright and a dose of hot coffee splashed across his fingers. He jerked them away and stuck them in his mouth.
“Son of a bitch. Figures,” he mumbled.
“Don’t sue us,” a voice said from behind. Bear turned and towered over a young Indian doctor in a white coat. His name tag read “Patel.” Thick, black hair combed to the side. Five-foot-five and slight of frame, with wide-set but kind eyes. Bear glanced over the doctor’s shoulder toward Logan’s room. The young cop stood as the dutiful sentry at the closed door, boredom etched across his face.
“That old lady got a couple million from McDonald’s,” Bear said. “I’ll settle for half.”
“You could get more by suing the hospital for the criminally negligent quality of their coffee.”
“At least it’s hot,” Bear said, wincing at the pain in his shoulder when he bent to retrieve the cup.
“You’re bleeding,” Patel said. Bear glanced at the crimson dots spotting the shirt under his jacket. The jacket flap must have flashed open when he bent over.
“Cut myself shaving this morning.”
“On your chest?”
Bear shrugged. “My wife likes a clean-shaven man.”
Patel studied Bear’s face. Bear ran a hand over his beard and mass of hair, knowing he was the antithesis of clean shaven.
“You have an interest in our patient in Room 360?”
“What makes you say that?”
“I thought I recognized you from earlier in the week. Plus, you’ve been eyeballing his room for an hour now.”
Bear flashed his badge. “I’m a sheriff, and Logan’s a friend of mine. Just making sure he stays safe.”
“Is he in danger?”
“Is there a cop outside his door?”
“And one inside the room. Seems to me he’s in pretty good hands.”
“And I’m here to make sure he stays that way.”
Patel pointed to the bloody spots on Bear’s shirt. “You want me to take a look at your shoulder
?”
“Not particularly.”
“You should let me look. You’re going to ruin a perfectly good shirt. Your wife will be most upset with you.”
“Won’t be the first time, but thanks anyway, Doc.”
“Come with me. It will just take a moment, and you can keep an eye on your doorway.”
Patel took Bear by the elbow and towed him from the vending machine. Bear was a mountain who moved only if he wanted to move, but he let the smaller man lead him. Truth be told, his shoulder hurt like hell.
Patel led him past Logan’s door to an exam room with an olive-green table covered with white butcher paper. Patel slid a steel-framed, hard-plastic chair to the opposite side of the room so Bear would have a clear line of site to Logan’s door.
“Please, take off your jacket and have a seat.”
With the pretense of being injury free dispensed, Bear winced as he shrugged off the jacket. With Patel’s help he managed to slide his massive arm out of the shirt sleeve, revealing a mound of bloody gauze.
“Gunshot or knife wound?” Patel asked, donning a pair of thin rubber gloves, snapping each into place.
“You have to report both to the police, correct?”
“That is the law.”
“Then I cut myself shaving.”
Patel peeled back the bloody dressing. He regarded the wound for a moment. Bear peered around him toward the door. The young cop yawned. Patel rummaged around a drawer by the exam table and returned with a bottle of saline and additional gauze pads.
“It is most unfortunate,” he said, “that you decided to shave yourself with a machete and take out a chunk of your shoulder. It is too wide a wound to stitch up. Best I can do is clean it up, apply some antibiotic, and give you a fresh dressing.”
“Anything for the pain?”
“I’ll give you something topical. Best I can do.”
Patel worked, and Bear watched Logan’s door.
“How is my friend?” Bear grunted as Patel scraped away at the raw wound with a sponge.
“Still in rough shape, I’m afraid. We’re hopeful he’ll regain consciousness again soon.”
“Again? He woke up?”
“Briefly, an hour ago.”
“He say anything?”
“He is heavily sedated, and it was hard to understand. The policeman in the room asked him who beat him.”
“What did he say?” Bear asked.
“As I said, he was mumbling a bit, but it sounded like he said ‘Devaroux.’ I picked up the name because my wife is from New Orleans and has relatives with the same last name. The policeman asked him to repeat it, but Mr. Logan went back under and hasn’t spoken since.”
“Devaroux. How do you spell it?”
Patel finished cleaning the wound, applied a cream from a stark white tube and taped a thick gauze pad against Bear’s shoulder while he spelled. “I’m not even sure if that is what he said, but my wife’s family spells it D-E-V-A-R-O-U-X. You’re set.”
Bear flexed the shoulder. It still hurt, but the sharp pain faded to a dull ache lurking in the background. “Thanks, Doc.”
Patel helped Bear back into his shirt and jacket.
“Please be more careful shaving next time, Sheriff.”
Patel hung a right down the hall, and Bear made a call to his data ninja buddy. As he talked, Bear rose to his feet and looked in the mirror. His bloodshot eyes told him what he already knew—he needed sleep. Bear told his buddy what he wanted and promised the guy a bottle of Maker’s Mark for his troubles.
“One more thing,” Bear said. “I want a picture.”
His buddy promised to do what he could. Bear called Jake to give him an update, but the call went right to voicemail. He left a message, walked back to the entrance of the room, and looked down the hall at Logan’s door. The cop was gone.
Chapter Forty-Three
With the rent-a-cop unconscious and stuffed under the desk, Jake tried the guard’s keycard at the grey pad mounted to the side of the thick, red, steel door off the hallway. The light on the pad disappeared for a hopeful second, then reappeared.
