FRIDAY: LA CAMORRISTA

TWENTY-NINE

Seated in the Business Premier car of the Eurostar high-speed train, Gia Cavano ate a light breakfast while her three bodyguards kept watch on the other passengers around her. As the French countryside flashed past the window at 186 miles per hour, she occasionally twirled the knobs on the device Tyler Locke had stowed in his vehicle. The dials spun in a seemingly random fashion; she could divine no purpose for their movement.

It was a beautiful piece of engineering, both in design and in construction. Perhaps it was something Locke had built. Once she had the Midas treasure, she would track him down and ask him before she killed him.

Cavano had considered flying to Munich directly from London, but her new toy was too tempting to ignore. Ever since she had acquired the Ferrari 458 Italia from a German buyer who’d been higher on the waiting list, she had been itching to unleash it on the autobahn, the only freeway system in the world that had no speed limits. The specifications listed the Ferrari’s top end at 202 miles per hour, and she had every intention of reaching it.

As punishment for letting Tyler Locke and Stacy Benedict escape, Pietro had been relegated to cargo duty and sent ahead with the truck carrying the Ferrari and a BMW M5 sedan on an overnight trip to Brussels. He would join the other three in the BMW and try to keep up with her on the drive to Munich, which normally took seven hours. If it took them more than four hours, it would be because of traffic.

She caught an older businessman looking at her, perhaps longing to spice up his Thursday morning by striking up a conversation about the unique object on the table in front of her, but he wouldn’t dare approach with her cousins all around her. One of the benefits of having an intimidating family. They kept paunchy executives like him from making pathetic advances.

Tyler Locke, on the other hand, was just the kind of man who excited her. Tough, handsome, intelligent, resourceful. Ungraceful on a horse, but that could be corrected. Not many men stood up to her the way he did, and that was a quality hard to come by for a woman in her position.

For six years she’d been the head of the Cavano family, growing it from a small player in the Naples Camorra. Few women, especially one in her thirties, headed families in the Camorra. The macho society of the Mafia rarely tolerated it, but she’d maintained her position through cunning, using brutality when it was necessary to make a point. Her late husband, Antonio, had been murdered by the capo of the rival Mezzotta family for infringing on their concrete-supply business. In response, Gia Cavano ordered the deaths of every member of the Mezzotta clan, and as a result of her careful planning, most of them were now stinking up a landfill outside San Marco. The rest of the corpses had been dumped in strategic locations to show that she was now in charge.

Unable to have children because of a series of miscarriages, she encouraged her cousins to build families themselves, promising to bring them wealth as long as they remained loyal to her. They stayed by her side because she delivered on her promises, and some of them had married into families from Albania, Libya, and England, expanding her reach into the arms, drug, and financial sectors. She had pushed into legitimate businesses that allowed her and her extended family to maintain a lifestyle far better than that of her rivals, who had to hide in the Naples fortress neighborhoods of the Secondigliano. Plummeting profits had recently begun to jeopardize her position, though.

Now she was facing new assaults on the expansion of her businesses. Chinese and Russian gangs were supplying other families with arms and men. Without a radical change in the situation soon, she would become a bit player in the Camorra.

But she had something none of the other families had: the secret to finding the Midas vault, a treasure so vast that she would be able to elevate her stature in Naples and become the new “boss of bosses.”

And that’s what this trip to Munich would allow her to accomplish.

Hans Rödel, the vice president of Boerst Properties and Investments, was negotiating her purchase of the building along Piazza Cavour that had been out of her grasp for so long. She was going through a German firm so the Italian authorities wouldn’t know that the new owner was going to be a Camorrista. She had been trying to buy the Ministry of Health building for the past six years and only now was about to close the deal, allowing her to tear apart its foundation and probe into the tunnel that she and Orr had found as children.

Rödel would help her sell the gold on the market once she began recovering it. It had to be done quietly, or the Italian government would seize her property, claiming it as a national treasure. She would die before she let that happen.

Cavano placed the bronze device back into its case and considered what to do about Locke and Benedict as well as Grant Westfield, whose identity had been revealed to her by Oswald Lumley. Orr had chosen his search team well, but he obviously hadn’t told Locke about their connection. The engineer seemed too smart to deliberately deliver himself to her home so conveniently. Locke, Benedict, and Westfield were a mortal threat. If they helped Orr find the Midas treasure before she did, it could ruin her.

That meant she had to find them and persuade them to divulge how she could find Orr. Failing that, she would simply kill the three of them, setting back Orr’s efforts to take what was rightfully hers.

Cavano’s network of informants in European police departments meant that she had eyes and ears everywhere looking for any sign that Locke had surfaced. All she had to do was hold Orr off until next week. The demolition would commence on Monday, with an estimated two days needed to break through to the tunnel. Once she had the gold in her possession, the race would be over, and it wouldn’t matter where Orr and his friends tried to hide. She would have unlimited funds to spend on the vendetta and would spit on each of their graves.

The blood of her dead enemies proved that no one got away with betraying Gia Cavano.

THIRTY

In the Audi rental sedan provided courtesy of Gordian Engineering, Tyler sat in the passenger seat while Grant drove out of Franz Josef Strauss Airport and onto the A92 autobahn toward Munich. Stacy sat in the back reading her printouts of the writing on the tablet. The flight had taken less than two hours, giving them plenty of time to get to the Boerst building and scout the location before Cavano arrived. He was just glad that his company had the resources to fund this venture, something Orr surely must have known when he picked Tyler for his blackmail scheme.

Stacy had spent the flight poring over Archimedes’ tablet, scraping the beeswax from it as best she could under the circumstances. More than once she’d winced at the process, which destroyed the writing on top, but the only other method would be painstaking analysis using a CT or MRI machine. Tyler had convinced her that they didn’t have that kind of time, and she reluctantly agreed.

Even after millennia, the writing on the bare wood had been preserved remarkably well by the tablet’s layer of beeswax. They took photos of the writing and sent copies to Aiden and several other email addresses for safekeeping.

They had debated whether to bring the tablet with them in the car. Taking the geolabe with them hadn’t gone so well, so they left the tablet behind with the pilots, who would remain on standby with the plane. On any other occasion, Miles would object to the extravagance of that expense, but with Sherman Locke’s life at stake and now a suspicion that strontium-90 was involved, he hadn’t uttered one word of objection.

“Are you ready to tell us what the tablet says?” Tyler asked.

Stacy scribbled a few more lines on her notepad and said, “Just a minute, bunny.”

Grant belched out a laugh. When the rental-car agent had seen Tyler’s last name, she’d snickered. When Tyler asked her why, she told him that the German pronunciation of Locke was a name you’d give to a pet. Grant and Stacy had ribbed him for the past twenty minutes about it.

“Okay,” she said. “I’m ready.”

“Let me guess,” Grant said. “We have to find some other old document somewhere.”

“You’re not even close,” Stacy said, and her eyes sparkled with wonder as she handed the translation to Tyler, who read the text aloud:

The spy of King Hieron has brought us a gift that may yet win our war. While seeking an underground path to enter the Roman fortress, the spy came upon the treasure of King Midas, a vault of gold the likes of which has never before been seen. As proof of his find, the spy produced a golden hand of such excellent design, it could not have been fabricated.

Three keys — this tablet, a manuscript, and the Parthenon — provide the map for finding the treasure, which cannot fall into Roman hands or they will rule the Earth and all who dwell within it.

Grant gaped at Tyler. “So it’s real?”

