Page 136 of Code 6

Patrick was starting to lose feeling in his fingers.

Picking a padlock behind his back was much harder than picking his bicycle lock. At least a dozen times he’d felt on the verge of success, only to find repeated disappointment. He recalled Javier, back at the freighter, telling him not to “get all Houdini” on him and try to escape. He was beginning to wonder if the Great Houdini himself could have picked a lock with a bent welding rod and his hands bound behind his back.

Patrick opened and closed his hands several times, working out the cramps in his fingers, and then made a fresh attempt. Tension rod in the widest part of the hole, like the base of the key. Raking rod in the narrower slot, like the jagged edge of the key. Rake the pins from deepest to shallowest—and turn.

Click.

“Yes!”

The open lock dropped to the floor, and Patrick shook free of the chains. That first taste of freedom made him almost giddy with excitement. He climbed to his feet, ran to the side door through which Liu had taken Olga, and pushed at full speed. It opened a crack but no more, and Patrick was knocked to the floor by his own momentum, feeling as though he’d run smack into a wall. The door was padlocked on the outside. He jerked his shoulder back into place and searched for Plan B, his gaze sweeping the warehouse.

No windows. No other door, except the main garage door. It, too, was probably locked from the outside. But he had to try. He hurried past the line of chopped vehicles to the front of the warehouse. Anelectric garage door opener would have been nice, but there was just a rope hanging from the track above him. He pulled hard. The door jerked upward an inch, but it caught on the latch. Locked.

“Shit.”

He released the rope and reassessed. He knew from the last call with Kate that Liu was coming back to the warehouse after getting the flash drive. Patrick had to either be gone by then or be able to defend himself. But with what? He counted nine cars, at least one of which had to have gas left in the tank. But a fire was risky. He could end up burning himself alive, trapped in a warehouse. And a Molotov cocktail was no answer to the pistol Liu was packing, only slightly less stupid than the old joke about the knucklehead who brings a knife to a gunfight. Patrick needed equal firepower. It seemed like wishful thinking, but not really. Chop shops were never in the nicest part of town. To be on the wrong side of Cali meant survival of the smartest, and anyone with a brain knew better than to cruise through the Warehouse District of Cali without protection. There had to be a gun in one of those cars.

Patrick started down the line of vehicles, throwing open the passenger-side door and popping the glove box. Nothing in the first. Or the second. Or the third. The fourth box was locked, which got his heart pumping. He ran to the work bench and grabbed a screwdriver, which made quick work of the shitty little lock. The box popped open.

Pay dirt.

Patrick smiled as he wrapped his fingers around the butt of the pistol. It was just like the one his father had taught him to use at the range. He released the magazine. Fifteen rounds of 9-millimeter ammunition. He had all the firepower he needed.

There was a noise outside the warehouse, the sound of a vehicle pulling up in the alley. The engine stopped, and the door opened.

Liu?

A second door opened. Someone was with him, which confused Patrick. The deal was that Olga would stay if Peel delivered the flash drive.

Something went wrong.

Patrick crouched behind the car, switched off the safety on his pistol, and waited for the door to open.

Kate’s wild ride into Barrio Siloé was uphill, a race past one redbrick building after another along narrow streets. Most of the streetlamps were unlit, either burned out or broken, but there was enough moonlight for Kate to read the endless string of graffiti messages on the walls, fences, and shuttered doorways along the way. One word caught her eye. It was eight feet tall and painted in the Colombian colors of yellow, red, and blue:Orgullo.Colombians truly were a proud people, even in the darkest corners of Siloé.

“They turned into that alley,” said Kate, pointing from the backseat.

Diego steered to the curb and stopped the car just short of the alley entrance. The entire street was nothing but warehouses, not a pedestrian in sight. Directly overhead, a good fifty feet in the air, were the moving cables that carried the commuter gondolas up and down the hillside. Two blocks ahead, Kate could see the elevated platform for the nearest station. Not a soul on it.

“I don’t feel safe here,” said Kate.

“We’re not,” said Diego.

“What’s the plan?”

“If I was alone, I’d find my way into that warehouse and do what needs to be done. But I can’t leave you here.”

“Then I’ll go with you.”

He shook his head. “Not gonna happen. The best we can do is call the police and circle the block until they get here.”

“But you said the police won’t come into Siloé.”

“I have a few friends in the department.”

“Friends who would come here?” she asked.

“How much would your daddy pay for the cops to show up right now?”

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