Page 170 of Nash Falls

As they passed through, Nash looked at the collapsible dome-shaped sensor affixed to the topside of the doorjamb. It was still in the unreleased, pushed-down position despite the door having been opened. It looked like it had been glued into place. And the thin metal piece, Nash figured, had been inserted to clear away any of the glue-like substance so that it wouldn’t impede the door opening.

“Search everywhere,” ordered Ryder.

As they began to do so, Nash suddenly thought of something. The cabinet in the room that held the tattoo binders. If Shock had left them. If they saw the—

Shit.

He walked there as quickly as he could, opened the cabinet, and saw that the binderswerestill there. He started going through them, while two of the other men came in and started to search other parts of the office.

When Rhett came in about a half hour later Nash was closing up the cabinet.

“Anything?” asked Rhett.

“Just business documents, and promotional newsletters I guess they send out.”

At that moment Ryder hurried in and held out an iPad. “We found these prints in one of the bunk rooms. They match Nash’s.”

“So he was definitely here then,” said Rhett.

“But he’s not here now,” pointed out Ryder. “Wehaveto track down this Isaiah York. He has to have another place somewhere.”

“And no mention of that in those binders you looked at in that cabinet?” asked Rhett. “Another property? Another address? On some of the promo materials you mentioned?”

“No, and I went through every page.”

“Shit, okay, let’s regroup.”

Nash side glanced at Ryder when the woman ventured over tothe cabinet door and opened it. His hand eased to his gun.Okay, this might be it.

And that would have been it if the man who had stayed outside on watch had not phoned Ryder, even as loud noises from outside reached them in here. She answered, listened for a few moments, and said to the others, “Sirens and alarm lights are going off outside. There must have been a trip sensor somewhere. We need to leave. Now.”

Nash thought that a trip sensor would have no doubt sounded a long time ago, but he was not arguing with Ryder’s command to immediately vacate the premises.

They all rushed to their vehicles and drove off. As the sirens grew louder, they reached a side road that carried them on a macadam path through a forest of mostly evergreen trees.

“GPS says this winds back to the road we originally came in on,” said Rhett, who was in the lead of the two-vehicle caravan. “We should be okay.”

And when the sounds of the sirens faded, they all let out a collective breath of relief.

However, Nash’s was longer and more sincere than the others.

Ninety minutes later the three of them plus the team of Asians were cruising at forty-one thousand feet.

It didn’t make Nash feel any better when Ryder was on the phone the whole time. And whenever she glanced at him, it was not with a friendly expression. But then again, he had concluded she never looked friendly to anyone.

He kept his fingers only a few inches from his gun the entire trip, while he noted that Rhett had his eyes closed, but did not appear to be sleeping. Nash wondered what would happen if he had to end up shooting everyone except the pilots and flight attendant. Maybe he could then hijack the plane to Cuba.

I might just take being in Witness Protection and stocking shelves at a dollar store in Idaho over this.

CHAPTER

83

LATER THAT NIGHT NASH PERCHEDon his bed at the Temple estate and stared down at the email he’d received from Shock on his phone.

We was watching all of you on the cameras. When the lady went for the cabinet I triggered the “sirens” I got up in the trees around the place. And sorry about the damn tattoo binders. When you alerted us that they were heading our way we had to really hustle to clean up the space. I thought Byron had gotten them and he thought I had taken care of it.

He messaged Shock back. It worked great. And thanks.