Exit 9

gun.

“I promise I’ll tell you exactly what we find. Okay?”

The man with the gun grinned. “I’m afraid you’re not going to get that opportunity.”

His words broke her spell. “He’s got a gun!” Even before she finished yelling, she started running toward the container end closest to her, hoping she could get behind it before the man shot her in the back.

She heard her uncle yell something, but her mind wasn’t registering the words. Her focus was only on finding a place to hide.

Something thudded against the ground behind her. She couldn’t help but look back.

Uncle Hector had jumped off the container and was standing between her and the man with the gun.

“Put it down!” he ordered.

Patricia reached the end and moved partially behind it. “Uncle Hector, please run.”

“I’m a police officer,” Hector said, still looking at the man. “You will toss the gun over here, then you will lie on the floor, your hands on your head.”

For a second it looked like the other man was surprised by Uncle Hector’s words, but then he said, “If anyone’s breaking the law here, it’s you. You don’t own this property. My employers do. You have no right to be here.”

“Your employers are the owners? Then what’s inside this box?”

“Whatever’s in there is not your business.”

“If you move the roof away, and open the top, it looks suspiciously like you are going to release something into the air. Some kind of waste product, is that what it is? Something you’re trying to hide?”

The man cocked his head. “Is that what you think? How interesting.”

If it weren’t for her fear of the gun, Patricia would have rushed out, grabbed the back of her uncle’s shirt, and pulled him to safety. “Please, Uncle Hector. Please come.”

A noise behind her startled her. It was her brother peeking at her from around the other corner. He motioned for her to come to him. She shook her head, and motioned with her eyes toward the other side where their uncle was.

“He wants us to go,” he whispered, “while the other guy can’t see us. He’s trying to keep him busy.”

Leave Uncle Hector behind? They couldn’t do that.

“Who knows you’re here?” the man with the gun asked.

“My colleagues,” Uncle Hector said. “They’re already on the way.”

“Really? That’s not what it sounded like to me. I got the distinct impression from what you told the other two that you hadn’t called anyone yet.”

“I called them on the way here. Told them where I was going. They should be here soon.”

Patricia could hear the lie in her uncle’s voice, and was sure the other man did, too.

“Tell your friends to come out. They’re not going to get away.”

Uncle Hector said nothing.

“Did you hear me?” the man said, raising his voice. “You’re not going to get out. I’ve blocked the entrance through the cabinet. And I guarantee you that the bullets in my gun travel faster than any of you can run.”

“Come on,” Rodrigo said. “We have to go now.”

“What about Uncle Hector?”

Rodrigo hesitated a moment, then said, “I have a plan, but you have to get out of here first.”

“You heard him. He’s blocked the cabinet.”

“Then use the rat hole.”

The rat hole? She had forgotten all about that. It wasn’t really an exit, but it was a way to get out of sight. If she still fit.

Not knowing what else to do, she scrambled past her brother, and out through the collapsed wall.

“I said, get out here!” the man yelled again, his voice now partly blocked by the container.

“Okay,” Rodrigo said. “We’re…we’re coming.”

Patricia whipped back around. What? What was he doing? He wasn’t really going to step out where the man could see him, was he?

She was about to go back to stop him, when she saw his shadow passing along the top of the container. Somehow he had climbed back up without her hearing him.

Now she understood what he was planning. He was going to get above the man and jump on him. That was actually a great idea. She should have thought of it herself.

Rodrigo noticed her through the opening in the wall, and waved for her to keep moving.

The rat hole. That’s where he wanted her to go.

She nodded, and moved into the corridor. As she reached the room where the rat hole was, she heard something in the distance that sounded like a spit or a slap. It happened twice in a row, and after a moment, a third time. But she didn’t have time to figure out what it was. She had to keep moving.

When she and Rodrigo were kids, they imagined the room had been used as an office by the factory’s owner. It was the only room in the building with an actual fireplace. The rat hole was in the corner of the same wall the stone fireplace was located. It wasn’t really a rat hole. It was a broken area near the bottom that, if she turned herself just right, she could squeeze through and slip inside the wall. She contorted her body into the position she’d used in the past, and hoped she was still skinny enough to fit.

She was. Just barely.

She shimmied to her left, toward the fireplace. There was a wide spot there, an open space behind the stones of the facade and mantel. As soon as she reached it, she crouched down and began to pray.

Perez eyed the man who said he was a cop. Were there others coming? He doubted it, but he needed to know for sure, and the only way to do that was to force the man to tell the truth.

Perez heard a low creak come from the IDM container, but pretended he hadn’t noticed. To try and surprise him from above was an obvious ploy. Inside he was smiling. Assistance, however unwitting, with his information problem was about to drop into his lap.

“Perhaps we should both walk away,” the maybe-cop said.

“Perhaps we should,” Perez agreed. “What do we call this? A misunderstanding?”

“I’d be willing to do that.”

Perez smiled. “I bet you would.”

In the silence that followed, Perez focused on the container. First there was a hint of a scrape, then a breath.

“So,” the man asked. “Do we have a deal?”

No further sounds now, but Perez could sense the person looking at him. Though he couldn’t know for sure, it was safer to assume it was the young man and not the girl.

“I think I’ve reconsidered,” Perez replied.

The other man was doing everything he could not to look at the container. “A mistake is all this is. Walking away is not a bad thing.”

Any second now. Any-

As soon as he sensed the man above him start to jump, Perez moved toward the IDM. The jumper-he was right, it was the man-arced over him, missing him by half a foot at most. He tried to grab Perez as he went by, but his outward trajectory was having none of it. When his feet hit the ground, he turned to take on Perez, but instead got a face full of pistol grip. Down he went, nose bloody, eyes rolling back.

“No!” the older man yelled, taking a step forward.

Before he could take another, Perez aimed his gun at the guy on the floor, really more of a teenager than an adult. The older man halted, getting the message.

“Now, who knows you’re here?”

The guy stared at him for a moment, clearly running through options in his mind, but Perez knew he’d eventually realize he had only one.

“No one,” the man said. “I haven’t called anyone yet.”

“So no colleagues on the way?”

Looking defeated, the man shook his head.