between them.
The elevator doors opened and she stepped off. After punching in the security code, she pushed open the door and headed to her office. Two agents were sitting across from her desk. The older one was overweight and his suit was worn and ill-fitting. The younger one didn’t seem old enough to be an agent. He was thin and wore wire-rimmed glasses. His suit was new but too heavy for the Southern California climate, giving her the impression he was just out of training school. They both stood and introduced themselves as being from the accounting squad. “We’re finally here to take the three million dollars off your hands,” the older one said with a certain amount of boredom.
“Believe it or not, with everything going on, I forgot it was here.” She pulled open her desk drawer and took out the safe combination, handing it to him. While he bent over the dial, she opened another drawer and handed a sheaf of papers to the younger one. “This is a list of the serial numbers from the third drop. We’d like to verify that they are the same.”
He took it from her and adjusted his glasses as his eyes slid quickly down the list.
The older agent pulled the drawer open and said, “Which drawers is it in?”
Kate jumped up. She looked down into the empty drawer and then started opening the other three. They were all empty. How could she have been so stupid to leave the combination in her desk and the office door unlocked? She grabbed the phone on her desk and ordered the two accountants away from the safe so as to not further contaminate any physical evidence that it might hold.
“Don, the three million’s gone.”
VAIL DIDN’T KNOW how long he had been out, but the first thing he heard was a woman’s sobs. Back over his shoulder he could see the silver Halligan holding up one corner of the two-thousand-pound steel plate. It was bent, and the claw had been driven into the floor three or four inches, but it was holding. His legs were still under the plate but they weren’t pinned. He pulled himself forward until he was clear. Standing up, he felt pain in his right shoulder blade. The plate must have caught him there just as he was diving to its edge, slamming his head into the floor and knocking him out. He touched his aching cheekbone. It was scraped raw.
He looked around for something to pry open the box. The voice became louder now that she could hear him moving around. He found a claw hammer on the floor behind it. “Hold on, Tye.” There were a dozen nails on both sides, and he sank the claw between the top and side, working the hammer along the seam until he could get his fingers in between. The crying became louder with relief. With one great pull he tore the lid up.
The woman inside sat up immediately. It was not Tye Delson.
DON KAULCRICK stared down at the empty drawers. “When’s the last time you saw the money in here?”
Kate said, “The day Vail put it in there. The day the safe was delivered. Actually, I never saw it in there. I was late for a meeting and had him secure it.”
“Who else knew the combination?”
“Tom Demick changed it before bringing it down, so just him, Vail, and me. But,” she continued, her voice anxious, “foolishly I left the combination in my desk drawer.”
Kaulcrick turned to the SAC. “I want a list of everybody who hasn’t been to work in the last couple of days.”
“I assume you’ll want to talk to Demick, too,” Hildebrand said.
“Yes.” He looked at Kate. “Where’s Vail?”
“I haven’t seen him today.”
“Get him in here now.”
VAIL WAS ABLE TO CUT AWAY the flex-cuffs that bound the woman’s hands and feet without much trouble, but the duct tape wound around her mouth and head took more time because of her hair. When she was finally free, she told him that she had been coming out of work late and was in the building parking garage when she was abducted at gunpoint. She was brought to this factory, bound, and gagged and placed in the box. Vail showed her a picture of Radek and she said he was the individual who had kidnapped her. “Who are you?”
“I’m with the FBI.”
“Why are you alone?”
“You’re safe now, that’s all that’s important.”
“How’d you find me?”
“I paid three million dollars.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You were supposed to