other guard had left, Rockman had begun feeding the command post a tape they had made from the feeds the two previous nights. “Saying something. Guard Two thinks it’s amusing. He’s opening his bottle. Should be out any second.”
Dean followed Karr down the staircase, moving as quietly as he could, each step, each breath, deliberate.
“Guard Two is getting up!” hissed Rockman. “He didn’t drink yet. Don’t let him see you.”
No kidding, thought Dean, pushing back against the wall and raising the blowpipe so it was ready.
“Going back,” hissed Rockman. “All right — taking a slug, another slug. Sitting down. Any second now. Bingo. You’re clear! You’re clear!”
“You ever think of doing baseball play-by-play?” Karr asked as he raced across the lobby.
31
Lia sat in a car three blocks away, listening to the conversation at the bank. She wanted to run over and try cracking the safe herself. It would be a useless gesture — they were already doing everything that could be done — but it would be better than sitting here helplessly.
Was this what it had been like for the people in the Art Room the day she’d been raped?
A loud tap on the car window jolted her to the present. Lia glanced up as a flashlight glared against the window. A shadow loomed behind the light, a voice.
“Out of the car, miss.”
Lia glanced to the other window and saw that she was surrounded by soldiers.
32
“Isn’t working,” said Karr, pushing on the handle again. “Next set of numbers.”
Rockman started reading the numbers. The cracker worked by listening as the wheels of the safe’s tumbler fell into place. It also guessed on the approximate positions of the numbers in the combination sequence by measuring the sound, but it was only a guess, and with eight wheels there were still many different possibilities.
Karr messed up halfway through and had to start again. The combination failed to open the safe.
“I’m thinking a whole big box of nitro,” said Karr. “Just blow it right out.”
“That won’t work, either,” said Dean. “Been tried.”
“Sequence number three,” said Rockman, starting to feed him the numbers.
Karr dialed in the combination, but the safe still didn’t budge.
“I felt something that time, on the sixth turn. Let me try again, reversing steps five and six.”
“Tommy, we really want to do this according to statistical probabilities,” said Rockman. “We’re starting to cut things tight.”
“Stay with me.”
Karr tried the combination with his variation, but it didn’t work. Dean tapped his watch next to him. “We’re down to four minutes,” said Dean.
“Next sequence,” Karr told Rockman.
Rockman began reading the numbers. This time, Karr swore he felt something tingling at his fingertips — and finally the safe unlocked.
“Let’s go, Sundance,” he told Dean, stepping back to open the vault.
33
Lia silently berated herself before rolling down the window. This wasn’t the result of some random twist of fate; she’d gotten sloppy, not paid enough attention to her surroundings.
The flashlight banged again. Lia reached to the manual crank at the side of the door, pulling down the window.
“What are you doing?” demanded a soldier. He shone the light into her face.
“I was thinking,” she said.
“Thinking?”
Apparently this was the most preposterous answer the man could imagine, because he demanded she get out of the car.
“Lia, tell him you’re with the UN,” said Telach over the communications system. “Let’s not fool around. He has no right to detain you — there is no curfew.”
“I had a fight with my husband,” Lia told the soldier. “I–I can’t stand him anymore. He’s a cheating slime.”
“Where’s your wedding band?”
“I threw it into the sea where it belongs.” Lia practically spit the words. She grabbed at the door, missing once, then getting the latch, and stepped from the car. “He’s a lying slime,” she said. “I caught him with his secretary. I’m sure there have been others. Men — they are all slime. Are you married? Do you cheat on your wife?”
One of the Art Room translators tried to correct her pronunciation, but she was on her own now, completely on her own. Anger welled up inside her — that part wasn’t an act. She seemed to have an endless supply of it. Her whole body grew warm as she complained and cursed her supposed philanderer of a husband.
“I hate him. If it weren’t for my children I would kill myself,” said Lia. She slammed her hand on the roof of the car, seemingly out of control. At the same time, she scanned the area, counting the soldiers, gauging exactly how convincing she had to be. She had a small Glock at her belt and another near her ankle.
Four other men, in the roadway. They all had M16s.
She could shoot her way out if she had to, but it wouldn’t be easy and it would complicate things immensely.
The soldier who had banged on her window didn’t know exactly what to do. “Calm down, miss,” he said, then corrected himself. “Ma’am.”
“Miss, yes — alone. Men are pigs — lying, cheating pigs. They take what you have and then where are you?”
Lia held her hands out, trembling.
Another soldier came over — an officer. “Why are you not with your children?” he said. “Go home to them. All men are not like your husband. He’s a dog, but you must make the best of it — for your children.”
“My mother came to watch them.” Lia looked at him. Something in his face told her he was skeptical, that he didn’t believe her. It reminded her of the Korean officer, the man who had raped her.
Then, she had met the look with scom.
She didn’t have that in her anymore.
“I can’t face them,” she cried, grabbing the officer’s arms. And she really did begin to cry.
The officer pushed her back against the car. The gesture began harshly, but then weakened, and as he held her there Lia could see that there was compassion in his face.
“Go home,” he told her gently. “That is where you belong. There are patrols throughout the city tonight. You will only end up finding trouble. Your children need you.”
Lia nodded. Silently, she got into the car and started it.
