Stolen (31 page)

C
hief Higgins pulled me over to Special Agent Brenner. I kept looking for Clegg but couldn’t find him anywhere. I also kept looking up at Dobson, as did everyone else, judging by the collective gasps.

A breeze kicked up, hard enough to ruffle hair and launch tiny dervishes of dust and debris into the air. The gasps from the crowds grew louder when Dobson momentarily lost his balance. He quickly recovered, his arms pressed spread-eagle against the wall. Dobson’s body moved in one giant quiver. Every part of him seemed to be shaking. I was amazed that he didn’t shake himself right off the building’s ledge. I didn’t know what scared him more—the possibility that he could fall or the fact that he was wearing a bomb strapped around his chest.

“Here’s the deal,” Higgins said. “Our guy is watching this nightmare from someplace. He says he’s not anywhere near here, but who knows if that’s true. Says he’s got a camera that can see the ledge and another one inside the apartment and that he’s watching. Apparently, this guy Henry Dobson was taken hostage sometime last night.”

“Anybody even remotely connected to me is a target,” I said.

“What’s Dobson wearing?” Brenner asked. “Do we know anything about the device?”

“I was told the bomb is fifty pounds of a homemade explosive mixed with iron shrapnel. It’s enough to take off the top of the building, that’s for sure. Agent Brenner, I want your people on it. See what you can make of it, and give us your analysis.”

“Of course,” Brenner said. “But did he say what he wants?”

“There’s a switch to deactivate the bomb that’s inaccessible because of a lock he put in front of it.”

You can’t keep your greatest fear locked up forever. It’s time to pick it open,
I thought.

My other thought:
Computer hackers love picking real locks.
It’s all about figuring out how mechanics work, finding the weakness in the design, and exploiting every bit of that vulnerability for fun or for profit. That’s the hacker creed. That was the game I started to play the moment I stole Uretsky’s identity. So it was fitting in this Fiend’s corrupted logic chain that it should be my final test as well.

But this was more than just about lock picking. He wanted me to do it standing on a ledge, looking down at the pavement, facing my greatest fear. This was his ultimate test of my ability and my will.

I was processing all of this when Higgins said to Brenner, “He wants John to go out onto the ledge and pick the lock, then hit the switch to deactivate the bomb. If anybody else goes up there, he says he’ll trigger it remotely.”

“That’ll kill Ruby!” I shouted.

“I think that’s the idea,” Higgins said. “Ruby is tied up in the apartment, at least according to him. If anybody tries to untie her, he’ll blow the bomb. Anybody else goes inside, he’ll blow the bomb.”

My phone buzzed. I lifted it up to read the text message.

“G
ive me the keys!” I screamed to Higgins, showing him my phone. “Give me the keys, dammit. We don’t have time! Now!”

Dobson’s terrified screams rained down from above, mixing with my own. I broke away from Higgins when he nodded, and rushed the police officers that had taken the keys. I grabbed one of the big men by the shoulder, reaching frantically for the keys, trying to force them out of his hand. He knew who I was, but still he looked ready to toss me to the ground.

“Please,” I said. “Please I need those keys.”

Higgins whistled to get his attention.

“Give him the keys,” he said.

Rushing to the front door, I forced my hands to stop shaking long enough to slip the key into the lock. Once inside, I took the stairs three at a time up five flights. I unlocked the door to apartment 7A, and in I went.

I saw Ruby right away. She was lying on the hardwood floor, the ball gag in her mouth secured around her head by leather straps, her arms pulled behind her back, bound with climbing rope. Her legs were tied together at the ankles. Then I saw the video camera attached to a computer—a live broadcast, I presumed. It was set up on the table, the only piece of furniture in an otherwise completely empty two-bedroom condo. I remembered the instructions. If I tried to untie her, the Fiend would see it, and boom would go the dynamite—or homemade explosive, in this case. There were no rules about kissing, though, so I pressed my lips to Ruby’s forehead, overcome with relief that for the moment, she was alive.

“
I’ll be right back, baby,” I said. “He’s watching us. If I try to untie you, he’s going to blow the bomb Dobson is wearing. I just have to go out onto that ledge for a second.” I pointed to the window. How nonchalantly I said that! Ah, just a quick little jaunt out on a narrow ledge five stories up, when I got sick to my stomach looking out a window.

