by Andrew Grant
I went directly to the active one and hit the call button. The doors parted after a few seconds and I moved inside. I placed the shelves in the center of the floor, climbed up on them, and shoved the escape hatch in the ceiling just hard enough to partially dislodge it. Then I laid the shelves on their side, hit the buttons for the tenth and the ground floors, and stepped back out into the lobby.
Without making a sound, I ran down the one remaining flight of stairs. I slowed down as I approached the door to the reception area and peered through the coating of dust on the little window. I saw four men on the other side. They were wearing black utility suits with FBI in large yellow letters on their backs. Three were standing, looking at the active elevator. The other was facing the other way. He was talking on a handheld radio, his empty hand pressed against his free ear.
His conversation ended and he turned to join the others. He gestured with his arms and they moved to form a shallow horseshoe facing the metal doors, an arm’s length apart. They all drew their weapons. I checked the floor indicator. The elevator was on the tenth. The display blinked. The elevator had started moving. It was coming back down. None of the agents reacted until it reached the second floor. Then, in unison, they raised their Glocks and took aim at the join in the center of the doors. I took hold of the handle in front of me and gently started to twist.
The elevator reached the ground floor. The agents were like statues. Their legs and backs were taut, their necks strained forward, all their senses focused in front of them. The elevator doors slid apart. At the same moment, I slipped into the lobby through the gap I’d made and carefully eased the door back into place. That put me six feet away from the nearest agent, directly behind him.
For a moment, all four stayed perfectly still. The agent who’d been on the radio was the first to move. He crept forward toward the elevator, his pistol snapping up and down between the abandoned shelves on the floor and the crooked escape hatch above them. As he moved, I moved. He went forward. I went sideways. He reached the entrance to the elevator, only looking up now, satisfied the car was empty. I reached the line of silver posts and kept moving, slowly and smoothly, until I was level with the entrance to the garage stairs.
Without warning, the elevator doors timed out and began to close. Another agent stepped up and hit the call button. The doors paused at the halfway point, then slid apart again. The two agents moved forward, together now, into the elevator itself. I edged backward, nudged the door, and disappeared silently down the steps.
I was at the bottom of the final flight before I realized I’d forgotten one detail. There were no windows in the turquoise doors leading to the garage. It would be impossible to tell if there were any more agents lurking on the other side. And no time to set up another diversion.
I gave the bottom of the left-hand door a sharp jab with my foot. It moved about twelve inches, its trailing edge grating harshly against the concrete. I slid across so that I was covered by the wall and waited for a reaction. There wasn’t one. No shots. No voices. No one coming to investigate. I waited another minute. Still no response. So I drew Lavine’s pistol, took a deep breath, and stepped through the gap.
There were more vehicles in the garage than when I arrived, but no people. Another three identical white vans had appeared next to Weston and Lavine’s, and two more black Fords were parked alongside the four I’d seen earlier. A couple of spaces farther down there was a pair of even larger black sedans-Lincolns-and opposite them, a shiny Cadillac with dark privacy glass.
Taking one of the vehicles was out of the question. I didn’t have the time or the tools to deal with the trackers. Not that I minded-staying one step ahead in a city is always easier on foot.
The exit ramp was on the other side of the garage. I made my way across, climbed up, and slipped into the empty security booth at the top of the slope. It gave a clear view of the street. There were vehicles parked along both sides. They were mostly sedans and SUVs-older models, dirty, with a few dents and scratches-but diagonally opposite the entrance there was a clean, white van. It was the same make and model as the four in the garage. A sign saying BAXTER ELECTRICAL was attached to the rear panel, but it wasn’t fooling anyone.
A steel-blue Jeep Cherokee turned into the street and cruised slowly between the lines of parked cars. It stopped, and reversed into a space a couple of slots behind the van. Two men got out. Both were wearing suits. The driver slung a black nylon computer bag over his shoulder. He locked the Jeep from his remote and they crossed the street, heading toward the garage. I waited for them to draw almost level and then drifted out of the booth, a couple of paces in front. It wouldn’t have fooled anyone keeping a proper watch, but I didn’t have time to wait.
As we walked I could hear a couple of vehicle engines on the move. They sounded like cars. Nothing more powerful. I risked taking a look over my shoulder and saw the white van was still in place at the curb. The guys from the Jeep were behind me, looking down, trudging along in silence. They stayed with me until the next corner when I peeled off to the left.
Two cars followed me. Black Lincolns. The first one drew level then braked to match my pace. It was far too slow to be regular traffic. The bureau guys in the van must have been on the ball, after all. I looked for some cover-an entrance to a building, a ramp down to another garage, an alley, a fire escape, anything to get off the street-but there was nothing I could use. Just a long, blank wall.
I turned to run back the other way. The cars responded, surging up onto the sidewalk. One cut across in front of me, blocking me off. The other came from behind, penning me in. The one in front was way too keen and its huge bulbous fender slammed right into the brickwork.
On a normal day that would give me my way out. I’d shoot the guys in the car behind me and slide over its hood while the other two were still wrestling with their airbags. And when they’d disentangled themselves and tried to follow, I’d shoot them, too.