“Shit,” Snell said. “That would have been too easy.”
Jake reached in his pocket and pulled out the keycard from the dead guy. The red light went dark, a green light flashed, and a satisfying click of the magnetic lock releasing.
“Bingo,” he said.
“Nice work,” Snell said.
“Gotta get lucky once in a while.”
Jake opened the door and revealed a narrow, metal staircase descending to the next level. An overhead light fixture sliced through the darkness, a constant buzz emanating from the fluorescent bulbs. Jake’s foot hit the tread of the first step when Snell caught him by the arm.
“Caldwell,” she said. “You think she’s down there?”
“One way to find out.”
Her grip tightened, her voice dropping to barely a whisper. “What if she’s not okay?”
Jake placed a hand over hers. His heart rate ratcheting up a notch as he recalled his own daughter’s kidnapping. He knew what she was feeling and had to remain positive. “What if she is?”
“I’ll kill Wyatt if he’s hurt her,” she said, eyes shimmering with a mix of fear and anger.
Jake put both of his massive hands on her shoulders. “If he’s enough of a bastard to hurt his own daughter, I’ll hold him while you beat the life out of him. Deal?”
Snell sniffed back tears. “Deal.”
Jake crept down the stairs, his Glock trained in front of him. Snell followed close behind with her own gun drawn. After four flights of ten stairs, they emerged to a six-foot wide, brushed concrete expanse. Even spaced light fixtures chased the shadows of the hundred-foot hallway. Three red-framed doors were inset into the beige cinderblock walls to their right. Another door loomed at the end of the stretch with another keypad required for entry. Jake got one foot through the doorway when Snell caught the back of his shirt, holding him back.
“What?” Jake looked back at her.
Snell slinked around him and pointed up to a security camera. Reaching into her jacket, she flipped open a six-inch serrated blade, stretched up, and sliced the wires. The red light went dark.
“Good call,” Jake whispered.
“That’s why they pay me the big bucks.”
“You been down here before?”
“Once when Wyatt was building it out. There’s three rooms to the right he said were going to be quality labs. Through the door at the end of the hall was another large room. He said it was going to be for storage, but who knows what he has in there.”
“Maybe Beth,” Jake offered, his voice hushed.
“Let’s find out.”
Jake checked his watch. “It’s ten forty-five. We’re supposed to meet the bad guys at midnight.”
“They can wait.”
“I’ll open the doors and check out the rooms. You keep an eye on the door at the end of the hall and what’s behind us. I don’t want to get surprised, and you cutting the video feed to the camera might have them coming out to check the equipment. We’ll work our way down the hall.”
Snell inclined her head in agreement. Jake hustled to the first door. Steel component, no keypad, a handle to open it instead of a knob. He held the Glock with his right and clutched the handle with his left. He whispered a count to three and flung open the door, swinging the gun up and sweeping the room.
It was a twenty-by-twenty-foot area. No people. Metal shelves with wooden platforms held various boxes, some wrapped in cellophane, some open. Three six-foot worktables with swiveling black stools in the middle of the room. The tables were covered with spools of shrouded wires of black, red, and green fed into steel cast housings the size of a baseball.
They moved in unison to the second door. Following the same routine, he surged into the room. No people, same basic layout except instead of housings there were beakers and Bunsen burners, tubes in racks, and a chemical cage holding a variety of bo
ttles with skull and crossbones on the labels.
They moved to the third room. Snell crept ten feet over and put her ear to the door at the end of the hall while Jake stationed himself in front of the third lab door. Snell heard nothing and shook her head. Jake popped the door handle and burst in the room. Same set up as the previous lab except this time a scrawny guy in a white lab coat bent over a beaker with a syringe in his hand. A hairnet clung to his moppy, blonde head, held in place by a pair of goggles. He was young, in his twenties with remnants of acne across pale cheeks and eyes so spread apart he could stand on Wednesday and see both Sundays.
“Hey,” he said, climbing up from the stool and backing into the table behind him. “Who are you? You can’t be in here.”
Jake stalked across the room; the gun trained on the kid’s forehead. “Do I have a gun?”
The kid nodded.
“Do you have a gun?”
The kid shook his head.
“Then shut the fuck up and listen. Where’s the girl?”
The kid’s thick eyebrows crunched together. “What girl?”
Jake pressed the gun against the kid’s forehead, driving him backward across the lab table.
“Don’t fuck with me, kid. Tell me where she is or I’ll blow your brains all over your pretty, white lab coat.”
Tears sprung up in the kid’s eyes. “Please, please don’t shoot. I have no idea what you’re talking about. I swear.”
Jake kept the gun pressed for a moment, seized the kid by the coat, and jerked him upright. He didn’t need the gun. He could beat the kid into a coma with his index finger and without breaking a sweat. But the gun was a good truth serum, so he stuck it into the skinny recess under the kid’s jaw. Snell pressed her back against the open door, gun trained to the floor.
“You’ve never seen a girl down here?” Jake asked.
“I wish. It’s just me and the suits.”
“What suits?”
“The security guys. There’s a station through the door at the end of the hall.”
“You ever go in there?”
Jake Caldwell Thrillers Page 46