Ruby rolled her head from side-to-side in a frenzied motion, screaming through the gag, twisting her body to get free. Of course she didn’t want me to go. Of course she worried that I would fall. I worried the same.

“Trust me,” I said. “I’m going to do it. I’ll be all right.” I kissed her forehead once more, rose from my crouch, and headed for that open window.

M
y fear hummed hard enough to shake my legs. I walked to the window as though crossing a tightrope, one foot in front of the other. A sense of dread redoubled with each slow and purposeful step. Before I knew it, I was standing in front of an open window. I forced myself to look all around and saw the scene from an entirely different vantage point. The police looked like specks from up here; the helicopters were distant planets. I heard Higgins call through the bullhorn.

“John! Are you all right?”

Where was Clegg?

I nodded and gave the thumbs-up sign, even though I couldn’t speak. Glancing to my right, I saw Dobson plastered flat against the brick exterior. He had his eyes closed, nostrils flaring, while his cheeks puffed in and out like fireplace bellows. Sweat had darkened his light blue shirt to navy. Every muscle, every limb on his body was trembling wildly.

“Henry,” I said. “It’s me. It’s John.”

Dobson opened his eyes and moaned, “John. Help me. Please. Help me.”

“Henry, I’m going to try.”

The vest was made of a green canvas fabric secured to the body by Velcro straps at the sides. Canvas pockets on both the front and back of the vest held at least a dozen steel pipes with threaded caps at each end. Clear plastic pockets running across the front and back of the vest provided a window into a showcase of nails and ball bearings that would become deadly projectiles upon detonation. Red and white wires were connected to the top of each threaded cap and terminated inside an opaque plastic case, which I assumed hid a button or switch to arm the weapon.

I didn’t know how powerful the blast would be or if the nails and ball bearings stuffed inside the plastic pockets would rip through the windows fast enough and accurately enough to kill Ruby. I didn’t care to find out. The padlock securing access to the plastic case wasn’t an expensive type, but rather something common in the locker room of a local YMCA. Nothing fancy. It should be easy enough to pick for somebody who knew how to pick a lock.

Unfortunately, that somebody wasn’t me.

“Henry,” I said. “I’m told I’ve got to get that lock open, but I don’t have anything to open it with.”

“It’s in . . . my . . . pocket,” Dobson said between uneven breaths.

A rattling gust of wind forced Dobson to claw at the brick for balance, his fingernails digging into the mortar until they came away gray.

I said, “I’m going to come out there, Henry.”

I didn’t know whether Dobson heard me. He answered a completely different question. It was as if he heard me ask “What happened?” but that wasn’t what I said.

“He must have broken into my apartment,” Dobson said, still breathless. “He drugged me. I don’t know. All I know is that I woke up in this apartment here with Ruby, wearing this vest. He gave me a lock-pick kit, which I’m supposed to give to you.”

“Did you see his face?” I asked.

“No,” Dobson said, whimpering. Okay, so he heard me. “He kept a ski mask on all the time. Please, John, can you do it?”

I sucked in a breath and swallowed a jet of bile souring my throat. I blinked once, then twice, but it didn’t change a damn thing. I was still up really, really high.

But I couldn’t do it. I was stuck. I had my body partway out the window, arms pressed up against the windowpane, ready to provide enough leverage to get my legs up and through, but I wasn’t going anywhere. I looked down. Shouldn’t have done that. The ground seemed to drop out like an elevator cut from a cable. Down it went, farther and farther, fading into infinity.

I couldn’t look up. The ground below me was spinning, a swirling vortex pulling me into its epicenter. So I closed my eyes, and with one leg out the window, I pushed until my other leg rested on the sill.

My legs were shaking like those of a newbie on ice skates. With my head poking out the window, the elements seemed exceptionally harsh to me—the wind blew fierce, and the sun blinded. The last time I felt wind this strong, I had cut a rope tethered to Brooks Hall.
No, it’s not like that.
My mind was tricking me into thinking the wind up here matched the force on the mountain. But the mind can be a powerful deceiver. My body shivered with a cold that was imagined as well. I thought about those nails exploding outward and saw them buried into Ruby’s arms, neck, and skull. I forced my head farther out the open window.

My eyes stayed closed. My face felt on fire. I shuddered and shook and couldn’t imagine how I was going to stand on a ledge without tumbling right off.

