by Noah Boyd
Vail laughed. “If there is anything to trip over down there, me in one of those outfits will make sure that I do. But let me go see what’s what before we decide anything.”
Everyone sat in silence as Vail stepped down from the van and made his way around the back of the building. Tye Delson said, “I know I’m just a lawyer and don’t understand every little thing that you guys do, but why does Steve always get to volunteer?” Her voice seemed to have a slightly emotional edge to it.
Kaulcrick turned toward Kate and they exchanged questioning glances. Then he said to Tye, “Did you hear anyone ask him to go?”
She asked the assistant director, “Is that how you justify not going yourself?”
Kaulcrick turned around and stared at the monitor, holding back his anger. He reminded himself that the important thing right now was recovering the money.
Kate watched him and knew that he wouldn’t forget the slight. He never did.
Henning had reversed one of the robot’s cameras and it captured Vail walking into the building. He stepped around the device and became visible on the other three quadrants on the screen. The beam of his flashlight lit the stairs as he tested the first step with his weight before descending. Once he made the turn halfway down, the cameras lost sight of him. At the bottom, he found a light switch and turned it on.
Half the basement looked like the bowels of a hundred-year-old building, unpainted, dank, abandoned, but the other half was finished. The walls were paneled and half of the area was covered with thick rubber matting, the kind that is found in gyms to absorb the impact of dropped weights. Four folding chairs sat near a minifridge. In the corner was a card table; on it was a cell phone, its charger plugged into the wall. The matted area was covered with weight-lifting equipment, benches, bars, dumbbells, and large steel plates. Vail hit Redial on his cell and the phone on the table rang. He disconnected the call. He checked the refrigerator and there was only a single can of beer in it.
He stepped back and tried to imagine the group’s traffic through the area. Obviously, someone used it to lift weights. A lot of men become addicted to the intensity of it in prison. The equipment upstairs indicated that they used the place as a workshop for making the punji boards. The basement was probably where they sat around drinking beer and planning whatever came next. But Vail’s eye for construction told him that something was out of proportion. Then he saw what it was—the matting, almost as if it were meant to be a distraction.
Teeth, like dovetail joints on well-made furniture, held the two-foot squares together. Vail did a quick count along two adjoining edges, determining that there were sixty sections, far more than were needed for the amount of weight equipment present. He started walking across them, looking for any further indications that they might be hiding something. In the middle of the floor, he knelt down and tried to get his fingers in between the pieces to pull one up, but it was almost impossible to get any kind of grip. He thought that one of the criteria which Radek would have set for himself was immediate access for a getaway. Maybe one of the outer pieces.
Letting his eyes trace the edges as he moved over them, he noticed an inch or so of cloth sticking out from under a stack of four twenty-five-pound plates in the corner. Vail restacked the weights to one side, exposing a sturdy foot-long black strap sticking up between two of the squares. Slowly he pulled on it. It was anchored under the middle of one of the tiles, which popped up. Under it was plywood. Vail pulled up the adjoining pieces of matting until he exposed the entire piece of wood. It was covering a three-foot-square hole cut into the concrete.
Vail lay on his stomach and lowered his face as close to the edge of the board as possible. He turned on his flashlight and lifted the plywood slightly. Under it he saw a large metal box. Slowly he lifted the cover out of the way. Scattered around the steel container were a half-dozen handguns and two canisters of what appeared to be pyrotechnics. He couldn’t tell for sure because they were wedged behind the metal chest, which had a heavy padlock on the front of it. There were also a number of boxes of different-caliber ammunition stacked around it.
Vail walked back upstairs and asked the SWAT officer at the back door to get him the largest bolt cutters they had. He then went out to the bomb unit’s van and told them what he had found.
“Well, let’s get it open,” Kaulcrick said.
“If anything’s booby-trapped, it’s that box,” Henning said. “Think you can get the robot down those stairs, Steve?”
“I think so, but I’m going to have to cut that lock, unless R2 can.”
“Unfortunately, it can’t. But once you do, don’t open the box. That’s the robot’s job.”
A SWAT officer came up to the van with the bolt cutters. “Don’t worry,” Vail said, “I can still see that flamethrower.”
Vail went back down to the basement, and after cutting the lock and carefully removing it, he went back upstairs to the robot. “Mike,” he said into its microphone, “how about retracting the arm as much as possible.” Once Henning had, Vail stood it up on its back end and bear-hugged it up off the floor. With short, measured steps he walked the device down the stairs, squeezing past the turn and then all the way down onto the concrete floor. “Okay, we’re all set here. Fire it up.”
The robot came to life, its cameras adjusting forward and the spotlight turned on. The arm extended forward with a motorized whir. Vail got in front of it and pointed at the hole in the floor. The arm and its camera craned down toward the metal box. “All set?” Vail asked.
The arm gave a short up-and-down motion, and Vail headed for the stairs. Before leaving, he walked around the first floor looking at the tools and board scraps, trying to figure out whether this was the building used to make the punji boards. If it was staged, the gang members had done a good job, because there was sawdust on the floor where the boards would have been cut. In the corner was a plastic twenty-gallon trash container. He took the lid off, hoping to find the nails used with the boards or, more likely, the boxes they came in. Immediately the strong odor of garlic became obvious. It was as pungent as the night before in the building on Seventh Street. He put the lid back on and dragged it out the door.