But today wasn’t normal. I was dealing with FBI agents. Killing them wasn’t an option. Nor was fighting my way out. These were trained, motivated guys who thought I’d killed one of their own. The situation was too volatile. Things would escalate too quickly. I was on the wrong side of the line already, and if one of them got seriously hurt, there’d be no way back for me. In the circumstances, I had no choice. Annoying as it was, I’d have to let them take me back in.
And next time, be more careful.
The guys from the rear car got out and walked toward me. There were two of them. They would be in their mid-twenties, with black, slightly shiny suits and dark, glossy hair. Both were holding weapons. The driver had a Colt. 38 Super in polished stainless steel. The passenger had a Smith amp; Wesson 1911 Performance Center in glassbead black. Expensive pieces of hardware. Flashy. Not the kind of thing you’d expect Quantico to approve.
The passenger tucked his gun into his waistband and came over to search me. It was my third time in seventeen hours. I’d be surprised if it was his third time, ever. He didn’t even turn me around. Just put his left hand on my chest to hold me against the wall and checked me over with his right. The urge to gooseneck his left wrist and force him onto his knees in front of me was almost too strong to resist. Instead I held my arms out, kept quiet, and let him have a good rummage around in my clothes. Lavine’s gun went into his waistband, next to his own, the money went into his back pocket, and the handle I’d taken from the meeting room seemed to confuse him, so he just dumped it on the ground.
“Give me your hands,” he said, reaching forward and grabbing both my wrists.
He’d left himself completely open. I was amazed the FBI could have sent such amateurs to arrest me, knowing what they knew. Quite insulted, actually. Then something struck me about how they’d driven into the wall. How their vehicles had functioning airbags. How they were using shiny handguns in the field. How comically inept their search technique was. Put it all together, and there was only one explanation.
They weren’t FBI
agents at all. I looked down at the guy’s face and smiled. He wasn’t off limits any longer. My head started to roll back. The muscles in my neck began to tighten, all on their own. It was as if some kind of magnetic attraction had developed between my forehead and the bridge of his nose. But before I could split his skull, another thought hit me. It stopped me in my tracks. This was no random mugging. These cowboys were out in too much force for that. And how had they known to target me in particular? What I looked like? Or where I’d be?
Someone had been helping them. And that was good.
Because now they were going to help me.
TEN
When I was four years old my grandparents bought me Snakes amp; Ladders for my birthday. Chutes amp; Ladders, they call it in the States. But whatever the name, it was my favorite toy for quite a while. And all because of the first time we played with it. I remember the anticipation, waiting for the old folks to get ready. Then lining up the counters next to the board. Picking up the dice. Rolling. And getting a… one.
I was disappointed. It was a terrible score. The worst you could get. I was obviously doomed. I took my counter and gloomily reached toward the first square. Then I noticed the ladder. It sprouted from the bottom corner and ran all the way up to square 38. It would carry me nearly halfway home with my first move.
From despair to hope in a single moment. It was an amazing feeling.
And when the fool from the Lincoln pulled a long white cable tie out of his pocket and wrapped it around my wrists, I felt something like it again.
I knew the guy from the car wouldn’t have been able to tell me anything useful, himself. He was too low down the food chain. But the person who sent him would be a different story. And this idiot was going to save me the trouble of tracking him down. I nearly laughed out loud, even when the driver popped the trunk and gestured for me climb inside.
We were on the move for fifty minutes. It was absolutely dark in the trunk, but apart from being cramped and a bit airless, I didn’t really mind. The carpet was thick and soft, and there was a raised ledge that made a kind of pillow. The big sedan’s suspension was much more civilized than the FBI van, it didn’t stink like the NYPD car, and the driver was taking it nice and steady. I’d been in hotel rooms that were less comfortable.
The first part of the journey was all stops and starts, so I guessed we were still in the city. Then there was a really rough section with tight twists and turns and lots of tire noise. After that a long, smooth, fast road with a couple of sweeping right-hand bends. The last five minutes were slower, then we turned left into some sort of rough yard or driveway. We snaked right and left, then crunched to a halt. The car paused for a moment. Then it rolled forward for the final few yards before coming to rest. The engine note died away. A car door slammed. Footsteps passed me. A mechanical clanking sound started up somewhere close. It lasted twenty seconds. Then there was silence.
The trunk lid opened, and all I could see was the inside of a roll-up garage door looming above me. The panels were made of wood. They ran horizontally. Each one was ten inches high, with some kind of dull brown coating applied to them. Rails ran up the sides to a winding mechanism that was fixed to the rough plasterboard ceiling.
The door was less than an inch from the car’s rear fender. I stood up in the trunk and looked around. The front of the car was touching a wooden pole, sticking straight upright, with a red circular reflector attached to it at windshield height. There was a blank unplastered wall to our left, and room for two other cars to our right. The driver was in the center of the empty space. He was leaning against a round metal pillar, his hands in his pockets, looking pleased with himself. The passenger climbed out and went to stand next to him, also with a smug grin on his face. Then a plain wooden door in the opposite wall scraped open and another man stepped into the garage. He would be in his fifties, and was heavyset with dark, wiry hair and an open, friendly face. He was wearing a black polo shirt with some kind of golf club logo, beige trousers, and boat shoes. He could easily have been a lawyer or stockbroker, home for a long weekend and killing time before the Tuesday-morning rush.
