Thr3e (26 page)

“Come on, let’s go.”

17

T
HE WAREHOUSE IDENTIFIED AS
369
on Thirty-third Street stood among a dozen others in northern Long Beach, all constructed from the same corrugated tin, all two stories high, all addressed with the same large black numbers above the doors. Years of neglect had worn most of them down to a dull gray. The
369
was hardly more than a shadow. No sign identifying a business name. Looked vacant.

Kevin slowed the car and peered ahead at the looming structure. Dust blew across the sidewalk. A faded Mountain Dew bottle, the two-liter plastic variety, bumped up against a single-entry door to the right of the loading bay.

He stopped the car thirty yards from the corner and eased the gearshift into park. He could hear several sounds—the purring of the engine, the blower blasting air over their feet, the thumping in his chest. They all sounded too loud.

He glanced at Sam, who stared at the structure, searching.

“What now?”

He had to get the gun out of the trunk; that was what now. Not because he thought Slater would be here, but because he wasn’t going anywhere without his new purchase.

“Now we go in,” she said. “Unless the fire codes were nonexistent twenty years ago, the building will have a rear entrance.”

“You take the back,” Kevin said. “I’ll take the front.”

Sam’s right eyebrow lifted. “I think you should wait here.”

“No. I’m going in.”

“I really don’t think—”

“I can’t sit around and play dumb, Sam!” The aggression in his tone surprised him. “I have to do something.”

She faced
369
Thirty-third Street again. Time was ticking. Sixty-two minutes. Kevin wiped a trickling line of sweat from his temple with the back of his hand.

“Doesn’t seem right,” Sam said.

“Too easy.”

She didn’t respond.

“We don’t have a key—how are we getting in?” he asked.

“Depends. Getting in isn’t the concern. What if he’s rigged it to blow upon entry?”

“That’s not his game,” Kevin said. “He said ninety minutes. Wouldn’t he stick to his own rules?”

She nodded. “Has so far. Blew the bus ahead of schedule but only because we broke the rules. Still doesn’t seem right.” She cracked her door. “Okay, let’s see what we have here.”

Kevin got out and followed Sam toward the building. As far as he could see in both directions, the street was empty. A warm late afternoon breeze lifted dust from the pavement in a small dust devil twenty feet to his right. The plastic Mountain Dew bottle thumped quietly against the entry door. Somewhere a crow cawed. If Jennifer had figured out the riddle, at least she wasn’t making the mistake of swarming in with the cops. They walked up to a steel door with a corroded deadbolt.

“So how
are
we getting in?” Kevin whispered.

Sam eased the plastic bottle aside with her foot, put a hand on the doorknob, and twisted. The door swung in with a creak. “Like that.”

They exchanged stares. Sam stuck her head into the black opening, looked around briefly, and pulled back. “You sure you’re up to this?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“I could go in alone.”

Kevin looked at the dark gap and squinted. Black. The gun was still back in the trunk.

“Okay, I’m going around back to see what we have,” Sam said. “Wait for me to signal you. When you go in, find lights and turn them on, but otherwise touch nothing. Look for anything out of the ordinary. Could be a suitcase, a box, anything not covered in dust. I’ll work my way through the warehouse in the dark just in case someone’s in there. Unlikely, but we’ll take the precaution. Clear?”

“Yes.” Kevin wasn’t sure how clear it was. His mind was still on the gun in the trunk.

“Go easy.” She edged to the corner, looked around, and then disappeared.

Kevin ran for the car on his tiptoes. He found the shiny silver pistol where he’d hidden it under the carpet behind the spare tire. He shoved it into his belt, closed the trunk as quietly as he could, and hurried back to the warehouse.

The gun handle stuck out from his belly like a black horn. He pulled his shirt over the butt and flattened it as best he could.

Darkness shrouded the warehouse interior. Still no signal from Sam. Kevin poked his head in and peered through the oil-thick blackness. He reached in and felt for a light switch along the wall. His fingers touched a cool metal box with a plastic switch on its face. He flipped the switch.

A loud hum. Light flooded the warehouse. He grabbed at his midsection and withdrew the gun. Nothing stirred.

He peeked again. A vacant foyer with a receiving desk. Lots of dust. The smell of mildewing rags filled his nostrils. But nothing like a bomb that he could see. Beyond the receiving area, stairs led up to a second floor. Offices. A panel of switches was mounted to the wall at the foot of the stairs. Marks broke the dust directly up the middle of the steps. Footprints.

He instinctively pulled his head from the door. Slater! Had to be. Sam was right; this was it!

Still no signal from her. Unless she’d called him and he’d missed it. With all these walls it was possible.

Kevin held his breath and slipped through the door. He stood still for a moment and then walked on the balls of his feet toward the receiving desk. Behind the desk—could be a place for a bomb. No, the footprints went up . . .

Clunk!

Kevin whirled around. The door had swung shut! The wind? Yes, the wind had—

Click
. The lights went out.

Kevin started in the direction of the door, blinded by darkness. He took several quick steps, stuck out a hand, and groped for the door. His knuckles smashed into steel. He fumbled for the handle, found it, and twisted.

But it refused to turn. He gripped hard and jerked the handle first to the left and then to the right. Locked.

Okay, Kevin, stay calm. It’s one of those doors that stays locked.
Except that it had opened for Sam. Because she was on the outside.

Wasn’t it normally the other way around?

