The Nightmare Thief

by Meg Gardiner

  Gabe leaned toward her. “Bzz.”

  “Okay, there’s high voltage, and the danger that the bridge would collapse.”

  “If it’s thrills you want, let’s get out of here and get a room. So come on and examine this mine, pronto.”

  “Right.”

  They had a reservation for the night at the Lodge at the Falls in Yosemite. That meant a couple of hours driving still to come, after the hike out. The wind sent a shiver through the trees. It sent a shiver through her as well.

  Phelps Wylie would never have chosen this as an afternoon’s recreation.

  Maybe he had taken a joyride in his warm, luxurious Mercedes, listening to Madama Butterfly on his German stereo system. But he never would have driven two hundred miles from home into a mountain range where, not much more than a century earlier, the Donner Party had become trapped for the winter and ended up eating each other.

  Wylie’s death was no accident.

  “Wylie had a map. Or he had a guide. He had some reason for being up here.”

  Gabe glanced over his shoulder. “Not a good one.”

  “Got that right, Sergeant.” A gust lifted her hair from her collar. “Okay, let’s pick it up. This wind is only going to get stronger. And we’re going to lose the sun.”

  Gabe nodded. “Weather’s coming.”

  She felt a cold thread skim past her, like a hundred pinhead snakes. Bad vibe about covered it. “Let’s move.”

  7

  Haugen eased off the throttle. As the speedboat settled lower in the water he counted the people on the shore ahead, running toward the beach.

  Three women, four men. What was an extra man doing there?

  “Maybe it’s a random picnicker,” Von said.

  Haugen’s jaw tightened. “Who runs toward a boat driven by men in ski masks?”

  Von didn’t reply.

  The boat crept forward. The wind raised spray on the water. Haugen tented a hand over his forehead to cut the glare, then adjusted his sunglasses to get a clearer view of the extra man on the beach. With a start, he was reminded that these weren’t his prescription pair. He had purchased these sunglasses this morning with cash, just as he had purchased his black work boots and gloves and pants with cash, all at separate stores, and had bought his black tactical gear online through a corporate account that couldn’t be linked to him. Should anybody report his description to the police, nothing he wore could tie Viking, the kidnapper, to Dane Haugen.

  But as a consequence, he couldn’t get a crisp view of the people on the sand. He grimaced and covered. “We’ll find out who it is in sixty seconds. We play it by the book, until we have to play it by ear. Follow my lead.”

  “No shooting,” Von said. The black mask, stretched across his basketball of a head, rendered his expression unreadable. But complaint was in his voice.

  Haugen turned his head toward the man. Haugen’s dead-eyed glare was hidden, but Von still cringed, intimidated. Good.

  Haugen got the walkie-talkie. “Ran, come in.”

  Sabine came back, staticky. “We’re on site. Ready to egress. But our numbers are—”

  “Extra man in the picture. Repeat, extra man in the picture. Possibly a bystander.”

  She paused. “Possibly not?”

  “Don’t know,” Haugen said.

  Another pause. “Understood.”

  He shoved the throttles to full power. The engine snarled. The stern of the boat dug into the bay, the bow rose, and they bounded across the whitecaps toward the beach. Haugen put the walkie-talkie to his lips again.

  “Going in. Follow my lead.”

  Autumn ran behind Dustin toward the beach. The speedboat, white and sleek, knifed through the glinting water straight at them. Ahead, Lark and Noah jogged to a stop at the water’s edge. Peyton was walking behind Grier, raspberry velour hips swaying, champagne bottle swinging in her hand. Up the sand in the distance, the tai chi practitioner stopped to watch.

  Autumn caught up with her friends. The limo driver, Kyle, ran up behind her.

  “All right, you all. Time to separate.” He pointed at the boat. “They’re coming to pick up Ms. Reiniger and her muscle.” He nudged Lark, Dustin, and Grier toward her. Then he pointed at Peyton and Noah. “You two federal agents—you best get lost, if you don’t want to get taken down in a firefight.”

  The boat drew nearer.

  “Or captured and interrogated,” Kyle said.

  Grier adjusted his straw hat. “Listen to the man—he knows the score. If you can’t deny the charges or buy ’em off, you’d better split.”

