“Can you stand on it?” Hale asked, reaching for her, but Gabrielle just laughed.
“Of course I can—Ow!” The pain that flashed across her face was quick and intense, but it was a different kind of panic that bled through her voice when she said, “Kat, I can’t stand.”
“I know, Gabs. It’ll be okay. Just sit here on the steps and wait for us. Simon and Hale can take the mainframe. I’ll check the hard files in the archives and—”
“I’m cursed,” Gabrielle said, as if she hadn’t heard a word. “I sent the Cleopatra Emerald skidding across the floor and now I’m…cursed.”
“Don’t be silly,” Kat said, reaching for her cousin.
“Don’t touch me!” Gabrielle said. “It might be contagious.”
“Kat…” There was a tenor of impatience and fear in Hale’s voice. “We gotta move,” he said, and he was right.
“Go,” Gabrielle snapped. “I can keep an eye on the doors from here.”
“But…” Simon started.
“Go!” Gabrielle yelled, and Kat knew what had to be done.
“How long until the real bomb squad shows up?” Hale asked, risking a glance out the massive windows.
“Best-case scenario?” Kat asked. Hale nodded. “Hurry.”
So Kat was alone as she made her way into the depths of the building, past the division of counterterrorism intelligence, through an entire corridor marked with the portraits of past secretaries-general. It should have been the ultimate in trespassing—walking through those particular halls. But it felt like just another office building, and she ran faster, relying on the blueprints in her mind to lead her to the small door with the even smaller sign that read archives.
She pushed her way inside, hurtling down the stairs, deeper and deeper into the belly of the building.
“Simon, what’s your status?” she heard Gabrielle ask from three floors away.
“Well, their encryption is really good, but I’ve managed to launch a worm into their—”
“English, buddy,” Hale reminded him.
“Almost there.”
“Kat?” Hale asked just as Kat reached the bottom of the staircase and pushed open another door. She stepped onto a small landing. “Kat?” He asked again. “What’s your—”
“Uh…guys…” Kat gripped the cold pipe rail. “You know how Interpol’s sort of a clearinghouse for information?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “I think I just found…the house.”
From her place on the landing at the top of the stairs, Kat could easily see the room that stretched out before her, as vast and endless as a maze. Shelves and filing cabinets—thousands of filing cabinets—filled the space that seemed as long as the building itself. Dim industrial lights hung overhead, and the whole place smelled of dust and disuse. Looking down, Kat couldn’t shake the feeling that what she’d really found was the graveyard—the place where old jobs go after they die.
“Twenty-five percent downloaded,” Simon said from above.
Kat bounded down the stairs, following the faded signs through dusty aisles that felt light-years away from the sleek offices and modern fixtures that dominated the floors above. She ran until she finally reached the deepest, darkest part of the room and the cabinets dedicated to art and cultural crimes.
“Hey…guys…” Kat heard Gabrielle say. “What will the real bomb squad look like?”
“Us,” Kat heard herself say at the same time as Simon and Hale.
“Then it might be time to start heading for the exits,” Gabrielle warned, and Kat felt her heart beat faster.
“Okay, I got it. I’m good,” Simon exclaimed.
“Gabrielle, I’m coming to get you,” Hale said.
Kat could practically feel her crew working, acting, moving toward the exits in an orderly fashion, but she felt lost among the dozens of filing cabinets standing before her. It was like staring at a slightly less organized, highly abbreviated version of Uncle Eddie’s mind.
“Kat.” Hale’s voice was steady and even in her ear. “No crazy chances,” he warned.