Secret Combinations (2 page)

Kenyon turned to all-frequencies. “This is Jack.
ETA
is ten minutes. There's been a change of plan. I want take-down after Jasper enters the room. Assume extreme counter-force. Do you copy?”

“We copy,” said Cravitz from the surveillance room.

“Ditto,” came Akita's reply from behind the desk.

Kenyon pulled the keys from the ignition and opened a footlocker behind the driver's seat. He lifted out two lightweight armored vests with large yellow
FBI
letters on the back and handed one to Leroi. After donning his vest, Kenyon pulled out a pump-action shotgun and a handful of shells. He loaded five rounds into the 12-gauge and handed the gun to Leroi. She racked a shell into the chamber and propped it beside the radio.

Kenyon turned to Deaver. “No matter what happens, stay inside the van unless I say otherwise; you got me?”

Surprisingly, Deaver merely nodded.

The radio crackled. “This is Benn. Jasper exiting at Mission.”

Kenyon grabbed the mike and crouched at the rear window. A few seconds later, a red Toyota sedan turned the corner. “I have visual contact.” The car slowed, then turned into the underground garage. “Jasper has just entered the parkade. Akita, stand by on visual.”

Kenyon licked his lips. Thirty seconds passed, then a minute, and still no response from Akita at the desk. Kenyon clicked on the mike. “Akita, do you have a visual?”

The response from the front desk came through clearly. “Nothing yet.”

Kenyon tapped the mike against the van wall; it was taking too long for Simon to get up to the reception area. Did he have a change of heart? Was he sitting in his car, frozen by indecision? Something was wrong. Kenyon stripped off his vest and opened the side door of the van. He glanced up and down the street, but no one was on the sidewalk. He turned back toward Leroi. “I'm going into the garage. Keep everyone on stand-by until I return.”

Kenyon hopped out of the vehicle and crossed the street toward the entrance to the underground parkade. Just as he reached the ramp, a blue commercial van pulled out of the garage. The agent jumped to one side as the vehicle rushed past, then he ran down the ramp, into the darkness.

It took a second for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. He looked around, but there was nobody moving in the garage. He scouted the rows of cars until he spotted Simon's red Toyota. It was parked, the motor turned off. As far as Kenyon could tell, there was nobody in or around the car. Good, thought Kenyon, he's headed up. He relaxed as he approached the rear of the vehicle.

As the agent crossed over to the driver's side, however, he spotted two feet sticking out along the ground. A man lay on his back, his eyes staring at the cement ceiling. Kenyon pulled his gun and chambered a round, simultaneously glancing left and right. Seeing no one, he advanced cautiously toward the prone man. It was Simon, a large, dark stain on the chest of his white shirt. He was alive, his breath ragged and labored.

Kenyon turned and ran for the garage entrance. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed 911 as he galloped up the ramp, calling for an ambulance as he ran. He sprinted across the road and reached the open door of the command van. “Simon's down!” He shoved the cell phone into Deaver's hand. “I got emergency on the line; guide 'em in.”

Kenyon scrambled inside and grabbed the mike. “Cravitz! Bust in now! Do you hear me? Now!”

“We copy,” responded Cravitz.

Suddenly, Kenyon remembered the other vehicle. He turned to Deaver, hunched by the door, the cell phone pressed to his ear. “Which way did the van go?”

Deaver looked at him in confusion. “What van?”

“A blue van came out of the garage when I was going in. Which way did it go, dammit?”

Deaver stared up and down the street. “I don't know.”

Leroi leaned forward. “I saw it out the back window. It went down the street and turned left.”

Kenyon grabbed Deaver by the shoulder. “Gimme your keys.”

“Why?”

“Gimme your keys!”

Deaver dug in his pocket and pulled out the keys to his car. Kenyon turned to Leroi as he stepped out of the van. “I'm heading south on Valencia. Tell
SFPD
to keep a look-out for a blue plumbing van. It says ‘Al's' or something on the side.”

