Page 50 of Savage Hearts
We drive in silence for about ten minutes until Kieran makes a turn off the road. We’re in an industrial area not far from the airport. Huge warehouses line both sides of the street. We pass dozens of them, then slow for a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire that crosses the end of the road.
Kieran punches a code into a small black box on a metal stand beside the roadway. In a moment, the gate rolls to one side, allowing us to pass.
Directly ahead of us is a four-story square redbrick building. It has no windows on the first floor. The windows on the upper floors have iron bars and dark tinting. Smoke billows from three cement stacks on the roof.
It looks creepy, like a crematorium. “What is this place?” I ask Spider.
“A safe house.”
He offers nothing more, which I also find creepy. Shouldn’t he be reassuring me we’ll be safe in the safe house?
Or does he have doubts?
We drive around back, stopping in front of a huge roll-up metal door. Kieran enters a code into another small black box. Mounted on either side of the door near the top are cameras, their red eyes burning.
I notice a curious opening in the center of the wall above the door. It’s about three feet long and maybe six inches high. “What’s that hole in the wall for?”
Kieran says, “The machine guns. They’re remote-controlled. Fifty rounds a second. Press of a button, and there’ll be a bloody grand hole in the ground where a trespasser used to be.”
When he sees my expression, he chuckles. “Did ye think we’d be tossin’ water balloons at our enemies?”
“No, I suppose not.” Then I smile. “Though it might be kind of fun to throw them afterward. Go up to the roof and see who can get the most balloons inside the bloody grand hole.”
Spider gives me a strange look.
“What?”
“Not much scares you, does it?”
Kieran snorts. “The wee lass takes after her sister, then.”
The next person who says I’m like my sister is in danger of losing a testicle.
The door opens, revealing the space inside. The walls are raw brick. The floor is unpolished cement. A single bare bulb hangs from the ceiling.
The entire first floor of the building is empty.
We pull inside and stop in the middle of the space. Kieran puts the truck in park. The metal door we entered through rolls back down, slamming against the concrete with a boom that echoes off the walls. Nothing else happens.
When I look over at Spider, he says, “Wait.”
I’m about to askfor what?when the ground moves beneath us. With a jolt, the SUV starts to sink. Within seconds, the entire vehicle has sunk below floor level. We’re surrounded on all sides by cement block walls.
We’re on a hydraulic lift, descending underground.
“Whoa,” I say, deeply impressed. “This is some Batman shit right here.”
“The living areas are all underground,” says Spider.
“What’s on the top floors?”
Kieran chuckles. “Lots and lots of ammo.”
I exhale and press my fingertips against my closed eyelids.
In a low voice, Spider says, “You don’t have to worry. Nothing and no one can get inside this building unless they’re invited in.”
I bet that’s what he thought about the castle in Bermuda, too. “Are Declan and Sloane here?”
