Chapter Forty-one
Friday, 1215
(The second phase of Prometheus begins)
Mackenzie and Reynolds stood on the corner searching around for any sign of Lopez. They had raced to get there in the twenty minutes they were given, but had missed it by six minutes. It was unrealistic to think it would be otherwise with the traffic, especially with all the chaos created by the military blocking roads into the Capitol, but Mackenzie was sure Lopez knew that. Mackenzie believed he was trying to ratchet up their tension level; he wanted them off-balance.
The three stood, hands in their coats, waiting for a call. Mackenzie knew Lopez was most likely watching to see if he could detect anyone covering them. If Mackenzie had managed to get someone to follow them to where Lopez was taking them, a very unlikely possibility given the time he gave them to set up such a thing, this would enable him to identify and eliminate them. Mackenzie expected Lopez was a very cautious man—what else would allowed him to survive and prosper in a field notorious for short life spans—while also simultaneously maintaining a position within the police. But he had already made several mistakes in his urgency to get the drive.
What she didn’t know was that Lopez had violated most of his protocols because of the desperation of his employers—on his last call Sanderson had threatened to kill him. He normally would have taken at least a week, if possible, a month, to study and plan. He had been successful because of his planning. But now there was no time. He was uncomfortable with spontaneity, and because of his haste he had exposed himself. That already was enough to increase his tension level.
The phone rang. Mackenzie answered and put the phone on speaker so Reynolds and Denton could hear.
“There’s a taxi coming. When it arrives get in, the driver will bring you to me after a few stops. When you get here you’ll be told what to do,” Lopez’s voice was matter-of-fact. Mackenzie figured he was going to run them around to ensure there was no chance of deception.
“Lopez, why play this game?” Mackenzie asked. “You must know I’m not going to screw around with the lives of Reynolds’s family. Especially over a flash drive I can’t even open. Why not just get us to you so we can get this over with and go our separate ways?” Mackenzie knew he wasn’t likely to accept such an offer, but it was worth a try, and he just might be desperate enough to want to expedite matters.
The call ended without him replying. Lopez wouldn’t normally make a change like that, and he certainly wouldn’t normally let her get the upper hand in this situation by allowing her to change the conditions he had set, but he decided he did want to finish this now. As far as he was concerned it had already taken way too long. So, in an unusual move for him he decided to do as she suggested and eliminate the next step and bring them directly to him. The better to finish this quickly.
“The sooner they’re here, the sooner I can get rid of them, finish my job, and move on,” he thought. He was impatient with this assignment and the pressure he was getting from Sanderson made the decision seem even more practical to him. “So be it,” he thought, “All in.”
###
As they sat quietly in the cab Mackenzie mentally ran through her plan once again. She felt a sense of urgency—Denton seemed anxious, nervously tapping his thigh, while Reynolds, who was sitting in the front seat next to a short, even small, lean and clean-shaven cabbie was just blank. Only one thing was important to Reynolds, his family. He was thinking about them, particularly his wife and the last time they parted before the divorce. He remembered vividly the day she left.
###
“Look Maggie. No one can live up to all of someone’s expectations. I’m a person. I have failings. But I try to do the best I can; I try to be the best husband and father I know how to be.
“But I have a job caring for people, and I have to go where I’m needed. You understand that, don’t you?” He hadn’t been a husband or a father as long as he had a nurse, so when he became emotionally overwhelmed, as he was now, he fell back on what he knew and was comfortable with, his professional demeanor—the exact wrong thing at that moment.
Maggie, who had dropped to the couch and sat slumped, her head down, her arms laying across her thighs, looked up at him. Her eyes were wide and wet.
“No one can live up to that perfect guy you’ve got in your head. I’m bound to come up short sometimes. The question is…what do we do now?” He pleaded.
Maggie’s expression dropped. She got up and turned around to look out the window, overwhelmed by sadness, for what seemed to Reynolds like hours. After a minute she turned to look at him. Her eyes were now clear and dry.
“You’re right. The question is what do I do now?…And what I’m going to do is take Jenni and leave.”
She said this in a direct, formal manner. He had retreated into a distant professional demeanor and now it was echoing back at him… and it cracked his heart.
“Please Maggie, we can figure this out.”
“I have figured this out Matt. The problem is that first and foremost you have to be here. You of anybody should know that.” Maggie looked directly in his watery eyes, and at that moment he could see that her heart had cracked as well. Only now, for the first time, he realized her heartbreak wasn’t happening now, with his, it had already happened. She had already had this moment, but she had had it alone, while he was off somewhere, and the thought that she went through alone what he was now going through with her, hit him like a passenger train.