  Peyton worried the charm bracelet on her wrist. Grier took off his smiling skull ring and handed it to her. “My marker, Marshal. You want to change teams, you call me.”

  Autumn rubbed her palms against her jeans. “The boat—they’re picking me up after my prison break?”

  “That’s right. We are now on the clock.”

  Kyle reached beneath his Edge Adventures windbreaker and pulled out a handgun that looked like something Colonel Quaritch would fire at aliens in Avatar. Matte silver, with a huge telescopic sight atop the barrel.

  He smiled, a cool leer. “And I, Ms. Reiniger, am your nemesis. U.S. Marshal Kyle Ritter, tasked with apprehending you and preventing your crime spree. If I was you, I’d run before I got brought down like a deer.”

  Autumn blinked. Then she turned and sprinted toward the water.

  Twenty meters from shore Haugen slewed the boat sideways and brought it to a halt. Von leapt over the side, gun out, and splashed through the shallow water toward the beach.

  The Reiniger girl was running toward him. Excellent. Her friends seemed confused. In the distance, sprinting over the park’s low hills, came the first members of Sabine’s team.

  Up the beach, a man in drawstring pants was doing tai chi. Haugen catalogued him. Bystander. Along the path, toward the fishing pier, an elderly couple ambled out from behind the trees. The woman was rotund. She was pushing a baby stroller that held a white poodle. Every few seconds she leaned over to pet and coo at it.

  Bystanders. Their presence was not a problem. Haugen had planned on having to take Autumn Reiniger’s group with people watching. That was the whole point of the way he had designed the operation.

  They had waited to ambush the Edge Adventures crew until after the boss, Coates, had phoned the SFPD. So the cops now knew a scenario was running at Candlestick Point. They didn’t have to like it. They just had to believe that, whatever happened from this point on, it was all a game.

  Sabine sprinted into sight. A ski mask covered her face. A very real SIG Sauer was gripped in her right hand. She pulled herself to a stop. Walkie-talkie to her mouth.

  “Seventh person in Autumn’s group has a gun. Do we back off?”

  Haugen raised his walkie-talkie and hesitated. Who was the man in the baseball cap, waving a toy science fiction cannon at Autumn Reiniger?

  8

  Autumn saw the alien-killer gun in Ritter’s hand, heard the “let’s play” snicker in his voice, and ran. The non-smile lingered on Kyle’s face. The speedboat bobbed in the cove, engine rumbling. A man in a ski mask was at the controls. Another was over the side and splashing through the water toward her. He was short and stout, with a huge round head covered by the mask. He too had some kind of gun in his hand, not as flashy as Kyle’s, and was holding it high so as not to get it wet.

  He waved. “Autumn. This way. I’ll cover you.”

  She dashed for the water, her heart racing. She realized she was smiling. Grinning. She yelled, joyful.

  The stout gunman pointed at Dustin. “You too.” He reached shore and swung into a stance: arms straight, gun pointed at the other people on the sand.

  Autumn heard Peyton shout. Noah cried, “Come on.”

  She looked over her shoulder. Three more masked people, swathed in black, had appeared behind them, armed, charging toward the beach.

  The stout gunman beckoned to her. “Hurry.”

  Sh
e hesitated. Her boots were brand-new Stuart Weitzman black leather, buckled, gleaming, top-bitch riding boots. “I can’t get these wet.”

  Peyton squealed. Autumn saw a masked attacker descend on her roomie, grab her around the waist, and sweep her off her feet. One of her little bow-covered ballet slippers flew off. Peyton threw her head back, squealing like a piglet.

  Dustin splashed into the water.

  “Wait—give me a piggyback,” Autumn said.

  Dustin slowed, unsure. The stout gunman charged past him to the beach, crying, “Get in the boat.”

  The man grabbed Autumn, hefted her into a fireman’s carry, and began trudging back toward the boat. She heard the water sluice around his feet.

  “Careful.” She bounced up and down, her stomach thumping against his shoulder. “This is undignified. I’m the Queen of the Underworld.”

