The Atlantis Cipher

CHAPTER TWENTY

The safe measured eight feet in height and three feet in width. It was an old Gardamm, a manufacturer that prided itself on making burglary-proof products and supplying to the American government not only valuables vaults, but means of weapons storage as well.

“I cracked one before,” Cross said dubiously. “Remember Milan?”

“Of course, but Eli… we were fully equipped.”

“Dammit, Bodie, get out of the way. Can’t hurt to try, am I right?”

“In the meantime,” Gunn said, “we need a plan B in case he fails.”

Bodie knew both men had valid points. He’d known Cross for many years now, and every time he came across something different, a new challenge, he approached it with puppy-dog eagerness. Cross was a jaded man in a burned-out world, but if there was one big reason Bodie admired him, it was that he never gave up.

Bodie turned to Gunn. “Failure doesn’t exist,” he said. “We don’t leave this house without that compass. Get it sorted.”

It was then he saw Cassidy, who stood on the other side of the room, gesticulating wildly. Instantly, he saw what troubled her.

The lower-floor security door stood wide open. Through it he could see straight to the downstairs living quarters. Crap, is that a pair of legs?

It was. When Bodie moved closer he saw the sprawled-out sleeping figure of what could only be Carl Kirke. The proportions were right. The hairline was right. The man lay on the carpeted floor, with what appeared to be a large poster of a woman’s face clutched in his arms. Bodie could hear heavy snoring quite clearly.

“Awkward,” said Heidi as he related the scene to her through the earpiece.

“Weird,” Cassidy whispered. “Think I should knock him out to prevent us disturbing him?”

“Why not leave him for the moment,” Bodie said. “Let’s not forget at least that a Chinese government faction and one other brutal gang are hunting these statues and, possibly, the compass by now. As we know, the international artifact- and relic-hunting grapevine runs faster than a fiber-optic cable.”

Cassidy took a closer look at the poster in Kirke’s arms while Cross played with the big Gardamm. The man from Alabama had employed his field kit already, using a portable listening device for the tumblers and a blindfold for the concentration. He wouldn’t break off to jot anything down; he wouldn’t even move unless someone physically lifted him out of the way. Cross was way down the rabbit hole already, the job the focus of all existence.

Not even Gunn’s anxiety could move him.

Cassidy returned. “It’s a signed poster of Heather Locklear,” she said. “I don’t get it.”

“I do,” Bodie said. “Is he butt naked?”

“Eww, no. Whoa dude, are you saying he fell asleep…” She made a gesture.

“Maybe. Maybe millionaires like to sleep with their old memories. Let’s try not to disturb him.”

Cross remained as stiff as the statues that surrounded him. Bodie left Jemma on watch and cataloged all the valuables he could see. He didn’t have to do that — Heidi hadn’t requested it — but the careful relic hunter inside him knew that a thorough scrutiny of the safe room could pay dividends in the future.

Thirty minutes later the silence in his head was broken.

Heidi came out with something odd. “Chatter heading your way.”

Bodie frowned at a reflection of himself in a highly polished Faberge egg. “What?”

“The agency set up a listening station around our perimeter. We have eight unknowns inbound.”

Bodie looked over to Cross, still huddled in front of the safe as if at daily worship. “They hostile?”

“If you mean hostile hostile, then I don’t know, but in your situation any new development is hostile. Wait, it appears they flew in.”

Bodie knelt down beside Cross. “Like we did?”

“No, no, they flew in over the mountains and landed right beside the house. Smooth as silk. I have no idea what they used. We only caught the ‘all-safe’ communication that passed afterward.”

Bodie looked up toward the ceiling as if his eyes could penetrate all the way to the third building and the land that lay beside it. “They’re about to find out somebody beat them to it.”

“Finally,” Heidi groaned. “You caught up. I figure you have minutes.”

“I don’t agree,” Bodie said. “If they’re good they’ll take their time, and their method of entry so far suggests they’re good. They won’t want to alert Kirke in case he has some kind of self-destruct system inside the safe room. Several wealthy benefactors of ours have used that method to destroy evidence and avoid jail. I believe a lost da Vinci was ruined that way.”

Heidi’s tone suggested she didn’t like it. “All right, Bodie. Your call. But watch your damn back.”

Immediately he rose and dispatched Cassidy to check for signs of the new interlopers. Interrupting Cross now would be like making the man start all over again, so Bodie chose to let him work until the very last moment. Seconds ticked away into minutes, each filled with a heavy silence broken only by Kirke’s snoring and Bodie’s pounding heart.

Then Cross sat back so fast Bodie jumped.

“What?”

“Do you have it?”

“Maybe.”

