“Don’t start that again. But there’s something I have to do. Overholt won’t be too pleased, but I’ve got to at least look at it.” He cranked open the rear door, breaking the delicate seal.

What they saw were square bundles about the size of hay bales wrapped in various shades of colored plastic. The bundles were stacked like any other commodity and ran almost to the ceiling. They could have been packages of tangerines or DVD players or any other commodity shipped in conex containers.

“Ho-hum,” Max said. “What did you expect? Ali Baba’s treasure room?”

Juan started at how accurate his friend had been. “Never hurts to hope.”

Cabrillo wrestled one of the bales from the stack and slit open the plastic with the knife he always carried. Fresh pain erupted from his shoulder, reminding him that he would need to take it easy for a few days. He opened the tear enough to pull out some money, a four-inch-thick chunk of hundred-dollar bills.

“I read someplace that a stack of one thousand American dollar bills is a little over four inches thick. These are hundreds, so I’ve got a hundred grand here.” They both looked at the enormity of the cache and had a better understanding than just about anyone on the planet of exactly what a billion dollars really was.

He wedged the money back into place, and this time let Max put the bale back into the container. They closed the door, the locking arm coming down with a finality that ended an eight-year operation. Ironically, their fee would most likely come from this very stack of money once it made its way into a black budget account.

Hours later, after the dead Iraqis had been buried at sea and the prisoners and cash transferred over to the USS Boxer, the Chairman hosted a dinner for the crew in the dining room and, to rounds of raucous applause, detailed the money each member of the Corporation should expect for the successful recovery of The Container.

As fate would have it—and, in their business, fate dealt more hands than most—Juan had just poured his second glass of Veuve Clicquot when he felt his phone vibrate.

It was the duty officer in the op center. “Sorry to ruin the party, Chairman. There’s a call on your private line.”

“L’Enfant,” Juan breathed. It had to be, and that could only mean the information broker had found Pytor Kenin. After this untimely but lucrative distraction, it was time to get back on the trail of Yuri Borodin’s murderer.

Chapter Twenty-four

Considering their destination, it made sense that Eddie Seng would accompany Juan for the scouting mission. L’Enfant had only provided an address. Mark and Eric had done their usual excellent research on the location, but nothing beat eyes on the ground. They flew commercial from Jakarta to Shanghai.