“You two,” he said. “Where are your manners? Help our guest.”
My feet were on the ground long before the passenger ambled across to the car, so he just took my elbow and steered me toward the internal door. The older man stepped through first, leading us into a basement area. It was basically a long rectangle, but with a block taken out at our end for a set of stairs. Another area was paneled in at the far end for something-I couldn’t see what-which made the remaining space into a shape like a capital H.
The floor was gray concrete throughout. There were wooden shelves all around the walls with piles of suitcases, bags, plastic containers, and cardboard boxes neatly lined up on them. There was a lot of stuff in there, but you could have emptied the place inside ten minutes. The ceiling was the only part that wasn’t tidy and organized. It was mostly boxed in, but in several places the boards were missing and wads of pink fiberglass insulation were hanging down. Either the place had recently been searched, or they had a major mouse problem.
The corner between the door and the stairwell was taken up with a washing machine, a dryer, some ironing equipment, and various baskets of clothes. The older man ignored them and hurried straight through, heading for the alcove on the opposite side. That was about the same size as the laundry area, and was also fitted out for a particular purpose. But not with white goods. Two giant cages had been crammed in there. They must have been ten feet deep by six wide and seven high. The floors as well as the sides and roofs were made of heavy-gauge wire mesh. Each one had a mesh door at the front. Both were padlocked.
The cage on the right, next to the stairs, was empty. There was a person in the other one. It was a woman. She was lying curled up on her side in the far corner, facing away from us. Her clothes looked smart. She had gray-green trousers, a matching suit jacket, and black low-heeled boots. I watched her carefully. Her shoulders flexed slightly as she breathed, but otherwise she didn’t respond to our arrival in any way.
“Need the john?” the older guy said.
“No,” I said.
“Hungry? Thirsty?”
I didn’t answer.
He took a bunch of keys from his pocket and unlocked the empty cage. I stepped inside.
“Hang in there,” he said. “I’ll be right back with some food. Then you can eat. Or not. It’s up to you.”
The guys from the car trailed meekly away after the older man. Their footsteps were hard and hollow on the bare wooden stairs, and the ceiling creaked loudly as they walked about above my head. I was glad they’d gone with him. With them all out of the way I could start to look around. I’d never been in a cage like that before. I wanted to know how it was made. Where its weaknesses were.
“Don’t you know what these things are?” a female voice said. It sounded harsh and irritated. I looked around and saw my neighbor had stood up. She was tall. Five eleven, allowing for the heels. It hadn’t been so obvious when she was curled up.
“They’re dog cages,” she said. “Made to hold big, angry dogs. Dobermans and Alsatians, for God’s sake. And you think you’re just going to claw your way out? Some fingernails you must have.”
“Have you seen any dogs around here?” I said.
“I didn’t say I’d seen dogs. I said these were dog cages. Which they are. Look.” She pointed with her right foot to a metal tag attached to the mesh low down at the side of her cage. It said HOUND COMPOUND INC.
If these were dog cages, where were the dogs? I’d had more than my fill of trouble with them in the past, and there was no room in my plans for them now. Especially not big, angry ones. I scanned the rest of the basement. There were no leads or bowls or baskets. No packets or cans of dog food. No dog paraphernalia of any kind. No dog hairs on the floor. No smell of dogs. And no sound of barking.
Maybe the dogs were dead.
Maybe a previous owner had left the
cages behind.
Or maybe these cages hadn’t been bought with dogs in mind.
A door banged above us, then I heard footsteps on the stairs again. The three guys reappeared. The older one was carrying a rectangular tray. It was brown plastic with fake wood grain like they use in cheap cafeterias. Two items were on it. Something tall and square wrapped in shiny white paper, and a small bottle of Coke. It was plastic. There was no cutlery.
The driver took the tray and the older man fished in his pocket for the keys. He motioned for me to move back then opened the door. The driver put the tray down just inside the cage. He moved slowly and kept his eyes on me until he’d stepped back out and fixed the padlock into place.
“There you go,” the older man said. “Enjoy.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Maybe I will. Then what?”
He studied me for a moment, as if deciding whether to answer.
“Someone wants to speak to you,” he said, finally.
“Who?” I said. “When?”
“Someone important. They’re on their way now. Be here soon. Better eat. Might not get the chance, later.”
He stayed and looked at me levelly for another few seconds. It didn’t seem threatening. More like he was curious about me. Then he turned and led the others back upstairs.
I picked up the tray, took it to the back of the cage and sat down. I took a mouthful of Coke-nice and cold-and then unwrapped the white paper package. A sandwich was inside. The largest sandwich I’d ever seen in my life. It was fully three inches thick. There were two large chunks of white bread crammed with dozens of slices of pastrami and big wedges of Swiss cheese. Mustard was dripping out between the layers. Fitting it into my mouth would be quite a challenge.