Kenyon jumped into Deaver's car. He pulled a U-turn, crashing over the curb, then sped down to the end of the side street and turned left onto Valencia and roared down the block. There was a red light ahead but the oncoming lane was empty and he zigged into it. He squealed to a halt at the intersection and glanced on the floorboards, but there was no cherry. Goddamn civilian car. He nosed the hood out into the intersection, then zipped through a break in traffic.

Valencia ran through a bustling Latino neighborhood. People crowded the sidewalks, ordering food at take-outs and drinking beer on the curb. Kenyon tried to imagine how long it had been since he saw the blue van; one minute? Three minutes? He glanced nervously down side roads as he passed; he had no idea if the van had turned off the street. Too much time, he thought. Too much time.

Then Kenyon saw the van. It was sitting in the left lane at an intersection, three cars back from the stoplight. The light turned green, and the van pulled slowly away. Kenyon didn't figure he'd been spotted. The agent swung over to the right lane into the driver's blind spot, following at a safe distance.

Time to call for back-up. Kenyon felt in his pocket for his cell phone, remembering as he did so that he'd left it with Deaver. He scanned the interior of the sedan, but there was no phone or radio hook-up. Shit. He would have to follow the van until it stopped, then call for back-up.

The vehicle continued south until it reached a commercial district. Still moving sedately, it turned onto a side street. Kenyon waited for a few seconds, then followed.

The side street was lined with run-down warehouses and boarded up factories. He eased in behind a parked car and watched from a distance as the blue van pulled over to the curb.

It stopped in front of a high steel gate. The driver, wearing a baseball cap, black sunglasses, and gloves, got out of the van and opened the barrier, then got back in and drove into the yard, disappearing around the far side of a building.

Kenyon looked around the street. There were no payphones nearby. The van might reappear at any time; he couldn't risk going to find a phone. Just then, a brown coupe came around the far corner and drove toward Kenyon. The
FBI
agent jumped out of Deaver's car, flipped open his
ID
, and stepped in front of the coupe, forcing it to stop. “I'm with the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” he said. “I need your help.”

The driver was an older Latino man. He rolled his window down a fraction of an inch. “What's wrong?”

“You got a cell phone?”

“Yeah.”

Kenyon pulled out a card from his
ID
wallet. “I need you to call this number.”

The man took the card through the slit at the top of the window. He glanced at it briefly. “What should I say?”

Kenyon turned and read the faded sign over the warehouse door. “Agent Kenyon is at the Salmon King fish packers, just off Army Street. Send reinforcements.”

As the man drove off, Kenyon entered the gate and ran across the yard to the front of the warehouse. He peered around the corner. The blue van sat fifty feet ahead, beside a door. The motor was turned off.

Kenyon pulled out his automatic and advanced on the van, trying to keep out of view. He reached the rear window and glanced inside. The vehicle was empty and there was no sign of the driver.

Kenyon checked the warehouse door. It was unlocked. As quietly as he could, he opened the door and eased inside. The interior of the warehouse was lit by sunlight pouring through small windows high on the walls. Long zinc-metal tables covered the concrete floor. He listened for sounds of movement. Except for the dripping of water somewhere, all was quiet.

Glancing down, Kenyon could see a fresh set of footprints receding in the dust.

He advanced slowly, following the footprints to a set of wooden stairs that led up to an office that overlooked the warehouse floor. The windows to the office were shuttered.

Kenyon sniffed the air, detecting the aroma of fresh cigar smoke. The driver was up top. He tested the stairs. The wood was old, but solid. He eased his way up, placing his weight on the side of the steps where they met the riser. He kept his gun pointed at the door to the office, the trigger cocked.

When he reached the top of the stairs he found the door to the office closed, but the smell of cigar smoke was very strong. He braced himself on the top step, then rushed against the door, bursting it open. “Freeze!” he shouted. “
FBI
!”

A shadow darted from behind a desk. Kenyon lunged to the left to cut off his retreat.

Suddenly, there was no floor. Kenyon's foot shot into a gap and he pitched forward onto his face, his gun clattering across the room. He tried to rise, but his boot was stuck in the joists. While he struggled to free himself he heard the crack of a gun. It felt as if he had been punched in the back with a sledgehammer. The floor rose up in slow motion, and a wave of blackness engulfed him.

