Chapter 19
nineteen
“I’ve been searching this barn since Kenzi left.” I stiffen when he says her name. If he notices, he doesn’t say anything. “She made it sound like there would be something here, but so far, I haven’t found anything.”
“What did she say?” I ask, pulling away from him slightly. It doesn’t get me far since I am still blocked in on one side by the car.
“She says this place has memories. Painful ones,” he repeats. “Then she told me to dig up the past while I can.”
“Did you find anything?”
“Other than it being a normal horse stable,” he huffs. “Nothing.”
Stable.
That term still sends a shiver through me whenever I hear it. It is sad how such an innocuous word can have such a dark and powerful impact on someone.
Wait—stable.
Elias wouldn’t have been the only one to have a horse stable set up to traffic women. From the look of the barn before me, this one is far older than the one he set up. Matthias wouldn’t have known to look for a hidden door because he has never been to the stable back home.
Striding past him, I make my way down the center of the dilapidated building and count out the beams where the horse stalls would have been.
If this is a place where they held trafficked women, then they would have placed the door at one end of the barn, most likely in the last stable.
There is only ever one exit and entrance to make it harder for women to escape.
Elias’s was larger than the one we stand in now, but the length of the barn had been tripled to hold more women when he got greedy.
I step into the last stall on the right and move the hay around with my feet, ignoring the mice and spiders that scatter at the motion. When I don’t find what I am looking for, I move to the other side.
And bingo.
It is barely noticeable even after all these years. The boards have been cut to look exactly like their surroundings, and the handle looks to be nothing more than notched wood from horses’ hooves. Grasping the underside of the wood-carved handle, I grunt as I lift the heavy door.
The smell of mildew and rotting eggs fills the air. We cough, the scent strong, even with the fresh rain.
“Let me grab a flashlight,” Matthias says.
“Don’t worry about it.” I shake my head and flip a small metal switch that rests where the stairs begin to descend.
The whirring of a generator fills the cramped space below our feet before the lights crack, flicker, and then turn on.
“Gross.” I pull a face as I step down onto the rotting wooden stairs.
They creak with my weight, and I take my time as I descend into the first hallway, taking it slow.
The steps are covered in a thin layer of mold, and I don’t want to trip.
Looking around, I let my eyes take a moment to adjust to the dim lighting.
The concrete walls are covered in mildew and combined with the warm yellow of the lights, it has the space feeling cramped and dark due to the dark tinge of green.
“This place looks like it has been abandoned for years,” Matthias notes.
“How did Kenzi even know of this place?” I wonder. “In fact, how are the two of you so chummy?” I push forward, refusing to look back at him.
“Mark has been monitoring dark web chatter,” he admits. “Not much goes on without him knowing, especially when it pertains to the Bratva. There were several dark web pings about a possible assassination attempt.”
“So someone leaked the information?” Who would do that? Or even know? Does that mean that the Dollhouse has a leak?
“Kenzi did,” he tells me. “She wasn’t the docile little assassin they thought she was.”
“I wasn’t the target, was I?” I ask.
“No,” he assures me softly. “There is no way anyone would believe that an assassin would get the drop on me directly. Not when I am so well protected.”
“I was your weakness,” I whisper, mostly to myself.
There is a beat and then he whispers back, “yes.”
Kenzi never believed Christian. She never wanted to kill me.
“She loves you very much, Ava.” Matthias voices my thoughts. “Kenzi hates that we didn’t bring you in on the plan.”
“Why didn’t you?” I ask.
“Because you needed a push,” he admits. “You’ve always been someone’s pawn.
I wanted you to become your own person. Even if I told you about our plan, I could have easily made you the queen of my empire, but if you knew I was there, behind the scenes, you would have never taken it into your own hands.
You would have questioned every decision and leaned on me for support.
I didn’t want that, and it wasn’t something you needed.
