Page 76 of Lord of Passion

One, for the Halloween Historical Tour when I played the role of a ghost inhabitant for one of the other houses, the John Tallow House. It was notorious because he would encase the body parts of his victims in wax.

We all took a big tour to hear the other actor's ghost stories, and I remember Marie Merriweather's. She loved secretpassageways. That's right! My heart begins to pound. There were two, if I remember the story. One on the third floor, and another that was close to the kitchen. I very much wish the actor had clarified where the secret passageways went. I walk back into the bizarrely pristine section of the entry hall leading to the kitchen. For once, this section of the house is blessedly silent. Even Johann's sour-faced cook isn't here.

I close my eyes, trying to recall where the secret entrance was. Oh shit, did the contractor wall over it when they were remodeling?

The pantry. It's in the pantry. Opening the nicely painted door that connects it to the kitchen, I heave a sigh of relief. The narrow little room hasn't been touched, it has been passed over by the carpenters and plaster experts. Looking between the dusty shelves and searching for a seam in the wall, a handle, something. On the shelves facing the door, I find it. There's a door there, it's concealed cleverly unless you're looking for it. It's much shorter than regular doors. Like a trap door.

Wrong use of words, Caroline. Stop freaking yourself out.

I get the lock undone just as there's the sound of footsteps in the kitchen. I freeze, my eyes squinted shut as if that will somehow enhance my invisibility, but the footsteps leave again. There's a difference in how they sound, they tap on the tiled kitchen floor, then go muffled as they step back into the hall and the thick woolen carpet there.

Staring into the dark unknown, I bite my lip. There's just enough light squeezing between the cracks in the lathe and plaster to find my way. Barely. I awkwardly crab-walk my way through the door and pull the shelves back into place, cutting off most of the light.

Anyone who thinks that secret passages are a magical idea are very wrong. It's essentially like crawling through your grandma's basement. Sixteen times. Then, add in enough cobwebs to knit a dusty shroud, spiders bigger than my fist, and an overwhelming cloud of dust with every footstep I take. I pull my shirt up over my nose, trying to mentally picture where I am in the house. I come to a dead end and I almost kick a rotting 2x4 before reminding myself that I'm being stealthy.

To my left, though, squinting past the shadows, there's a stairway. I take excruciatingly slow steps, painfully aware of each tiny squeak. There are missing steps and I gingerly grab onto the wall studs to pull myself up, praying another step doesn't crack and send me down through it. There's no hiding that from the guards, as well as the two broken legs and tetanus I'd get from all these rusty nails.

I gratefully stand in the second-floor stairwell, it feels sturdier than the stairs, almost reassuring. Putting my hand on the doorknob, I hesitate. It could be locked. It would make sense for safety's sake. Once again, I'm dealing with a psychopath. His concept of safety could be very different.

It opens though, and I heave a deep sigh. Stepping out into the hallway, I listen for a moment, but there's no activity downstairs, so Johann must still be gone. This hallway is also improved, to the right is his master bedroom, so I turn left.

There's a continuous, low beeping sound as I walk down the hall. That specific kind of beeping is one you never forget. It's a vital signs monitor, I'm sure of it. My father survived the car crash that took my mom. He was hooked up to one in the hospital until he took his last breath. A monotonous, endless drone, telling you that your heart and lungs are still keeping you alive.

The beeping is coming from behind the second door down the hall. It's freshly painted, a nice clean white. I stand in front of it, shifting from foot to foot. Could this be another victim? That means it's my responsibility to go in to see if I can help get them out of here. I shuffle around for a minute more as my guilt and anxiety do battle. Guilt wins, so I suck it up.

Wrapping my fingers around the doorknob, I hope in a cowardly way that it's locked and thus taking it out of my hands, but it opens. The monotonous drone of the beeping continues as I step in the room. It's remodeled too, tall ceilings with paintings on the walls that look disconcertingly familiar and windows that look out on the back garden. In the center of this grand, elegant room is a hospital bed, shrunken in the middle of all this lofty grandeur. It's surrounded on three sides by those miserable beeping monitors and I don't know how the patient can endure the endless noise.

The room is dim and I step closer, squinting. "Hello?" I say softly. "Has Johann hurt you? I can help you." There is a dry rustle of a cough and a sound that ratchets, like he's trying to wind his voice up to talk.

"A visitor," the patient rasps. "Come closer, won't you? I rarely get visitors these days."

Oh my God, this poor thing.

"Hi, I'm Caroline," I say, walking quickly over to the bed. "How long have you –" I look at the withered form in the bed. There's enough height to know that they used to have a formidable size and strength, but the poor soul that's left has gray, papery skin and their face is nothing more than a skull. Skin stretched over bone. An animated corpse.

"Dritan fucking Krasniqi," I say. "I thought you were dead."

Chapter Thirty-Four

In which betrayal cuts deepest when it’s close.

Nikandr…

The meeting with Melor Balabanov isn't going well, and I'm fighting my desire to shoot him in the face when my phone goes off. It's a special ringtone for Caroline's bodyguards.

"Excuse me, Melor. This is a security issue."

The motherfucker has arrogance to click his tongue disapprovingly. "There's been so many of those, haven't there?" I'd kill him. At any other time, I'd slam his face down on his desk until I flattened into paste. Not right now.

Stepping out into the hall, I answer it. "Rafail. What is it?"

"Mrs. Morozova has disappeared."

***

I don't remember bidding Melor farewell, and his smug fucking face and the end of our shipping deal barely registers. The captain has the jet fueled by the time I get to the airstrip and within minutes, we're leaving Moscow behind and I'm on my phone again.

"Kolya, what do you know?" He's my favorite hacker in a crew of exceptional and highly morally flexible specialists.