Chapter 3 - THE ROOM BEHIND THE WALL
There are moments when fear makes men reckless.
Other moments make them precise.
The photograph made me precise.
“Lock the estate.”
My voice carried through the upstairs hallway.
“No vehicle moves. No gate opens. Search every room, every tunnel, every outbuilding.”
Marcus nodded.
“And find Claire?”
I looked at the photograph again.
“Find everyone.”
Within four minutes, every electronic gate around the Vale estate was sealed.
Within seven, twenty-three men were searching forty-two acres.
Within ten, I learned the first impossible thing.
Claire's Mercedes was still in the garage.
Her coat was still hanging beside the kitchen entrance.
Her purse was in our bedroom.
Her phone was on the library table.
She hadn't left through any door we knew about.
Which meant my house had doors I didn't know about.
Dr. Aaron Patel arrived from Poughkeepsie and treated Mia in one of the first-floor guest suites because she refused to let Harper out of sight.
I didn't blame her.
I assigned two guards outside the door and one inside.
Then I walked to the east study.
Nathan sat in a leather chair facing the fireplace.
Daniel stood behind him.
Nathan looked up when I entered.
“You found the photograph.”
I stopped.
“How do you know about it?”
“Because they sent me one too.”
Daniel immediately frisked him again.
Nathan sighed.
“Inside pocket.”
Daniel pulled out a folded photograph.
It showed a house I didn't recognize.
A woman in her thirties stood in front carrying groceries.
On the back:
SAY NOTHING.
“Who is she?” I asked.
Nathan looked at me for several seconds.
“My sister.”
I knew Nathan had a sister.
Sophie Cross.
They hadn't spoken in years, or so he'd claimed.
“She lives outside Boston,” he said. “Schoolteacher. Husband. Two boys.”
“When did you get this?”
“Tuesday night.”
The same night Mia disappeared.
“And instead of telling me—”
“You were in Atlantic City.”
“I own telephones.”
“Whoever sent it knew where you were, which floor you were staying on, and which private elevator you used.”
“So?”
“So they had access to your security movements.”
He leaned forward.
“And the only people with that access were you, me, Daniel, Marcus... and Claire.”
Daniel's expression tightened behind him.
Nathan continued.
“I didn't know who I could trust.”
“You could trust me.”
“Could I?”
The question landed badly.
I stepped closer.
“Be very careful.”
“They used your master code to unlock the east service gate Tuesday night.”
My anger stalled.
“I wasn't here.”
“I know.”
“Then why didn't security flag it?”
“Because your master code overrides alerts.”
I looked at Daniel.
His face darkened.
“That's true.”
Nathan continued.
“Then, Wednesday morning, I found Mia.”
“You left her tied up.”
“I gave her water.”
“You left her tied up.”
His jaw flexed.
“Yes.”
I wanted to hit him.
Instead I asked the only question that mattered.
“Why?”
Nathan looked toward Daniel.
“Get him out.”
Daniel stiffened.
I shook my head.
“He stays.”
“Dom—”
“If you have something to say, say it.”
Nathan sat back.
“Claire showed me a live feed of Sophie's house.”
Silence.
“She told me if Mia walked out of that cellar before the ledger was found, my sister's family would disappear.”
“You believed her?”
“She sent me a photograph of my nephew asleep in his bedroom.”
Even Daniel looked unsettled.
“I bought myself time,” Nathan said. “I brought Mia water. Food. I loosened one wrist rope when nobody was watching.”
Mia's right wrist had been less bruised than the left.
I remembered.
“Why not release her and move your sister?”
“Because Claire isn't running this.”
“How do you know?”
Nathan stared toward the fire.
“Because she was scared.”
That wasn't what I expected.
“When?”
“Wednesday night. I caught her crying in the north corridor. Not fake crying. Not Claire crying because the florist ordered ivory instead of champagne roses.”
He looked at me.
“She was terrified.”
“Of whom?”
“She wouldn't say.”
“You expect me to believe you protected a kidnapper because she looked frightened?”
“No. I expect you to realize the woman you're marrying may be dangerous and still be somebody else's pawn.”
