Chapter 3 - The Door Above the Stairs
The first metallic knock from upstairs changed the room.
Diane moved toward the staircase.
Wade stepped into her path.
“It’s the pipes.”
Nathan looked up.
“Pipes don’t knock twice.”
The sound came again.
Three slow impacts.
Then silence.
Ava tightened her grip on Nathan’s sleeve.
“Someone is in that room,” she said.
Wade rose fully from the armchair.
His injuries made the movement awkward, but his voice remained sharp.
“There is no one upstairs.”
Franklin spoke too quickly.
“The room is used for storage.”
Nathan looked at him.
“You recognized the latch.”
Franklin’s mouth closed.
Diane stared between her husband and father-in-law.
“What room?”
Wade turned toward her.
“Diane, don’t encourage this.”
Nathan took one step toward the staircase.
Wade blocked him.
“You are not searching my house.”
Diane finally spoke.
“It’s my house too.”
Wade looked at her with a flash of anger so fast most people missed it.
Nathan did not.
Neither did Ava.
Ava lifted her phone again.
“There are more pictures.”
Wade lunged.
Nathan drove one shoulder between him and the staircase, forcing him back against the chair without striking him.
“Stay down.”
Wade pointed at Ava.
“She broke into private rooms. She took staged photographs. She attacked me when I confronted her.”
Ava’s lower lip trembled.
“They weren’t staged.”
“Then whose wrist is that?” Diane asked.
Ava looked toward the locked door.
Before she could answer, Franklin stood from the sofa.
His knees looked unsteady.
“Wade,” he said, “open it.”
Wade’s face hardened.
“You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“I said open the door.”
For the first time, Wade looked afraid of his father.
Ava noticed.
So did Nathan.
Franklin had not been surprised by the photographs.
He had been terrified they still existed.
Nathan pointed toward the stairs.
“Who is in that room?”
Franklin looked at Ava.
Then at the clear evidence bag on the coffee table.
Inside it sat a small brass latch.
The screws were bent.
The metal was scratched.
It had been torn from a door recently.
Franklin whispered, “Where did you get that?”
May you like
Ava answered without looking away from him.
“From the first door.”
