The Midas Code

Two of Cavano’s men just passed you. Don’t turn around.

Stacy stiffened. She hadn’t been expecting them down so soon.

“I don’t see it,” the guard said.

“It was a blue car,” Stacy said, her heart pounding at the danger they were all in. “I saw it speed by way too fast. It must have hit a car around the corner. We should go look.”

The guard turned back toward the reception desk. “But I’m not supposed to leave the building-”

“Did you see the car?”

She was debating whether to leave or stay when the elevator dinged. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of Cavano, her long raven hair distinctive. She was with her other bodyguard. If they realized it was Stacy with the guard, they’d be on her in a second.

Cavano and her hulking escort went out the door to the garage.

Stacy held on to the guard’s arm and continued to pepper him with questions, trying to keep him engaged as long as possible. The second he got back to his station, all hell would break loose.

The empty vehicle tray had already been swapped for the tray with the Ferrari on it, and Tyler was watching his chance of recovering the geolabe being whisked toward the exit. His plan to climb down and get it before leaving through one of the maintenance exits had vanished.

Tyler had to get to the Ferrari before it rose into the exit bay. He ran along the front of the cars, not caring if the camera could see him at this point. If the guard even glanced at the camera, he’d sound the alarm when he saw the crushed remains of the BMW.

The Ferrari stopped at the bottom as the system transitioned to lifting the tray. Tyler was still three cars from the end. He pushed the unlock button on the Ferrari’s key fob that he’d taken from Pietro.

The tray rose. With a couple of leaps over the hoods of the last two cars, Tyler banged into the wall. As the Ferrari reached the level below him, he jumped.

His feet barely caught on the edge of the tray, and he thumped into the Ferrari’s rear. He had no time to get into the front boot, the only other possible storage place for the geolabe. He opened the driver’s door and squeezed inside, slamming it behind him. He crouched down across the passenger seat as the Ferrari stopped and waited for the exit bay’s floor to slide aside for the tray to rise up.

He redialed Grant’s number.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Is Stacy with you?” Tyler said.

“No, she’s still in the lobby. If Cavano goes back in, she’ll see Stacy for sure.”

“Tell her to leave through the front door in fifteen seconds.”

“Okay.” He and Grant had known each other long enough for Grant not to waste time asking why.

“And, no matter what you see, stay where you are.”

“But Cavano-” Grant wouldn’t like that request, but Tyler hung up before he could hear more.

The Ferrari began rising again and stopped in the exit bay. As the doors opened, Tyler sat up and started the engine.

Right in front of him were the three bodyguards and Cavano, who stared at Tyler in disbelief.

When Sal had left to find out what the surprise was, Cavano suspected Pietro was attempting to get one of the other bodyguards to switch places with him.

But a few minutes after he’d gone, Sal called to say that the BMW was missing and that they couldn’t get hold of Pietro. Cavano wondered if Pietro had left his post and taken the BMW for a drive, but she realized that he couldn’t have exited the garage on his own. Retrieving the car could be done only from outside the garage. Perhaps the computer system had directed the tray to the wrong spot in the garage, but a nagging feeling told her that something was wrong, so she instructed Sal to retrieve the Ferrari to make sure it was still there.

As Cavano hurried from the elevator to the garage exit, she had barely registered the sight of the guard speaking to a woman at the front door, their backs to her.

She was standing in front of the bay with Sal and the other two bodyguards when the Ferrari arrived, seemingly intact. But as the doors opened, she was stunned to see Tyler Locke sit up in the seat of her car and start it up.

Before any of them could react, Locke gunned the engine and smoked tires out of the bay, sending the four of them diving to avoid being run over.

Cavano had thought the whole business with Locke was a sideshow until this moment. Now she realized how important that device must be to him if he was willing to take this kind of risk to get it back.

As she pushed herself to her feet, Cavano vowed again that Orr and Locke would not beat her to the Midas treasure. She ran out into the street and saw her new Ferrari screech to a halt. The woman the guard had been talking to burst through the doors and ran to the Ferrari.

“Get in,” Locke yelled through the open passenger window.

At the Ferrari’s door, Stacy Benedict turned and locked eyes with Cavano, who was momentarily frozen with rage.

Benedict jumped in, and the Ferrari took off.

An alarm went off in the Boerst building, but Cavano ignored it. She had to get her car back, and the BMW was nowhere to be found.