He wondered how much earlier it had happened to her, and how long she had carried it, and waited, and how he couldn’t have seen it. Then the realization slapped him hard; for him to have seen it he would have had to have been around!
“Maggie’s right,” he thought, “this is all my fault. I broke her heart and I wasn’t even around to console her, or to be able to save our marriage.”
“I’m so sorry Maggie,” he said, turning his gaze to the floor. Then, after a moment, he slowly looked up, tears overflowing from his eyes, and said, “I really am.”
“I know you are, Matt, but that doesn’t make this alright. It just makes it sadder.”
Reynolds looked down, quiet and still, his face wet. Maggie was wavering in her stance and reached for the back of the couch to steady herself.
She had been wanting to say this to him for so long that now that she had finally said it out loud to him—finally purged herself of the thoughts and feelings—the relief and the sadness made her light-headed. The space and the weight of their slowly crumbling relationship was now being emptied and the void was dizzying, a vertigo of emotions.
The saddest thing was that even then, in the middle of the emotional pool he had waded into, with the stunning realization that the relationship which gave him so much joy and purpose was over, his thoughts still drifted to the assignment he was to leave for that night. He shuddered when he realized he could be in the most important moment of his life and still be distracted by his work. It made him feel weak and helpless and empty and ashamed and alone.
###
“Matt…Matt!”
Reynolds returned from his memory. His eyes were watery, with a sad, distant expression on his face. It was as though he was with Maggie and when he had been pulled forward into the car he had lost her again.
“What?” Reynolds quietly returned to his friend, slightly angry to have been pulled away.
“We lost you for a minute there,” Denton said. “Where were you? Did you hear what Detective Mackenzie just said?” Denton was ever more concerned about his friend. He knew all this must be wreaking havoc with him emotionally, and he wondered if he would he be able to deal with what was about to happen. Mackenzie’s plan would only work if everyone did their part. Were they going to be able to count on him?
“No, I’m sorry. I was lost in thought,” Reynolds replied softly, absently.
“Well, you’d better pull it together Matt. You’ll end up getting us all killed if you don’t get your head in the game,” Mackenzie said irritably. “This isn’t complicated, but it has to be done right!”
The cab driver released a slight smile.
“I know. Sorry. I’m ready.”
The cabbie looked in the rear view mirror at Mackenzie, then gave a sideways glance at Reynolds, and then returned to his driving. The cabbie seemed to be trying to piece together what they were talking about. But he was completely out of his depth, and so he gave up and just stared straight ahead and drove.
Denton was watching Reynolds from the back seat. He was concerned his friend would lose it the moment he saw Maggie and Jenni. He could only imagine the anguish he was going through. He reached forward and put his hand on his friend’s shoulder and gave a light squeeze. Reynolds’s head came up and he turned to Denton and smiled.
The smile wasn’t forced, which reassured Denton that Reynolds was, in fact, aware and ready. He smiled back, let go of Reynolds’s shoulder and settled back into his seat.
Mackenzie kept her focus on the driver, while also concentrating on her plan. She was mentally going over it again and again, trying to think of anything she might have missed. She knew the unexpected was likely, but she was desperate and she was counting on Lopez’s commitment to success, and the cold-blooded logic of an assassin.
Mackenzie had looked around the cab for surveillance devices. A camera was hidden in an air vent and what appeared to be a microphone was in the sun visor. There were probably more, but just what she saw confirmed what she suspected. She had warned Reynolds and Denton about this possibility before they left and she hoped they would remember and stay quiet. She also realized this meant the driver was working with Lopez and would have to be dealt with after they got to their destination.
Mackenzie anticipated Lopez would have one of his men pick them up—the taxi was a nice touch. She was certain Lopez wouldn’t trust such an important detail to someone he didn’t know and who could connect him to the location. The fact that she had correctly anticipated Lopez’s move helped reassure her that she understood him to a degree and that her plan might just work. As a small surge of hope travelled through her, the cab slowed down and turned into a riverside warehouse facility. There were maybe a dozen buildings, but no one was around. As they drove it became apparent that the entire facility was no longer in use. This was likely the reason Lopez chose it.
The driver went straight down the entrance road and then took the last left—they had no choice at this point as the road dead-ended at the Anacostia River, then they went down the road to where the warehouses stopped.
“Turn the car around,” Mackenzie ordered.
The driver sat for a moment. He apparently wasn’t expecting to be ordered around, and was likely deciding whether to comply. He looked in the rearview mirror again to find Mackenzie staring directly at him with a look that told him she wasn’t going to accept any objection. He thought for moment and decided it would be better to do as she said than to get into a disagreement right there at the destination; Lopez wouldn’t like it if he screwed this up, and besides, the point was to get them inside the building. What difference did it make which direction the car was parked?
