Pope chuckled. “He works for me.”
“Not anymore,” Jack replied jabbing the button for the elevator. He tossed Pope a sideways glance and waited for the elevator to come up.
Spike put a hand near his jacket as if reaching for a gun, and Pope stopped him, shaking his head. “You know, Mr. Weslo, this evening I received news that employees of mine were found murdered.”
He stared at him as if expecting Jack to confess; instead Jack stepped into the empty elevator, and threw back the same words Pope had used when referring to Tyson.
“What a shame. Terrible world, isn’t it?”
Jack smiled, tapped the elevator button and the doors slid closed.
The look on Pope’s face was priceless.
Chapter 25
The elevator jerked to a stop somewhere between floors seventeen and sixteen. The lights shut off and Jack found himself enveloped in a blanket of darkness, staring up at where the glowing numbers were previously counting down. Although he knew Pope was pissed, and expected blowback from winning the fight, killing his men and disrespecting him, he couldn’t rule out that this wasn’t just a simple malfunction. Though it didn’t take long to begin to think the worst.
Jack listened carefully. He thought he could still hear the faint sound of music. He climbed up and pushed up the escape hatch that led into the shaft. High above he could see the faint glimmer of light seeping through the cracks of the upper elevator doors, and hear the sound of music. There was still power but not in the shaft.
He expected Pope to try something; he just hadn’t anticipated this.
Jack shoved the suitcase full of money up through the hatch, and hauled himself into it. The elevator shifted ever so slightly, and the cables holding it from dropping to the thirteenth floor wobbled like thick piano strings.
There was no ladder in the shaft as most maintenance could be done from on top of the elevator car. The only way up was to climb the rails like a fire station pole but they were covered in grease and that meant he couldn’t carry up the suitcase.
He had no other choice than to jam it between the shaft rails and leave it there hidden by darkness, wedged in between metal and grease. Once done, Jack looked up, took a deep breath and began the precarious climb.
“Is that everyone?” Pope asked Spike.
“That’s all of them. We just loaded the last group into the elevators. They’ll be out of the building shortly.”
“Good.” Pope nodded, he wasn’t going to let that weasel slip away into the night telling him what to do, taking his money or more importantly making him look like a fool.
“As soon as the last one leaves, lock down the thirteenth to twenty-second floors. We’ll start the elevator again, and then I want our guys ready on the sixteenth floor. When the doors open, don’t kill him.” Pope jabbed his finger at Spike. “I want him alive.”
“And if he fights back, which he will?”
“Bruise, maim or break a bone but I want him alive, Spike.”
He nodded and took off with three men holding Glocks. Pope took a hard sip on his beer and tossed the bottle across the room. It shattered and he walked over to the large tinted window and looked over the city. He’d never been so insulted in his life. He hadn’t worked this hard, come this far to have some stranger walk in off the street and steal it out from underneath him.
As the last of the paying customers exited the building for the evening, Spike had the tower locked and contacted Pope by phone to let him know. In days gone by Pope would have let his crew send a message to anyone he disliked but this was personal. He wanted to humiliate him in front of his men the way he had been when news spread that Weslo was behind the death of some of his men. As for the money, he’d lost far more than what was given in winnings. He like many of his colleagues from surrounding cities had placed large wagers on Duke winning and now it was gone. He could recoup the financial loss but making him look like a fool, that was unforgiveable. He couldn’t have people think they could take out his men without punishment — what message did that send?
Now his remaining guys needed to see how he handled it.
Pope took off for the stairwell to join Spike on the sixteenth floor. He wanted to see the look on Weslo’s face when the doors opened and they dragged his sorry ass out and made him kneel.
Thick, pasty black grime gloved his hands as he struggled to climb up the slippery rails. Instead of exiting on the seventeenth floor he continued up one more floor. He figured if Pope was behind it, there would be men waiting and right now, with no weapon the odds were stacked against him. On a steel lip in front of the elevator doors on the eighteenth floor, Jack wiped his hands on his clothes before trying to pry open the jaws of steel by wedging the tips of his fingers between the crack. He had no idea who or what lay beyond but unless he got out of the shaft he was nothing more than a sitting duck. As fluorescent light flooded his face and he slipped his body through, he took a second to catch his breath. There was no one waiting for him on the other side but he figured that wouldn’t last. Jack pressed on down the corridor, sliding his back against the wall and trying his best to make no sound. He snuck into the stairwell only to hear the echo of voices, and boots heading his way. Jack peered over and saw four armed men. He dashed up two more floors to the twentieth and found himself in a darkened corridor with locked offices. He
