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He detected the scent of Malloy all over him. He took a deep breath and it was all he could do to stop himself from sprinting back up the steps, waking the woman, and doing it all over again.
He slowly rose and staggered to the door. A minute later he was back at the hotel.
As he passed Reel’s room down the hall from his, he noted that there was no light coming from under the door. At three a.m. she was, like most people, asleep in her own bed.
Like I should have been for the last four hours.
He showered and lay down in the bed with just a pair of boxers on. He stared at the ceiling, hoping perhaps to find some answers to bewildering questions on the drywall up there.
It didn’t work. There were no answers there or in his head.
He finally fell asleep and then rose when his phone alarm sounded. He dressed and went downstairs for breakfast.
He saw Reel had beaten him down. She was just finishing her meal at a corner table. She saw him and motioned him over. Robie squared his shoulders and marched toward her. He had more apprehension doing that than he’d had going into that home in London to battle seventeen armed terrorists.
Such was the unique effect that Jessica Reel had on him.
He sat down and ordered coffee from the waitress who hurried over to take his order. There weren’t many people in the small restaurant, and she was probably happy to have something to do.
“You look tired,” said Reel. “You didn’t sleep well?”
“I’m fine. Maybe drank a little bit too much,” he added in a low voice.
“Right. So what did Malloy want with her nightcap?”
Robie fiddled with his napkin. “Nothing much, but I’m getting fed up with not telling her about Holly.”
“I told you how I feel about it, but I also see Agent Sanders’s position. And we gave him our word.”
“Yeah, well,” said Robie, not finishing the thought.
His coffee came and he drank it down quickly.
Reel watched him and said, “You feel better?”
He nodded.
“You want something to eat?”
He shook his head. “So, luxury silos today?”
“Lambert texted me. He’s going to come by around ten.”
“Okay, but you really think there’s a connection?”
“Blue Man toured the place right before he disappeared.” countered Reel. “And you didn’t have a problem last night with our checking it out.”
“Fine,” said Robie curtly.
“I think we just need to learn as much as we can about this place, Robie. The more we know, the chances increase we can find Blue Man. But if you have a better idea, I’m listening.”
“I don’t have a better idea,” he said distractedly. “I don’t have any ideas.”
“Okay, so then we’re on the same page.”
They finished up and were waiting out front for Lambert when he pulled up in a Yukon at a few minutes past ten.
Robie watched dully as Malloy walked across the street, dressed in her uniform, at the same time Lambert arrived.
Shit.
He had forgotten that she was coming.
“Sheriff,” said Reel as Malloy joined them.
Malloy nodded at her and then settled her gaze on Robie.
“Agent Robie,” she said.
“Sheriff.”
“That was great least night, wasn’t it?” she said.
“What’s that?” asked Robie nervously.
“The dinner at Claire’s.”
“Absolutely. She knows how to throw a party.”
He didn’t notice Reel glancing first at Malloy and then at him.
They all walked to the Yukon and climbed in. Reel took shotgun, and Robie and Malloy settled into the middle row.
Lambert said, “I brought donuts, if anyone’s interested.”
“I am,” said Malloy, glancing at Robie. “I didn’t get enough last night. I’m still really hungry.”
Robie looked out the window, even as Reel glanced toward the back.
“Well, eat up,” said Lambert.
Malloy took a donut and bit into it. “I plan to.”
“Let’s go,” said Reel curtly.
Chapter
39
“POLYCHLORINATED BIPHENYLS AND trichloroethylene were the two biggest issues for this site,” said Lambert as they approached the former missile silo complex in his vehicle.
“See, the biphenyl got into the soil. And the trichloroethylene got into the groundwater. The missile crews used it to flush the fuel tanks after readiness tests.”
“No problem with radiation?” asked Reel. “Didn’t the Atlas missiles use plutonium for their core?”
“They did, but all warhead maintenance occurred at the manufacturing facility. Not here. Did you know a version of the Atlas was used to launch John Glenn into space as part of the Mercury program?” He smiled and slapped the steering wheel. “That’s a part of American history for sure. Now, the truth is these missile silos had a short shelf life. They came online in 1961 and were put on high alert during the Cuban Missile Crisis. But then they were phased out in 1965 for lots of different reasons. Environmental remediation was complete around twelve years ago, and the site closure happened a couple years later. Then it went on the market. I bought it and developed it from there. Paid four hundred thou for the site and spent five years and about eighteen million dollars renovating it.”
He pulled to a stop at a large steel link gate topped with concertina wire. There was a call box with a digital pad. Lambert rolled down his window, punched in a code, and a voice came through a speaker.
“Yes?”
Lambert waved at a camera mounted on a post. “It’s me, Karl. With our guests.”
“Yes sir, Mr. Lambert.”
The gate swung open and Lambert drove through.
“The Army Corps of Engineers originally built the site,” Lambert explained. “They picked the location too, and they picked well.”
They navigated a long macadam road that meandered through open fields.
Lambert pointed to several tall posts along the way.
“State-of-the-art surveillance at regular intervals. We can see anyone coming from a long way away.”
“And who exactly would be coming?” asked Reel.
Lambert shrugged. “In an apocalypse it’s hard to say. Maybe everybody who didn’t plan ahead, I guess.”
“You mean who didn’t have the money to plan ahead?” countered Malloy.
“Well, that sort of goes without saying.”
They finally pulled up to what looked like an enormous concrete dome with a large metal door.
“Blast door,” said Lambert as he brought the SUV to a stop. “Sucker can withstand a nuclear strike. Concrete walls are nearly three meters thick. That dome can take five-hundred-mile-per-hour winds easy.”
In front of the door was a parked Hummer that was decked out with a turret machine gun. Four men in cammies and bulletproof vests and carrying assault rifles were standing by the vehicle.
“So you have perimeter security as well,” noted Robie.
“Absolutely, that’s one of the chief selling points. In the event of an emergency the guards’ families will be allowed in, of course.”
“Of course,” said Reel, the disgust clear on her features, though Lambert wasn’t looking at her.
They climbed out of the truck and approached the door.
“So who buys these sorts of places?” asked Malloy.
“Wide spectrum of folks. I can’t reveal any names of course, but we’ve got hedge fund managers, investment bankers, Silicon Valley people, you know, Facebook, Yahoo, Google. Captains of industry. Names you see in the Wall Street Journal. Got one professional athlete, a golfer.”
“Silicon Valley, huh?” said Malloy. “Techies afraid of the apocalypse? I thought they believed technology was going to save the world.”