“Apparently,” Tyler said. “And Archimedes created this puzzle so that someone other than the Romans would find the treasure. But why didn’t they go after the gold themselves?”

“Because for two years,” Stacy said, “the city of Syracuse, which was a Greek city-state on what is now the island of Sicily, was under siege by the Roman Navy. If the city fell — which it eventually did, resulting in the death of Archimedes — the Romans could have found the map and claimed the treasure, funding their military campaigns for a hundred years. That’s why Archimedes used the Parthenon as the third key. It was the most famous building in the world at the time, but the Romans wouldn’t have access to it.”

“And we know the Romans never found the gold,” Tyler said, “because Orr and Cavano saw it. Now we have to follow Archimedes’ instructions to find it again.”

“Keep reading,” Stacy said. “I’ve tried to translate his writing as plainly as possible.”

As the seat of Herakles is to the island of Megaride, the feet of Aphrodite are to the Parthenope acropolis.

All dials must start by pointing to the top position. When you are facing the Parthenon, the geolabe must lie on its side with its knobs up so that it blocks all but the pediment. As the shadow moves on the sundial, rotate the left-hand knob so that its dial points at the seat of Herakles. The opposing dial will now reveal the direction from Megaride.

With the geolabe in the same position, rotate the right-hand knob so that its dial points to the feet of Aphrodite. The opposing dial will now reveal the direction from the Acropolis.

Thus, the combination of directions will reveal the well from which you will begin your journey. From that point, marked by the sign of Scorpio, the geolabe will show the way.

Tyler read it a second time to make sure he got what Archimedes was suggesting.

“Incredible,” he said. “He’s telling us to use triangulation to home in on how we get into the tunnels.”

“How does triangulation work?” Stacy asked.

“You use triangulation to pinpoint a location using two other points. You don’t need the distance to the location from those two points, just the angles. Once you have those, you can draw a line from each point, and where they cross is the location you’re looking for. So the directions from the island of Megaride and the Parthenope acropolis will point to the tunnel entrance. It’ll be a crude approximation because the angles provided by the geolabe won’t be exact, but it will give us a small region to search.”

“And we get those angles from the Parthenon?”

“In a way. Let’s take it one step at a time.” Tyler read the first paragraph out loud:

As the seat of Herakles is to the island of Megaride, the feet of Aphrodite are to the Parthenope acropolis.

Tyler turned to Grant. “You said that Lumley showed you statues of Herakles and Aphrodite on the Parthenon’s pediments, right?”

“Yeah. But they’re both in the British Museum now.”

“Doesn’t matter. We can look up where they used to be on the building itself. I’ll text Aiden to find some detailed schematics of the Parthenon.”

“Why?” Stacy said as he typed the message.

“Because I think Archimedes had visited the Parthenon at some point and constructed the geolabe based on its dimensions.”

“What is Megaride?” Grant asked. “Sounds like a roller coaster at Disney World.”

“Tyler pronounced it wrong,” Stacy said. “It’s Maygah-REE-day. I know I’ve heard it before. Let me look it up.”

She used Tyler’s laptop.

“Aha!” she said. “Megaride used to be an island off the coast of Neapolis, but they’ve built a stone pier to it now, creating a peninsula. It’s now a famous attraction in Naples called Castel dell’Ovo, a fortress first built in the twelfth century.”

“But it says the second point is the Acropolis,” Grant said. “You’re telling me the triangle is formed with two of its points in Naples and Athens?”

“It says the Parthenope acropolis,” Stacy corrected. “Acropolis is a generic Greek term for the high point of the city. In Parthenope — Naples today — the acropolis would have been what’s now another castle called Castel Sant’Elmo, on a bluff that has a commanding view of the city. Megaride and the acropolis would have been the two most prominent locations in Neapolis in Archimedes’ time.”

“Which makes them perfect for two triangulation anchors,” Tyler said. He looked at the map of Naples that Stacy had brought up on the laptop. “Once we have the angles from those two points, we’ll know where to start our search for the tunnel.”

“So how do we get those angles?” Stacy asked.

Tyler read the next two paragraphs to them:

All dials must start by pointing to the top position. When you are facing the Parthenon, the geolabe must lie on its side with its knobs up so that it blocks all but the pediment. As the shadow moves on the sundial, rotate the left-hand knob so that its dial points to the seat of Herakles. The opposing dial will now reveal the direction from Megaride.

With the geolabe in the same position, rotate the right-hand knob so that its dial points to the feet of Aphrodite. The opposing dial will now reveal the direction from the Acropolis.

“The shadow on a sundial moves in the clockwise direction, of course,” Stacy said.

“And all dials pointing to the top refers to the calibration we did,” Tyler said. “That’s why we needed the Stomachion puzzle. Orr’s original translator realized it related to the geolabe, but he didn’t know how. The dials had to be zeroed out to the twelve o’clock position before we could use the geolabe. Archimedes says that the geolabe must lie on its side to reveal only the pediment, which is the triangular part at the top.”

“Makes sense,” Grant said. “Lumley said the façade of the Parthenon was build in the shape of a golden rectangle.”

“And if the geolabe is also in the shape of a golden rectangle, it would be a perfect match.”

“But we need to be at the Parthenon to use it,” Stacy said. “I get it now. Only a Greek would be able to go to Athens and see the Parthenon in person. Even if you had the other two keys, they would be useless if you couldn’t get to the Parthenon.”

“Right. We have to actually be standing there, knowing where the seat of Herakles and the feet of Aphrodite would be, and then twist the knobs until the dials point to those locations. That’s what the three hundred and sixty notches on the third dial of the geolabe are for. They’ll give us the correct triangulation angles. Then we transpose those to the island of Megaride and the Parthenope acropolis.”

Tyler read the last paragraph:

Thus, the combination of directions will reveal the well from which you will begin your journey. From that point, marked by the sign of Scorpio, the geolabe will show the way.

“So the triangulation will lead us to a well?” Grant asked.

“Many of the points of entry into the Naples underground are wells leading to the cisterns and aqueducts that carry water into the city,” Stacy said. “The spy must have come out of the Midas treasure chamber and wended his way through the tunnels until he found an exit. Droughts were not uncommon, which would make it possible for him to walk through the tunnels that served as aqueducts and were normally filled with water. The spy marked his exit well with the sign of Scorpio so that he could find it again. Maybe the mark on the well will still be there.”

“So all we have to do to find this well,” Tyler said, “is go to the Parthenon with the geolabe, turn it on its side, twist the knobs to get the angles of triangulation, and transfer them to a map of Naples.”

“Sounds easy when you put it that way,” Stacy said. “But we need the geolabe to do it. Then the triangulation will lead us to the map.”

“Wait a minute,” Grant said, snapping his fingers. “There is no map.”

No map? Tyler thought. There had to be a map. How else would they find the treasure?

From that point, marked by the sign of Scorpio, the geolabe will show the way.

Up until now, Tyler had just assumed that a map was hidden somewhere, possibly in this well. But Grant was right. The map wouldn’t be hidden in the tunnels. The spy would have brought his drawn map back with him to Syracuse, and Archimedes would have destroyed it to keep it from falling into Roman hands.

Tyler sucked in a breath at Archimedes’ boundless ingenuity.

The geolabe will show the way.

The geolabe wasn’t leading to a map that would show them how to find the Midas treasure. The geolabe was the map.

