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I clear my throat. “What about it?”
“Your pad has a panic button.”
I nod. The technician, a potbellied man who told me to call him Big Jim, said if I ever pressed it, I had better make sure I meant business because the police would show up with guns blazing. He also said I had to press it for a minimum of three full seconds in order for the silent alarm to activate, and I remember thinking three seconds seemed like an eternity when there’s someone coming at you with a gun.
Now I’m wishing I’d asked him to install a couple of strategically placed hidden ones—right here under this breakfast bar, for example.
I duck my head, tucking a hank of hair behind an ear, using the motion to chance a glance at my iPhone screen.
The screen is completely black.Shit. I waited too long.
“Where are the other pads? By the front door, I’m guessing, but anywhere else? How many do you have?”
My head jerks up. “What?”
He pulls three paper towels from the roll and spreads them across the bar top, dropping on them clusters of grapes, distributing the snacks. When he gets to the cheese sticks, he needs both hands to peel back the plastic, so he places his gun on the island behind him. I stare at the weapon and wonder—could I leap across the marble and get there first? Could I grab the gun with one hand and a knife from the block with another? Cam’s sharpest Nesmuk with the carbon steel blade and handle of petrified bog oak. Could I use it to stab him in the throat?
The moment passes, and when he finishes, he reaches for the gun. “Come on, Jade, I really need you to focus here. Where in the house are the other alarm pads? And before you answer, I’d advise you to think really long and hard, because if you’re lying, if you accidentally on purpose forget to mention one of the alarm pads, I’m going to find out. And then this little problem will suddenly become a big one.”
“There’s one in the master bedroom,” I say, my heart sinking. “It’s on this level, down the hallway by the stairs. That’s the pad we use when we come through the front door. It’s the only other one.”
On Big Jim’s advice, the second pad was installed on the bedroom wall instead of next to the front door, in case we ever needed the panic button in the middle of the night. From here, though, an impossible distance. Across the living room, around a corner, down a hallway, inside the door. A literal obstacle course where I’d have to dodge furniture, swerve around walls. Even if I left my kids here, which I never would, I’d have to hold the panic button down for three eternal seconds. I’d never make it there fast enough.
“And cameras?”
My heart gives a hard kick. “What about them?”
He puffs a put-upon sigh, rolls his eyes. “Stop making this so hard. How many are there? Where are they located?”
With shaking fingers I try my phone again. Three rapid clicks of a side button while looking this man in the eye. I make sure to look himstraightin the eye.
“We have six, all outside. Two on the front, one on each side and two on the back.”
“You sure about that?”
I nod. My heart is booming so hard I’m surprised he can’t hear.
He frowns, watching me through squinted eyes. “No indoor cameras in a fancy place like this? I find that a little hard to believe. You sure you don’t have a secret camera somewhere, keeping an eye on the jewelry box in your closet maybe, or tucked behind a plant on a shelf upstairs?”
My gut muscles clench. My ears ring with building pressure. “I’m sure.”
He cocks his head, his lips pursing in thought. “Then prove it.” He stretches a long arm across the bar. “Show me the footage.”
Dread throbs and expands in my veins. It’s like those last, breathless seconds right before your car slams into a tree. The squeal of locked-down tires, the tug of momentum, the sickening flash of understanding that there’s no stopping disaster.
He snaps his fingers, a muffled slap of gloved skin hitting fabric on his outstretched hand. “Come on, Jade. A system like yours will have an app on your phone. Show it to me.”
Beatrix jerks on the chair next to me, a quiet seizure of fear.
And this is where I know I’m in trouble. Beyond the gun and the alarm and the unreachable panic buttons, there’s something deeply unsettling about the way this man is constantly one step ahead of me. This whole time we’ve been inside, while he was pointing us to our chairs and gathering up our snacks, his eyes have been alert. His mouth and hands were moving while his eyes watched. Scanning the room and our faces, coolly assessing our every move.
This is what I’m up against.
“Give me the phone, Jade, and no one gets hurt.”
J A D E
3:34 p.m.