The Tomorrow Heist (7 page)

 

Chapter Nine

Toronto

4:30
A.M.
Local Time

H
ANK
HAD
NEVER
actually been to the Toronto research facility and was fairly dazzled by the building when he walked Per in. The Crystasis Foundation's main laboratory was housed in what had once been a steel mill on the outskirts of Toronto. The smelting hardware and blast furnaces had been replaced with state-­of-­the-­art labs. Several levels of catwalks still ran along both sides of the vast, football-­field-­sized main chamber, but now they were painted a gleaming white and washed down several times a day to avoid contaminants. Along all the catwalks were floor-­to-­ceiling glass walls with offices and small labs clearly visible. The center of the room was still wide open and almost a hundred feet from the floor to the peaked roof. Where the blast furnaces once used to run hot for months at a time, spraying molten metal high into the air, showpieces now sat—­modern art and sculptures to impress investors.

The lab was a poster child for excess and spoke to the man who had created it. A man who, ironically, couldn't bring himself to leave his home to visit his monstrosities. He had to settle for pictures and webcams showing him the daily routine of his workers. Who, unbeknownst to them, all toiled for a single reason—­to extend the billionaire's life. Indefinitely, if possible. Oddly, even at four in the morning, it hadn't been that difficult to find someone to take Per on a tour of the facility. Though it was partly because of the company-­wide memo that had gone out telling everyone that when they were speaking to Harcourt's newly hired investigator, they were speaking to
him
.

Hank let Per go on the tour alone and snuck into one of the upper offices to use his cell phone in private.

“I think we made a mistake,” Hank said into the phone, his back to the door. Per was several floors down, but even at that distance, Hank found himself lowering his voice. There were no shades of gray; Hank was terrified of the man.

“What are y'all talking about,” Harcourt said. “You've barely been gone a day and a half. Give him a chance.”

“Listen, I'm telling you he's not right. In the head,” Hank said, checking over his shoulder. “Or anywhere else, neither.”

“Jesus, is it the arm? Get ahold of yourself. It's . . . well, let's face it, it's weird. But it's just a prosthetic. Other than that, he's just—­”

“It ain't the arm!” Hank said, louder than he meant. He took a second to get himself in check. “It's not his arm. His arm is about the most normal thing about him. It's the way he talks, or worse, the way he don't. And the way he looks at stuff. ­People too. When he looks at me I feel like . . . like he's pulling me apart and trying to figure out what all my bits are for.”

“Look,” Harcourt started, but Hank knew if he let him speak, he'd end up talking Hank out of what he wanted. He always did.

“No, I don't want to do it no more. Get someone else. You got a ­couple of hundred ­people on staff here. Get one of them to do it. Or better yet, just fire his ass. I can get you a dozen investigators a day for half of what we're paying this guy.”

“Wait a second,” Harcourt said, his voice sounding confused. “A ­couple of hundred ­people? Jesus, you took him to Toronto?”

“Uh, yeah. You told me to take him wherever he—­”

“I didn't mean there! Christ, Hank, don't you get it? That's where Reese worked. If someone there knows that Reese didn't just disappear—­”

“Oh, shit,” Hank said. He hadn't even thought of that.

“Listen and listen good, Green. You get his ass out of there, and I mean
now
. You understand me?”

“Uh, yes. Yes, sir. But about accompanying him—­”

“Just get him out of there and babysit him for a few more hours. I'll make some calls and get someone else there to take over. I don't want Broden running around on his own. And for God's sake, don't tell him what you're doing. He doesn't seem like the kind of fella that takes kindly to ­people's making decisions about him.”

“No shit,” Hank said. “Thanks, Jim. And sorry about this.” Hank hung up, took a deep, breath, and headed out of the office.

How could I have been so stupid? Well, just get him out of here, and you're done in a few hours. No big deal. A few more hours won't kill me.

