would repay the money within one week. Harrington scanned it, tucked it away.
“This way, please.”
He led them to the employee entrance, spare and white-painted. The hallway ended in a no-nonsense steel door that reminded Brian of the NSA. Harrington put his badge to a wall sensor, led them into an anteroom watched over by a woman behind a plexiglass window.
“I probably don’t need to say this, but please, no pictures.” Harrington raised his badge to the window.
“Cuánto?” the woman said.
“Cinco.”
The lock buzzed. Harrington led them into another white-walled hallway, this one lined with cash carts and watched by two guards wearing pistols and bulletproof vests.
“I understand the security may seem severe,” Harrington said. “But we move hundreds of millions of euros through here every year.”
Near the end of the hallway yellow hospital gowns were stacked on a shelf. “Normally visitors wear gowns before entering a count room, but I’ll make an exception. Please don’t touch anything until I tell you. And I’d rather the boy wait here.”
“No,” Brian said. Tony had been alone too much today. “He’ll be fine.”
Harrington nodded. To Tony: “Hands to yourself, please, my son.”
* * *
Harrington led them into a room whose walls were so white they almost glowed. Bubble cameras studded the corners. Digital safes were embedded in the walls. Two fiftyish women stood near the back of the room. They were identically dressed in hairnets, black pants, and black short-sleeved shirts. They stepped aside, revealing a table covered with inch-thick stacks of rubber-banded notes.
“Each note one hundred euros,” Harrington said. “Two hundred notes per stack. One hundred stacks in all. One hundred times two hundred times one hundred. Two million. The Casino Barcelona has no interest in cheating the government of Spain but check them if you wish.” He picked up a stack from the center, riffled it, showing them that each note was identical.
Brian had to admit, seeing so much cash aroused something primal in him, lit his blood. Maybe this was what other people meant when they talked about love. Most people worked their whole lives without ever seeing this much money. Here it was sitting on a table for him to take.
He stepped to the table to examine his temporary fortune. Compared to American bills, the European currency seemed fussy, almost fake. The notes were green and beige, a big blue-black 100 just off center. Bridges and archways decorated them. The Europeans couldn’t pick historical figures to decorate their bills—one country’s hero was another’s villain.
He thumbed through a stack. All hundreds. He laid it down, tried another. Also perfect. Of course. As Harrington had said, the casino wasn’t going to rip off the Interior Ministry.
“Looks fine,” he said. He wanted to be in charge, at least for a moment.
Harrington pulled a soft green zippered bag from a basket beneath the table. “Good luck, then.”
* * *
Twenty minutes later Brian, Rebecca, and Tony sat in CC’s office at the El Raval Mossos station, the safest place they could find to keep the cash while they waited for instructions.
Fernandes was gone. At the casino, he’d taken pictures of the money with his phone. “Call if you hear anything.” Then he’d left, barely saying goodbye.
“We should have gone upstairs, put it all on red,” Brian said now.
No one smiled.
“Double or nothing. Make an extra couple million.” He could see the stacks doubling, multiplying, filling another bag and another.
“Shut up, Dad.”
“Don’t tell me to shut up, Tony.”
“Or what? I’ll get taken too and you’ll talk about gambling the ransom?” Tony’s voice was tight, angry.
“Tony,” Rebecca said. “We’re all stressed. Apologize.”
“Sorry.” The word a mutter. “I wish they wouldn’t make us wait.”
“She’s okay,” Brian said.
“How do you know?”
Because I know who took her, and I know why.
“Nobody goes to this much trouble to show off, Tony. This is about money. If these men didn’t know who your mom was before, they’ve figured it out now. They’ll know their best move is to get paid and go.”
As if the kidnappers had been waiting for Brian to conjure them, his phone trilled with an incoming text. Rebecca’s followed.
“I’m getting a Craigslist link,” Rebecca said. “In New York.”
“Mine’s in Hong Kong.” Brian clicked through, found nothing but a string of numbers and letters.
“I’ve got a link to a Dropbox account,” Rebecca said. “Asking for a password.”
“This must be it.” Brian handed her his phone.
She copied the key into hers.
A single file. A voice recording.
“Mom. Dad. Tony. I miss you.”
Kira’s voice, unmistakable.
She stopped speaking for a moment, though the playback