Page 30 of The 9th Man

He glanced her way. “How about you? Have you found something you’re good at?”

She shook her head. “Still searching.”

Luxembourg City disappeared into the rearview mirror and the road gradually steepened as they climbed into more rugged terrain penetrated with deep, narrow valleys hemmed in by thick forests. Twenty minutes later they reached the small town of Ettelbruck, then turned north into the Portes des Ardennes. A few minutes later a sign for Michelau appeared.

“I did a quick count,” she said. “Between Luxembourg City and Ettelbruck there were three self-storage companies. Yet Benji chose one way out here in the middle of nowhere.”

“Maybe for the same reason we took that indirect route. Avoiding prying eyes.”

Half a mile east of the road they found the Fetschenhof Stockag storage facility tucked up against a forested hillside behind a large expanse of ramshackle warehouses. The weed-strewn asphalt and graffiti-plastered façades told him the compound was not well maintained. Among the fourteen warehouses he counted he saw only a handful of unbroken windows. Apparently, this was the spot for teenage vandalism. He pulled to a stop beside a pole-mounted keypad and rolling security gate topped with barbed wire. A touch of modernity in an otherwise neglected place.

“Do we have a code?” he asked. “Seems to be four digits.”

“Try five-nine-two-four.”

He punched in the number. In red letters the screen flashedIncorrect pin.

“Sorry,” she said. “Swap the last two digits.”

He tried again. The screen flashed green and the gate began rolling aside. “What was it?”

“The last four digits of Benji’s army service number before they changed over to using socials. It was his password for everything.”

“I like it. Easy to remember. But hard to guess.”

Beat the hell out of those suggested passwords every computer program around today liked to offer. A confusing and impossible-to-remember mix of letters, numbers, and symbols that no one in their right mind would choose.

“Okay, we’re looking for unit 214,” she said.

He drove through the gate, deeper into the warren of connected storage units, which varied in size from a walk-in closet to a two-car garage. Jillian spotted 214. He stopped the car beside a white corrugated aluminum door and they both climbed out into the cool, damp late-morning.

“A little brisk,” she said, zipping up her jacket.

The rain had chilled the air enough that they could see their breath. The wind had picked up, sending bits of trash skittering across the asphalt. All was quiet save for the ticking of the Peugeot’s resting engine and the patter of rain on the aluminum roofs. Unit 214 was one of the larger spaces.

They approached the padlocked door.

“Pretty damn big,” he said. “He must have a lot of stuff.”

“Here goes nothing,” she said.

The key fit perfectly and the lock snapped open.

“It’s oiled,” she said. “And the thing looks relatively new.”

That it did.

Together, they lifted the door up on its rollers. Inside measured about twenty feet square and was empty save for three white cardboard banker’s boxes stacked against the back wall.

“A bit underwhelming,” she said.

“What were you expecting?”

“Not this.”

“Even the smallest of boxes can contain the greatest of secrets.”

She tilted her head at him. “Who said that?”