Chapter 24
JULIA
P anic sent Julia’s heart into overdrive. It thudded against her ribs as her stomach turned over. She stared at the pile of dirt cutting off their access to the world as though her eyes deceived her. Her lower lip trembled, and her brows furrowed as she sucked in a shaky breath. “We’re trapped.”
“What?” Sierra barked, stomping her way to the door and pushing between Grant and Julia. “OMG! Oh no! Not again!”
“Again?” Kyle asked.
“Julia and I were trapped in Maine! And we barely survived it!” Sierra smacked her hands against her head, digging her fingers through her hair.
“Uh, I think you got out pretty unscathed. It was Julia who had to escape on her own,” Kyle argued.
Sierra twisted to face him, wagging a finger at her brother. “You have no idea what happened when those rocks fell. It was terrifying.”
Grant slid his hands onto his daughter’s shoulders. “I’m sure it was, baby. But…maybe we can just dig some of the dirt away and get out of here.”
“We can try, but…” Julia began.
“But?” Kyle asked.
“Sometimes shifting the dirt can make the cave in worse. We can give it a try, but if we don’t make any progress, we should stop. We’re better off letting people from the outside dig in to us. They can assess the situation above us,” Julia answered.
Kyle set his hands on his hips and bobbed his head up and down. “Oh, right, because that worked out so well for you in Maine. We literally spent hours vetting ideas that wouldn’t work, and you had to find your own way out.”
She flicked her beam around the vault again. “Unfortunately, that’s not an option for us. This is a dead-end. An airtight underground vault. We’re not finding a back way out.”
“Unbelievable,” Grant said, flinging his hands in the air. “We survived two years of hell and in one final twist of fate, Lydia will off all of us in one fell swoop.”
“Ally is here. She’ll do everything she can to get us out of here,” Julia said as she slid a hand onto his shoulder.
“No, we’re not waiting for that,” Grant said with a shake of his head.
“I’m with Dad. We need to dig our way out of here.”
“No!” Julia argued as she pulled her phone from her pocket. “Leave it. Let me try to call Ally.”
She pressed the call button next to Alicia’s name with trembling hands. The phone beeped, unable to connect the call.
“Try from outside the vault,” Kyle suggested.
She nodded and stepped into what remained of the corridor, trying the call again. “Nothing. Does anyone have a signal?”
After a check of their phones, they found that none of them had the ability to place a call. A curse escaped Julia’s lips as she came to the realization that they were trapped without the ability to communicate with anyone to get help.
“We’re stuck!” Sierra exclaimed.
“Okay, just…calm down.” Julia forced her breathing to slow. “Ally is here. She’ll find the open bookcase, she’ll follow it, and she’ll see the collapse.”
“Not if someone closed the bookcase,” Grant said.
“Who would close it?” Julia asked.
Kyle pointed a finger at Julia. “I’m with her. Who would close it?”
“Right, so, Ally will find us.”
“Or she’ll think we came down here, saw the collapse and turned around and left,” Grant answered as he scrubbed his face.
Julia heaved a sigh. “No, if she can’t find us anywhere else, she’ll figure it out. She’s smart.”
Grant stared at the wall of dirt preventing their escape. “All right. We’ll give your sister some time. But if she’s not here soon…”
“We can dig,” Julia agreed.
“So…we’re just going to wait?” Sierra asked, her voice shrill with panic.
Julia slid her arm around her stepdaughter’s waist. “I know it’s hard, but that’s the best thing we can do.”
“I don’t like waiting. And I’m scared.”
“Now, who’s the ‘fraidy cat?” Kyle teased.
“Shut up, Kyle,” Sierra said, her voice shaking, “I’m sorry that I’m scared when there’s reason to be scared, unlike you who is just scared on a permanent basis.”
“I’m not scared on a permanent basis,” Kyle shot back.
Grant slid an arm around his daughter’s shoulders. “It’s okay, baby. We’re together at least, right?”
She frowned. “I guess.”
“Hey, why don’t we look around and see what else is down here while we wait to be rescued,” Julia suggested, desperate to keep her mind off of the building panic.
“Okay,” Sierra said. “Maybe I’ll find a new necklace.”
“Sierra, you can’t keep any of this. It’s probably going to be impounded,” Grant answered.
“Quiet, Daddy. I need a distraction. Stop ruining it.”
“Right. Maybe you’ll find a matching set of earrings and a necklace,” he said with a shrug.
Sierra dug through the boxes. “If I’m lucky, there will also be a ring.”
Sierra sniffled as she frowned at the box. “This just has a stupid vase.” She shoved it back onto the shelf.
Kyle tugged the box back and opened it. “That’s probably a priceless artifact, Sierra.”
“Who cares?”
“Me. It would be quite a find.”
