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“I was worried about him with everything going on.”
“He knows how to take care of himself.”
“I know he’s trained with a gun, but anyone can be ambushed. Like Eric. And Vince.”
Lucas winced. “True enough. I’ll rouse the troops for a trip back to their house. They can get some belongings while you search the house for that egg surprise. It’s only nine. We have time to get there, search, and return by three. It would be great if the surprise was found. Once the news is out that the egg’s in the hands of the auction house, the danger all around should be over.”
“Maybe this nightmare will be over soon and we’ll be out of your hair. You’ve been a real trouper to deal with all of us. The crowd keeps expanding. The next thing you know, neighbors will think you’re the one running the bed-and-breakfast.”
His grin widened. “It hasn’t been so bad.”
Had his manner thawed a little? Carly thought so, but now that he’d moved away, she was glad he hadn’t kissed her. It had been a moment of weakness and fear, and she needed to keep her guard up. While he seemed so different from other men she’d been around, there was no guarantee he wasn’t just like Ryan. Or her dead husband, for that matter.
***
Carrying Noah, Carly walked behind Lucas through the trashed home. The doors to the entertainment center stoodopen, and wires and electronic parts had been pulled out. Several antique armoires lay tipped on their fronts. All the kitchen utensils lay scattered on the floor. Dressers with the drawers pulled and splintered were strewn around the bedrooms. All of Elizabeth’s lovely things—destroyed.
The blood in the living room was a gruesome reminder of the violence done here last night. Still no word on who that might have been. Lucas tried to steer Elizabeth around it into another room, but the older woman stared at the stain and shuddered before moving to the kitchen at his guidance.
Lainey set a suitcase in the foyer as Carly exited the living room with Elizabeth. “Let me take the baby while you have a look around.”
Noah’s warm solid weight had been her comfort as she walked through the destruction, but Carly handed him over anyway. “Thank you. It’s hard to know where to look. There’s no safe anywhere? An attic or a basement that might hold old boxes from when your grandma was a child?”
Lainey adjusted the baby on her shoulder. “I hate the basement, so I never go there. Grandma doesn’t either. She’s afraid of all the ‘haint’ stories her mother used to tell her. I don’t think either of us have gone down there. Let me show you the stairway.” She led Carly to a utility room off the kitchen. “We had a furnace put in a few years ago, and Holt went down with the HVAC guy. He had to take a broom down to clear out the spiderwebs.”
Carly shuddered. “I think I’d better at least give it a look, though.”
Lucas grabbed a broom hanging on the wall. “I’ll go with you.”
He opened the door and flipped on the light. A weak yellow light illuminated old wooden steps that descended into a dark well below.
Holt stepped into the room behind them. “There’s another switch at the bottom. I can show you. I didn’t search much down there and spent as little time in it as possible. It’s as old as the hills.”
Lucas stepped away from the doorway to allow Holt to go first. “After you.” Holt stepped down the stairs with Lucas on his heels.
“Call me when it’s safe,” Carly said from the second step down.
The place smelled dank and musty. It seemed like something out ofPoltergeistorThe Amityville Horror. She swallowed the sour taste in her mouth and moved toward the third step when Lucas called her name.
She could do this. She had to. Finding the surprise was the only way to keep everyone safe.
The odor of something dead grew as she descended into the dim light below. Though she knew it was a dead mouse most likely, the stench didn’t help her nerves. It took all her courage to step onto the old stone floor and move toward Lucas, who was still sweeping out cobwebs overhead from the floor joists and hanging pipes.
Lucas had to stoop a bit, and Carly wanted to follow suit so she didn’t slide her head into something icky, but it would be too hard to clearly see into every nook and cranny. She flipped on her phone flashlight and angled it around at the walls, hoping to find some kind of hiding space. It took fifteen minutes to examine the walls and find nothing.
The men waited for her at the bottom of the stairs, and she headed that way. She started to put her phone back in her pocket without remembering to turn off the light. The movement illuminated the ceiling. She hadn’t thought of examining everything under the floorboards.
“Hang on, let me look around a bit more.”
“Take your time,” Lucas said. “If you see anything scary, just yell.”
“Oh, I will.” She shone the light under the floorboards and around the pipe all the way back toward where an ancient oil furnace sat.
Holt had told her they’d opted not to have the old relic cut up and hauled away because of the cost, and it loomed in her light like a scary torture device. What a scaredy-cat she was. She aimed the flashlight in that final space and squinted. Was that some kind of box clear in the back? She’d need someone taller to see better.
“Lucas, can you come here?”
“Coming.”