  She raised her head. On the beach, Peyton lay facedown on the sand, a raspberry velour prisoner with her hands laced behind her head. Nearby, an attacker marched Grier and Noah toward her, gun aimed at their backs.

  Lark was farther down the beach. She was waving at the elderly couple with the poodle. The woman, chubby and black with a foam of white hair, had a cell phone in her hand. Lark was undoubtedly explaining to her that this was all a joke.

  With a grunt the stout gunman heaved Autumn onto the speedboat. She clattered awkwardly over the side and Dustin pulled her in. The gunman clambered aboard. A tall man stood at the throttles, completely sheathed in black, from his ski mask to his wraparound shades to his tactical clothing to his gloves.

  Using sign language, he told the stout gunman to take the helm. Then he leapt over the side of the boat into knee-deep water and forged toward the beach.

  “Awesome,” Dustin said. “Freakin’ awesome, man.”

  The boat bobbed. Autumn grabbed the side of the hull to steady herself. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go.”

  The man at the throttles turned and glared at her.

  “Come on . . .”

  Why didn’t he say anything?

  Haugen splashed through the water to the beach. The situation on shore looked like kindling, ready to ignite. Sabine’s team had three of the college students under control but the fourth, a crow-haired girl who had the earnestness of a librarian, was trying to soothe the old lady with the poodle. Lark Sobieski—Haugen recognized her from surveillance photos. Sabine was headed toward her.

  The seventh man on the beach—the stranger—stood gripping a ludicrous toy gun in both hands. From seventy meters away his face was just a blur, but even so Haugen could see who the man was.

  He was a damned Edge Adventures employee.

  Haugen ran toward the tête-à-tête with the poodle couple.

  “. . . a role-playing game,” Lark was saying. “Honest. It’s a birthday party.”

  Sabine reached Lark. “Get in the speedboat, quickly. Your principal is unprotected.”

  Lark gestured to the poodle woman. “I’m explaining to them.”

  “My responsibility, not yours. And I have the business cards.” Sabine put a calming hand on Lark’s shoulder. “Get going.”

  With a final look at the elderly couple, Lark ran toward the boat. Young Ms. Sobieski, Haugen thought, was going to be an irritant. She had an overdeveloped sense of responsibility.

  But right then she wasn’t the main problem.

  The elderly couple glared at Sabine. From the baby stroller, their dog whimpered. Sabine lifted the mask from her face. Her expression was calm. With the blue contact lenses, dramatic makeup, and a blond wig, she was well-enough disguised. She handed the old woman a card.

  “Sorry to alarm you. This is just a game,” she said.

  The woman pointed at Sabine’s handgun. “Doesn’t look like fun to me.”

  “Fake. It’s from Toys ‘R’ Us. Listen, this was cleared with the parks department and the SFPD. The rangers should have posted signs. I’ll speak with them about the oversight.” She got out her phone. “Could I have your name, so I can tell them whom they’ve inconvenienced?”

  She had it under control. Haugen stepped away and beckoned to Pat Stringer, one of Sabine’s team. He was a black-clad little weasel of a man. Haugen drew him out of the others’ earshot.

  “We have a problem,” Haugen said.

  “Tell me about it.” Stringer glanced up the beach at the Edge employee who was guarding Peyton and Noah with his toy gun. “Edge changed the scenario at the last second. They brought in an extra man. And I think I know why.”

  He nodded at the parking lot. Parked across four slots was the crassest, biggest Hummer Haugen had ever seen.

  “Peter Reiniger asked Edge to pick up the kids,” Stringer said.

  Haugen eyed the Edge man from afar. Black baseball cap, sunglasses, Edge windbreaker, that absurd toy weapon. “Have you seen him before?”

  “No. He’s new. This is his first scenario.”

  Haugen’s acid reflux flared. This should not have happened. This was not part of the plan. And it posed several difficulties.

  His whole enterprise depended on keeping everybody in the dark—the public, the police, and of course the kids whose weekend was being hijacked. Perpetuating the illusion that the game was still in progress could not have been more vital.

  He couldn’t let this Edge newbie—“What’s his name?”

  “Ritter.”