THIRTY-ONE

After two days cooped up in his cell, Sherman Locke was spending most of his time trying not to go stir-crazy. He’d persuaded his captors to let him read the newspaper they used in the proof-of-life video, but the copy of USA Today could have been purchased anywhere, so it didn’t tell him anything about his location. With a diet of Subway sandwiches and McDonald’s hamburgers, he could be anywhere. He spent the majority of his time doing calisthenics. When his chance at escape came, he would need to be ready.

The only time they let him out of the cell was to record the daily proof-of-life video. His two choices were to escape when he was brought out for the video or to break out of the cell. With just the one crude window in the heavy steel door, the cell was virtually impregnable. That left overpowering two or more guards while he was shackled at his wrists and ankles, then breaking Carol out before escaping the building.

The odds were slim, but he had a plan. The only question was when to try it.

On his first day, only two men had been there to make the video. Sherman would have tried his plan on the second day, but three of them had been present. There was no way he could take out three men. It had to be when there were only two recording him.

He had the means to get out of the handcuffs, but the problem was the short time he had to put them on after they handed him the cuffs through the hole in the door. If they weren’t paying attention, he just might be able to make his plan work, but it would require split-second timing, and he’d get only one chance.

The garage door opened, letting in reflected rays of the dawning sun through the crack in the portal.

Sherman rose and went to the door. Through the sliver of space, he saw the second van return and pull in next to the semi they’d brought in the day before. The trailer of the semi was the same steel gray it had been when they brought it in, but Gaul had pasted a new logo saying WILBIX CONSTRUCTION onto the blue cab’s door over the old logo saying DWIGHT’S FARM SERVICES. Sherman hadn’t seen any clue to what the trailer might contain.

Crenshaw had been working around the clock on some kind of project out of Sherman’s view. Sherman would occasionally hear the grind of metal or see the bright spark of a welder, but otherwise he couldn’t tell what Crenshaw was doing. The man would emerge wearing headphones and nodding his head to music, and he kept his interactions with the other men to a minimum.

The van door opened, and Gaul, Orr, and Phillips got out dressed entirely in black. Gaul stuffed a balaclava in his pocket and slid the side door open. He and Phillips pulled two handcuffed men out. They were both wearing hoods, which Gaul removed, revealing two skinny dark-skinned men in their twenties, one in a short-sleeved white shirt and slacks, the other dressed in a T-shirt and gray sweatpants. Both were of Middle Eastern descent.

“Who are you?” the one in the T-shirt said in a thick Arabic accent. “Why have you kidnapped us?”

“I have done nothing wrong,” the other one said, sobbing. “I am in this country legally.”

“I know,” Orr said. “Why do you think we chose you?”

“Chose us for what?” the T-shirt man said.

“That was rhetorical. Put them away.”

“But I don’t understand! Are we under arrest?”

“That’s right. You’re under arrest. And you’ll be tried soon enough.”

As they continued to protest, Gaul and Phillips dragged them to the other cells next to Sherman and locked them in. He watched in silence. There was nothing he could do for them.

Orr walked toward Sherman’s door, and Sherman crept back to his cot. Orr opened the covering on the portal and stared at Sherman, who returned his gaze without blinking. Then Orr smiled.

“Hello, General Locke.”

Sherman didn’t respond.

“You’re the stoic type. I like that.”

“Who cares?” Sherman said.

Orr laughed. “Your son must have had a great time growing up with you.”

“My son doesn’t give a rat’s ass about me.”

“You two might have your disagreements, maybe a lot of them. But blood is thicker than water. If he didn’t care about you, you’d be dead already.”

“Maybe the FBI is on their way here right now.”

“I don’t think so.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“Well, I think I just said I wasn’t sure, but I’ve been evading the authorities for a very long time, and they haven’t caught me yet.”

“There’s always a first time,” Sherman said, “which would be the last time for you.”

“You can’t get high rewards without high risks. As a former fighter pilot, you should know that.”

“And you should know that Tyler will never let you get away with whatever you’re planning.”

“So you’ve been observing our preparations on your little excursions out of the cell. Have you put all the pieces of the puzzle together?”

“You’re either a traitor to your country plotting some low-rent terrorist action or you’re a greedy bastard with some plan to get rich quick with money you don’t deserve.” Sherman remembered when Gaul had talked about his payment. That was the only time he’d seen Orr get a gleam in his eye about anything. “My bet is on the greed. You don’t look like someone who gives a shit about politics.”

Orr smiled. “This has certainly been a fun pissing match. Now, let’s do your video.”

He threw the wrist and ankle cuffs into Sherman’s room. Gaul and Phillips were standing outside, one with a pistol, the other with the Taser.

Sherman put the cuffs on. With three of them out there, this wasn’t the opportunity for his escape, but it would have to be soon.

According to the newspaper, it was now Friday. He’d heard Orr say something about getting the truck out by Monday. Whatever they were planning would be done by then, and if Sherman didn’t make a break in the next three days, he never would.

THIRTY-TWO

Grant watched Boerst Properties and Investments from inside the café across the street. Designed to blend in with the eighteenth-century construction of the other stone buildings north of Marienplatz, the structure had been built by Boerst only two years before as a showpiece headquarters. From his position, Grant could see the ground-level entrance into the seven-story underground parking garage as well as the door leading from the garage into the glass-encased lobby.

Boerst abutted another new building, whose first floor was taken up by an exotic car dealership showing off its merchandise to tourists who gawked through its windows. A truck pulled up, and Grant was worried that it would block his view, but it stopped in front of the dealer and began unloading a bright yellow Lamborghini Gallardo.

Grant looked at his watch. Nearly four in the afternoon. On his laptop, he checked the GPS readout for the tracker inside the geolabe. Cavano was only a few minutes away. Right on time.

Stacy sat across from him nursing a cup of coffee.

“You think Tyler’s okay?” she said.

Grant waved his hand. “Ah, he’ll be all right. He’s probably taking a nap.”

“And you think this will work?” she said.

“If Cavano leaves the geolabe in the car like we think she will, it should go off without a hitch. Tyler will be in and out in five minutes.”

“What if she takes it in with her?”

“There’s no reason for her to, but if she does we’ll know from the tracker. You ready?”

“I can handle my end of the plan as long as Cavano doesn’t see me.”

“You’ll be fine,” Grant said. “You won’t go in until Cavano is in her meeting.”

Guided by Grant’s expertise with electronic surveillance and security systems, Stacy had called Boerst claiming to be with the firm’s security company. They’d found out that the garage was observed by security cameras, but the building had only a minimal guard presence. The guard at the front desk of the Boerst lobby was tasked with monitoring the garage’s cameras along with the other cameras at the back of the building.

The cameras posed the only problem with their plan, which was why they’d pressed Stacy into service, not only because she spoke German but also because she was sufficiently distracting.

Grant appraised her blouse, which Stacy had buttoned up to the top.

“You sure you don’t think my idea would work better?” he said.

She rolled her eyes. “Showing him my boobs? Really?”

“It would work on me.”

“That’s because you’re as mature as a fourteen-year-old. Besides, he could be gay for all you know.”

Grant smiled. “All true.”

“Just leave it to me. Keeping someone’s attention is my job. How are you going to let me know to wrap it up?”

“I’ll text you when Tyler’s got the geolabe.”

Stacy drained the last of her coffee. “Is this the craziest situation you’ve ever been in?”

Grant thought about it. “It definitely ranks up there.”

Stacy laughed. “It ranks up there? See, that’s where you and Tyler are different from me. Everything that’s happened in the last two days would make up the top ten craziest events in my life.”

“That’s because you’ve never been in the Army.”