Kenyon dreamed he was back
in Montana, riding the horse that Cyrus and Daisy had given him as a birthday present when he was ten. The young boy he had been climbed through the pine-scented forest to a ridge that overlooked Eden Valley ranch. Below him, tucked into a sheltered valley, were the fields and barns and stables that Cyrus' father had built in the shadow of the Rocky Mountains. Above him, a hawk circled the sun, a tiny dot in the immense blue sky.

A ringing phone awoke him and he stared around, momentarily disoriented.

He was lying in a narrow bed with protective chrome rails, propped on his side with an orthopedic pillow. The curtain that surrounded the bed had been pulled back. The walls of the room were white, and the floor was finished in beige Formica tiles. A tag sewn on the bed cover said “San Francisco General Hospital.”

With a start, a jumble of memories came pouring back. Flashing red lights, a rush to the hospital, the brilliant white glare of an operating room.

Kenyon stared irritably at the bedside phone, but it continued to ring. He finally reached over and picked it up.

“What?” he croaked, his voice hoarse and phlegmy.

“It's me,” said Leroi. “How you doing?”

There was a plastic bottle with a straw resting on a table beside the phone. Kenyon took a sip of water. “Somebody tried to cut me a new asshole. It hurts like hell.”

“Good. That means you're too mean to kill. You get the flowers from the guys?”

Kenyon looked over at a table covered with several bouquets. He couldn't read any of the tags from where he lay. “Yeah, I got 'em.”

“How long you in for?”

“I don't know. The doc hasn't come in yet. They wanted me to get some sleep.”

“Sorry about waking you, but I wanted to talk before the posse arrives. You alone?”

“Yeah,” replied Kenyon.

“Good. What happened?”

“You first,” said Kenyon.

“Okay,” said Leroi. “After you took off, I went in and covered Simon.”

“How is he?”

“Real bad, last I heard.”

“What happened to Dahg?”

“The
SWAT
team took him down, no problem. Cravitz says his eyes just about popped out of his head when they crashed the door. I guess the last thing he expected was a bust.”

Kenyon briefly explained to Leroi how he tailed the killer south to the warehouse. “I was worried he might escape, so I tried to take him solo. I screwed up.”

“Hey, shit happens,” said Leroi. “Mama says you get better real quick. Talk to you later.”

Kenyon hung up the phone and took another sip of water. He was relieved that his squad had arrested Dahg without incident, but there was no masking the operation as anything but a fiasco. His head hurt, and his guts were filled with a queasy feeling.

There was a knock on the door, and a young, attractive Asian woman in a white lab coat entered. “I'm Doctor Lui,” she introduced herself. “I did the surgery on you last night. How do you feel this morning?”

“I'm fine,” he replied. “How's Simon?”

Lui sat down on the edge of the bed, facing Kenyon. “He suffered a lung puncture and a lacerated aorta. We tried to repair the damage, but he lost too much blood. He didn't make it.”

“He's dead?”

The doctor nodded. “Yes. I'm sorry.”

Kenyon felt numb; the death of Simon weighed heavily on his heart.

“You want to know how you're doing?” asked the doctor.

Kenyon turned back to her. “What? Yeah, sure.”

Lui lifted Kenyon's hospital gown and listened to his chest with the stethoscope. She then examined the wound to his backside. “You were lucky,” she finally said. “The bullet was deflected by the notebook you had in your back pocket. You got a bad bruise and ten stitches in your butt.”

“Can I go home?”

Lui stood up. “I want to let the swelling go down and check it again this afternoon.” She gave him a wink as she was leaving. “If it still looks as good as it did last night, I'll cut you loose.”

Kenyon blushed, but also breathed a sigh of relief. The last thing he wanted was to get stuck in San Francisco General for several days. Ever since he had watched Daisy die in a cancer ward, Kenyon hated hospitals.

The doctor left the door open, and Kenyon glanced out into the hallway. An agent stood to one side, guarding his door. Kenyon wondered if that was for his own protection, or to keep everyone out until the official investigation. The agents had a name for all the second-guessers who swarmed over a botched assignment: the rear-admirals. He wondered which rear-admiral would be in first.