The three of us stood in the doorway, aiming our flashlights into the black void. It was a concrete tunnel a little over six feet tall and maybe five feet wide. The air inside felt much cooler. I didn’t notice any odors or wet spots, like I had in the missile room. The structure appeared to have held up fairly well to the elements.
“That’s a long tunnel,” Cross said. The beams from our flashlights were simply swallowed by the dark. Reaching into one of his shirt pockets, he removed the blueprints for the silo. He tucked his flashlight under his chin, so he could unfold the paper. “Hmmm. This is strange.”
“What is?” I asked.
“This tunnel doesn’t seem to be on the blueprint. “We’re standing here,” he said, pointing at the paper.
On it, I could see the line drawings resembling the room.
“But there’s no tunnel extending off from here.” He tapped his finger on the paper. “There’s not even an indication there’s a door here.”
“Are you sure you have the right blueprint?” I asked as I took a closer look.
“Yup. Here’s the registration record and title: SF-89C Mount Sutro. That’s the official name for this silo.”
“Maybe it’s outdated,” Kang suggested.
“That’s a possibility, but I doubt it.” He folded the paper back up and tucked it into his shirt pocket. “Shall we venture forward and find out what’s behind door number three?”
Min and one of his men, Glen, sat in the front seats of the white delivery truck. The signage on the side was for Young’s Laundry—the business didn’t exist, of course. The truck was a rental, and the plates were fake.
There were two other men in the back, along with the medical equipment needed for Nadia’s arrival. They had a gurney, a portable vital-signs monitor, a CPR kit, syringes, a stethoscope, and other medical devices and medicine that might be needed during transport.
Min uncapped his bottle of water and took a swig, draining the last of it. He crumpled the bottle, screwed the cap back on, and shoved the bottle into a plastic bag.
Authorities had never investigated the reports, because the victims had turned up less than a day later. But with the FBI digging around, Min knew it was important that they plan for the worst. Nadia was a celebrity and her disappearance would prompt an investigation.
He wanted to minimize any traces of DNA. They wore latex gloves and beanies on their head. They were all dressed in black pants, white long-sleeved button-downs, and gray vests—very similar to what the male employees wore in the hotel. They’d also applied facial hair; two of them had mustaches, and the other two had goatees.
It wasn’t foolproof. SFPD would easily put two and two together from the hotel’s security footage; and eventually they would track down the truck. The license plates and a non-existent company would slow their efforts.
Min assumed Nadia would be their last snatch-and-grab, at least for a while. Any hopes he’d had of succeeding Devlin were quickly fading. And now he had to contend with the possibility of actually being caught.
Devlin sat at a table just off to the left of Nadia. He watched the staccato movements of the bow across the cello’s strings. Her head was tilted downward and moving in time with the bow. She kept her eyes closed when she played, opening them occasionally, but since she wasn’t quite facing Devlin, he was unable to make eye contact.
He tried to take solace in the fact that he was a mere seven feet away from her and watching her perform, but the enthusiasm he’d had earlier in the night had vanished. He never had meet Nadia during dinner. She had been whisked away and introduced to one person after another, right up until it was time for her to perform.
Devlin didn’t bother to intervene; instead he chose to sit alone at the table and sulk as he stared at Nadia’s uneaten pie, the pie that should have left a bit of cream on her upper lip. The cream he would have playfully wiped away.
Why can’t you just look to your left? I’m right here. I see you looking straight ahead. I see you looking to the right. How is it that the left side of the audience merits a snub? I don’t deserve to be treated this way. I’ve done nothing but sing praises for you. Why must you return the favor this way?
Devlin’s leg bounced faster. His jaw clamped a little tighter. The heat around his collar increased. He no longer viewed Nadia in the same light. She was an ungrateful little bitch.
Chapter Seventy-One
The tunnel was eerily quiet—just the shuffling of our shoes against the floor. I ran my hand along the wall. The previous spaces had all been constructed with blocks of concrete; here, the walls were smooth.
I didn’t notice any ventilation shafts or openings, but there still seemed to be a slight breeze. The lack of lighting didn’t make any sense. There wasn’t a single fixture anywhere. What would be the point of building a tunnel without any access to lights or electricity?
“Where do you think this tunnel leads?” I asked. “The control room perhaps?”
“It’s a possibility, but the farther we walk, the less likely that’s where it leads,” Cross answered.
We would soon learn he was right. The grading in the tunnel angled downward.
“I think it’s safe to say we’re no longer under the silo and are heading down the mountain.” Cross said. He stopped and turned to face us. “Shall we continue or turn around?”
“Let’s continue,” I said. Kang nodded his agreement.
The grade of the tunnel got a little steeper but not overtly. There were a couple of switchbacks to minimize the steepness.
“Gordon, any idea what this tunnel might have been used for?”
He drew a heavy breath. “Well, considering we’ve passed no doorways, and the grade is extremely manageable, and the footing is smooth… I’m thinking it was used for transport.”
“A missile wouldn’t fit in here,” Kang said.