“You and Tyler both were together?”

“He was a captain and I was his first sergeant.”

“The first he ever had?”

“No, that was my rank. It meant I was the top NCO— non-commissioned officer — in his company. We were in some hairy combat situations.”

“Is that how he got the scar on his neck?”

Grant nodded. “Along with a Silver Star and a Purple Heart.”

“What happened?”

Grant took a deep breath. “Ambush. We were traveling from our outpost to Baghdad when a roadside bomb went off next to our convoy. Destroyed the Humvee in front of us and damaged the lead one. We were pinned down on all sides, and we didn’t know if there were more bombs on the road.”

“Sounds horrible.”

“Two guys in the unit died instantly. Another three were injured. Tyler and I and two other soldiers took cover in a ditch. Help wasn’t coming anytime soon, so that meant we had to get out of there, but the guys in the front Humvee couldn’t move. While we provided cover fire, Tyler ran back and forth between us and the damaged Humvee. He dragged all three injured men to safety.”

“And the scar?”

“Grenade. With all those bullets whizzing around, he hadn’t gotten a scratch until then. I thought for sure someone was looking out for him. Then, while he was pulling the third soldier back, a grenade landed near him. He kicked it away, but not far enough. He shielded the soldier’s body with his own before the grenade went off. Shrapnel got him in the neck. You’ve never seen so much blood.”

Stacy leaned forward in her seat with a horrified look. “My God.”

“Once we got Tyler back to the combat medical hospital, they got him some blood and patched him up. I wasn’t even sure he’d make it to the hospital alive, but he was back with our unit two weeks later.”

“Sounds like a brave guy. I’m glad I got paired up with him.”

Grant thought he heard more than admiration there, but he didn’t want to ask. “I’ve trusted him with my life many times. You should, too.”

Stacy gave him a wry grin. “I already have.”

Grant checked the tracker again and saw that the geolabe was just around the corner.

“Here they come,” he said.

Right on cue, the Ferrari zipped into view followed by a BMW sedan. They both turned into the garage. In two minutes, Grant could see Cavano enter the Boerst building with three men. The guard didn’t make them sign in but instead waved them on to the elevators.

Grant looked at the tracker. The signal was gone. That meant the concrete floor of the garage was blocking it. If Cavano had taken the geolabe with her, he’d still be getting the signal.

“All right,” Grant said. “You’re up. Just keep your phone handy.”

Stacy stood and threw him a jaunty salute. She may be little, Grant thought, but she’s feisty.

She left the café and walked across the street. Once she was inside and speaking to the guard, Grant called Tyler, whose stronger cell signal could penetrate the garage floor while the tracker couldn’t.

“You awake?” Grant said.

“It’s actually more comfortable than I thought it would be,” Tyler said.

“Cavano’s in, the geolabe’s in the garage, and Stacy’s chatting up the guard. You’re clear.”

“What’s the car look like?”

“BMW M5.” He gave Tyler the license number. “The geolabe’s probably in the trunk.”

“All right. Time to stretch my legs. I’ll call you when I’ve got it. Just one request.”

“What’s that?”

“Next time I do this,” Tyler said, “remind me to bring a bottle of water.”

“I’ll have one for you when we’re done.”

“You’re a prince among men. Call you back in a few.” Tyler hung up.

Grant caught the waitress and asked for the water. With that easy task done, all he could do was wait and hope that Tyler wouldn’t have any trouble finding the BMW once he got out of the rental car’s trunk.

THIRTY-THREE

Using the spare key fob for the rented Audi, Tyler popped open the trunk. The rear of the car was so close to the back wall that he had only a foot of space to get out and stretch his legs. He closed the lid and looked around to get his bearings as he adjusted his Seattle Mariners cap.

He’d brought a flashlight in case the garage was cloaked in darkness, but the seven-story structure was well lit, probably to give the security cameras a clear view. Tyler took the heavy flashlight with him anyway. It would be the easiest way into the locked BMW.

The robotic system for parking cars was simple for the driver. On the ground floor, there were two bays enclosed with glass doors, one for cars entering the garage and the other for cars exiting. Once the driver parked the car in the bay and got a ticket, the car sank into the underground structure on a tray.

The garage itself was designed to maximize space. The cars were stacked in cubbyholes on either side of a center atrium, and the tray moved on a track system to place each new car in an empty slot with its rear to the wall. The tray with the car would slide into the slot, and the empty tray already there would slide out at the same time.

The garage was supported by girders, so there were no walls between the vehicles. Since people weren’t parking the cars, there was no chance of getting a door ding. Another advantage of the automated garage was that thieves couldn’t break into or vandalize the cars. Unless, that is, they hid in the trunk of a car as Tyler had done.

That’s what the cameras at either end of the atrium were for, in case anyone tried this kind of trick. Tyler just hoped Stacy could keep the guard’s eye away from the monitor while he prowled around the garage.

Tyler went to the front of the Audi and stopped at the edge of the center atrium to note that he had ended up on the sixth level up from the bottom. It had been difficult to gauge how fast the system moved from inside the trunk.

In answer to his unspoken question, a bare tray whooshed by and stopped in front of a VW two levels below him. In a few seconds of whining motors, the bare tray was exchanged for the tray holding the car. It zipped along the tracks until it was at the end of the garage, where it rose until it disappeared into the ceiling. The VW’s entire retrieval took no more than a minute.

He searched the garage and saw the BMW with the license number Grant had given him. It was one level below him on the opposite side. Cavano’s Ferrari was on the lowest level, its bright red paint job shining like a beacon.

Cavano had mentioned putting the geolabe in the trunk when she was in her office, which had to mean the BMW. Since the Ferrari was a rear-engined V8 with no room for a trunk, it had only a small storage space under the hood. Still, it might have enough room, so he’d check there if he didn’t find the geolabe in the BMW.

To get to the BMW, he’d have to cross the center atrium, but at twenty feet wide the span was too far to jump. Mounted on either end of the garage were access ladders and narrow walkways for maintenance crews to work on the equipment.

Tyler was in the middle of the row of cars, so he squeezed past their trunks to make his way to the catwalk on his level, trying to stay out of view of the cameras as much as possible in case the guard glanced at his screen. He pulled his cap lower to shadow his face, making him unrecognizable even if the camera did catch sight of him.

In two minutes, he had crossed the catwalk, climbed down the ladder to the fifth level, and trekked past the back ends of the cars to the slot with the BMW, approaching from the passenger side. The heavily tinted windows and the darkness of the parking spot made it impossible to see the interior, but the most likely place for the geolabe was the trunk. The rear of the car, however, was so close to the wall that it would be difficult to stand behind the car and thoroughly search the trunk. He decided he’d push the car out from the wall to give himself some space to look through the luggage.

With no key fob to disable the security system, he’d have to do this the old-fashioned way. No one would be able to hear an alarm down here.

Tyler put on the leather gloves he’d brought with him and raised the flashlight to shatter the window but stopped before he swung it down. Would they really set the alarm? he thought. Maybe they wouldn’t even bother to lock it.

He lowered the flashlight and tugged on the passenger-door handle. The latch released.

With nowhere else to put it, Tyler stood the flashlight on the roof. He pulled the door open and put a knee on the passenger seat of the left-hand-drive car. He flicked the manual transmission to neutral and released the parking brake so that he’d be able to push the car away from the wall. The trunk release was by the driver’s foot just inside the door. He leaned over and punched the button. The trunk popped open.

Tyler rose and was about to get back out of the car when he felt the cold metal of a pistol barrel press against his left temple.

