Turbo Twenty-Three (Stephanie Plum #23)(50)

The chain link enclosed about five acres that were lit up like daylight from banks of overhead halogens. Not good for Lula’s ass dimples, but it kept us from stepping on rats and assorted rusted junk. Most of the acreage was filled with cars waiting to go into the crusher. Two four-story elevators with a long connecting catwalk sat in the middle of the jumble of cars. A control room that looked like a freight container was attached to one of the elevator towers. The guy in the control room operated the electromagnet, the crusher, and the crane.

We followed Joey and Boomer to an elevator, and Lula, Howie, the makeup ’ho, and the clacker ’ho went up with Boomer. I waited with Briggs and Joey for the second trip.

Briggs was wearing a robe and sneakers. He pulled a scarf out of his pocket and handed it to me.

“Do it,” he said.

He was in a cold sweat, and his face had no color to it.

“It’s going to be great,” I told him. “We’re not going up very far. I’m going to hang on to you all the way.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Hang on to me. Promise you won’t let go.”

I wrapped the scarf around his head and made sure he couldn’t see past it.

“Is he okay?” Joey asked. “He doesn’t look good. And what’s with the scarf?”

“He’s fine,” I said. “He’s in the role. He’s pretending to be scared. The scarf is part of the thing.”

“That’s good,” Briggs said. “That’s what I’m doing.”

The elevator door opened, and I guided Briggs in. It started to rise and I felt his knees buckle.

“Steady,” I said. “You don’t want to get too much into the role too soon.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I gotta keep that in mind.”

We reached the top, the door opened, and I looked out at the catwalk. It was about four feet wide. There were railings on the catwalk, but it looked like a piece had been removed from the middle. Everyone was in place on either side of the removed railing. A young guy with dreads motioned us forward.

“I’m the jump wrangler,” he said. “Nothing to worry about. I’ve done hundreds of these jumps. Haven’t lost anyone yet.”

I shuffled Briggs along up to the jump wrangler.

The wrangler looked Briggs over. “Why’s he blindfolded?”

“He likes to be surprised,” I said. “As soon as you get him hooked up and ready we’ll take the blindfold off.”

“I’m not up very high, right?” Briggs said.

I looked down and wanted to throw up. We were at least forty feet above the crusher.

“We’re practically still on the ground,” I said.

We got Briggs out of his bathrobe, and the wrangler strapped him into an ankle harness.

“I’m getting cold,” Briggs said. “Are we almost done?”

“We just have to raise you up a little more,” the wrangler said.

He gave a signal to the control room and I saw the giant crane slowly swing around. There was a cage attached to the skyhook. The crane operator brought the cage to the opening in the railing, and the wrangler stepped in and pulled Briggs in with him.

“What’s happening?” Briggs said. “Where’s Stephanie? Are we going down?”

“We’re going up,” the wrangler said. “Ordinarily we’d start from the ground, but the salvage crane only lowers so far.”

“And anyways this is a better angle for Howie,” Lula said. “He’ll get to film you coming and going.”

The crane swung out a little, the cage rose, and the rest of us stood on the catwalk gobsmacked at the height of the jump.

“Holy frijoles!” Lula said, head tipped back, watching the cage swinging high above us. “You gotta be nuts to do this.”

The scarf floated down, the cage door opened, and I could see Briggs look out. Next thing he was in the air.

“Eeeeeeeeeeeeee!”

Briggs fell like a rock past us, the cord stretched to its limit, and for a nanosecond Briggs stopped in midair. The cord recoiled, and Briggs shot up past us.

“Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!”

“Did he look like he was having fun?” Lula asked.

“He looked like he was peeing hisself,” the clacker ’ho said.

He dropped past us again and bounced around for a while until he was just hanging there by his ankles.

“This here’s not a complimentary angle for a naked man,” Lula said, looking down at him.

Joey waved at the crane operator. “Swing it around here!” he yelled. He turned to Lula. “You’re up next. As soon as we get him onto the catwalk we’ll bring the basket down and you can get in.”

“What are you, crazy? I’m not doing that,” Lula said. “I’ll rupture something. You’d have to be an idiot to do that. Out of my way. I’m going down. Which way’s the elevator?”

The crane was slowly bringing Briggs up, and he was full-blown rabid dog. His eyes were bugged out, and he was clawing at the air with his hands. He was making wild animal sounds, and I think he might have been foaming at the mouth.

“I’ll go down with you,” I said to Lula.

We left Joey on the catwalk to reel Briggs in, and the rest of us crammed into the elevator. We got to ground level and looked up as Briggs was hauled off the platform.