In the van, everyone was even more closely gathered around the monitor, but Henning was waiting to make sure that Vail had cleared the building before going ahead. When he stepped back up into the van, Henning said, “Okay, here we go.”
He maneuvered the robot back and forth until it was at the edge of the hole and its arm was directly over the hasp from which Vail had cut the lock. With microscopic movements on the joystick, Henning closed the pincers around the hasp. He raised the lid a quarter of an inch and stopped, taking his hand completely off the joystick so he wouldn’t accidentally raise it any farther. He put his hand back on the control, raising it an inch, this time keeping hold of the stick. They still couldn’t see into the box. He raised it another two inches and then maneuvered the spotlight into a lower position. The lowest camera’s image on the screen became the most vivid with the increased light. Fully illuminated were the strongbox’s contents. It was filled to the top with strapped bundles of hundred-dollar bills wrapped in the same heavy plastic and tape as the recovered three million dollars.
A small cheer went up inside the van. Henning continued raising the lid. Suddenly Kate said, “What’s that on the side, a wire?”
Henning tried to reverse the robot’s arm to close the lid but it was too late. The screen went blank. “What happened?” Tye asked.
The sergeant checked a gauge on the control panel. “That’s weird. It’s shorted out. Must have been wired to fry whoever opened it.”
“What do we do now?” Kaulcrick asked.
“I’ll have to suit up and go down there.”
Just then gunfire erupted from inside the building. The SWAT officers stationed around the perimeter pulled back and took cover where they could. “What’s that?” Kaulcrick said.
Henning said, “There’s no one in there.
That electrical charge must have set off the pyrotechnics Steve saw around the metal box, heating up the ammunition.”
Everyone scrambled out of the van and watched the building. Dark gray smoke started escaping around the door and window frames. Henning tilted his head back slightly and sniffed the air. “Metallic. That might be thermite,” he said ominously.
“What’s that?” Kaulcrick demanded.
“Thermite grenades are used by the military to destroy enemy equipment in a hurry. They burn at two thousand plus degrees centigrade. It’ll burn right through a tank and melt everything around it.”
“The money!”
“If that is thermite, all you’re going to have is a pile of ashes.”
“Why would anyone store something like that next to money?” Kaulcrick said angrily.
“They probably had it in the cache ready to destroy the guns and ammunition in case they were raided. They put the box in there and electrified it, thinking if they had to get out in a hurry, all they had to do was shut off the juice, grab the box, and set off the thermite to destroy all the evidence. The electrical current must have set off the thermite unintentionally.”
“What do we do now?” Kaulcrick asked.
Tye Delson lit another cigarette and, her reserved composure regained, said, “Call the fire department.”
TWENTY-FOUR
KAULCRICK ORDERED EVERYONE BACK TO THE OFFICE FOR A TWO o’clock meeting and asked Sergeant Henning to join them when he was done at the scene. Kaulcrick knew he had to break the news to the director that they had just incinerated two million dollars of Bureau money and realized there would be technical questions he wouldn’t be able to answer. Besides, it was the LAPD’s robot that had destroyed the money. And if push came to shove, Kate had actually spotted the trip wire and tried to stop it.
Kate got behind the wheel and told Vail she’d drive. She looked up and said, “I think we’re being followed.” She adjusted the rearview mirror to get a better look at the blue-gray trash can sitting on the backseat.
“It’s nice to see that watching two million dollars burn didn’t dampen your sense of humor.”
“Hey, life is good. All the bad guys are dead and the money is accounted for, unless your friend in the backseat has a different opinion.”
Vail reached over the seat and pried open the lid. Immediately the odor of garlic filled the car. “Ring any bells?”
“Funny, I suddenly have an overwhelming premonition I’m about to be shot.”
“Exactly. Just like last night.”
“I know you’re big on tying up all the loose ends, but hunting down whoever overseasoned a meal is a little obsessive, even for you.”
“Ever notice, every time you drive we have an argument?”
“Yeah, me driving, that’s the problem.”
“Maybe it’s low blood sugar. How about some lunch? No Italian, I promise.”
KATE AND VAIL sat at an outdoor table. She was nibbling on a single taco while he worked his way through a combination plate that looked more like an entire station at a buffet. She said, “You know, this isn’t the last meal the Bureau’s going to pay for.”
“You’ve just answered the one question that’s been on my mind.”
“Which is?”
“Why you’re not married.”
“Are you saying I’m too critical?”
“Oh, no, dear.”
“Sorry, it’s just that it’s kind of fun to find little things about you to pick at. Were you really wondering why I’m not married?”
“For a good-looking, only slightly neurotic woman, I think that is the presumed path.”
“You do know how to turn a girl’s head.”
“Okay, an attractive, confident, fearless woman.”
“Fearless? Does that mean you think marriage takes a certain amount of courage?”
