Page 10 of Body of Trust

He gives me a side-eye. “Right.”

“And how might one find these mysterious tunnels? Is there a map I don’t know about?”

“If you know the right people,” he states matter-of-factly and then stops. He looks up and starts counting beams on the ceiling. I open my mouth to speak, but he holds his palm up. “Wait. I lost count.”

“You’ve been counting this entire time?”

“Three hundred and four,” he says to himself and then appears to continue to count in his head. “Okay, this way.”

We walk to another grate in the wall, and I hold my hands up in refusal. “I’m not going into another dark tunnel.”

“This one should be different. You’ve trusted me this far, right?” His eyes shine bright as he pleads with me not to give up on him.

“Seeing as I have nowhere else to go …”

“That’s the spirit.” He removes the grate on the wall with ease, which seems to surprise him. “At least one thing is going our way tonight.”

I know the drill, so I go first and wait for him to get behind me. We only have to crawl for a short time before we’re below a metal door in the ceiling. He unhooks the long handle, unlatching the lock.

“Now, we pray,” he says.

“After everything that has transpired tonight, now, you want to pray?” I nearly choke on my words. “For what?”

“That the latch on the other side is open.”

“Jesse, why would the latch on the other side be closed?” I think back to what he said before about these tunnels. “Are we about to magically appear inside someone’s home?”

“Yep.” With a push and a shove, he opens the door. “Hope they like unexpected company. Let’s go.”

I want to fight him. Normally, I would. But under the circumstances, I have no options.

“Ladies first.”

Chapter Three

“Listen, I have followed you through this little Shawshank escape, but breaking and entering is where I draw the line,” I say.

“You do realize, we’re running from gun-slinging criminals who want to kill your family?”

The convoluted essence of that sentence has my head reeling. “My family?”

“For a smart girl, you’re slow to pick up on this.”

He doesn’t wait for me to say anything as he lifts himself up through the hole. He’s lucky he’s no longer in front of me because his insult did not go unnoticed.

“It’s clear,” he calls from above.

His hand appears, and I hesitate for a moment before grabbing it and allowing him to help me up. He easily lifts me and sits me on the ground with my feet dangling in the tunnel. I stand, dust off my hands, and adjust my dress.

“We can wait it out upstairs.” He closes the metal tunnel door and secures the latch.

I look around the room. We’re in an old basement. An oil tank has cobwebs on it, and the water heater doesn’t sound like it’s running.

He moves to a staircase and doesn’t seem to care how loud his footsteps are. I, on the other hand, walk on tiptoe.

The main floor of the home is dark, and there’s no furniture inside. He walks to a bookcase built into the side of the fireplace and puts his gun on the shelf before grabbing two candlesticks. He places them on the mantel and lights the candles with a matchbook.

With the room lit by the two wicks, he takes the phone from my hand. “While I like traveling by iPhone light, I’d also like to save my battery.”