Distracted by his screwup, Hank walked out of the office just as someone grabbed his arm, wrenching it up behind his back. The pain was instantly replaced by fear as he felt cold metal press against his carotid artery.

“Take me to Per Broden. Now!” a woman with an Asian accent hissed into his ear. Hank, could see her reflection in the glass. The woman was just average height, but incredibly strong—­though nowhere near as strong as Per's robotic arm. He couldn't see her face because she was wearing a black hoodie, but what he did see was the glint of the knife against his throat.

“Sweetheart, I don't think that's such a great . . . AH!” Hank yelped as the knife slit into his flesh. He felt warm blood drip down onto his clavicle.

“Jesus, all right, all right. He's down there, lower level. But we'll never get all the way down there like this.” Hank saw the reflection of the hood tilt down as she looked where they had to go. There were only a handful of ­people between here and there, most in lab coats, but the lab's open concept meant Hank and the woman would be on display the whole time.

The woman said something in a language Hank didn't understand, then, “Fine. Then we make him come to us.” She turned Hank and pushed him back into the office he'd just come out of.

“We'll do it any way you want. You're the boss.”

As Hank stepped into the room, he pushed her arm away from his throat and spun around to shut the door on her, but she was fast. Like lightning. Before he'd moved the door an inch, she'd plunged the knife into his abdomen. He clasped his hands to the wound as pain ripped through his stomach muscles, and he fell back onto the office's carpet. His attacker hung on to the knife as he fell, and more pain assaulted him as the blade slid out. Then he was being dragged across the floor, behind the desk, every bump like his guts were being scooped out. He distantly realized she was hiding him.

Afraid of more pain, he couldn't bring himself to lift his head or call out. He carefully raised his hand up so he could see the blood on his fingers as he gasped for breath. It was dark, almost black. A lifelong rodeo rider, Hank knew about puncture wounds. Every rider knew that if you were gored and the blood was black, your liver was hit and you were done.

He carefully put his arm back down and stared at the white lift ceiling tiles above him as his life slowly spilled onto the carpet. He heard the door close, then the woman knelt beside him. He winced as she ripped the sleeve of his shirt off, balled it up, and pressed it against the wound. “Press here. Hard,” she said.

He didn't see the point and just lay there, a numbness starting to take him. It eased the pain, but he knew he was going into shock. She took his hand and pressed it against the make-­do bandage when he didn't respond. She sat back on her heels, looking at him. “Why did you do that? I wasn't going to hurt you.”

“My . . . my neck begs to differ, sweetheart.”

“That's a scratch. Nothing. You would have—­” She stopped talking as Hank started laughing, then coughing. “What are you laughing at?”

“I thought
he
was going to kill me. I just made arrangements to get away from him. If I'd just stayed with him, I probably would have lived to be a hundred.”

“No one's going to live to be a hundred anymore,” she said with a faraway look.

“What?”

“Never mind,” she said, getting up and taking her hoodie off. She made a pillow out of it and eased it under Hank's head. She was young, Asian, and had flaming red hair.

“Jesus, you're a kid.”

“I haven't been a kid for a million years . . . what's your name?”

“Hank.”

“I'm Tatsu,” she said, and he knew she thought he was going to die too. He felt her pat his pockets until she found his cell phone. She took it, got up, and moved out of his view. When she came back, she was wearing a lab coat she must have found in the office. “Look, just keep pressure on that. I . . . I don't think I hit anything vital. Somebody will find you and . . . you'll be fine.”

“You're a terrible liar, kid,” Hank said before another coughing fit began. The room was starting to swim.

“I . . . I'm sorry,” Tatsu said. She left his view again, and a moment later he heard the door open and close.

Hank tried to stare at the ceiling again, but he couldn't get the tiles to come into focus. Then he realized he was about to die in a building devoted to extending life, and he couldn't help but laugh again. It was the last thing he ever did.