“No, I think marriage takes a lot of courage. More than I have.”
“Actually, I question whether I do.” Her eyes hooded in a new level of contemplation. “My father traveled a lot, on business. On one occasion, after returning home, he passed along to my mother a sexually transmitted disease. By the time I got to high school, she had left him. Since then, the few guys I could have been serious about couldn’t pass the fidelity tests I ran by them. So here I am, career woman. Hear me roar.”
“What kind of test?”
“If I let that out, then someone could cheat it. Besides, I’ve come to realize that if I’ve got to give someone the test, he’s already failed.”
“So it’s going to wind up just you and your retirement check, a little too much of which will go for cat food.”
She smiled, trying to deny the tiny flicker of sadness in her eyes. “If the cats will have me.”
Vail said, “You were probably wondering why I’ve never been married.”
Kate burst out laughing, launching a small bite of her taco into the air.
“Then again,” he said, “maybe not.”
VAIL DROVE BACK to the office, and when they pulled into the garage, Kate asked, “You are coming to the meeting, right?”
“I don’t know if you saw the look on Kaulcrick’s face when he came out of that bomb van, but I’ve seen it before. This case is wrapping up. I’m just a matter of hours away from being two thousand miles east of here with a brick trowel back in my hand. Me being at that meeting will just make everyone uncomfortable. My presence has a way of getting in the way of a good rationalization, which several people in that room are going to need. Besides, it’ll be best for you to be seen in public without me tagging along.”
Kate knew she was probably wasting her time trying to convince him. “I’m sure the director will want to thank you personally.”
“Which will make it even worse.”
“You mean for me. Any credit you get will be less for Don, and he’ll see me as part of that.”
Vail gave her a half smile. “We burned up two million dollars today. Any credit being passed around may not be the kind you’re expecting.” Vail pulled up in front of the federal building.
“When the dragon’s slain, no one asks how many federal dollars it cost,” she said and pivoted toward him. “Why won’t you stay with the Bureau?”
“I guess because it is the Bureau.”
“We’ll have dinner tonight?”
“Does that mean you’re giving me one last shot at the brass ring?”
Kate leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “What makes you think you had any shot, bricklayer?” She got out and disappeared through the door.
THE MEETING STARTED at a few minutes before two o’clock. Tye Delson asked, “Where’s Steve Vail?” Everyone was sitting around the table in the SAC’s conference room.
Kaulcrick turned to Kate. “Where is he?”
“To tell you the truth, I have no idea. You know Vail.”
“I’d be surprised if anyone knows Vail.”
The phone rang and Kaulcrick hit the Speaker button. “Don Kaulcrick here.”
“Hello, Don.” It was the director. “Please tell me who is present.” The assistant director first introduced Tye Delson. “She’s been with us through this whole thing, giving legal opinions and making sure our search warrants were valid.” The director thanked her, and then Kaulcrick went around the table, naming the SAC, Kate, and the two ASACs. Finally he introduced Mike Henning as the sergeant in charge of the LAPD bomb squad unit that had helped at the tunnel and again today at the steam cleaners. “Mike has the technical savvy about the robot and what happened with the money, sir.”
“Mike, as always, the FBI is indebted to a local police department. I know your chief fairly well, and he’ll hear from me about your assistance. I cannot thank you and your people enough. Can you give me a rundown on what happened out there today?”
Henning detailed the attempt to recover the two million dollars, and how the electrical booby trap set by Radek detonated the thermite device accidentally.
Lasker said,
“How do we know there was two million dollars in the box?”
“Before I tripped the device, we saw the stacks of banded hundred-dollar bills, and the box was full. It was the general consensus, based on the three million recovered, that it was about the right size to contain the missing two million dollars.”
“Where is the box now?”
“Your Evidence Recovery Team is packing it up. There’s not much of it left.”
“What about the contents?”
“Just a fine ash now, sir.”
The director said, “Don, I want everything carefully preserved. There are two agents from the lab on their way. They tell me that with microanalysis and spectroanalysis they can determine what was burned inside that box and how much there was of it. I just want to be sure the money is gone when I explain this to the White House. I know they’ll ask.”
“I’m sorry about the money, sir, but I don’t see any way that it could have been prevented,” Henning said.
“There’s absolutely nothing to be sorry about. You’ve all performed impressively during an impossible situation. You’ve recovered more money than you’ve lost, and two million dollars does not make a dent in what we would have had to spend if this went on any longer. We would probably have offered a million-dollar reward for Victor Radek alone.”
Kaulcrick leaned back. “That’s very generous of you, sir.”
“And, Mark,” Lasker said to SAC Hildebrand, “I’m going to try to get out to L.A. next month. I’d like to meet with all your people who were involved.”
“They’d be honored.”
“So where’s Steve Vail?”
Kaulcrick hesitated, and Kate said, “Oh, you know how much he likes to be thanked, sir.”
“Take me off speaker, please, Kate. Again, everyone, well done.”
Kate picked up the handset. “Yes, sir.”
“Where is he really?”
“It’s like I said, he really doesn’t like to be made a big deal of. I think it embarrasses him.”
