Chapter 62
MCLEAN, VIRGINIA
With no TV and no internet, they had tried to take their minds off the situation with whatever distractions the house offered. Erin had discovered two ancient board games—one called Sorry! and another called Masterpiece—both of which Connor had eventually lost patience with and quit.
In the same closet, there had also been a handful of old paperbacks and she decided to occupy herself by reading. Pulling one out called Memories of Midnight by Sidney Sheldon, she made herself comfortable near the fire and tried to tune everything else out.
The little house had never been meant to hold people under strain.
During the day, the light filtering through the trees and the charm of the mid-century architecture had made the place feel almost like a retreat.
But at night, with the woods pressing in from all sides and the black glass of the windows giving back only their own reflections, it felt more like a trap.
Connor stood at the front window. He had been there for the better part of twenty minutes. It wasn’t because he had seen anything. He just couldn’t shake the feeling that something outside in the dark had shifted. Finally, he moved to check the kitchen window.
Erin looked up from her book as he passed. “You’re doing it again.”
“Doing what?”
“Wearing a path in the floor.”
“Sorry,” he said, as he stopped at the sink and stared into the darkness.
“No, you’re not.”
That was true. He wasn’t. Like it or not, this was how he was wired.
He bent closer to the window. There was barely enough ambient light from the sliver of a moon to make out the nearest trees.
Beyond them, the woods fused into layers of black.
Every now and then a branch shifted in the breeze.
Beneath the window, a tangle of leaves skittered past, scraping over one another.
The sounds were perfectly normal. The problem was that his nerves no longer trusted normal.
Stepping away from the window, he picked up the tablet. Its battery was down to 42 percent and he made a mental note to charge it overnight.
One of the camera thumbnails was black, another showed a fixed view of the gravel drive, and a third was frozen on a patch of woods dense enough to hide an army.
There was a sharp crack from the suspended fireplace and both of them flinched. Connor’s hand shot to the back of his waistband before he saw the shower of sparks collapse behind the mesh screen. One of the burning logs had split.
Erin let out a breath. “Jesus.”
Connor didn’t answer. He was busy tapping the screen, trying to refresh the feeds.
The driveway camera came back first, washing the strip of gravel in chalky-pale infrared. There were no headlights. No movement.
The frozen image of the woods resolved next, then steadied. Again nothing.
Connor waited, watching.
“Anything?” Erin asked, seeing the tablet in his hand.
“Hang on.”
The third camera hesitated, its icon spinning. Finally, it resolved into a grainy image of the south side of the property. The picture flickered once and then held.
He brought the tablet closer.
At first, all he saw were tree trunks and undergrowth, washed flat by the cheap infrared. Then something moved at the edge of the frame. It was just a blur and was gone as soon as it appeared.
Connor held perfectly still.
“What?” asked Erin, setting her book aside.
He held his finger to his lips and kept watching.
The feed stuttered, and when it came back, a figure crossed between two trees and disappeared again. Not a deer.
Erin was on her feet now, coming toward him. “Connor?”
He enlarged the image, which only made the resolution worse, but there was still enough to see what mattered. A second man slid into view, offset from the first by several yards. He moved with the same practiced precision.
The picture faded, but came back again. This time, farther back and on a parallel line, two more shapes appeared and vanished through the trees.
Two pairs, spaced apart, moving with purpose. Connor felt his blood go cold.
Erin looked from the screen to him. “Who are they?”
Setting down the tablet, he drew his pistol. “Get away from the windows.”
“Connor—”
“Now.”
She backed away without another word.
Connor looked once more at the screen. Four men divided into two teams. Moving through the dark and closing in on the house like they had done this many times before.
He didn’t know who they were, but he knew exactly why they were there.
They had come to kill them.