“No it wouldn’t, but it could be used to covertly transport smaller items from the bottom of the hill to the top.”
We continued walking for another thirty minutes or so. It seemed like the tunnel went on forever. We could have literally been walking around in a circle and not known it.
“The grade is starting to level out. We might be nearing the bottom of the mountain,” Cross said.
“I wonder what side of the mountain we’re on,” I said.
Cross slowed as he reached into his pants pocket and removed a compass.
“Right now we’re heading west, but that doesn’t mean we were heading west the entire time,” he said.
We pushed on for another ten minutes or so, until Cross stopped abruptly. “The end is upon us,” he said.
“What?” A chill tingled throughout my body.
Cross stepped over to the side of the tunnel so we could see ahead of him. The beam from his flashlight circled around a metal door.
“It doesn’t look locked either,” he added.
He moved forward, grabbed hold of the door handle, and pulled. The door jerked to a stop.
“My mistake. Looks like the door is secured from the other side.”
“That’s odd,” I said. “All the other doors up until now were locked from our side.”
“The other side of this door might be a public area, which could explain why it’s locked from the other side.”
I pulled out my cell phone. The signal was weak, but I had one. “Let’s see what Google Maps tells us.”
I opened the app, and after a beat or two, the GPS locator positioned us on the west side of the mountain. Cross was right. “We’re clearly off the mountain.” I showed the other two the map. I switched it to satellite view, but the signal wasn’t strong enough to pull up imagery, so I switched it back to terrain.
“That’s the UCSF Hospital right there.” Cross pointed to blocks of gray. “We’re to the southwest of it. Looks like we’re right next to another building, but I don’t know what it is.”
“I do,” Kang piped up. “That’s Cerberus Fertility. We’re practically right
under it.”
Chapter Seventy-Two
We hurried as fast as we could back through the tunnel. If what I had presented to Reilly earlier wasn’t enough to convince him, surely a secret tunnel leading from the clinic to the silo would seal the deal. My bet was that Barnes had been abducted, taken to the clinic, and transported via the tunnel to be released at the silo. And if I was right, our visit earlier in the day would have set off alarm bells.
“They’re probably scrambling to cover up,” Kang said as he jog-walked ahead of me.
“Exactly. We need to hit that clinic as soon as possible. I also want CSI combing every inch of this tunnel. I’m betting they’ll find Barnes’s DNA.”
Back outside the silo and with stronger cell-phone service, I put a call in to Reilly and told him what we had just discovered.
“We need extra manpower to secure the tunnel and the area around the silo. And I want CSI up here to start their investigation.”
The cleanliness at the entrance to the silo now made complete sense. We hadn’t air it out on our last visit. Someone had cleaned up.
“You think that’s a good idea?” Reilly asked. “They already think we’re on to them.”
“We’re far enough from the clinic that they won’t know, and if for some reason they do open that door at the end of the tunnel, then we’ll move in. Once the silo is locked down, I think Kyle and I should sit on the clinic. If they are spooked and covering their trail, they’ll most likely make a move after hours.”
“That sounds like a game plan,” Reilly responded. “Once the search warrant is issued, we’ll send in the cavalry.”
Nadia’s jaw had a slight cramp from all the smiling she had done that night, especially after her performance, when it had seemed like everyone in attendance wanted to tell her how much they’d enjoyed it. Of course, she truly was appreciative of their comments, and she loved meeting her fans, but her day had started at five in the morning. The only thing she wanted to see was a bed.
As she rode the elevator to her floor, she thought briefly about taking a shower before bed. She would feel refreshed as she climbed under the covers, but she was so drained; it came across as a daunting task.
She chose the bed. Closing the door to the suite behind her, she left the lights off. Sheer curtains allowed enough moonlight to seep in through the terrace doors.
She kicked off her shoes at the doorway. Flowers from her hair fell to the floor as she crossed the large sitting area. She slipped her gown off her slender frame at the entrance to the suite’s bedroom and placed the earrings, choker, and bracelet at the bedside table. Standing in only a pair of white lace panties, she placed a knee on the edge of the bed, pausing briefly.
I should at least wash off my makeup.
Nadia made her way over to the en suite bathroom and flicked on the light switch. She stood in front of the double washbasin and stared at herself in the mirror for a moment before turning the chrome faucet handle. She had just begun to splash water over her face when she heard the doorbell. She stopped, thinking she might have imagined it, but it rang again.
Bloody hell.
Nadia grabbed a robe hanging from a hook and pulled it around her, fastening the sash. The knocking continued as she made her way to the door. She peered through the peephole and saw a hotel employee standing outside.
He stood there with a pleasant smile on his face. Off to the side of him she could see a cart with white linen covering it. On top was a sterling silver, dome-shaped cloche with intricate engravings. There was also a champagne bucket, with a bottle protruding from it, and two glass flutes.
“Yes? What is it?” she asked while watching the man through the peephole.
“Sorry to disturb you, Miss Ulrich, but I have been instructed to bring you a midnight snack consisting of chocolate-covered strawberries and champagne.”
“I appreciate the gesture, but I’m not hungry.”
