Chapter 2 - The Dark House
The room vanished into darkness.
Someone screamed.
Glass shattered near the bar.
Guests stumbled into furniture.
I pulled Lily against my chest and turned my back toward the center of the room.
Old instincts returned without permission.
Protect the injured.
Control the doorway.
Identify movement.
Never stand in front of a window.
A faint emergency light flickered near the kitchen.
Richard was no longer beside the bar.
Margaret’s voice cut through the confusion.
“Everyone stay calm.”
“It’s only a power outage.”
It wasn’t.
The music outside was still playing.
The fountain pumps were still running.
Only the mansion had gone dark.
I heard fast footsteps moving toward the rear hallway.
Richard.
I lowered Lily carefully against the sofa.
“Stay here.”
Her hand tightened around mine.
“Don’t leave me.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“I’m stopping him from destroying whatever you were about to show me.”
I moved toward the hallway.
A man stepped into my path.
Cream linen jacket.
Champagne on his sleeve.
He raised both hands.
“Arthur, let the police handle this.”
“What’s your name?”
“Daniel Mercer.”
“Richard’s attorney.”
Of course he was.
“Move, Daniel.”
“You’re trespassing.”
“My daughter called me from inside this house after being attacked.”
“That does not give you authority to search the property.”
“No.”
“But it gives me a reason to remember your face.”
He hesitated.
That was enough.
I stepped around him.
The rear hallway was almost completely black.
At the far end, a blue light flashed once.
Then disappeared.
A security panel.
I heard a door slam.
I reached it three seconds later.
Locked.
Behind it, something metallic crashed.
Richard was inside.
I drove my shoulder into the door.
The frame shook.
Daniel grabbed my arm from behind.
“Stop!”
I turned and pinned him against the wall.
Not violently.
Precisely.
His breath left him.
“Touch me again,” I said, “and you’ll explain your bruises to the same officers who are about to photograph my daughter.”
He stopped moving.
I released him.
Then I kicked the door beside the lock.
The wood split.
The door swung inward.
Richard stood in a private office beside a smoking metal cabinet.
A hard drive lay smashed on the floor.
He held a fireplace poker.
His perfect silk shirt was torn at the shoulder.
For the first time, he looked less like a millionaire and more like what he truly was.
A frightened man protecting evidence.
“You broke into my office,” he said.
“You destroyed a camera system.”
“It malfunctioned.”
“With a fireplace poker?”
He looked past me.
Daniel stood in the doorway.
“Tell him to leave.”
Daniel didn’t answer.
Richard’s eyes narrowed.
Then he swung the poker.
I stepped aside.
The iron bar struck the desk.
Before he could lift it again, I trapped his wrist and drove him against the wall.
The weapon fell.
Richard grunted.
I twisted his arm behind his back.
“Where is the camera footage?”
“Go to hell.”
I tightened my grip.
Not enough to break anything.
Enough to remind him that bones had limits.
A voice came from behind us.
“Let him go.”
A deputy stood in the doorway with his weapon drawn.
Two more officers filled the hall.
Richard immediately changed.
His breathing became ragged.
His face twisted with fear.
“He attacked me,” he said.
“He broke into my home.”
“He threatened my mother.”
The deputy looked at me.
Then at Richard’s arm.
Then at the destroyed equipment.
“Step away, sir.”
I released him.
Richard rubbed his wrist and smiled through the pain.
The sheriff entered behind the deputies.
He was broad, gray-haired, and wearing a gold badge.
Richard’s confidence returned instantly.
“Tom,” he said.
“Thank God.”
Sheriff Thomas Grant looked at Richard.
Then he looked past him toward the broken hard drive.
His expression did not change.
“Arthur Cole,” he said quietly.
I had never met him.
At least not under that name.
The sheriff’s eyes held mine.
Then he spoke the words I had not heard in fifteen years.
“Commander Cole.”
May you like
The entire room went silent.
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