He froze, and heard Pietro say, “Buon giorno, Signor Locke.”

THIRTY-FOUR

Pietro couldn’t believe his good fortune. He’d been forced to remain with the BMW because he had let Locke escape just the day before. Now he had a chance to make up for his failure.

He was supposed to keep an eye on both cars, but when he saw the interior of the garage, he couldn’t imagine there would be any kind of security threat. So he had stayed in the backseat to stretch out and listen to his iPod.

The music had been so loud that he hadn’t heard Locke approach. It wasn’t until the door opened that he realized someone was there. When Pietro saw who it was, he knew it was the perfect opportunity to redeem himself. He silently drew his SIG Sauer pistol and when Locke was upright again, he made his move.

He didn’t know much English, but the gun at Locke’s head made any additional communication unnecessary. His captive didn’t move.

With his free hand, he took out his phone and dialed Salvatore.

“Sì?” Salvatore answered.

“Sal, I have a surprise for Gia,” Pietro said in Italian. “Come and get me.”

“She’s busy.”

“Then you and Tino. I have something she’s been looking for.”

“Okay. But this had better be good.”

“Just get me,” Pietro said, and hung up.

He tilted his head toward the door so Locke would close it. Locke pointed at it questioningly, and Pietro nodded.

But instead of closing it Locke slowly got out of the car with his hands up.

Pietro said, “No, no, no!” But the imbecile kept going until he was leaning with his hands against the roof, as if Pietro were a police officer making an arrest. Stupido.

Pietro didn’t really care about killing Locke, but Cavano would want him alive. Wounding him was always an option, but that would get blood all over the car. Pietro didn’t know how to say, “Get back in the car, you idiot!” He’d have to work on his English.

With his gun trained on Locke, Pietro opened his own door. Locke remained standing by the side of the car with his hands still up high.

Pietro got out to put Locke back in the passenger seat. As he stood and brought the pistol up, Locke whipped around in a lightning move and the heavy flashlight smacked into Pietro’s arm, sending the SIG flying.

Pietro cried out in pain at his shattered wrist. He stumbled back and lashed out with a kick as Locke came at him with the flashlight raised for the knockout blow.

His foot caught Locke in the midsection, sending Locke reeling back against the Mercedes parked in the slot next to the BMW. Pietro reached into his jacket pocket, drew his switchblade, and clicked open the wicked five-inch blade.

He crouched and warily moved toward Locke, his limp right hand cradled against his body. Pietro wasn’t going to bother trying to keep him alive any more. Even with one hand useless, he was a master with a knife. If he could just get in close enough, nothing would stop him from cutting Locke’s throat.

In the narrow space between the two cars, Locke feinted with the flashlight. Pietro dove forward hoping for a killing thrust, but Locke shoved him backward, knocking Pietro against the BMW’s back door, which slammed shut. Pietro swung around. The only thing between him and Locke was the open front door.

Locke rushed forward, the flashlight low, going for the upper cut. Pietro was ready to slash him across the neck as he went by, but before he reached Pietro, Locke struck the window of the open door, sending chunks of safety glass hurtling at Pietro.

Pietro instinctively shielded himself from the flying glass and only realized too late that it was a diversion. While Pietro had his hands up, Locke rushed in and brought the flashlight down like a lumberjack.

Pietro’s world went black.

* * *

Tyler kicked Pietro a couple of times to prove that the Italian wasn’t feigning unconsciousness. Convinced that his hammer blow had worked, Tyler knelt and caught his breath.

In a few seconds his heart rate was below hummingbird speed. He picked up the switchblade and put it in his pocket. The gun was nowhere to be seen, and he had no time to look for it.

Tyler searched Pietro’s pockets, but there were no more guns, just a passport, a wallet, and a key chain with keys to both the BMW and the Ferrari. He was surprised that Cavano shared the keys with anyone. Either she wanted someone else to carry her spare or someone was being a naughty boy and taking the Ferrari out for joyrides when he wasn’t supposed to.

Tyler pocketed the keys and took out his phone to call Grant.

“You got it?”

“Not yet,” Tyler said. “I’ve had a run-in with one of Cavano’s men.”

“She left one down there?” Tyler knew Grant was kicking himself for not warning him, but with the heavily tinted windows there was no way Grant could have known that someone was in the car.

“Doesn’t matter. He’s down for the count, but I think he made a call to her. We may need an alternate exit strategy. And tell Stacy to get out of there before they see her.”

“Crap! It’s too late. They’re in the lobby.”

“I’ll call you back,” Tyler said, and hung up.

He pushed the car forward far enough to get behind it and opened the trunk. He didn’t have time to go through the bags and search for the geolabe. There were five pieces of carry-on luggage inside. The geolabe must be in one of them. He put the flashlight down and swiftly removed the luggage, sliding the cases between the BMW and the Mercedes.

He had just taken out the last case when he saw movement inside the car and heard the glove box open.

Pietro. The blow hadn’t left him incapacitated long enough. Tyler picked up the flashlight, ready to finish the job, when bullets started blasting through the backseat.

He dove under the bumper. In his haste, he hadn’t checked the interior for more pistols, and with the switchblade in his pocket he was the proverbial guy who had brought a knife to a gunfight.

The shots were wild. Pietro was probably woozy from a concussion, but one of the shots would eventually connect. Tyler had only one chance.

With his feet against the wall, he put his back against the bumper. The BMW rolled forward. A bullet creased his shoulder, but Tyler ignored it and heaved with everything he had.

His legs were fully extended when the front wheels fell over the edge. The BMW tilted forward and plunged into the abyss as Pietro screamed from inside. An earsplitting crash echoed through the garage when the car slammed into the concrete floor.

Tyler got up and went to the edge. Five floors below, the BMW had landed on its roof. The air bags hadn’t saved Pietro. His lifeless body poked out of the wreckage, blood pooling around his head.

The empty tray began to lower from its spot at the exit bay. Pietro’s friends were coming for the BMW.

Tyler had to hurry. He unzipped the first bag and rifled through its contents. Nothing but clothes. He did the same with the second, third, and fourth, but came up empty. He tossed each of them into the atrium as he finished with them.

That left the fifth bag. The tray from the exit bay came and lined up to switch itself with the tray the BMW had been on. Tyler picked up the last bag and jumped onto the hood of the Mercedes so that he wouldn’t be crushed as the trays were exchanged. With luck, the empty tray would buy him more time as they tried to figure out why the car was missing.

With the new tray in place, Tyler got down and opened the final bag. He was aghast when he realized it was just another bag of clothes.

The geolabe wasn’t here. He’d gotten enough of a view of the BMW’s interior to know that the geolabe wasn’t inside. But if it wasn’t in the smashed car below, that left …

The retrieval tray came down a second time, but it didn’t stop at the sixth level. It kept heading to the bottom.

Puzzled by the empty tray and the noise from the crash, Cavano’s men must have inserted the ticket for the other car.

If Tyler didn’t move fast, he’d lose his best chance to get the geolabe, which had to be inside the Ferrari.

THIRTY-FIVE

The TV screens at the guard station in the Boerst lobby were at the front of the desk, so Stacy had positioned herself to the side with her back to the elevators. Her strategy to use the map from the rental-car agency to ask for directions worked to perfection. The guard, a thin blond kid who looked straight out of high school, seemed to be the helpful type, and she was right. In her experience, men liked having a problem to solve, so she had made her predicament as complicated as possible, intentionally flubbing her German for good measure. The guard hadn’t once glanced at the security-camera feeds.

