Chapter Thirteen
Now
‘W hat is Panic Room Mode?’ I put my hand on the front door handle and gave it another futile tug. But I’d seen the film. Jodie Foster didn’t have a particularly great time. ‘Why is the whole house in Panic Room Mode?’
Some of Ethan’s hair was standing on end, because he’d been worrying at it constantly for the last two minutes, and his cheeks had blanched to the colour of the path I knew was outside, but could no longer see. He peered at the Sparks panel, then his phone.
‘What’s going on, Ethan?’ There was a fluttering in my chest, but I tried to ignore it. This was fine. It was just a weird blip.
‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. ‘I mean, I do know, some of it.’
‘You know some of what’s happening with the house you built?’
‘Shush a minute,’ he said distractedly.
I inhaled through my nose, and let it out slowly, like a whoopee cushion deflating. The house was deathly quiet, and the spacious, elegant hall looked strange, with the windows dark and the lights on. The sunset was probably spectacular, but we couldn’t see it.
I walked over to the study, as if I might find some kind of answer in there.
Ethan was still tapping away, working between the wall panel and his mobile.
After an indeterminate amount of time, when I thought I was in danger of fidgeting myself to death, he let out an emphatic ‘Fuck!’ and the fluttering in my chest intensified.
‘What is it?’ I went back into the hall.
He looked up at me. ‘When you said there was an emergency, you activated the Panic Room feature, which essentially shuts the house down and stops anyone from getting inside.’
‘I sort of got that, but there has to be some kind of mechanism, a way the house will open up again. What if there was a fire? What if an intruder had got in and … and was coming after us?’ I swallowed heavily, and Ethan took a step towards me.
‘Ordinarily, the moment Panic Room Mode is activated, the local authorities would be notified. But because nobody has bought this house yet, it’s still set up as a show home, so that loop hasn’t been closed.’
‘Right. So … what? Nobody’s coming, but there must be some kind of override. Some way of turning off Sparks and unlocking the door. The house can’t be so modern that it stops you from turning a key in a lock.’
Ethan ran his hand through his hair again, tugging at the strands, and a little thread of my patience snapped. I gripped his forearm, pulling it away. ‘Your hair is too nice for you to yank it all out.’
He gave me a bleak look.
‘Your override?’ I prompted.
‘It seems my override has been … overridden,’ he said quietly.
‘What?’
‘Something’s not right. Panic Room Mode turns off the Wi-Fi in case of a cyber-attack, so—’
‘Of course it does.’ I massaged my chest. ‘But we can still phone out, can’t we? We can get Sarah to come back or the local police to turn up? I know DC Sommer, he can be creative when he needs to be, he could jimmy one of the locks or …’
Ethan held his phone up so I could see the screen. In the top right corner, where the Wi-Fi logo should have been, or 4G or 5G, there was that horrible SOS symbol that looked like a sticking plaster.
‘This is an SOS situation.’ I slipped my rucksack off and ferreted inside it for my own phone.
My hand brushed against the soft black bag that held my silver mermaid, and I squeezed it as if it might bring us some luck.
But when I looked at my phone screen, mine was also showing the SOS logo, alongside a red alert sign.
I had less than 10 per cent battery left.
‘You idiot, Georgie,’ I muttered, and put it back in my bag. ‘OK, so what do we do?’
Ethan took a step back, so his head thudded against the wall. ‘I don’t know.’
I stared at him. ‘You don’t know ?’
‘No, I … You said the system said goodbye to you, even though you hadn’t mentioned Sparks?’
‘It said farewell, Georgie .’
‘Something’s not quite … right.’
‘Something not quite right that has trapped us inside ? We must be able to call out from here. Does it have a landline?’
‘It’s … like I said, those final links haven’t been secured, because nobody’s bought it yet. The plan is to do that with the new owner, set up all their favourites, their preferred contacts and emergency services.’
‘Who else is there other than the police? You think whoever buys this house will have a direct line to MI5? Ethan!’ I threw my hands up in despair.
‘It’s a sophisticated system.’
‘A system that’s so sophisticated it’s managed to lock us inside with no means of escape?
’ It was my turn to pull at my hair, snagging the elastic tie so my ponytail came loose.
‘This cannot be happening.’ I tugged the door handle again.
It didn’t budge. ‘Where are the other doors?’ I strode towards the back of the house, past the staircase.
There was a door here too, wider than my back door at home but a lot less grand than Sterenlenn’s entrance.