He turned and yelled. “Sam?” His voice sounded muted.

“Sam!” This time the word echoed from beyond the stairs.

He’d seen a light panel by the stairs. Maybe they operated other lights? Kevin turned and walked toward the stairs, but his knees found the reception desk first. The crash sent a bolt of electricity through his nerves and he nearly dropped the gun. He stepped to the side and shuffled up to where he remembered the light switches.

“Samantha!”

He slapped the wall, found the switches, and palmed them on. No lights.

The floor above him creaked. “Sam?”

“Kevin!” Sam! Her voice sounded distant, from the back, as if she was still outside the building.

“Sam, I’m in here!”

His eyes had adjusted to the darkness. Light glowed from the upper level. Kevin glanced back toward the door, saw only darkness, and mounted the stairs. Light glowed faintly above him, a window maybe.

“Sam?”

She didn’t respond.

He had to get to some light! Another floorboard creaked and he whipped around, gun extended. Was the weapon cocked? He snugged his thumb over the hammer and pulled it back.
Click
. Easy, Kevin. You’ve never shot a gun in your life. You shoot at a shadow and it might be Sam. And what if the gun doesn’t even work?

He headed up the stairs on weak legs.

“Kevin!”

Sam’s voice came from his right and forward, definitely outside. He paused halfway up the steps, tried to still his breathing so that he could hear better, but finally gave up and hurried toward the light at the top.

The glow came from a doorway at the end of a barely visible hallway. His breathing came hushed and low now. Something thumped down the hall. He held his breath. There it was again, a step. Boots. Directly ahead and to his right. From one of the other rooms along the hall. Sam? No, Sam was still outside!
Dear God, give me strength.
He felt exposed standing in the hall. What was he thinking, waltzing up the stairs as if he were some kind of gunslinger?

Frantic, Kevin stepped to the faint outline of a doorway on his right. The floorboards protested under his feet. He cleared the doorway and slid back against the wall on his left.

Boots. There was definitely someone else on the upper floor with him. Could be Sam if the acoustics had misdirected her voice. Could it be her? Sure it could.

It is, Kevin. It’s Sam. She’s in the next room, and she’s found the bomb. No, her voice had been distant. And she didn’t walk like that. No way.

Her voice suddenly came again, faint. “Kevin!”

This time there was no mistake, Sam was yelling at him from below, out near the front door now. Her fist pounded on the steel door.

“Kevin, are you in there?”

He took one step back toward the doorway. The boot again. Thumping in the next room.

Someone was in there! Slater. He gripped the pistol tightly. Slater had lured him in. That’s why the riddle was so simple. A dread spread through his bones.

Sam was at the front door. The deadbolt wasn’t engaged—she should be able to either break it or pick it.

Another thought occurred to him. The bomb was probably set to go off—what if he was trapped in here when it did? What if the cops came and Slater detonated the bomb early? But Sam would never allow the cops anywhere near the warehouse now.

But what if she couldn’t get the door open?

Panicked, Kevin slid along the wall, met a corner, and felt his way along the back wall. He put his ear on the plaster.

Breathing. Slow and deep. Not his. Slow shuffling.

A low voice reached through the wall. “Kevinnnn . . .”

He froze.

“Forty-six minutesss . . . Kevinnnn.”

The difference between innocence and naiveté has never registered in Slater’s mind. The two are synonymous. In fact, there is no such animal as innocence. They are all as guilty as hell. But he can’t deny that some are more naive than others, and watching Kevin creep up the stairs like a mouse has reminded Slater of how utterly naive his nemesis really is.

He’d been sorely tempted to kick the man in the head then, while Kevin was still four steps from the top. Watching him tumble and break would have held its appeal. But place-kicking has always struck him as one of sport’s more boring moments.

Welcome to my house, Kevin.

The man has gone and gotten himself a gun. He holds it like he might hold a vial of the Ebola virus and probably hasn’t thought to cock it, but he’s at least gathered the resolve to arm himself. And he is undoubtedly packing without Samantha’s knowledge. She would never allow a civilian to stumble around with a loaded weapon. Kevin has found a sliver of manhood. How fun! The man may actually try to kill him, as if he’s become the stalker instead of the victim.

In ways not even Kevin can yet know, this isn’t such a new thing. Kevin has tried to kill him before. Their lives are inseparably intertwined, each bent on killing the other. To think that this man who’s crept up the stairs holding his big shiny pistol has the stomach to pull the trigger, much less kill, is absurd.

Now the fool has wedged himself in the next room down and is undoubtedly wetting himself. If he only knew what lay in store for him in the hours to come, he might be lying in a puddle of his own vomit.

Here, kitty, kitty.

“Forty-six minutesss . . . Kevinnnn . . .”

Kevin nearly pulled the trigger then. Not with calculated aim, but out of sheer terror.

“Sam?” His voice sounded like a wounded lamb’s bleating. He was briefly revolted by his weakness. If this was Slater, he was getting exactly what he wanted. A face to face. A chance to blow him away.

The doorway stood opposite him, its gaping hole darker than the black surrounding it. If he were to run now, he could bound down the stairs and reach the front door, right?

A new sound reached into the room—the sound of something sharp scraping along the wall outside. Down the hall toward his door.

Kevin gripped the pistol in both hands, pointed it at the doorway, and slid down to his seat. If Slater stepped through that space, he’d do it. He’d see the dark form and start pulling the trigger.