“On what I have to do there.”
“Sam, you
I don’t commit to an answer, but I do shrug my shoulders to indicate she’s on the right track. It’s the best I can do.
“I knew it. Look, I’ve known other men that work for government agencies. I dated a CIA guy once. We went the longest time before I found out what he did for a living and it really pissed me off.”
“Why?”
“Because he’d been lying to me. He told me he was a lobbyist. He exhibited all the same signs as you — he was secretive about his job, he was gone for long periods of time, he was unbelievably fit for his age, and he was a devotee of martial arts. Believe me, Sam, I know the type.”
“And that’s my type?”
“Isn’t it?”
I let that one ride. The meal continues pleasantly and the conversation moves along to safer subjects. At one point during dessert — we share the Irish coffee chocolate brownie mousse — I feel her bare foot brushing against my calf. She’s removed her shoe and has begun to rub my leg, inching higher and higher until her foot is in my lap. She presses her toes into my crotch, all the while looking at me with a glint in her eye that means business. I’m suddenly immensely aroused, a reaction I know has to do with coming back from a life-or-death assignment. The NSA psych doctors who examine me every year always express surprise when they learn of my years of celibacy. Most guys who perform dangerous missions for the government have a libido that won’t quit. Maybe that’s now finally coming to the fore.
“What say you we pay the bill and get the hell out of here?” I ask.
“I was wondering when you were gonna suggest that,” she says, a mischievous grin playing on her wet lips.
We spend the rest of the afternoon and evening in my room at the hotel. The sex is as intense as it was on my birthday back home in Towson. Katia is insatiable, it seems, and I no longer feel the fatigue that was plaguing me when I arrived in California. Maybe it’s the pheromones surging through my body or something like that, if you believe in that kind of stuff. Whatever it is, the chemical reactions in my loins don’t fail to do the job.
By nine o’clock that night we’re hungry again. I order room service and we have a couple of sandwiches and sodas. We sit on the bed, naked, eat our dinner, and laugh at the absurdity of how we must look. After the meal Katia offers to give me a massage and I readily accept. As she works me over with her strong hands I begin to feel tired again. I’m wonderfully relaxed and seem to be floating on water. The next thing I know, the room is pitch-dark and Katia is in bed next to me. I must have fallen asleep during the rubdown. The digital clock on the nightstand reads 2:35. I slept for a good six hours.
I quietly slip out from under the sheets and sit for a moment just watching Katia. She’s sleeping soundly. In the dim light her dark curly hair, spread over the pillow, looks like splashed paint.
As if on cue, though, my OPSAT beeps quietly. I grab it, shut off the noise, and see the text message from Coen. All the details I need to find GyroTechnics have been beamed to me. Agent Kehoe has reported that the building was mysteriously evacuated and as of midnight no one is there. Lambert suspects that Mike Wu’s arrest has prompted the firm’s management to take some drastic measures. Lambert wants me to get over there as soon as possible.
Katia stirs and opens her eyes. “What time is it?” she mumbles.
“It’s the middle of the night,” I say. “Go back to sleep. I’ll be back in the morning.”
She sits up and asks, “Where are you going?”
“I have a job to do. I’ll be back. I promise.”
“Are you in danger?”
“No. Katia, go back to sleep. I’ll be back when it’s time to get up.”
Her brow wrinkles and there’s a moment when I fear there might be a conflict of interests. But instead she smiles, reaches out, pulls my head toward hers, and kisses me.
“Just be careful,” she whispers. She then lays her head back onto the pillow and closes her eyes. She adjusts her body beneath the sheets and snuggles over onto the warm spot I left on my side of the bed.
I get dressed in my uniform and leave the hotel in the Murano.
25
I find GyroTechnics easily enough. It’s an odd place to stick a technology development company — isolated in the hills, surrounded by trees, standing at the end of an unmarked gravel road — but then again it’s a firm doing illegal shit. If what the FBI discovered is true, and I don’t doubt it for a minute, the place is financed and run by a Triad. It just goes to show that these criminal organizations like Triads, Yakuzas, and Mafias are branching out beyond their normal expected enterprises like drugs, arms, prostitution, and gambling. Now they’re in the global crime market and that means sponsoring and developing technology to use in committing offenses.
I park the Murano on Norman Place and walk to the gravel road. I stay off of it, though, electing to make my way through the dense growth of trees. With my night vision activated, it’s not a problem. I come to the wire fence and can now see the futuristically designed building that is GyroTechnics. A couple of floodlights illuminate the empty parking lot but otherwise the place appears deserted. I draw my Five-seveN, attach the noise and flash suppressor, and aim at the floodlights.
Now the grounds are pitch-black, dimly lit only by the hazy night sky. I climb the fence, dart to the employee entrance, and find a code access keypad next to the door.
Pressing my implant, I say, “Hey, Anna, are you there? I need an access code for GyroTechnics.”
“Hold on, Sam,” she answers. “I thought I’d have it for you by morning and didn’t know you’d be ordered to infiltrate the place at this hour.”
“Well, I’m standing out here in the dark. Hurry.”
I suppose I could blast the damned thing but it would probably set off all sorts of alarms and the police would show up before I could say “Oops.” Instead I circle the building and look for another entrance. The really odd thing about this place is that there’s no front door for Joe Public. The only people that go in and out of GyroTechnics are employees. UPS must bring deliveries to the back door and the postman shoots the mail through a slot. I guess the management doesn’t do much in the way of entertaining clients.
Before Grimsdottir comes back with the access code, a pair of headlights swings toward the building. Uh-oh. I make a run for the fence but have no time to climb it. I hit the dirt and lie facedown as the car pulls into the parking lot and stops. It’s a Corvette. The driver extinguishes the lights and gets out. He’s alone. It’s too dark to discern who it is, even with my night vision. He’s Asian, I can tell that much.
The guy goes to the employee entrance and punches in the code. The door opens and he’s inside. I quickly get up and run to the door, switch my goggles to thermal vision, and note the keys that are still warm from his touch—9, 7, 2, 0, and *. I have no idea in what order they’re supposed to be. I snap a shot of the keypad with my OPSAT camera and adjust the controls so the thermal readings are indicated on the screen. Usually I can make an educated guess as to which keys were pressed first and last — the first one will be the dimmest and the last one will be the brightest. The difficulty is if a key is pressed more than once.
I take the chance and press the combination I think might be the one. It’s like playing roulette in Vegas — the odds are outrageously against me. Of course, nothing happens. I try a slightly different combination and again come up with zilch. Sometimes these keypads are rigged to set off an alarm if someone tries incorrect codes more than