Hope surged, but I grabbed the handle and yanked it, and got the same, strong resistance.
‘Sparks, open the back door,’ I tried.
‘Panic Room Mode is activated,’ the voice said.
I rolled my eyes. ‘Sparks, override Panic Room Mode.’
‘Panic Room Mode cannot be overridden. Emergency services are on their way.’
‘They’re not though. What other doors are there, Ethan?’
‘There are the French doors in the living room, but you won’t—’
‘I’m going.’ I hurried through the kitchen, my arm knocking against an ice bucket that still held a bottle of champagne, condensation beading the glass.
I kept going, rubbing my arm, then came to a halt.
I hadn’t made it in here so far, unable to squeeze through the crowds congregating in the kitchen, and it was sumptuous.
Ahead of me were the French windows. Their glass was dark too, which meant I couldn’t see the view, but it also meant there was nothing to distract me from the beauty of the room.
The fireplace that Ethan had been so enamoured with when the house was abandoned was the focal point, preserved while the walls either side had been knocked out, so the room stretched the full length of the house.
There were large windows that should have been showing off the gardens at the front and the back, with the French windows opening onto the side aspect.
The walls were a dusky grey-blue, and three huge, cream sofas that looked comfy enough to sleep on were arranged, not around a television – though one was mounted on the wall, so thin it was almost flush with it – but around the beautiful fireplace.
Glass and chrome occasional tables were dotted throughout, with more extravagant bouquets, the flowers cream and blue to match the decor, vibrant pink roses adding a pop of colour.
The rug in front of the French windows was woven through with the same sea tones I’d seen glimmers of in the other rooms, and chrome uplighters stood sentry in the corners.
It was a soft, calming space, and I would have appreciated it a lot more had I not been in panic mode, just like the house.
I strode to the French windows and pushed down on the handles, but they held firm. ‘Sparks,’ I said, ‘please open the French windows.’
‘Georgie, we are in Panic Room Mode.’ Had she sounded extra soothing?
‘Sparks, there is no intruder. Please end Panic Room Mode.’
‘I need authorization from the emergency services.’
I balled my hands into fists. ‘Sparks, nobody is coming to save us.’
‘You are safe in Panic Room Mode,’ the voice said, and I pressed my hands into my eyes, trying to will away the fear that was crawling up my spine.
‘Georgie.’ I heard Ethan come up behind me and turned around, dropping my hands so I could see him. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘There must be other doors,’ I said. ‘Or we could … have you left that window open in the back, for old times’ sake? Some sentimentality would really help us right now.’
He put his hands on my shoulders. ‘I’m sorry. I never meant for this to happen.’
‘I know.’ I said it automatically, but did I know that? Was he really as helpless as he was making out? ‘Your Sparks system isn’t bug-free yet, is it?’
He rubbed his forehead. ‘It’s gone through thousands of hours of testing, and I don’t know what the fuck it’s doing.
’ He glanced at the fireplace. It still had its original moulding, the floral designs that had been there for over two hundred years.
‘Do you remember that first night, when Orwell said there might be something dead shoved up the chimney?’
‘I think he said there might be a dead cat up there. Thinking back, he could be properly creepy when he wanted to be.’ I shook my head. ‘But I also remember that you loved this fireplace, and it’s so gorgeous, now, the way you’ve restored it.’
‘It was important to me.’
‘Did you spend a lot of time here, during the build? Or did you only visit occasionally?’
‘I came as often as I could, to see how much progress had been made, see if things were going as planned.’
I nodded. ‘Well, they’re not going as planned right now. What options do we have left?’
Ethan’s hands were still on my shoulders, and I could feel the slow sweep of his index fingers as he rubbed the juncture with my neck.
I wasn’t sure he knew he was doing it, but it was sending soothing tingles down my spine and I didn’t want him to stop.
‘I can’t get in touch with anyone,’ he said.
‘Not Sarah or anyone else from the office. Aldo’s gone, and I can’t seem to call out, either from my mobile or the house’s communication system. Your phone’s the same?’
‘It has the little SOS thingy,’ I said, not adding that it was almost out of battery.
‘Right. And Sparks is firmly in Panic Room Mode, and—’
‘Panic Room Mode is activated,’ Sparks confirmed.
‘—my override code is doing nothing.’
‘OK,’ I said, my voice suddenly smaller. ‘So then … what? We break a window? fiddle the lock on one of the doors? Open a skylight and climb onto the roof?’