Chapter 12
The downstairs room was behind the wine cellar.
Old security room.
Decommissioned five years earlier.
Or so I thought.
My signet opened it.
So did the copied access Vanessa had created.
Inside:
A second communications console.
Route monitors.
Gate controls.
Old Hayes channels.
Grant smiled when he saw my face.
“You really didn’t know.”
No.
And he enjoyed that.
Vanessa stepped inside.
“This house existed before you noticed every wall.”
I looked at her.
“How long?”
“Months.”
“What did you use it for?”
She shrugged.
“Listening.”
“To?”
“Everything.”
My stomach turned.
Private conversations.
Guard rotations.
Movement.
Maria whispered:
“Is this how you knew when Daniel left?”
Vanessa smiled.
“And when you slept.”
Sophia hid behind her mother.
Vanessa noticed.
“Oh, don’t start crying again.”
I stepped in front of the child.
She continued anyway.
“That little girl hears one scary sentence and suddenly everybody stops working.”
“You starved her.”
“She was given chances.”
“To do what?”
“Tell us where Luis’s phone was.”
“She didn’t know exactly.”
“She knew enough.”
Grant laughed.
“Kids always know more than adults think.”
I checked the console logs.
South Ridge.
Friday.
My return.
A beacon attached to the lead vehicle.
Then another entry.
Tonight.
West cottage.
MARIA / CHILD.
I stared at it.
The child.
No name.
Just category.
I looked at Vanessa.
“You wrote this?”
“Yes.”
“You couldn’t even write Sophia.”
“She wasn’t important.”
Sophia heard.
Maria pulled her close.
My voice went quiet.
“That is where you were wrong.”
Then my captain called from upstairs.
“Boss. We found another device.”
“Where?”
“Your bedroom.”
Vanessa stopped breathing.
I looked at her.
“What?”
No answer.
Upstairs, behind my bedside cabinet, my men found a miniature transmitter.
Connected to my private alarm channel.
Programmed for Friday morning.
If activated, it would disable my bedroom distress signal for six minutes.
Six minutes.
Enough to enter.
Enough to leave.
This was never only an ambush on the road.
May you like
They had prepared for me to survive it.
And still planned what came next.