Then the crash had reverberated through the building. The guard had been looking at her map and Stacy had been looking at the video feed when the BMW fell to the bottom of the garage. She feared the worst for Tyler until she saw his familiar form peer over the edge of the chasm. Something had gone dreadfully wrong, and all she could do was delay the guard’s figuring out what had happened long enough for Tyler to get out of there.

The guard’s head snapped up when he heard the noise. Stacy grabbed his arm and pointed outside.

“Did you see that?” she said, and frantically pulled the guard with her to the front door, not giving him a chance to check his screens.

“What happened?” he said.

“I think I saw a car just crash into the building next door.”

As they looked outside for evidence of the accident, her phone buzzed.

The text message from Grant said,

Two of Cavano’s men just passed you. Don’t turn around.

Stacy stiffened. She hadn’t been expecting them down so soon.

“I don’t see it,” the guard said.

“It was a blue car,” Stacy said, her heart pounding at the danger they were all in. “I saw it speed by way too fast. It must have hit a car around the corner. We should go look.”

The guard turned back toward the reception desk. “But I’m not supposed to leave the building—”

“Did you see the car?”

She was debating whether to leave or stay when the elevator dinged. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of Cavano, her long raven hair distinctive. She was with her other bodyguard. If they realized it was Stacy with the guard, they’d be on her in a second.

Cavano and her hulking escort went out the door to the garage.

Stacy held on to the guard’s arm and continued to pepper him with questions, trying to keep him engaged as long as possible. The second he got back to his station, all hell would break loose.

* * *

The empty vehicle tray had already been swapped for the tray with the Ferrari on it, and Tyler was watching his chance of recovering the geolabe being whisked toward the exit. His plan to climb down and get it before leaving through one of the maintenance exits had vanished.

Tyler had to get to the Ferrari before it rose into the exit bay. He ran along the front of the cars, not caring if the camera could see him at this point. If the guard even glanced at the camera, he’d sound the alarm when he saw the crushed remains of the BMW.

The Ferrari stopped at the bottom as the system transitioned to lifting the tray. Tyler was still three cars from the end. He pushed the unlock button on the Ferrari’s key fob that he’d taken from Pietro.

The tray rose. With a couple of leaps over the hoods of the last two cars, Tyler banged into the wall. As the Ferrari reached the level below him, he jumped.

His feet barely caught on the edge of the tray, and he thumped into the Ferrari’s rear. He had no time to get into the front boot, the only other possible storage place for the geolabe. He opened the driver’s door and squeezed inside, slamming it behind him. He crouched down across the passenger seat as the Ferrari stopped and waited for the exit bay’s floor to slide aside for the tray to rise up.

He redialed Grant’s number.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Is Stacy with you?” Tyler said.

“No, she’s still in the lobby. If Cavano goes back in, she’ll see Stacy for sure.”

“Tell her to leave through the front door in fifteen seconds.”

“Okay.” He and Grant had known each other long enough for Grant not to waste time asking why.

“And, no matter what you see, stay where you are.”

“But Cavano—” Grant wouldn’t like that request, but Tyler hung up before he could hear more.

The Ferrari began rising again and stopped in the exit bay. As the doors opened, Tyler sat up and started the engine.

Right in front of him were the three bodyguards and Cavano, who stared at Tyler in disbelief.

* * *

When Sal had left to find out what the surprise was, Cavano suspected Pietro was attempting to get one of the other bodyguards to switch places with him.

But a few minutes after he’d gone, Sal called to say that the BMW was missing and that they couldn’t get hold of Pietro. Cavano wondered if Pietro had left his post and taken the BMW for a drive, but she realized that he couldn’t have exited the garage on his own. Retrieving the car could be done only from outside the garage. Perhaps the computer system had directed the tray to the wrong spot in the garage, but a nagging feeling told her that something was wrong, so she instructed Sal to retrieve the Ferrari to make sure it was still there.

As Cavano hurried from the elevator to the garage exit, she had barely registered the sight of the guard speaking to a woman at the front door, their backs to her.

She was standing in front of the bay with Sal and the other two bodyguards when the Ferrari arrived, seemingly intact. But as the doors opened, she was stunned to see Tyler Locke sit up in the seat of her car and start it up.

Before any of them could react, Locke gunned the engine and smoked tires out of the bay, sending the four of them diving to avoid being run over.

Cavano had thought the whole business with Locke was a sideshow until this moment. Now she realized how important that device must be to him if he was willing to take this kind of risk to get it back.

As she pushed herself to her feet, Cavano vowed again that Orr and Locke would not beat her to the Midas treasure. She ran out into the street and saw her new Ferrari screech to a halt. The woman the guard had been talking to burst through the doors and ran to the Ferrari.

“Get in,” Locke yelled through the open passenger window.

At the Ferrari’s door, Stacy Benedict turned and locked eyes with Cavano, who was momentarily frozen with rage.

Benedict jumped in, and the Ferrari took off.

An alarm went off in the Boerst building, but Cavano ignored it. She had to get her car back, and the BMW was nowhere to be found.

Cavano could hijack a car driving by, but it would never be able to keep up with the Ferrari. Then she remembered the exotic car dealership, the same one that had brokered her purchase of the Ferrari.

She whirled around and saw the truck delivering cars for the dealership. Two were already parked on the street, a yellow Lamborghini Gallardo and a black Pagani Zonda. Both of them were supercars at least the equal of her 458 Italia.

Cavano waved to her men and pointed at the cars.

“Let’s go!” she yelled.

A salesman from the car dealership was inspecting the cars. Cavano ran to the driver’s door of the Zonda and opened it.

The salesman started yelling in German.

“What are you doing?”

Sal jumped into the passenger seat of the Zonda, while the other two took the Lamborghini. The keys were still in both cars.

The Lamborghini took off after Locke, leaving the salesman screaming at them.

Cavano started the Zonda and revved the twelve cylinders to the redline.

“Tell your boss Gia Cavano just bought these cars,” she said to the salesman through the open window in her passable German.

The salesman sputtered in amazement, but Cavano didn’t wait to hear his response. She threw the Zonda into gear and laid down a patch of rubber twenty yards long.

THIRTY-SIX

With a yellow Lamborghini in the rearview mirror, Tyler knew his escape wasn’t over. It had to be the one he’d seen as he exited the garage, which meant that Cavano wasn’t giving up on her Ferrari that easily.

He had hoped to find a good place to ditch the car and make their escape on foot into Munich’s U-Bahn subway, but the rush-hour traffic had slowed them enough to allow their pursuers to catch up. Because he and Stacy were unarmed, a footrace would be suicidal. And going to the police wasn’t an option after trashing the garage, killing a man, and stealing a car.

“Oh, my God!” Stacy shouted above the roar of the engine. “You’re bleeding!” She took off her sweater and pressed it against his arm.

Tyler winced. In the escape he’d forgotten about the gunshot wound, but now the pain in his shoulder howled.

“I’ll be fine,” he said through gritted teeth.

“It looks like you got shot! Are you hit anywhere else?”

“I don’t think so.”

“I saw a wrecked car in the garage. What the hell happened? Why are we in Cavano’s car?”

“Had a little trouble getting into the BMW. Pietro surprised me.”

The traffic slowed ahead, so Tyler cranked the wheel to the right, turning onto a street called Steinsdorfstrasse that ran alongside the river. Stacy squealed as he weaved through the traffic, occasionally zooming into the oncoming lane when he saw an opening.

