Chapter 6 - The House With No Basement
We left St. Catherine's in darkness.
Grant came with me.
I hated that he did.
I needed him to.
Those two truths could exist at the same time.
My mother did not answer on the first call.
Or the second.
On the third, I heard Ellie laughing in the background.
"Mara?"
I could breathe again.
"Lock every door."
"They're locked."
"Turn off the exterior lights."
"What happened?"
"I'll explain when I get there."
Grant reached for the phone.
I pulled it away.
He looked at me.
"She needs to know—"
"You lost the right to decide what she needs to know when you threw money at me."
Pain crossed his face.
Good.
Some small, ugly part of me wanted him to feel it.
We reached my mother's house twenty-eight minutes later.
Nothing looked wrong.
That was the problem.
No strange cars.
No broken windows.
No lights across the road.
Threats would have been easier if they announced themselves.
Ellie ran toward me the second I opened the door.
"Mommy!"
I picked her up.
Grant stood behind me.
She reached toward him.
"Daddy!"
I almost stopped her.
Almost.
But whatever Grant had done to me, Ellie did not understand betrayal.
She understood Daddy.
Grant held her.
His face collapsed for half a second when she wrapped her arms around his neck.
"I'm sorry," he whispered into her hair.
She patted his cheek.
"It's okay."
Children forgive things they do not understand.
Adults sometimes do the same.
My mother saw Adrian enter behind Rueben.
Her entire body stiffened.
"You."
Adrian stopped.
"Evelyn."
They knew each other.
Of course they did.
At that point, I was more surprised when two people in my life had not shared a secret relationship.
"You told me he was dead," Mom said.
I looked at her.
"Who told you?"
"My father."
Adrian almost smiled.
"Richard told everyone something different."
Mom crossed the room.
"I saw you once."
"At St. Catherine's?"
"No."
She stared at him.
"At Mara's wedding."
Grant looked up.
Adrian did not deny it.
"Why were you there?"
"Richard invited me."
I laughed bitterly.
"My wedding apparently had better security clearance than the Pentagon."
Nobody laughed.
Ellie tugged Grant's lapel.
"Daddy, basement?"
The room stopped.
I looked at her.
"Show Mommy."
She pointed toward Grant.
"He knows."
Grant's face changed.
"Mara—"
"Show me."
"There isn't a basement."
"Then why does our daughter think there is?"
His silence answered.
I took Ellie from him.
"Show me."
Our house was twelve minutes away.
Grant drove separately.
Kingsley security surrounded us front and back.
When we reached the property, Grant used his thumb on a panel inside the garage.
A section of storage cabinetry unlocked.
Behind it was a staircase.
My knees nearly gave.
We had lived there seven years.
I had parked six feet from that wall almost every day.
"How long?"
Grant did not look at me.
"The room existed before we bought the house."
"You knew?"
"Your father showed me."
"Of course he did."
The staircase descended beneath the garage.
Not a basement.
A bunker.
Concrete walls.
Independent ventilation.
Servers.
Monitors.
Emergency food.
A medical cabinet.
And an entire wall of surveillance feeds.
My life.
Our house.
Ellie's preschool entrance.
My mother's driveway.
Kingsley & Traynor.
Grant had been watching everything.
I turned.
"You've been surveilling me."
"Protecting you."
"Stop using that word."
"Mara—"
"Who else has access?"
"Only me."
Adrian walked to the server bank.
"That's not true."
Grant frowned.
Adrian pointed to a blinking secondary network port.
"Someone's been mirroring the system."
Grant went pale.
"Impossible."
Sloane sat at the console.
"Move."
She began typing.
Within minutes, lines of connection logs filled the screen.
External access.
Regular.
Encrypted.
Hidden inside maintenance traffic.
"How long?" I asked.
Sloane checked.
"Twenty-six months."
Ellie was three.
Someone had begun watching the bunker when she was approximately ten months old.
Grant swore under his breath.
I moved closer.
"Where does it go?"
Sloane traced the route.
"Three relays."
"Final location?"
She typed again.
Then stopped.
"What?"
"It's local."
"How local?"
She rotated the screen.
The final connection resolved to an address.
My mother's house.
Mom stared.
"No."
Sloane ran it again.
Same result.
Someone had been accessing Grant's secret surveillance bunker through my mother's property.
"Do you have a server?" Grant asked.
"No."
"Smart-home hub?"
"Basic security."
"Guest network?"
"Yes."
"When did you install it?"
"Two years ago."
"Who installed it?"
Mom opened her mouth.
Then stopped.
I knew before she spoke.
"Your father's contractor."
My dead father again.
Adrian walked toward the stairs.
"We go back."
"No."
Mom's voice sharpened.
Everyone looked at her.
"No one is going anywhere until I tell Mara something."
She sat down.
My mother suddenly looked older than sixty.
"Richard didn't die at home."
I stared at her.
"What?"
"He collapsed at my house."
The world went silent.
"You told me he died in his study."
"Because that's what he made me promise to tell you."
"You were with him?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"He came to warn me."
"About what?"
"Someone had found Bluebird."
"Who?"
"He didn't know."
"Then what happened?"
Mom's eyes filled.
"He walked into my kitchen."
"He looked terrible."
"He put a key on the table."
"He said if anything happened to him, I was to keep it away from Grant."
Grant stepped back as if struck.
"Why?"
"I don't know."
"You expect me to believe—"
"I don't care what you believe."
She looked at me.
"Then your father grabbed his chest and fell."
"Did you call 911?"
"Immediately."
"And?"
"He regained consciousness before they arrived."
"What did he say?"
Her tears came then.
Not dramatic.
Quiet.
"He told me to cancel the ambulance."
"Why?"
"He said it wasn't his heart."
Adrian moved closer.
"What did he think it was?"
Mom whispered:
"Poison."
Grant swore.
I felt numb.
"What key?"
Mom looked around.
"I hid it."
"Where?"
"In the one place Richard told me no Mercer would ever search."
Adrian and Grant exchanged a glance.
"Where?" I asked.
May you like
Mom looked toward Ellie.
"In her teddy bear."
