“I volunteered. But if you didn’t want me to come, why am I here?”

“You heard Mallory. You don’t come then he goes public.”

“Oh come off it, there’s no way you believed that. He was bluffing.” She watched him closely. “But you knew that, didn’t you? You knew it was an empty threat. You just didn’t want me to get hurt.”

“People around me tend to get hurt, Reggie. Really hurt.”

“Then, again, why am I here?”

“I guess Frank took the threat seriously. He insisted that you come along.”

She eyed the plans on the table. “I won’t be dead weight, Shaw. I’ll do everything I can to be an asset.”

“I appreciate that. But-”

“You see, I don’t want you to get hurt either.”

“My safety shouldn’t be your concern.”

“But it is. I’ve got your back. Do you have mine?”

“Yes.”

“Then please understand this. If it comes down to me living or Kuchin dying, tell the monster I’ll see him in hell. Do not miss him, Shaw. Do not. Even if it means I don’t make it back. Will you promise me that?”

Shaw didn’t answer.

86

THE TRUCK backed into the loading dock behind the high-rise building. Work orders were duly scanned and proper signatures obtained. The two big boxes were offloaded and placed inside the dock’s storage area. The manifest said that inside were some antiques belonging to a resident in the building who was away for the summer. The crates were to be stored and opened only when the owner returned.

A few hours later the loading dock was locked up and the supervisor and his crew left. Thirty more minutes passed before a side of one of the crates collapsed outward and Shaw emerged. Using a small focused beam light he went over to the second crate and helped Reggie out of her hiding place.

They were both dressed in black and had various pieces of equipment hanging off their belts.

“You ready to hit it?” Shaw whispered.

She nodded.

He clipped on a headset, powered it up, and said, “You there, Frank?”

“Copy that. Have your partner give us the video feed.”

Frank had flown in separately from England to set up the support they needed to break into Kuchin’s penthouse.

Shaw nodded at Reggie and she slipped a strap around her chest at the center of which was a round dial roughly three inches across with a glass lens. She flipped a switch on its side and a red light popped on.

Shaw said into the headset, “You good?”

“Roger that. Video is live. Proceed to target area.”

The elevator security was defeated by a cloned card Shaw inserted in the slot.

Frank’s voice once more came over the headset. “The building’s video surveillance is on a monitored loop but we’ve remotely frozen the security cameras in the delivery elevator and outside Kuchin’s penthouse. The elevator isn’t typically used after hours and the guards won’t expect any change on that camera or outside Kuchin’s place since he’s out of town. But they do make periodic rounds. The next one is sixty minutes from now. After that you’re on your own.”

They took the elevator to the top floor. The doors opened to reveal a small entry foyer with a steel door and a security pad mounted on the wall next to this portal. Shaw looked in the corner at the surveillance camera and waved, though he muttered under his breath a little prayer that Frank had indeed managed to freeze the feed. He motioned Reggie to video the security pad.

“Got the picture?” asked Shaw into his headset. “It’s a retina recognition system like our research said.”

“Got it. Have her stand closer so we can get a better look and confirm the manufacturer.”

Shaw motioned for Reggie to stand immediately in front of the retina-reader bubble.

“Okay, we’re good,” said Frank. “Get the laser ready, Shaw. We cut the juice to the building in five seconds. There’s a backup battery for the security system, but we’re sending a calibrated power spike right behind the power cut that’ll burn that backup out. But we have to turn the power back on quickly or it’ll trigger an emergency response.”

“Understood.”

Shaw pulled the laser from a holder on his belt and pointed it straight at the retina reader.

“On my mark,” said Frank. “Five… four… three…”

Right after the count of one the power to the building vanished and they were in complete darkness inside the enclosed foyer. The red power light on the retina reader went out. Shaw powered up the laser and pointed it right at the reader. The red beam shot into the glass disc, filling it with a reflected crimson color. A moment later the power came back on.

The door clicked open.

Reggie looked at Shaw as he put the laser away. He said, “Little flaw in this particular system we discovered awhile back. Power off, power on, and in that millisecond of start-up it’ll read a laser point set at a specific frequency as if it were an authorized retina.”

“Pretty cool,” she said with admiration.

“Well, it’s not really a flaw.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean we have a good working relationship with some major security hardware firms. We do some stuff for them from time to time and they leave back doors like this for us.”

Reggie shook her head while Shaw pulled the steel door all the way open. “Fifty-nine minutes and counting. Let’s get to it.”

Shaw slipped a miniaturized laminated set of floor plans from his pocket and looked at them using a low-power penlight. “Keep away from the windows,” he advised. “Just in case Kuchin has real eyeballs on the place from another building. Even without any lights on we could be seen with the right surveillance equipment.”

“Too bad.”

“Why?”

“I wanted to check out the views.”

They searched quickly but methodically, and on their bellies when they had to get close to the window line. After thirty minutes they had found nothing helpful.

They stood in the middle of Kuchin’s bedroom. Reggie looked disappointed, but Shaw seemed curious.

“What is it?” she finally asked, noting his puzzled look.

“I used the laser to mark out the square footage of the place as we went along, but according to these plans we’re about fifteen hundred square feet short.”

“How can that be?”

Shaw spent five minutes pacing off parameters. “Center core is off,” he finally said.

“What does that mean?”

“That means there’s some hidden space in the interior block of this penthouse and it’s too big just to be the HVAC equipment. That’s usually in the ceiling in places like this anyway.”

After some more searching they reached the end of the hall and stared at the elaborate built-in cabinet there. “Why do I think that thing’s set on a pivot?” said Shaw to Reggie. “You see it, Frank?” he said into his headset.

“Yeah. I’m with you. We got less than thirty minutes. Start poking around.”

Four minutes later, a twist of a knob in a counterclockwise motion by Reggie made the entry code panel pop out. Shaw pulled a spray canister from his belt and shot it over the panel. Then he hit it with a blue light, which revealed fingerprints on certain number keys. “Got the four digits,” he said. He attached a small device to the panel’s wiring and turned it on. He looked up at Reggie. “Knowing which four digits are part of the code cuts the combination possibilities way down.”

“Yeah, that I know. Then you just have to find out the order of the numbers,” she said. “And you manage that with a full numbers assault.”

The numbers 4-6-9-7 froze on the screen and the wall cabinet clicked open, revealing a darkened space beyond.

“So let’s go see what Mr. Kuchin is hiding in here,” he said.