Page 155 of Smoke Screen
Twenty minutes later, after admitting them into the one-story warehouse on a main drag near the airport, the guard closed and locked the door behind his visitors, then shuttered himself into his office.
Zeke, with Cruz in tow, wheeled the safe into an open area near the door. A lack of windows left only overhead track lighting to illuminate the air-conditioned building, which Phin supposed was better for the artifacts. At least they could control the environment.
Behind them, random boxes and storage containers were stacked on shelves. To the right sat a car. An old Datsun 280Z straight out of the seventies.
Gearhead Cruz, wandered over, circling it while he examined tires and taillights and then the T-top.
“What’s with the car?” he asked Maddy.
“It was President Thompson’s when he was in college. He’s saved it all these years. He’s still deciding if he wants it in the Center or not.”
Maddy brought her attention back to Zeke, who’d slid the hand truck from beneath the safe and was on his knees, unpacking a drill from its case.
Maddy stood, head cocked, watching Zeke lay out his tools. “How does this work?”
Pointing at the thick titanium drill bit, Phin said, “He has to drill a hole in the top so he can see the lock inside. If he misjudges, he’ll need another hole. And he has to avoid the relockers.”
Maddy swung her head up. “What’s that?”
Safety glasses on, Zeke picked up the drill. “An additional security device. If I breach it, it triggers the auxiliary lock and we’re screwed. Even if we had the combination, the safe won’t open.”
“Oh my God.” Maddy put her hands out. “Should we be doing this, considering what we think is in there?”
An excellent question that, with anyone else manning the drill, might be worth considering.
“Zeke,” Phin said, “how many times have you hit a relocker?”
Zeke pressed the trigger, sending the bit whirling. “Once. When I was learning. Swore it would never happen again.”
Phin held out his hand. “There you go. Between practicing and actual jobs, he’s done this literally hundreds of times.”
Zeke got to his feet, bending over the safe, estimating where to drill based on the position of the dial. He set the drill in place, hit the trigger, then leaned in, pushing down with both hands for leverage.
The warehouse filled with abzzzzzingnoise as the drill ground into steel, the hard titanium bit slowly plowing through.
A minute later, he removed it, set the drill down, then cleared debris from the hole with his vacuum.
Hole cleared, Phin picked up the borescope, squatted next to Zeke and handed it off. Zeke placed the handheld monitor on top of the safe while he fed the bendy tubelike wire into the hole.
Phin then picked up the monitor, held it while Zeke checked the screen. “There’s the relocker. I didn’t go far enough back. Dammit. Need a second hole.”
Once again, he picked up the drill, but changed out the bit for a longer one and went through the same routine again. Drill, vacuum, scope.
“Bingo,” he said while Phin held the monitor. “There’s the wheel pack.”
One hand on the scope, Zeke turned the safe’s dial with the other, watching the monitor as he went.
Microinch by microinch, Zeke adjusted the scope. “There’s the opening for the fence. Got it.”
Phin had watched him do this plenty of times, but still didn’t know—nor did he give a rat’s ass—what a fence was.
Zeke spun the dial again.
“There,” he said, “someone write this down.”
Maddy grabbed the pen and pad Zeke had pulled from his duffel. “Ready.”
“Forty-eight.”
