The Killing Floor Blues (Daniel Faust #5)(52)

“It will be.” He thumped my shoulder with his fist. “Mexico, brother. Nothin’ to it, but to do it. I’ll see you at the big show.”

I sat in my cell and waited.

Mostly, I looked for a way to get those gates open. And I wasn’t finding one.

I couldn’t see the outside sky, couldn’t imagine the slow descent of the sun, but I could feel it in my bones. Just like I felt the tension simmering in my gut, that old feeling of nervous energy before taking a score. Normally I’d have a pre-job drink to settle my nerves. With the only options being prison wine or another dose of Buddy’s nauseating pink glop, I figured I’d do this one on an empty stomach.

A guard sauntered by, rattling cell bars with the business end of his truncheon. He glared at me behind beige-tinted sunglasses, his thin lips twitching at the corners.

“Faust! Visitor.”

Our next stop was Buddy’s cell. He fell right in line, shadowing my heels like a puppy. The guard—Vasquez, said his nametag—waved us ahead of him. He escorted us past the first gate and through the metal detector, a bulky old warhorse that would have been right at home in a 1970s airport. It didn’t make a peep.

My mental map of the prison unfurled behind my eyes as we walked toward the visitor center. Here, I thought, as we prepared to round a bend to the left. This is the place.

The next stretch of hall ran about fifty feet, with arrows and big block letters stenciled on the wall pointing the way to the visitor center, the front offices, and the motor pool.

No cameras. Just a pair of convex security mirrors perched high in a corner at each end, like you might see in a convenience store. As close to privacy as we would get.

And here was Westie, still whistling as he rolled his bucket along, strolling toward us from the other direction.

I’d hoped to hit Vasquez from behind. That would have been the easy way. He wasn’t having any of it, though, forcing Buddy and me to walk directly in front of him. The bucket rolled closer, time running out fast.

I dropped to one knee, quickly tugging at my shoelace. The knot unfurled, falling free. “Hey,” Vasquez said, looming over me. “On your feet.”

I gestured to my shoe. “Laces came untied. Give me a second, huh?”

Westie saw my play. He changed his angle of approach, moving closer to the middle of the hall. Vasquez didn’t give him a second glance. He was too busy standing over me with his hands on his hips, glaring like I’d personally ruined his day.

Funny, that was the next thing on my agenda.

I finished reknotting my shoelace as Westie passed, bringing the bucket right next to me. Without a word he yanked the mop from the bucket, twirled it in his hands, and hit Vasquez like a battering ram, pinning him against the wall with the mop handle bracing his shoulders. I snatched the knife from the bucket, spinning it in my grip. Vasquez already had his gun out by the time I lunged. He pressed the barrel into Westie’s belly, and I pressed the blade to Vasquez’s neck.

“Pull that trigger,” I hissed, “and your wife’s a widow.”

He froze.

“Listen to me.” I pressed the knife harder. Not hard enough to cut, just hard enough to make him feel the blade every time he took a breath. “I don’t want to kill you. And you don’t want to die. So I’m going to take your gun now, and you’re going to let me. Understood?”

His eyes narrowed in disgust, but he nodded as much as he dared. I clamped my free hand over the barrel of his pistol and gave it a tug. His fingers went limp as I pulled the gun away.

“Turn around,” I said. “Get moving. Nice and easy.”

I passed the knife to Westie. He kept it close to his hip. As we walked by the bucket, he crouched down, grabbed the two night-vision goggles, and handed them to Buddy.

“Do I put these on now?” Buddy asked.

“You guys,” Vasquez snarled, “are morons. Nobody’s ever escaped Eisenberg. Nobody. And more people have tried than you think.”

“I’m an overachiever,” I told him.

“You’re all dead men. Dead, or you’re heading straight for Hive B.”

I jabbed the small of his back with the gun barrel. “What’s in Hive B?”

“Go f*ck yourself.”

“Aren’t you a ray of sunshine,” I said. “Take a left up here.”

“Motor Pool” read the black block letters on the wall, with an arrow pointing the way. At the end of the corridor, a barred access gate blocked our path. And behind that stood the tall steel double doors leading to our final destination.

“When we get up to the gate,” I said softly into Vasquez’s ear, “you need to get us through. If you warn your buddy, if you stall, if you do anything that doesn’t result in that gate opening with zero delay, I’ll put a bullet in your spine. I said I don’t want to kill you. Doesn’t mean I won’t.”

“The garage?” Vasquez replied. “Oh, yeah, nobody’s ever tried escaping that way before. Real good plan you’ve got there. Slick.”

We approached the gate. On the opposite side, a doughy-faced guard who looked barely a day out of high school sat at a stool behind a small bank of controls. I kept the gun easy in my hand, making sure Vasquez could feel it pressed to his back.

“Three coming through,” he told the guard through the bars.