The cab moved up and then swung around and pulled up outside the door to an old grey-green warehouse, right beside the seawall. The driver shut off the engine and pulled out the key. All four doors swung open and everyone stepped out—Reynolds and Denton from the right side and the driver and Mackenzie from the left. The driver stood and scanned the group and when he looked at Mackenzie he saw she was staring out at the river. He turned to see what had caught her attention. At that moment Mackenzie grabbed the keys from his hand and shoved him so hard that he stumbled forward and, while trying to regain his balance, he stepped off the seawall and fell the ten-fifteen feet from the seawall into the river. The current quickly swung him out and down river as he flailed around trying to keep his head up and regain control of himself. He was quickly carried over a fifty yards down-river and heading out before he had righted himself, but by then he was powerless against the current as it hauled him away.
The two men’s jaws dropped.
“What…what…why did you do that?!” Denton asked.
“When was the last time you saw a cabbie in that good of shape?” Mackenzie said sardonically.
Reynolds and Denton paused, thinking for a moment, and then Denton said, “And based on that you decided he was with Lopez?”
“That and the fact that he was scanning us, listening, and there were cameras and microphones hidden in the car. All together they add up to him being one of Lopez’s men.”
“But why do that!?” Reynolds erupted, “Lopez will be furious that you shoved one of his men into the river. He might do something in retaliation!”
“Relax. Lopez doesn’t care about that guy. All he cares about is getting the flash drive. If one of his men gets wet in the process, it’s nothing to him.” Denton looked back at the river and said, “I hope he can swim.”
Mackenzie turned to Denton with a smiled and said, “or not.”
“You had better know what you’re doing,” Reynolds added, unamused, his jaw clenched. “If this causes him to hurt Maggie or Jenni I’ll hold you responsible.”
“Listen Matt, he might be annoyed, but it’s finishing his contract he cares about,” Mackenzie replied as she walked around the car to the door of the warehouse, followed closely by Reynolds and Denton. There was a small square window in the door, but it was whited out with age so she couldn’t see inside clearly, just light and shadow. She grabbed the door knob, turned it, and cautiously pulled the door open. Sunlight spilled into the room replacing the poor illumination that came from the long row of opaque windows set about twelve feet above the floor at the back of the warehouse.
Mackenzie put her arm out to prevent Matt and Denton from going into the building until she had a chance to clear the area. The room, which was about sixty by a hundred feet, was completely empty except for a long, grey, wooden table, set off to the front half of the room and which was surrounded by five chairs. The table had some condiments, pizza boxes, and some crushed brown bags scattered over it. There were four doors spaced out along the opposite wall, one with a half window, she figured was an office.
After Mackenzie held up her hand to signal them to wait, she stepped into the room. She didn’t see any cameras and she didn’t hear anything. She took a few more steps into the warehouse and stopped. She scanned the room and then turned to the two men who were impatiently waiting and motioned for them to enter.
Reynolds quickly stepped through first, his desperation visible from his pace and his expression. Denton was more circumspect. He stuck his head in slowly and looked around. After reassuring himself it was clear, and seeing his compatriots waiting, he too walked over the threshold and somewhat nervously stepped up behind Reynolds.
After waiting for a moment Mackenzie called out, “Lopez.”
Nothing.
Then Reynolds called out, “Maggie. Jenni.”
Mackenzie turned to Reynolds with narrow eyes and put her index finger across her tight lips. She was to be the only one to speak. Reynolds ignored her, walking further into the room.
Simultaneously they could hear the sound of muffled speech followed by the sound of something banging. It was coming from the door next to the office and without knowing who it was they could hear a kind of despair and desperation in the noise. They looked at each other, silently confirming what they all thought; Maggie and Jenni were behind that door.
Reynolds took a step toward the banging door and then stopped when the office door opened and a man walked out who was as big as the taxi driver was small, followed closely by Lopez. Both were rock-faced. Lopez’s right arm was in a sling. His shirt was new, but a small red stain showed through.
Despite the situation, and Maggie and Jenni being close by, all three, upon seeing Lopez immediately flashed back to Mike Stanford. Reynolds was swamped by the years of memories of their times together in foreign places, laughing as a bulwark against the horrors of the inhumanity they were witnessing, crying as they lost friends and saw children murdered by power-hungry and greedy and petty bullies. Their friendship a shield against the cold-blooded nightmare of poverty and war.
Denton barely knew Stanford, but he liked him, and the newness of their relationship, the excitement of making a new friend was smeared out by the bloody murder by the man standing mere feet away.
Mackenzie was angry at the memory, but her mind was on Lopez.
“I’m glad you could make it, Detective. I see you brought some muscle with you.”
