A Treasure Deep (41 page)

“We had a little time on our hands,” Perry
said, shaking the general’s hand. “This is our lead project
manager, Jack Dyson.” The men exchanged nods.

“This way,” Hitchcock said. “Your chariot
awaits. We can talk as we walk. According to the tower people at
Bakersfield airport, there was only one business jet on the ground,
a Citation X. They were able to give me the registration number. I
called back fifteen minutes later and was informed that the craft
had departed two minutes before.”

“The timing fits,” Jack said. “The cargo was
small and fairly light, even crated. A strong man could move it
himself, if need be. Throw in a hand-truck, and it would be a piece
of cake.”

“Well, we know he’s a strong man,” Perry
said, remembering the beating he and Jack had taken at the hands of
the man they were now tracking. “You said you have the registration
number?”

“I did,” Hitchcock replied. “I even called a
couple of folks I know in the FAA. The jet belongs to a
pharmaceutical firm: RS BioDynamics. Get this:They’re headquartered
in your stomping grounds.”

“Seattle?”

“That’s right. How’s that for irony?” The
general led the men from the helicopter to an aircraft parked on
the tarmac. “Here’s your ride. My fanny is on the line for this, so
I want it back in better shape than it leaves in.”

Before Perry stood a sleek white Lear Jet.
Blue letters on the tail fin read NASA. “The space boys made this
available?”

“We exchange favors now and again,” Hitchcock
replied. “There was a fee. I asked. They said yes. You will be
billed for the air time and the fuel.”

“What, no stewardesses?” Jack said.

Hitchcock gave an icy stare. “Two pilots have
been provided. They know that we’re tracking another aircraft and
will take directions from the ground. I’ll stay on the project
until your man touches down. After that, you’re on your own.”

“Thank you, General,” Perry said. “If this
weren’t life and death, I wouldn’t have asked.”

“Glad to help. Just keep it to yourself and
give your father my best.”

“I will.”

Once inside, Perry took his seat, snapped on
his seat belt, and activated his cell phone.

“Who you calling now?” Jack asked as he
settled in.

“Karen Brant.”

“Your administrative assistant? The office is
closed, you know.”

“That’s why I’m calling her at home.” Karen
Brant had been Perry’s assistant for twelve years, and her
organizational skills and freethinking intellect made her
invaluable.

“I’ve been trying to get her to move to my
office. I know it’s unethical to steal employees from the boss, but
a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.”

“You stay away from Karen. She makes me look
good.”

Perry waited for an answer. When one came, he
asked for several things in quick succession. “Can you do that?” he
asked. A moment later he said, “You’re the best,” and rang off.

Five minutes after, the Lear Jet lifted
off.

HITCHCOCK’S PEOPLE TRACKED the RS BioDynamics craft
all the way to the SEATAC airport in Seattle. The Lear Jet touched
down thirty minutes later. After thanking the pilots, Perry and
Jack stepped from the craft and walked quickly to the terminal.

A gray-haired woman with bright blue eyes and
a wide smile met them. She held a long roll of papers in her hand.
Karen Brant gave them a once-over and then said, “You guys give up
bathing?”

“It’s overrated,” Jack said. “Besides, they
have a water shortage in Southern California.”

“They can have some of ours,” she replied.
“It’s been raining for the last three days.”

Perry motioned to the roll of papers. “You
got them.”

“Of course I got them,” she said. “I also
talked a SEATAC customer aide into letting us borrow a meeting
room. This way.” She strode off without another word. Perry and
Jack followed.

The room was an empty office off one of the
wide corridors that ran like arteries through the terminal. A metal
desk was situated in the middle and Karen unrolled the papers on
it. Perry found himself looking at a set of blueprints.

“Here they are, the blueprints to the RS
BioDynamics building. Since the building department was closed,”
Karen said, “I got hold of Tim in Information Systems and told him
what you needed. He was able to access our firm’s computers from
home. He’s a smart one, that Tim. Anyway, since he keeps track of
all major construction jobs around the world, he was able to learn
who the architects and engineers were. The electrical engineer for
the project was Ron Mion. We lucked out on that.”