“I understand but… could I ask a favor?” At this point, he stared directly at the peephole, moving his head forward a bit. For a second, Nadia thought he could see her, but she knew that was ridiculous.
“What is it?”
“My supervisor insisted that I bring this to you. Could I please just bring the cart inside and leave it? I’ll be back in the morning to pick it up.”
If this will end the conversation and let me be, I’m all for it.
Nadia pushed the door handle down and pulled the door back. Only then did she notice the second hotel employee. Before she could even consider why two people were needed to push a small cart, the man she had been speaking to rolled the cart through her door and into the suite. The other man stood in the doorway.
“Thank you so much, Miss Ulrich, for understanding our predicament.” He set the brakes on the wheels of the cart.
“Do you always send two people to deliver food?”
Oh no," he said as he moved towards her. "Never."
Chapter Seventy-Three
“At least their secret backdoor is secured,” Kang said.
We parked our SUV a little ways down from the entrance to the clinic’s property. It was nearing ten at night, and we hadn’t seen any movement in the parking lot. The last employee had cleared out a little after seven.
With regard to the search warrant, things weren’t looking very peachy. Reilly had received unexpected pushback from his supervisor, but he also told us he hadn’t run out of options and still had some cards he could play.
“You’d think they’d want to get to the bottom of whatever this is,” I said.
“Seems like it’s turned political. A bunch of administrators are more worried about their precious careers than investigating federal crimes,” Kang said.
“This is why I don’t want any of their jobs. It clouds your judgment and turns you into a pansy.”
Kang chuckled. “How are we doing on pizza?”
I reached behind to the rear seat and opened the pizza box. “There are two pieces left.” I handed him one and took the other for myself.
I bit into the cold slice. The cheese had hardened, and the pepperoni had dried around the edges. “Still tasty,” I said through a mouthful.
“My stomach will always have room for cold pizza,” Kang said. “By the way, have you heard from Archer regarding… what’s her name, the wife?”
“Connie Shi. I haven’t heard a single word from him since that day. I think the whole family is in custody. I asked Ryan about Colin, and he said he’d stopped coming to school and the dojo. Lucy said she hasn’t seen Hailey at school either.”
“Rounded up and detained. I bet the kids had no idea.”
“Most likely not.”
“You think the wife knew?”
I pursed my lips and swished them from side to side as I thought about Kang’s question. “I think she did. I think she was in on it. No way he was working alone.”
“How does it make you feel? I mean, it seemed like you two really got along.”
“It makes me angry. I feel betrayed. I opened up to this woman, talked about my family, even a little about my life back in Hong Kong. To find out she was only fishing for information… well, not only did it hurt, it made me feel a bit foolish.”
“Why?”
“Because I got played. And in a major way. I usually can sniff out this sort of bullcrap. Something went awry with my internal antenna.”
Kang waved it off. “That’s not you. You’re not trained in counter-surveillance measures.”
“I know, but my gut never tingled at all. She had me completely fooled.”
“It’s what that woman is trained to do. She was tasked with developing you.”
The speaker on the radio crackled. There were a couple of agents stationed inside the tunnel on the other side of the locked door. We were using high-powered UHF two-way radios to communicate.
“Agent Ross here. It’s still quiet on our end.”
“How are you guys holding up?” I asked.
“We hav
e sandwiches and water. We’ll live.”
“Can you hear anything on the other side of that door?”
“Not a thing.”
It didn’t take much to subdue Nadia. Min had clamped the chloroform rag around her face, and a few moments later, she slumped in his arms. Min removed a leather pouch from his pocket and unzipped it. Inside was a small vial of propofol and a disposable hypodermic syringe.
“Ready the cart,” he said as he filled the syringe and then injected Nadia.
The food-service cart had a holding area for trays of food. Two magnetic doors were located on either end. Min loaded Nadia through one side while Glen pulled her through from the other side. It was a tight fit, but they managed to get the doors closed. Not long after the initial knock on the door, they were wheeling the cart back down the hall to the service elevator.
The elevator stopped on the ground floor and opened up into a service hallway with the kitchen at one end and the laundry room/housecleaning at the other end. The exit to the loading dock was straight ahead. They pushed the cart through double doors leading to the dock, where their box truck was waiting. The truck was backed up to the loading dock.
Min knocked on the roll-up door, and it slid halfway up, enough for Glen and the cart to slide underneath. Min then helped pull the door back down before getting into the cab of the truck and driving away. From start to finish, the whole process took no more than fifteen minutes—exactly as planned.
Min drove west on California, toward the Pacific Ocean. The quickest way back to the clinic would have been to turn left onto Masonic Avenue and make their way to 6th and Kirkham, where 6th Avenue turned into Locksley—the street where the clinic was located.
Min knocked on the back of the cab. The small sliding window opened, and Glen’s face appeared.
“What is it, boss?”
“How is she?”
“Her vitals are fine, and we’ve started the process.”
“All right, then. Keep moving.”
The Curator: SG Trilogy Book 2 (Abby Kane FBI Thriller 8) Page 26