“Okay, Indiana Jones. You can have the old vase, then,” she answered. “I’ll keep any diamonds we find, deal?”
Julia smiled at the exchange before she wandered to the back and studied the filing cabinets.
“Don’t want to search for jewelry?” Grant asked as he joined her.
She smiled at him, wiggling her ring finger. “Nah. I already have the perfect ring.”
He grabbed her hand and kissed it. “I’m glad you like it.”
“I love it. And I’m curious what is in the filing cabinets.” She pulled one open, finding a set of folders hanging inside.
“Maybe DG Industries stuff. We had a hard time tracking down any information on them. Maybe that’s because they’ve been down here the entire time.”
Julia pulled a folder from inside and opened it, her eyebrows furrowing. “Oh my.”
She stared down at the image of a prominent businessman, captured through a window, kissing a woman who was very obviously not his wife.
Grant squinted down at it. “Is that Richard Cunningham?”
“Looks like. And that’s not his wife, Eve.”
“No, it’s not.” Grant pulled another folder from the drawer, finding more risqué pictures, this time of a government official.
Julia snapped her gaze up to Grant. “This is the other way she was getting her money.”
“Blackmail. And it looks like she’s got pictures of a lot of people,” he said as he stared at the folders lined in the drawer.
“She’s unbelievable.” Julia snapped the folder closed and shoved it back inside before she pushed at the drawer.
“Wait,” he said, holding it open.
“What?”
He peeked into a few additional folders.
“Are you serious? Don’t look at those!”
“I’m just…checking.”
“Checking what?” she asked, crossing her arms.
“I…wanted to make sure there wasn’t any folders on me in here.”
She arched an eyebrow at him. “Really?” She lifted her chin and peered at the folders.
He shifted to block her view. “Don’t—you didn’t want to look.”
“Now, I want to know.”
“I don’t want you to know,” Grant shot back. “I just want to prepare myself in case these are made public.”
Grant shoved the drawer closed with a sigh.
“Well?” she asked.
“Nothing.” He smiled as he rubbed the back of his neck.
“What if there would have been something?”
He flicked his gaze to her. “I would have burned them.”
She took his hands in hers. “You know, I love you no matter what, right?”
“You didn’t,” he said as he glanced at their clasped hands. “You almost didn’t come back because of my past.”
“But I did come back despite your past. Your past is your past, not your future.” She slid her arms around his neck.
“You are my future,” he said as he pressed his forehead against hers.
“Ew! Not the time, Daddy!” Sierra shouted.
He lifted his head to glance at his daughter.
“Really, Dad. You spent two years avoiding telling her how you felt, and now you can’t keep your hands off her? Come on,” Kyle scolded.
Grant held his hands in the air with a shake of his head. “Fine, fine.”
“Maybe you ought to put those hands to use digging us out of here,” Kyle suggested.
Grant arched an eyebrow at him.
“Wait, I still don’t think we should try this. It’s risky,” Julia said.
“How long are we going to wait?” Kyle asked. “We should set a time limit.”
Sierra nodded. “Yeah, I agree with Kyle.”
“Well, that’s a first,” Grant answered. “How long do you propose we wait?”
Kyle toggled on his phone and glanced at the time. “It’s six-oh-seven. I think we wait until six thirty.”
“I say we wait until ten after,” Sierra said.
“Six thirty works. It shouldn’t take Ally any longer than that to get through the house and fine us.” She eased onto the floor and leaned against the vault’s wall.
“Fine,” Sierra said, flinging a hand in the air as she plopped down to sit.
Grant and Kyle settled on the floor with them. Grant narrowed his eyes at Sierra’s top. “What is wrong with your shirt?”
“Nothing,” she said with a shrug.
“There’s something sticking out of the top.”
Kyle rolled his eyes as he tugged the neck away from her skin. “She’s ‘hiding’ some jewelry for when we escape.”
“Sierra! Put those back,” Grant said.
“No,” she said tugging the fabric over them again. “It’s the least Lydia can do. She owes me. She spent my entire life lying to me…and you.”
“But it worked out for the best because I got a fantastic daughter out of the deal,” Grant answered.
“Thanks, Daddy.” She grinned at him. “But I still want the jewelry.”
Grant shook his head at her as he looped an arm around Julia’s shoulders and pulled her closer.
“I don’t blame you. Lydia kind of owes all of us.”
“I think she’s already given us something that’s priceless,” Julia said as she leaned her head onto Grant’s shoulder.
“Please don’t say something ridiculous like self-respect,” Kyle answered.
Julia smiled at him and shook her head as she leaned forward to reach for Sierra’s hand and his. “No. But without Lydia, we probably wouldn’t be a family.”
“Julia’s right. Without Lydia, Sierra would never have run that ridiculous interview process. We never would have met, married, and none of this would have happened.”