“Crap! Maybe?” Bodie struggled to keep his voice low.

“Is there a problem, Guy?”

“Oh, there’s a few. But chiefly, how do we get into this safe?”

Cross whirled the spindle. Tumblers clicked and a lock disengaged. The thick silver door inched open. Some might then have pulled it wider, but Bodie remembered Cross teaching him to always double and triple check a newly cracked safe door.

Cross took his time. Gunn practically squeaked with impatience, but Bodie saw the thin wire at the same time Cross did.

“Bollocks.”

“Indeed,” the older thief noted. “Connected to a secondary alarm, no doubt. There must be…” He leaned forward, flashlight in hand, trying to get a better look at the new obstacle.

Gunn sighed heavily. “We’re fucked. My hack just failed.”

Bodie swallowed the surge of worry, knowing it wouldn’t help them now. Cross moved a millimeter at a time, not daring to breathe, leaning in.

“I need pliers.”

Bodie found a pair and placed them in Cross’s hand.

“Kirke must cut this every time,” Cross murmured, “and then attach a fresh wire. Just shows the importance he places on whatever’s in this safe.” Gently, he snipped, the sight of his rigid frame making Bodie tense up.

The door opened. Cross grinned. Bodie clapped him on the back. Jemma pushed through and pulled hard.

“Gunn,” Bodie said. “Watch for Cassidy. The moment you see her, tell me.”

“We’re on comms, dumbass,” the redhead’s voice came back.

“Not in the safe we aren’t.”

“Shit, the old redneck did it?”

“You can call me a redneck,” Cross said, “just don’t call me late for dinner.”

Bodie ignored the banter and took a swift gander around the safe. The shelves were crammed with items, but at least there was room for two inside. “Jemma,” he said. “Have at it.”

Quickly they sifted through the items, starting low and working higher. They even started at the back, suspecting the older items would be lying forgotten behind the newer. Ten minutes later and Jemma found a compass. She took it out of the safe and sent a picture to Lucie, but the historian discounted it.

“Chinese,” she said. “Ming dynasty. Probably fifteenth century.”

Bodie kept hunting. No more compasses turned up. He was beginning to despair. Jemma worked hard too, the pair of them sweating alongside each other. When Gunn reported that Cassidy was seeing movement up in the loft, Bodie was ready to call it a day.

“Not here,” he said. “Pass it on.”

Gunn held a finger to his ear as he related the message over the comms. Cross groaned loudly, having wasted so much effort. Carl Kirke stirred in the living room, rattling and creasing Heather Locklear as he turned in his sleep.

Cross clicked a finger. “You check the other safe?”

Bodie kicked himself. There was always a safe within the safe. Wealthy clients loved it. And because it was always small and hard to get at, they usually never stored the valuables they wanted to access regularly there. Cross does it again. Bodie didn’t know what he and the team would do if they couldn’t lean on the man’s vast experience.

Lying on the floor, feet sticking out of the safe, he found the portable metal box and studied the lock. Jemma kept searching. From his pocket Bodie withdrew a set of truly bespoke Allen keys, fitting one above the other into the lock and twisting. At first it protested, but then he attempted brute-force realignment and snapped off the keys.

“Bollocks, that’s not good.”

Jemma hovered over him, holding an object wrapped in a white cloth. “How about this?” Quickly, she uncovered it and snapped a photo.

The squeal from Lucie suggested one of two things. Either Jemma had hit gold or Heidi was turning frisky. Bodie bet heavily on the first option and rose fast.

“Out, out, out,” he growled into the comms. “We have the package. Time to go home.”

“Thank God for that,” Cassidy whispered back. “These guys look the shit up here.”

Gunn’s face twisted as he waited for her. “Is that supposed to be good or bad? I can never understand you lot.”

“It’s real good,” Cassidy affirmed. “And you can hardly talk, with your ‘bollocks’ and ‘dog’s bollocks.’ Get a move on; I can see you.”

“Which way?” Gunn asked, never too sure.

“The quickest, I’m afraid,” Bodie said. “We go right past Kirke and out the front door. We don’t all have combat experience and can’t risk a battle. Hightail it to the car and back to the plane. Shit, is that the sunrise?”

The others glanced out of the room’s only window, opaque from the outside. Sure enough, the pitch black at the edge of the horizon was turning orange.

“Bad timing,” Jemma said.

Bodie radioed Heidi. “Break out all the guns,” he said. “These guys are gonna be chasing us, and Cassidy says by the look of them and the way they move, they’re good.”

“She knows that?”

“She’s that good. I trust her.”

“Shit.”

“Glad you see it our way.”

He signed off. If Cassidy Coleman said these people were good, then the best place to be was a world away from them.