Now she’d get an idea of what it had been like for him on the horse. Using the paddle shifters, Tyler had complete control, as if he were part of the car. Stacy, on the other hand, looked distinctly unhappy as she struggled to keep from getting thrown back and forth.

“Put your seat belt on,” Tyler said. “This could get dicey.”

She snapped the belt into place. “Dicier than this?”

“Could be.”

Tyler couldn’t put any distance between them and the Lamborghini, which had now been joined by a black Pagani Zonda.

“Did you get the geolabe?” Stacy asked.

“It’s got to be in the front boot.”

“Where are we going?”

He had to get out of these narrow streets. They could corner him if he ran into a traffic jam.

A blue sign flashed by depicting a highway overpass and an arrow toward 95.

The autobahn. The sleek sports cars following them were a match for the Ferrari. Outrunning them would be next to impossible, but the open highway was better than a city traffic jam.

He gave Stacy his phone.

“Call Grant and tell him to head this way.”

“But he’ll never catch us.”

“Just tell him that we’re getting onto the 95.”

As she dialed, Tyler thought about the evidence he’d left behind in the garage. Now he was glad he’d worn the gloves. If he had been successful in keeping his face out of sight of the cameras, there would be nothing leading back to him.

Of course, none of that would matter if Cavano and her men caught up with them.

He passed through an intersection just as the light turned red, but that didn’t deter the Zonda and the Lamborghini. Horns honking, they blew through.

The Ferrari’s gas gauge read more than half full. Cavano must have filled up before she arrived in Munich, which sparked a brainstorm for how to get out of this mess.

Tyler’s plan was simple. At high speed, these cars all gulped fuel at a prodigious rate. Because the Lambo and the Zonda were being delivered to a dealer, Tyler was sure that they had only a token amount of gas in their tanks. If he could stay ahead of them long enough, they would run out before he did. Then he could leisurely plan a place to rendezvous with Grant.

On the phone, Stacy said, “No, he’s busy trying to kill us. Where are you … On the road? … Thank God.” To Tyler, she said, “He got the Audi. The police got there just after he took off. He says Cavano’s driving the Zonda, and she looked pissed.”

Tyler wasn’t surprised. He’d be pissed, too, if someone had stolen his $250,000 supercar.

Stacy told Grant they were about to get on the 95. “What then?” she said to Tyler.

“Tell him to take the autobahn south, and we’ll call him back when we can.”

While she did that, Tyler swung onto E54, the highway leading to the autobahn. He couldn’t get above eighty miles an hour as he constantly squirted through tiny spots between cars, much to the annoyance of the Germans he passed, who were used to the rigid law of cars passing only on the left.

The honking horns behind him meant that Cavano and the other car were using the same tactics, and they were gaining ground.

A minute later, a sign said one kilometer to 95.

The traffic in the left-turn lane leading onto the autobahn was backed up and at a standstill.

“Don’t stop!” Stacy yelled.

“I’m not.”

When Tyler reached the intersection, he stood on the brakes, throwing him and Stacy against their straining seat belts. With a flick of the wheel, he veered left from the middle lane and charged past a turning truck, eliciting another scream from Stacy.

They now had a clear stretch of autobahn in front of them. Tyler snapped the Ferrari through its gears. In ten seconds they were doing over 120 and still accelerating.

The Lambo made it through the intersection faster than Cavano’s Zonda. Tyler had to slow as he waited for a station wagon that was tooling along at 100 to pass a semi, giving the Lambo time to catch up. By the time the lane was free, the Lambo was right behind them.

Tyler floored it, and the Ferrari leaped forward. Stacy had forgotten about his wound and gripped the sides of her seat.

Within seconds they were skirting 200 miles per hour on the sweeping turns through the Bavarian Forest. Even in a car meant for the track, 200 was eye-watering. Tyler was now so focused on the road that he didn’t dare glance at Stacy again.

A Porsche sedan up ahead must have noticed the two supercars headed its way and decided to see if it could match their speed. The car pulled into the passing lane and sped up, but it was still slower than the Ferrari.

Tyler caught up to the Porsche and had to tap the brake to keep from rear-ending it. That was all the Lambo needed to make up the distance, and the Zonda was nearing them as well.

The Porsche pulled aside to let Tyler pass. The Ferrari rocketed forward, but the Lambo stayed with them. The Porsche fell behind, unable to keep up.

In the rearview mirror, Tyler saw the Lambo’s passenger window roll down. The man in the passenger seat stuck a gun out the window, ready to take aim at the Ferrari’s tires, but he hadn’t counted on the force of the 180-mph wind. The pistol was torn from his hand and skipped across the road into the grass.

If they had another gun, the Lambo’s passenger wouldn’t make that mistake again, and a blowout at this speed would mean the end of the Ferrari and both of the people it carried.

Tyler let up on the accelerator.

“Why are you slowing down?” Stacy said. Even she was getting used to the speed when slowing down meant going under 175.

“I want them to get closer,” Tyler said.

“Closer? Are you nuts?”

The road was curving to the left, so Tyler hugged the inside of the left lane, letting the Lambo pull along Stacy’s side. He’d have to do this just right, or they’d be eating metal.

The driver raised a pistol. He was gesturing for them to slow down or he’d shoot. Perfect. Only one hand on the wheel.

Tyler jerked the wheel to the right, bashing the Ferrari into the Lambo. The driver got off two shots, but they both went into the hood.

The Lambo was nudged over just far enough to catch the edge of the shoulder. The unevenness made the driver over-correct, and the back wheels spun out. When it reached the grass embankment, the Lambo flipped, spewing body panels and engine parts all over the side of the autobahn. Tyler saw the bodies of both occupants go flying. At that speed, they would be pulped on impact.

Now Tyler was responsible for the deaths of three men today. He had killed before in self-defense, so he understood the grim necessity of it, but Stacy was aghast at the carnage.

Tyler was so fixated on the crash that he hadn’t noticed the Zonda closing the gap. Cavano’s car had just a little more horsepower, so she was slowly creeping up on them no matter how hard he pushed the Ferrari.

The Zonda pulled up on Tyler’s side, and the man in the passenger seat had his own gun pointed at Tyler. Tyler tried the same maneuver he’d used to destroy the Lambo. He yanked the wheel over, but Cavano was too deft and avoided the impact.

When she pulled even again, she leaned over so that Tyler could see her smile and wag a finger at them.

“She’s got us,” he said.

“You’re giving up?”

“Never. I just have to think of something else.”

“Like what?”

“That’s the hard part.”

Cavano’s passenger fired two warning shots into the air. Apparently, Cavano wanted her Ferrari back in one piece. But her passenger made it clear that the next two shots were going to end Tyler’s and Stacy’s lives one way or the other if they didn’t pull over.

Tyler saw a sign that said AUSFAHRT. An exit. Two kilometers. If he could reach it, maybe he could figure out something. He slowed to give the impression that he was obeying her command.

The Zonda suddenly lurched as if the car were having a seizure. Tyler thought Cavano had hit the brake, but then it sped up before lurching again.

The passenger turned away to see what was happening, but Tyler already knew. She was out of gas. He mashed his own pedal down.

Cavano gestured wildly to the gunman, but by the time he turned back around, the Ferrari was already directly in front of the Zonda. Not learning from his dead comrade, he stuck the gun out to shoot them and had it snatched from his hand.

The Zonda continued to slow and finally pulled over to the shoulder.