P
ER
WASN
'
T
SURE
if Dr. Reese's disappearance was connected to the bombings, but in his experience, coincidence was rarely unremarkable. And the harder it was to get an answer out of anyone, the more sure he became. Of course, what he really cared about was the enigmatic words left at each bombing. If he managed to find out what “Dead Lights” meant, the continuance of the attacks meant nothing to him. He'd already decided to dump his babysitter when they were done here, wherever Green was.

The technician finally returned to the office Per was waiting in. The man's face told Per all he needed to know.

“I'm sorry, Mr. Broden, she wasn't in either,” the technician said. “Like I said before, most of the head scientists and their assistants are already en route to that conference I mentioned.” Apparently there was some kind of longevity conference happening this weekend on a yacht off the coast of Japan. The entire lab had been invited—­free of charge—­and that was reason ­people were still working at such an ungodly hour. When they completed their assignments, they could all fly out.

Unfortunately, Per was finding that because of the conference, no one who had worked with Dr. Reese seemed to be on-­site. Still, Per refused to believe that
every
scientist was out. Especially when the catwalks were rife with ­people in lab coats. Though the technician before him—­Darrell something—­had already explained they were all just technicians and engineers.

“And there's nothing you or any of the other technicians can tell me about Dr. Reese's work? Surely, you must be able to do that, at least.”

“It's just not that structured, here. Everyone helps everyone, but there's not really a way to—­” Darrell stopped talking as something in the hallway caught his eye. “Just a minute.” Darrell stuck his head out the door and called: “Mark! Mark!” Darrell waved for someone to come over.

Per stood up. A young blond man came over, and Darrell put his arm around his shoulders and ushered him into the room.

“What's up?”

“This is Mr. Broden. He's doing some work for Mr. Harcourt, and I was hoping you could help us out since everyone else has already left for the conference,” Darrell said. Per noticed that at the mention of Harcourt's name, Mark's demeanor seemed to change. Not much and probably not noticeably to most ­people, but Per caught it loud and clear.

“I'm trying to discern what Dr. Reese was working on before he disappeared,” Per said. The change in Mark's behavior this time would have been noticeable to a blind man.

“Disappeared? Oh, I mean, no, I don't know what he was working on,” Mark said quickly. Per tilted his head and stared at the man.

“If Dr. Reese didn't disappear, then where did he go? I'm going to assume that you had more than a working relationship with him, and that's why Darrell brought you in here. That being said, and a given, you do not seem particularly concerned considering that your friend disappeared without a trace. To be honest—­Mark, is it?—­you should be asking me questions right about now.”

“Uh, what?” Mark said after a moment.

Per just looked at him. The air in the room seemed to slow down and thicken. Per observed everything in great detail—­the man's Adam's apple bobbing up and down as he swallowed, his labored breathing, the sweat suddenly trickling down his temple. And then, just a microsecond too late, Per realized something.

He's going to run.

Mark shoved Darrell at him and launched himself out of the room. Per ducked Darrell's pinwheeling arms and let him crash into a desk before hitting the floor. Per vaulted out the door and looked up the catwalk past several ­people in lab coats. It took him a second to eye his prey. Mark was already halfway to the stairs. Per knew he could never get through the throng of bodies in time to catch him.

The catwalk had a railing that was three inches wide, plenty of room for the human foot. Per jumped up on the railing and without even a glance down at the cement floor twenty feet below, he ran after Mark. ­People turned at the clanking of Per's shoes on the metal railing and threw themselves back against the glass office walls as he passed.

Mark had reached the stairs and gotten about two steps down them when Per maneuvered around the bend in the railing and launched himself into the air. Mark looked up just as Per slammed into him. The two men rolled down the stairs and came to a stop on the landing. Per easily got the upper hand, but he knew he only had moments before others got to them. He put his robotic hand around Mark's throat and squeezed only slightly, until Mark gasped for air.

“Where is Dr. Reese? You have two seconds to tell me, or I'll crush your windpipe and search your home. The choice is yours.” Per eased up on Mark's throat so he could talk.