Shadow of Betrayal

He only had seconds now. He squeezed through the opening and grabbed the rail that ran across the top of the door. The sliding sections closed again the moment he was out of the way.

He could hear the steps come into the elevator alcove, then stop. There was a moment of nothing, then the sound of an electric motor starting somewhere below Quinn.

Quinn looked behind him to see if he could tell which car was on its way up. But it was too dark.

The sound got louder and louder. Quinn kept his eyes on the darkness below him, looking for any change, prepared to jump if the car appeared directly beneath him.

The whir grew louder and louder. Then he saw the outline of a car moving up. Not below him, but next to him.

The car stopped seven feet to his left. There was a slight delay, then he heard the door open and the waiting passenger get on. As soon as the doors closed again, the motor restarted, and the elevator plunged back down into the darkness.

Quinn donned his backpack, then inched over to the pipes he’d spotted earlier, and attached the end of his rope to one of them. Once it was tied off, he cinched the loose end around his waist and began a controlled descent into the inky well below.

“Quinn?”

Marion looked up. Nate seemed to be talking to himself. When he noticed her, he said, “Radio.” He turned his collar out so she could see the black dot attached on the inside. “Quinn?”

“Maybe he’s hiding and can’t talk,” she offered.

Nate frowned. “Maybe. But he should have done a radio check by now.”

Before he could call out his friend’s name again, there was a buzzing sound. He shot a hand into one of his pants pockets. When he pulled it back out, he was holding a vibrating cell phone.

“Maybe his radio’s not working and he’s using his phone,” she said.

“It’s not him,” Nate said, looking at the display. He flipped it open. “Hi.” He listened for a moment. “I’m in the emergency exit tunnel…. No. He went back in…. about fifteen minutes ago…I can’t get through. I think he can’t get a signal on the second level…. There’s a reason, a good one…. Wait, wait. Orlando, let me talk for a moment…I didn’t go with him because I’m not alone. We found Marion Dupuis. She’s with me…. No, no kid. That’s who he went back for … are you there?… Yes. Said if he didn’t get back in a few hours, I was to try and get Marion out…. Where are you?… Jesus, you’re as crazy as he is…. You need to watch out for the motion sensors. They go all along the road, then fan out in a wide arc as you near the gate. Maybe you should wait at the … Okay, okay. But you’re not going to be able to get through the gate without them knowing…. What’s that mean?… Orlando?… Orlando?” He pulled the phone away from his ear. “Shit.”

Orlando had been the name the other man, Quinn, had mentioned before he left. Marion assumed it was another member of their team.

“What did your friend say?” Marion asked.

Nate continued to stare at the ground for a few seconds longer before looking at her. “She’s on her way to help us.”

“That’s good, right?”

He forced a smile, then turned and walked back down the tunnel toward the facility corridor. “Maybe I can get a signal if I go back into the hallway.”

“Don’t. Please,” she said. “I mean Quinn wanted us to wait here.”

Nate nodded. “All right. I’ll give him another fifteen. If we don’t hear from him by then, I’ll go back in. That fair?”

“Sure … yes. Very fair.”

It wasn’t the fear of being discovered that had made Marion stop Nate. It was the fear that he might actually get ahold of Quinn. And when he did, Quinn would tell them that Iris was dead.

At least this way, she could hold on to hope a little longer.

CHAPTER

34

FOR AN HOUR AND A HALF TUCKER HAD PLAYED THE good boy, standing beside Mr. Rose as they both watched the others get the cargo ready. The technicians had started the job by prepping the solution that would put each package—as Mr. Rose had dubbed them early in the project—under for as long as would be needed, then administering it one by one. Tucker’s men then moved the gurneys each package was on into one of the two storage rooms nearest the elevator.

Tucker purposely didn’t look at any of their faces. It wasn’t because he was afraid of feeling a sudden rush of sympathy. In fact, quite the opposite would have been true. Their faces, their bodies, turned his stomach. They were just… wrong. He’d felt that way since he’d picked up the first one in Bangladesh two months earlier. Still, they were the key, the method in.

But not the delivery device itself. That was also a stroke of genius. No one would suspect a thing. And when it was over, not only would the targets be eliminated, but the unwanted brats, too. The fact that Mr. Rose was using them in this way made perfect sense to Tucker. It was economical. No waste at all.