Tyler cruised to the exit, satisfied that he and Stacy were in the clear. He blipped the throttle and soon the Zonda was out of sight.

Taking a back road that ran parallel to the autobahn, they met Grant at a rest-area parking lot where they’d dump the Ferrari. Cavano would get it back, though with about eighty thousand dollars’ worth of bodywork.

“You guys okay?” Grant asked as they got out.

Tyler nodded, holding his wounded arm. “Nothing that a bandage won’t take care of.”

Stacy steadied herself against the Audi. “After that ride, I feel like I’m bathing in adrenaline.”

“Let’s make a pact,” Tyler said. “I never drive you in a car at two hundred miles an hour again, and you never make me ride another horse.”

She smiled. “You’ve got a deal. Next time we’ll compromise and make it a horse and buggy.”

Tyler groaned playfully, opened the front boot, and saw a case inside. He lifted its lid to make sure the whole car chase hadn’t been for nothing.

There was the geolabe shining brightly at him. He breathed a sigh of relief and was about to close the case when he heard it rattle, as if a piece of metal was loose inside. Then he noticed a protrusion on the side. He turned it over, and his heart sank when he saw what it was.

“Uh, guys,” he said. “We’ve got a new problem.”

“It’s not there?” Stacy said.

“No, it’s here all right. At least, most of it is.”

Tyler held it up to his eye and could see Stacy straight through the bullet hole.

THIRTY-SEVEN

They found a clinic that bought Tyler’s story about injuring his arm with a piece of jagged metal. After the doctor put ten stitches into the arm and gave him a tetanus shot, the three of them returned to the Gordian jet. Tyler and Grant had just begun to disassemble the geolabe to assess the damage from the stray bullet when Tyler’s phone rang.

“Is it Orr?” Stacy asked.

Tyler nodded and put the call on speaker.

“How are you doing, Locke?” Orr said. “Found the map yet?”

“We’re working on it.”

“I already know you work well under pressure. You have to meet me in Naples in two days.”

Tyler remembered Cavano’s explanation about beginning her excavation on Monday. There would be no wiggle room in Orr’s schedule, but he had to put up at least a token resistance.

“We need more time,” Tyler said. “There’s no way we can finish our task by Sunday.”

“Find a way, or start making funeral arrangements.”

Tyler hesitated a few seconds for effect. “Fine. We’ll be there. How are we making the exchange? I don’t imagine you’re bringing my father and Stacy’s sister with you to Italy.”

“Have someone ready to confirm their release at the Lincoln Memorial that day at 3 P.M. eastern time. At the same time on Sunday, 9 P.M. in Naples, there’s an outdoor concert taking place on Piazza del Plebiscito before a fireworks show. Meet me there. Both you and Stacy.”

“Just me,” Tyler said.

“Both of you, or don’t bother showing up.”

“We haven’t seen our proof-of-life videos today.”

“I’m sending the video now. When I confirm that you’ve solved the puzzle, I will release Sherman and Carol.”

Hearing Orr use their names as if they were friends made Tyler’s bile rise. He didn’t believe Orr was going to give his hostages up that easily, but they had no choice but to continue playing along.

“How will we find you at the concert?”

“I’ll call you with more instructions then. Just make sure you’re there at 9 p.m.” Orr hung up.

Tyler checked his email. Carol and Sherman looked more haggard than they did the day before, but they seemed uninjured. There wasn’t any more signing to decode, however. This video was from the chest up. Sherman’s hands weren’t in the frame.

“Orr isn’t leaving us many options,” Tyler said to Stacy as he showed Grant the video.

She nodded as if she were expecting it.

“Without any more leads from Aiden,” Grant said, “I think we’re going to have to go through with this.”

Tyler sighed. “I think you’re right.”

Ransom handoffs were notoriously messy for everyone involved. Double-crosses were too easy to pull off. One side would bring the money, but the kidnappers would take off with it without delivering the hostage, sometimes by killing the bagman. Or the kidnappers got nabbed by the police as soon as the hostage was recovered. A successful handoff depended on a degree of trust on both sides, but that was sorely missing in this case. Tyler sure as hell didn’t think Orr was going to let any of them go free.

“So what’s the plan?” Grant said.

Tyler had the start of an idea for how to approach the handoff, but he had to mull it over before he told Grant and Stacy. “Let’s work on that later. First, we need to see if the geolabe can be saved.”

The bullet had gone in through the side of the geolabe and out through the top. If it had been struck through the face, the entire device would have been destroyed, but since only a minor portion was damaged Tyler was hoping it could be salvaged. As it was, though, he’d tried turning the knobs, and something inside was definitely broken.

The outer metal faces of the geolabe were fitted together using tiny screws. Tyler unscrewed them using his Leatherman tool and lifted the single-dial plate. As he’d suspected, there was the tracking device affixed to the inside of the plate with epoxy. He set down the plate so that he could inspect the interior.

He shined a flashlight into the device and saw the problem. The gears meshed together precisely. Any warping or misalignment would cause the teeth to miss each other, rendering the device nonfunctional.

“Crap,” he said.

Stacy leaned forward. “Is it bad?”

The gears could be lifted out one at a time. He took out three, all of which were perfectly intact. Then he reached the main universal gear, the one that drove the entire mechanism.

The bullet had grazed just this one gear. A dozen teeth were missing, and the gear was hopelessly bent.

Stacy picked it up and turned it over in her hands.

“Can it be fixed?” she asked, giving it back to him.

Tyler gave Grant a somber look.

“How long to make that gear?” Grant asked.

“A couple of days. If I had the right equipment.”

“A couple of days?” Stacy said. “Can’t you just buy one?”

“This isn’t an off-the-shelf gear ratio,” Grant said. “It requires precision machining.”

“I’ll call Miles,” Tyler said. “We can send out the specs. He probably knows someone in the US who can whip one of these out quickly.”

“It’s Friday afternoon there. Even if we could get the gear fabricated, it wouldn’t make it over to Europe in time for us to fix the geolabe, use it at the Parthenon, and then get to Naples.”

“There’s got to be some way to get a new one more quickly,” Stacy said. “Too bad we can’t just use Archimedes’ original one.”

Tyler put the damaged gear down. That was it.

“We can get the original,” he said. “The gearing inside the Antikythera Mechanism is very similar to the geolabe’s. Its main gear has exactly the same dimensions as this one.”

Stacy laughed and then stopped when Tyler didn’t join in.

“You mean the one in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens? I was joking. It’s corroded and embedded in a rock. It’ll never work.”

“Not the one they found in the shipwreck. The replica. It might require a few modifications to fit it on the axle, but the diameter, thickness, and number of teeth are identical.”

“Isn’t that one also in the National Archaeological Museum?”

“Right next to the original.”

“Wait a second,” Grant said. “You think they’re going to let us borrow their replica of the Antikythera Mechanism, take it apart, and use a piece of it in our own reconstruction?”

Stacy shook her head. “Museums are stingy with their display objects. Even for a respected institution, it would take months of negotiations to get a loan approved by the cultural ministry. For us, there’s no chance.”

“That’s if we asked,” Tyler said.

Grant scowled. “You’re kidding.”

“We’re only going to borrow it. We’ll give it back.”

Tyler expected Stacy to protest, but she stared at the ceiling. He could see that her mind was churning with the implications of his proposal.

“Are you on board?” Tyler asked her.

Stacy’s eyes focused on him. He’d never seen a more serious and determined expression.

“I just saw a video of my sister in handcuffs,” she said. “The question isn’t if we should steal that thing, but how.”

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