Raymond Sloan's name came back to me.
“Mia found Sloan's name in the ledger.”
Nathan's face went completely blank.
There it was again.
“You know something.”
He rubbed his mouth.
“Your father had a private records system.”
“I know.”
“No. You know the one he wanted you to know.”
I didn't answer.
Nathan stood slowly.
“When this mansion was renovated in 1998, Victor added six service corridors that never appeared on the official plans.”
My father loved secrets.
“I know about four.”
“There were seven.”
I stared at him.
Nathan almost smiled.
“Your old man didn't trust architects.”
“Where are the other three?”
“One connected his office to the garage. One ran from the wine cellar to the river path.”
“And the last?”
Nathan looked past me toward the western wall.
“Room Nine.”
I'd never heard the name.
“What is Room Nine?”
“Something your father told me never to show you unless he was dead and you were in danger from your own house.”
“My father has been dead nine years.”
Nathan's face darkened.
“I spent nine years hoping we'd never need it.”
The entrance was behind a mahogany bookcase in my father's old office.
Nathan pressed a brass hinge, then pushed the third shelf inward.
The entire case moved.
Cold air rushed out.
Daniel swore under his breath.
A narrow corridor stretched behind the wall.
No dust.
Someone had used it recently.
We moved with weapons drawn.
At the end stood a steel door.
Nathan entered six numbers.
My father's birthday.
Red light.
“Changed,” Nathan muttered.
I looked at the keypad.
Four numbers had faint wear.
Claire's birth year.
I entered 1987.
The lock clicked.
Nathan looked at me.
“That bothers me.”
“It should.”
We opened the door.
Room Nine wasn't a room.
It was a surveillance center.
Old monitors had been replaced with modern screens.
Live feeds showed my gates.
My kitchen.
My office.
Guest hallways.
The garage.
Nathan's room.
My bedroom.
I felt my stomach turn.
Someone had been watching us from inside my own walls.
Daniel began checking equipment.
“These aren't connected to the main security network.”
“Can you tell who installed them?”
“Give me time.”
On a long desk sat folders.
Wedding plans.
Financial documents.
Photographs of me leaving meetings.
Copies of my signature.
Copies of Claire's signature.
A preliminary draft of my updated marital trust.
And one document I had never signed.
LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF DOMINIC VICTOR VALE.
My name.
My assets.
My death.
Claire listed as beneficiary.
I scanned the signature.
It looked perfect.
It wasn't mine.
Nathan read over my shoulder.
“Jesus.”
Daniel found three burner phones.
One had dozens of erased messages.
Another contained only a single contact.
R.S.
Raymond Sloan.
My father's attorney.
My godfather.
The man who had been calling me every Sunday since I was twelve.
I suddenly remembered Raymond insisting I update my will before the wedding.
Responsible planning, he'd called it.
My phone rang.
Marcus.
I answered.
“Tell me you found Claire.”
Silence.
“Marcus?”
His breathing was heavy.
“The power cut in the guest wing.”
I was already moving.
“What happened?”
“Backup came on after eleven seconds.”
“And?”
“The guards outside Mia's room are down.”
My blood turned cold.
“Mia?”
“Still here.”
“Harper?”
He didn't answer.
I ran.
Nathan and Daniel followed me through the hidden corridor.
By the time I reached the guest suite, Mia was standing barefoot in the hallway screaming Harper's name.
One guard was unconscious against the wall.
Another had been locked inside the bathroom.
The window was shut.
No broken glass.
No open door.
Then Nathan pointed toward the wardrobe.
A panel stood open behind it.
Inside the dark passage lay Harper's yellow hair ribbon.
Mia made a sound I will never forget.
I picked up the ribbon.
A monitor on the bedroom wall suddenly turned on by itself.
Black screen.
White letters.
BRING MIA CARTER TO ST. AGNES CHAPEL.
MIDNIGHT.
NO POLICE.
May you like
Then a second line appeared.
OR HARPER LEARNS WHAT HAPPENS TO CHILDREN WHO HEAR TOO MUCH.
