“But Oliver,” I argue. Maya’s brother, Oliver, is an officer with the Sleepy Hollow PD. At the very mention of trouble at B and A, he’d come right here.
“Shea’s pregnant,” Nora says. “She’s been having a rough time of her first trimester.” Hesitating, she adds, “Let’s get closer to the house. See if we notice anything else off. If it looks like we need backup then, we’ll call it in.”
“What about Cole?”
“I’ll text him.” She pulls her phone from her pocket and types for a few seconds. Then she puts her phone away again. “I gave him the sitrep. If he wants to call Oliver right away, he can.”
Nora catches my hand and tugs me towards the gate. “But I really want to get in there. Now. Maybe it’s nothing. Maybe everyone’s asleep, and they never noticed the generator didn’t kick on. But—” Her gaze holds mine. Tiny white flakes dot her eyelashes and brows. “We’re trained for this. A lot of the cops in town aren’t.”
She has a point. Oliver was CIA, so he’s more skilled than most of the patrol officers, and his partner, Kane, is extremely competent, as well. But Nora and I don’t have to follow the rules of the law, not like the police do. Which means if there’s a threat inside the house, I’d rather we deal with it than anyone else.
“Okay,” I agree. “Let’s take a look.”
Nora falls behind me as we run towards the main building, her footsteps in rhythm with mine. With the sky thick with large white flakes and the snowy lawn reflecting the moon peeking through the clouds, there’s no way for us to move undetected. Our best bet is to move as quickly as we can, using the scattered trees for occasional cover.
Once we reach the front door, I hold my hand up in a gesture to hold. Nora gets into position at my six, her back to mine as she scans our surroundings. I grab the door handle and give it a twist, but it doesn’t move.
“It’s locked,” I whisper. When Nora moves back beside me, I add, “If the gate was open, but the main door is locked…”
“I’m not sure what it means,” she replies. “But I do know I want to get inside.”
“We can knock,” I start.
“No.” She grabs my hand and tows me away from the door. “That feeling? It’s even worse now. If the gate wasn’t working, it should stand to reason that the front door wouldn’t work, either. Since they’re all linked to the same system. But with this locked…”
As she looks at me, her gaze is solemn. “I’m worriedsomeone’s inside, Jack. And I don’t want them to know we’re coming in.”
“The garage, then.” There’s a passageway from the garage to the basement, and I know the Bilco doors in the garage aren’t locked like the others. Ever since Finn and Hanna were trapped in there and had to use the secret passage to escape, the Bilco doors have always been kept unlocked, just in case.
“The garage is locked, anyway,”Leo explained.“So we don’t have to worry about someone breaking in that way. Not that I think anyone’s going to bomb the garage again, not with the drone detection system up and running, but still. We don’t want anyone to get trapped in here.”
Of course, the garage could be locked, too. But it’s worth trying, at least.
Less than thirty seconds later, Nora and I arrive at the garage. We stare at the overhead door for a moment before turning to each other. “If the door’s locked, we can break one of the windows,” Nora says. She turns her gaze to a small window about eight feet up from the ground.
“Maybe. Or maybe the door isn’t locked, either.”
Nora lifts her chin. “Only way to find out is to try.”
In silent agreement, we both grab hold of the door handle and give it an experimental tug. For a second, it doesn’t move.
I’m not sure whether I’m disappointed or relieved.
But then.
The bit of ice that must have created a seal at the bottom breaks free, and the door starts rolling up. Nora flashes me a quick smile of victory. Despite theworry snaking through me, I can’t help smiling back at her. “We did it.”
She kisses my cheek, her lips soft and warm on my skin. “We did.”
As soon as the door is open a few feet, we scurry under it, then hurry over to the Bilco doors in the corner. Nora grabs one of them and pulls it open, then takes out her phone and switches the flashlight on. “It’s pitch black down there,” she explains.
Following her lead, I use the flashlight on my own phone, as well. With the twin beams lighting a path ahead of us, we make quick time of the distance between the garage and the house. When we reach the next door, I have another brief moment of worry—what if this door is locked? And we have to go back to the start?
But in a stroke of luck—or at least, I hope it’s luck, and not misfortune leading us to our doom—the door opens. With me still in the lead, we creep into the basement, our flashlights illuminating the empty hallway.
“I don’t hear anything,” Nora whispers. Which isn’t too odd, given that we’re in the basement, where the gym and shooting range are, and it’s highly unlikely that Rylan would be using either of them at one in the morning.
“Let’s go upstairs,” I tell her, adding unnecessarily, “Stick close.”