“We’ve subcontracted some work to him,” Perry
said. “So he had a set of plans from his work on the building?”

“Right. I tracked him down, found him at
home, and he agreed to meet me at his office. Then voila! You have
the plans you requested.”

Perry and Jack both nodded
appreciatively.

“As far as the other info you requested,”
Karen continued, “I can tell you this: The ‘RS’ in RS BioDynamics
stands for Rutherford Straight, the company’s founder. He’s a
wunderkind in the field and has made tons of money with innovative
pharmaceuticals. He leads the world in selective cloning—that is,
where they clone only parts of animals or people. Working from stem
cells, they can force a growth process that creates heart cells,
muscle cells, skin, and so on.

“I couldn’t get as detailed as I’d like—just
not enough time—but I learned that his company has more patents on
biological material than any other. He’s been the cover boy for
Fortune, Time, Newsweek, Forbes, Money, and at least a dozen other
high-end periodicals. They love showing him in his wheelchair.”

“Wheelchair?” Perry asked.

“He has ALS. Apparently he has this gigantic
intellect trapped in an ever-weakening body. Like that physicist
guy.”

“Stephen Hawking?” Jack said.

“That’s the guy. He’s like him. It’s kinda
sad.” Karen drew herself up and looked Perry in the eye. “Now, may
I ask what all this is about?”

“Sorry,” Perry said. “For the moment I need
to leave you in the dark. I’ll fill you in later.”

“Sure, cast me off like a dirty shirt,” she
quipped. “Anything else you boys need?”

“A car,” Perry said. “Could you head over to
the rental counter and arrange a car for us? Jack and I’ll stay
here and go over the plans.”

“No need,” she said. “Here are my keys. I
also put the tool boxes you requested in the trunk.”

“How will you get home?”

“Taxi, of course. I plan on billing the
company for it. What would you do without me?” she asked.

“The same things; I just wouldn’t do them
nearly as well,” Perry said.

“Coercion through compliments,” Karen said.
“It’s devious behavior, but it works. I’ll be back soon.”

“Pharmaceuticals is a competitive and
secretive business,” Jack said after Karen left the small office.
“I’m betting they have the best security possible.”

“That makes things more difficult,” Perry
said.

“Difficult? How about impossible?”

“I don’t believe in the impossible, Jack.
Think about what we pulled out of the ground over the last two
days: Roman soldiers in California, a woman’s remains with the name
Mary Magdalene etched in her coffin, and artifacts from the tomb of
Christ. None of that is possible, but you’ve seen and touched
it.”

“Point well taken,” Jack said. “So how do we
get Claire and Joseph out—and recover the artifacts?”

Perry studied the plans: blue lines on white
paper laid out in a complex fashion. It was a substantial building
of nineteen floors. The top held offices and conference rooms, the
next four floors held laboratories of some kind, and below that
were more offices and open space. Most likely, Straight leased the
lower floors to pay for the building. It was a common practice. By
leasing lower floors to other businesses, the building would pay
for itself. Perry studied the first floor and saw what he was
looking for.

“Here,” he said, pointing to the lobby on the
first floor. “The ground floor was designed to accommodate a
restaurant. You can see the kitchen area. Ron calculated higher
loads for the equipment. It also shows several other exits.
Building codes would require that. Of course,” he added, “it’s a
business office. The lobby should be open for employees on the
swing shift.”

“Okay, so we can get into the building
through the restaurant or lobby, then what?”

“Then, we play it by ear. Let’s go page by
page through this. Memorize what you can. We’ll improvise once we
are there.”

“Shouldn’t we notify the police?” Jack asked.
“They’re better equipped for this than we are.”

“In any other situation I would,” Perry
agreed, “but we have some special circumstances here. The police
are going to have as much trouble getting in as we are. They would
also need enough proof to get a warrant. We have no proof. I’ve
seen a picture of Claire and Joseph in an empty lab, but that’s it.
Calling the police would take too much time. We’re on our own for
the moment. You up for this?”

