Chapter Eighty-Two
Eighty-Two
Mary decided to start with the living room, or at least its east quarter, and since the curtains that covered the French doors that led out to the fire patio carried a few different shades of pink, matching some of the cushions on the large sofa closest to that door, she placed the pink bouquet – the one that had been delivered at midday – on the low coffee table that sat between the sofa and the armchairs.
Perfect.
Five bouquets left.
Mary took a step back and tried to decide which one to go for next. It didn’t take her long before she pointed at the gorgeous yellow and white bouquet that was delivered at 3:00 p.m.
‘Definitely the entry room,’ she said, as she scooped up the vase with both hands.
The front doors to Quaddra and Mary’s mansion opened straight into an ample and brightly lit entry room, where the floor was tiled in black and white Italian marble.
At the center of that room, a round chrome and glass table greeted every arrival.
The vase already on it contained a very nice selection of dried pampas grass, but the yellow and white flowers would work much better in brightening the room a little more, giving it an even better welcome feel.
A minute later, Mary was back in the living room, studying the four bouquets that were still left.
‘Of course,’ she said, nodding at the blue and purple one.
Purple was Quaddra’s favorite color, so why not place that vase in their bedroom? And she knew exactly where it would go.
Mary picked up the vase and headed upstairs.
But before she reached the double stairwell that led to the house’s second floor, she noticed that the door to Quaddra’s office, which was just a little further along, to the right of the double stairwell, was open – something that rarely happened.
Quaddra must’ve forgotten to lock it after he dropped his briefcase in there.
That gave Mary an idea – since purple was Quaddra’s favorite color, why not brighten his office with some flowers, because truth be told, that room could really do with some color.
‘Why not?’ She shrugged. ‘It will be a nice surprise. He will love it.’
Instead of taking the stairs going up, Mary veered right and quickly stepped into Quaddra’s office.
In there, she looked around for a spot where she could place the large vase.
This was definitely a man’s den work office, full of sharp edges and dark colors everywhere, but to the right of the door, pushed tightly against the wall, was a Victorian-style chest of drawers, where Quaddra kept a small selection of Hors d’Age cognacs.
‘This is perfect,’ she said, turning around to look back at Quaddra’s desk, which was set directly across the room from the chest of drawers.
‘Yep, it will look great right here,’ Mary agreed with her own assessment.
All she had to do was reposition some of the cognac bottles to create a little space right at the center.
She placed the vase on the floor, ready to rearrange the bottles, when she noticed something odd about the bottom drawer – the one by her right foot. Its pull handle looked slanted. It didn’t look like it was broken… it was just out of line.
‘Weird!’ she whispered to herself, as she studied it. The handle didn’t seem to have come undone from the drawer. It looked to be properly screwed in place, just like the handles in all the other drawers, but it was lop-sided – its right edge about an inch higher than its left one.
Mary grabbed the handle and tried pulling the drawer open, hoping to check the screw on the inside, but the drawer didn’t budge.
She held on to the chest and pulled the drawer harder still.
Nothing. The drawer seemed stuck.
She got down on her knees and bent over to have a better look at it. The handle definitely wasn’t broken. It wasn’t coming apart from the drawer either.
This time, instead of trying to pull the drawer open, Mary tried twisting the handle in place to see if it would move back into a straight line – left edge leveled with its right one.
There was a slight resistance, but to her surprise, the handle twisted in the same manner that a door handle would.
As it did, she heard a clicking sound come from the wall to her right.
‘What the fuck was that?’ She frowned, letting go of the drawer handle, her eyes searching right. It took her a moment before she finally noticed that the large filing cabinet that was pushed up against that wall now seemed skewed, as if its right side had been pushed forward a little.
‘What the hell?’
Mary stood up straight before approaching the cabinet.
She was right – its right edge wasn’t pushed up tight against the wall anymore – it had moved forward about three inches or so, creating a gap between the cabinet and the wall behind it.
The only problem was that behind the cabinet, there was no wall.
What Mary was looking at was a secret door – spy-movie style.
‘Are you fucking kidding me?’ she whispered, angling her body a little to the right to try to see through the gap.
It was too dark. She couldn’t see anything.
Curiosity was screaming at Mary to pull the cabinet forward so that she could open the secret door and look inside.
Why did Quaddra have a secret door in his office?
What did he need to hide so badly?
But two of the first lessons that Mary had learnt as a con artist were to be patient, and to be careful.
No one could survive for very long in the con world without both components.
So instead of opening the door, Mary turned around to look behind her.
She was still alone in Quaddra’s office, but she wasn’t risking it…
not until she was certain that she wouldn’t get caught, so what she did was quickly run out of the office before taking the stairs up to the landing on the second floor, where a long corridor led deeper into the house.
Hers and Quaddra’s bedroom was right at the end of that corridor.
‘Baby, are you out of the shower yet?’ she called, loud enough so that if Quaddra was done with his shower, he would’ve heard her.
No reply.
Mary still needed to be certain, so she ran halfway down the corridor and listened for a moment, but she couldn’t hear if the shower was still on or not.
‘Baby?’ She called again, even louder this time.
‘Just getting out of the shower, honey,’ Quaddra replied from their bedroom. ‘Do you need me?’
‘No, no,’ Mary called back. ‘Just checking.’
‘I’ll be ready soon.’
‘Take your time. There’s no rush.’
But there was a rush… at least for Mary.
She ran back downstairs as if the house was on fire.
Back inside Quaddra’s office, she approached the cabinet and carefully pushed it back towards the wall.
Despite how heavy the module was, it surprised her how easily it moved back before clicking into place again, as if the whole thing was on well-oiled wheels, which it probably was.
She took a step back and looked down at the floor – there were no marks, no scratches…
nothing. This was a state-of-the-art Murphy door, but what the fuck was behind it?
Whatever it was, it was clearly something that Quaddra wanted to keep a secret, so Mary wasn’t about to go snooping around with her husband in the house. Instead, she grabbed the flower vase that she had left on the floor by the chest of drawers and quickly exited Quaddra’s office.