  He couldn’t let Ritter ruin his finely tuned scheme. But he couldn’t leave him here. Nor could he beat the man unconscious and throw him in the back of the Hummer—the beach was crawling with witnesses. And he couldn’t spare the time or the manpower to subdue Ritter and deliver him to the big rig in the truck depot.

  And he could not possibly leave the garish Hummer parked there for the weekend. The vehicle couldn’t draw more attention if he put a giant ice cream cone on the top and played tinkling children’s music. The dog-stroller granny would talk about it. The rangers would investigate.

  And every second they lingered on the beach bent his exquisitely tuned timeline further out of shape.

  Tick-tock.

  “Has Ritter asked questions?” Haugen said.

  “He asked why we were late.”

  Haugen turned slowly. “He thinks we’re the real Edge team?”

  “Like I said, he’s brand-new. He was hired by Terry Coates and hasn’t met anybody else from the company.” Stringer looked at the ground. “But Ritter’s asking where Coates is—which brings up a third problem.”

  “What?”

  With a jerk of his head, Stringer led Haugen to Sabine’s Volvo SUV. He popped the tailgate.

  The back of the Volvo contained their gear, including a six-foot army duffel bag with canvas tarps inside. One of the tarps had been removed and spread across a large lump in the back.

  Haugen’s jaw tightened. “Coates . . .”

  “Fought back when we tried to load him in the big rig. He grabbed for Max’s weapon and—”

  “I warned you he was an ex-cop. I specifically told you—”

  “That if anybody tried to attack it would be Coates. I know. It happened too fast.”

  Haugen lifted the edge of the tarp. The man’s dead eyes stared through him.

  It was not the first freshly killed body he had seen. But Haugen wanted to throttle Stringer, right there.

  “You couldn’t have loaded this in the big rig?”

  “People were coming. We had no time. And it’s too hot to leave him in the back of that truck. After three days . . .”

  “Shut up.”

  Sabine ran over. “Got Ma and Pa mollified. But we have to get out of here or we’re screwed.”

  Haugen kept his voice flat. “Why didn’t you tell me about this?”

  “I tried. You interrupted me.”

  He held still for a cold moment, staring at the corpse. Then he looked down the beach at Ritter and at the Hummer.

  He took Sabine by the arm. “You’re coming with me in the speedboat. We’ll ride herd
on Autumn.” He pointed to Stringer. “You drive the Volvo to the dock. Von and Friedrich will take that Hummer, and Ritter, and follow you. We’re going to turn this to our advantage.”

  “Extra man—Ritter’s a loose wheel,” Stringer said.

  “We’ll decide what to do with him later. Right now, we need to get all these people and that limo off this beach and get out of San Francisco.”

  Stringer slammed the tailgate and sprinted back to the beach, shouting, “Into the Hummer. Let’s go, kiddies.”

  Noah Holloway, Peyton Mackie, and Ritter eagerly followed him back to the flame-riddled attention magnet.

  Sabine faced Haugen, expressionless. She knew they were committed now. She pulled the mask back down.

  Together they ran across the beach and splashed through the water to the speedboat. Von lugged them aboard. Autumn, Lark, Cody Grier, and a tipsy-looking Dustin Cameron turned toward Haugen eagerly.

  “Ready to run?” he said.

  “Finally. I have stealin’ to do,” Autumn said.

  “Don’t we all.” Haugen slammed the throttles forward, spun the wheel, and sent the boat flying across the bay.

  9

  The entrance to the abandoned mine gaped in the mountainside. Jo held back. The mine’s wooden support beams were weathered and rotting. Inside was a void: gloom and mystery.

  “It’s all wrong,” she said. “Everything about this.”

  The idea that Phelps Wylie had randomly hiked here, or that he had committed suicide by pitching himself down the mine shaft, struck her as absurd.

  Gabe took a Maglite from his backpack and crouched in the entrance. The flashlight’s hard white beam shone on rubble, animal droppings, an empty plastic water bottle. The mine tunnel looked like a throat.

  “Do you want to go in?” he said.

  She put a hand against one of the support beams. “Not without roping up.”

  She turned and examined the pine-stabbed mountainside. A fresh gash had been torn in the slope; a raw wound where the ravine had eroded violently under the force of fast-flowing, debris-strewn water.