“You have to ask?”

Perry smiled at his friend and hoped he
wasn’t leading the man to his death.

KAREN’S MERCURY COUGAR sped easily along the dark
streets of downtown Seattle. Perry was at the wheel, Jack in the
passenger seat. A gentle drizzle peppered the windshield.

Perry found it ironic that it was here that
he interrupted the attack on Dr. Henri that had changed his life.
Perry didn’t believe in coincidence. He had come upon Dr. Henri
after leaving a very late meeting. Had he not called for that
meeting, had he left fifteen minutes earlier or later, everything
would have been different. But that didn’t happen. He left at just
the right time, made just the right turn, saw just the right thing.
There was no doubt in Perry’s mind that Providence was at work. He
comforted himself with the thought that God was still on the
job.

“The stairs,” Perry blurted as he parked the
car a block from the RS BioDynamics building.

“What about the stairs?” Jack asked.

“We can take the stairs up,” Perry said.
“Fire codes require sealed exit stairways.”

“No good, buddy,” Jack said. “True, there
will be at least two stairways, but I doubt that the doors will
open into the upper offices. They’re exit doors and have to open
in, but they’re allowed to be locked on the stair side. That way,
panicked people don’t exit on the wrong floor. Only those doors
that lead outside will open.”

“And the one to the roof,” Perry said. “I’m
not suggesting that we can get access to the offices on the upper
floors from the stairway. I’m suggesting we go to the roof. Exit
stairways must exit to the roof as well as the ground floor.”

“What do we do once we get there?”

“You’ll come up with something,” Perry said.
He exited the car, popped the trunk, and removed two plastic
toolboxes, handed one to Jack, and then started down the street
toward their destination.

The stairway door was open as expected. Perry
and Jack had entered the lobby separately. To the right of the
lobby was the restaurant they’d seen on the plans. Since it was
well after nine in the evening, the place was nearly empty. To his
left was a smaller office that was home to a travel agency.

Perry was sure that video cameras were
trained on the lobby. He had no way of knowing if anyone was paying
attention to them as they entered. When he first approached the
building, he noticed lights burning on almost every floor. People
moving in and out of the structure would be normal. Dressed in work
clothes and carrying toolboxes, he hoped they’d look as if they
belonged.

The air in the stairway was stale, lacking
the ventilation the rest of the building enjoyed. Perry started up.
According to the architectural plans, the steel frame building
consisted of nineteen habitable floors and one additional floor for
equipment. Above that was the roof and Perry’s destination.

He didn’t run. Exhausting himself on the
stairs could only be counterproductive. His mind and body had
already been strained beyond anything he’d experienced, so he took
his time despite the constant nagging of fear in the back of his
mind. He kept his head down, partly in thought but also to keep any
cameras that might be trained on him from seeing his face. His
hope, his prayer, was that he and Jack would be taken for
maintenance workers. They were certainly dressed for it.

They came to the twentieth floor and found a
steel door with a plastic sign attached: “Equipment Room—Authorized
Personnel Only.” Perry tried the door. It was locked. No surprise
there.

One flight later Perry stood in front of a
metal fire door. This one had a panic bar across it as was required
of all exit doors. He paused.

“Do you suppose it’s alarmed?” Jack
asked.

“I don’t see any obvious sign of it, but it
would make sense. If we open this, we may be inviting company.”

“Maybe. Let’s do it.”

Perry pushed the bar, and the door opened
freely. He steeled himself for the piercing shriek of an alarm but
heard nothing. Of course, an alarm could be ringing in some
security office on the premises or at a remote site. It didn’t
matter now. The deed was done.

Damp air greeted the two as they left the
stairwell. Before them was a wide expanse of treated concrete that,
with the metal decking below, formed the roof of the building. The
stainless steel boxes that housed HVAC fans, cooling coils, and
more were scattered along the open surface. Several satellite
dishes were anchored near one edge. The still night air was filled
with the droning of equipment that breathed air into the building.
Near the center was a ten-foot-high structure that looked like a
wide shed.

“Elevator overrun,” Jack said.