Denton straightened a little, he had never been called the ‘muscle’ before, especially by someone like Lopez, and it made him feel self-conscious and embarrassed, but also…powerful.
“I assure you he won’t be necessary if you do as you’re told. Now if you will step forward my associate will check you for weapons,” Lopez ordered.
“No. He won’t,” Mackenzie countered, “I am armed, but I’m not going to give up my weapon!”
“Detective….”
“Listen. We’re here to make a transaction. But if you think I’m going to allow you to disarm us, you’re not as bright as I thought,” Mackenzie replied, looking fiercely at Lopez and speaking with a tone of conviction that made it clear there would be no negotiation on this point.
Lopez surprisingly let his face relax into a broad smile.
“And you are just as bright and determined as I was told.”
“Forget the charm Lopez. It doesn’t suit you.”
The smile escaped his face and he said, “Okay. All business. You will put the flash drive on the table over there and then the Mrs. Reynolds and her daughter will be returned to you.”
Reynolds started to speak, but Mackenzie put her arm across his chest and said, “Not on your life. Perhaps you’ve already forgot the part about my being ‘bright’.
“First you will bring them out of that room over there so we can see them. Then when we’re satisfied they’re okay we’ll talk about the drive.”
“I don’t like being told what to do Detective. We’ll do this my…”
“Let’s be clear,” Mackenzie interrupted, “we’re doing this my way. We agreed to meet on your ground, but you’ve already proven to be untrustworthy, and a liar, and a murderer. So there’s no way I’ll trust you to dictate this trade. You have the advantage here, so, we do this my way,” her face was expressionless, but her eyes had narrowed, and her voice was strong and measured, even threatening.
“You can have what you want, but only if we get what we want,” Mackenzie added. Then, after a moment she continued, “What’s on it anyway? What’s so important?”
“I don’t know, and you’re not knowing is the only thing allowing you to continue living,” Lopez replied with a snarl.
Lopez stood rigid. It wasn’t obvious to anyone in the room, but he was in a rage; he didn’t like being spoken to this way. He absently reached his left hand over and touched his right shoulder. His instinct was to kill them all right then. But he couldn’t be sure they had brought the drive with them, and he realized Mackenzie had likely taken steps to insure it couldn’t be taken away from them before they got the hostages back. If he killed them he might never be able to retrieve it, so he considered what to do next. He had never been in a situation like this before. For all his career he had simply killed who he was told to kill. He hadn’t had to negotiate with anyone in order to accomplish his mission, so his confidence was low because of his lack of experience.
Reynolds and Denton were likewise uncertain how to behave. Mackenzie told Denton he was supposed to scowl and act mean, or at least serious, and Reynolds was to keep his eyes open for Maggie and Jenni, act frightened, and wait. Her idea was to give them something to concentrate on while she handled Lopez, but now that they were there they were lost, Reynolds wasn’t even thinking about ‘acting’ and Denton just felt awkward trying to be something he wasn’t, a tough guy.
She was to do the talking. They had agreed to that because she was the expert; she had the training, but that didn’t prevent them from worrying this psychopath would act irrationally. Being with Lopez was like being with a pit bull. He might behave as though he were harmless, but he could turn on them unexpectedly.
Denton worked hard to control his fear. Even though he was larger than anyone there, even the guy who preceded Lopez out of the office, it was of little use since he had no experience with violence.
Hearing Mackenzie speak to Lopez so forcefully, and seeing Lopez and the guy with him react obediently was otherworldly to Denton. He knew the stakes, life and death. He knew he was looking at the guy who had killed Mike Stanford; someone who made him both scared and angry. But he was awash in that fear which cohabits with uncertainty.
Despite this, Denton was trying to put on a brave face, or rather, a mean face. He wanted to run, but he didn’t because he cared about Reynolds and his family. So he just stood there, trying to stay focused, watching Lopez and his ‘associate’ and listen and look tough, just like Mackenzie told him.
Reynolds was failing at his act. He wasn’t acting frightened. He looked enraged. If he could have gotten to Lopez he would have killed him with his bare hands. He was surprised he could feel such anger.
It was an act of will, and love, that allowed him to stand still and appear calm while Mackenzie worked the plan. He went from staring a bullet hole right through Lopez to looking at the door to his left. He was certain Maggie and Jenni were being held behind it, but he would not allow himself to move; any action could provoke Lopez and his men to escalate the situation to a fatal degree.
The gun Mackenzie had given him, comforted him. It felt heavy against his back, but its presence gave him a feeling of control. However, Mackenzie had made it clear that if he were to start shooting it would endanger not only their lives, but would most likely mean the death of his family.
So he waited.