That was when I saw him. It was just like the time I rode the glass elevator in the Wilhelm Genetics skyscraper. Back when I had faith I could find a way to get Ruby her medication. Before I became a criminal. Only this time, Brooks’s eyes were blue and infinite, not black and dead. He was standing on the summit of a mountain, waving a flag in victory. His smile could melt the snow. He beckoned me to come.

A time warp, that’s the only way I can describe it. One minute I was perched on the windowsill, body halfway in and halfway out. The next thing I knew, I was standing on the ledge, flush against the wall, feeling the scratch of rough brick rubbing against my back. The wind kicked up with startling power. Or maybe that was just how my brain perceived it. My muscles twitched and contracted with powerful spasms that threatened to expel me from the ledge. My knees were wobbling; my heart lodged in my throat. The world below me kept spinning and spinning and spinning.

“Look at me!” Dobson shouted. “Look at me, and don’t look down!”

His voice sounded far off and distant, no more powerful than a fading echo. But he commanded my attention, so I looked at him.

“You’ve got to get closer,” Dobson said. My hesitation, it seemed, gave him strength. His voice sounded less shaky. He needed me able-bodied so that we could both live.

I took shuffling side steps, inching my way closer to him, closer still. The sound of my feet scraping along the cement ledge pierced my eardrums. I could feel an invisible string pulling my head lower, trying to make me look down. My muscles tensed to the snapping point. Each breath brought in little air. One second the skin of my face was afire, and in the next it would turn frostbite cold. But somehow I took another shuffling side step toward Dobson, my toes dangling over the ledge. I got close enough that I could feel his hot breath bathe my face.

“You’ve got . . . to get . . . the lock-pick kit,” Dobson said, stuttering. “It’s in the front pocket of my pants. Can you reach it?”

I stretched, wishing my fingers were elastic. Keeping my back against the brick, I let my fingers become my eyes, and bit by bit they found the inside of the pocket. Slowly, carefully, I slid my hand in deeper, gripped something leather, and was able to remove a small black zippered case.

“He told me it’s the easiest lock to pick,” Dobson said.

Down below I heard horns blaring. Higgins’s voice crackled up through the bullhorn. People were shouting. Helicopters whirled overhead. But I refused to look down. I kept my gaze locked on Dobson. I brought the case close to my chest, but to unzip it, I would have to let my arms come free of the wall. I would need to become more vulnerable than I already was. Determination overcame my momentary paralysis. I took out the tools, a tension wrench and a pick, and let the case fall from my hands. I didn’t watch it drop, but I heard people cry out, as if I’d just let a baby fall.

“I don’t know how to do this,” I said.

“You can do it, John. I’ll tell you how.”

“You know how?”

“Just trust me. He told me the steps to follow.”

I took a shuffled step toward the window. I couldn’t do this. But then I worried that leaving the ledge would be a violation of the Fiend’s rules.

It had to be done here, and it had to be done now. I swiveled my hips to the right, allowing me to use both hands, while keeping my feet glued to the cement. Dobson spoke clearly, his instructions both precise and methodical. I followed them as best I could.

I blocked out all distractions—the wind, the honking horns, the helicopter chop, the people, Dobson’s erratic breathing. Everything. Getting myself centered and somehow calm, I steadied my hand enough to slip the tension wrench into the lower portion of the keyhole. Turning the wrench clockwise, I applied torque to the cylinder, feeling the give. Dobson’s instructions were clear and easy to follow. They focused me, channeled my energy. Slipping the pick into the upper part of the keyhole, I could feel the tip of the pins with the tip of the pick. My teeth were chattering, and my hands were awkward and clumsy.

I kept working the pick. Some of the pins were harder to push up than others, just as Dobson said, so I applied more tension with the wrench to increase the torque. I did this several times, feeling around with the pick, pushing up on pins, and adjusting the torque, until I heard a satisfying click. My eyes went wide as the lock fell open.

Dobson squealed in delight. It was Dobson who pulled the lock from the hole that allowed the opaque case to pop open.

I searched the inside of the newly opened case, looking for a button, an off switch of some sort, but all I saw was a piece of paper taped to the inside cover. I took the paper in my hands, unfolding it. A note was written in the same handwriting the Fiend had showed me during our soundless chat.