They dragged his limp body deeper into the alley. Hollis patted him down; strapped to the man’s leg in a leather sheath, hidden under the jumpsuit, was a short-barreled revolver. Caleb appeared with a length of laundry line; they bound the man’s hands and feet and stuffed a wadded rag into his mouth.

“Is it loaded?” Peter asked.

Hollis had opened the cylinder. “Three rounds.” He snapped it closed with a flick of his wrist and passed the weapon to Alicia.

“Peter, I think these buildings are empty,” she said.

It was true; there were no lights anywhere.

“We better hurry.”

They approached the prison from the south, across an empty field. Hollis believed the entrance to the building was located on the far side, facing the main gate to the compound. There was, he said, a kind of tunnel there, the entrance arched in stone and set into the wall. They would attempt this if they had to, but it stood in full view of the observation towers; the plan was to look for a less risky way in. The vans and pickups were kept in a garage on the south side of the building. It would make sense for Olson and his men to keep their hard assets together, and, in any event, they had to look somewhere first.

The garage was sealed, the doors drawn down and secured with a heavy padlock. Peter looked through a window but could see nothing. Behind the garage was a long concrete ramp leading to a platform with an overhang and a pair of bay doors set in the prison wall. A dark stain ran up the middle of the ramp. Peter knelt and touched it; his fingers came away wet. He brought his fingers to his nose. Engine oil.

The doors had no handles, no obvious mechanism by which they could be opened. The five of them formed a line and pressed their hands against the smooth surface, attempting to draw it upward. They felt no sharp resistance, only the weight of the doors themselves, too heavy to lift without something to grip. Caleb scampered back down the ramp to the garage; a crash of glass and he returned a moment later, holding a tire iron.

They formed a line again, managing to lift the door far enough for Caleb to wedge the iron under it. A blade of light had appeared on the concrete. They drew the door upward and ducked through one by one and let it fall closed behind them.

They found themselves in some kind of loading area. There were coils of chain on the floor, old engine parts. Somewhere nearby water was dripping; the air smelled like oil and stone. The source of the light lay up ahead, a flickering glow. As they moved forward, a familiar shape emerged from the gloom.

A Humvee.

Caleb opened the tailgate. “Everything’s gone, except for the fifty-cal. There are three boxes of rounds for that.”