What you needed was to be pushed out of your comfort zone. ”
“I might have gone a little overboard.” I shrug my shoulder shyly, glad the dim lights hide the flush that creeps up my cheeks.
“Oh, I’ve heard everything about you, my little psycho.” There is a smile in his voice. “It was a turn on hearing about your little exploits. My hand and I are very busy imagining all the ways you’ve gone around kneecapping people.”
“I didn’t kneecap the last one.”
He chuckles. “That’s true.”
We fall into a companionable silence as we walk along the long stretch of hallway, peering into the worn, cleared-out rooms. I don’t know what the hell Kenzi was talking about but there isn’t anything here.
Not of any worth, anyway. So, she found an old trafficking barn, good for her.
I am about to suggest we turn back when something catches my eye.
“I know that symbol.” I point to the all-seeing eye carved inside of the Seal of Solomon. “Vas showed this to me, it’s the crest for this secret society thing.”
“Potestas Omnis,” Matthias breathes, coming up behind me.
“You’ve heard of it.” Duh, Ava, obviously he has.
“We’ll compare notes when we get back,” he says, running his hand over the symbol. Pressing onto the wooden door, I push. It slides open with a groan. The room is empty just like the others.
“There might be hidden compartments.” I run my hand up and down the brick on the right side of the wall, stretching tall before moving toward the floor. He follows suit on the other side. Inch by inch I search for any type of false or loose brick.
“Pay dirt,” Matthias calls out. He shifts one of the bricks from its spot.
It doesn’t look like the rest of its counterparts which have greyed with age.
This one is certainly duller, but it is slightly misshapen, most likely from weather damage.
The fake brick is barely a few inches long and the other bricks on either side of it have been carved out to make room for something else.
A small wooden box.
Carefully, he removes it from its hiding place and hands it to me. The design is Irish, I’ve seen something like this before, but I can’t place where. On the top, molded from silver, is the Celtic love knot.
My breathing stills as I open the lid, the wood of the box soft from being exposed to the elements for who knows how long.
Inside there are small trinkets and baubles, things a child would have.
I remove them one by one and place them in Matthias’s outstretched hand.
Rings, a baby tooth in a small clear baggy, a lock of red hair, some crayons, a photo of a baby and a young woman I don’t recognize.
“Oh my god,” I gasp.
“What is it?” Matthias leans in to get a better look.
“Holy fuck,” he whispers. “That can’t be—”
At the bottom of the small box, beneath the first photo, is an old grainy photo that is dated March 1990.
It isn’t hard to recognize the young girl in the photo with her long strawberry-blonde hair and brown eyes.
She has the same angular features now as she did back then and is even wearing the same necklace she wore in all of the photos I have seen of her.
“Marianne.” I finish his sentence, horror rushing through me. The girl in the photo can’t be any older than twelve or thirteen. Not long before my mother becomes friends with her. “I don’t understand.”
“Let’s get this back to the hotel and we can go from there,” Matthias empties the trinkets in his hand back into the box and shuts the lid before ushering me out of the room.
The rain has stopped, the sky empty of clouds allowing the stars to shine through. It is such a peaceful place for such tragic memories. This time, we aren’t alone. Several of our men wait for us, along with my father and Sully.
“You two were taking too long so we thought we’d come and find you,” my father approaches me. His eyes scan my body, checking for injuries.
“I’m okay,” I placate him. “We found a few things that—” God, how am I going to tell him? He didn’t take it very well the first time I suggested Marianne had something to do with Mom’s kidnapping and murder. How is he going to take this?
“Where did you get that?” he asks, pointing at the box in my hands.
“Umm,” I stutter, holding the box tighter in my hand. This is the proof I need to bring my mother’s murderer to justice. I am not going to let anyone take it from me. Not even him. “In one of the rooms downstairs. It was hidden in a wall.”
“That’s impossible,” he tells me harshly. Matthias growls at his tone and steps forward.
“Watch your tone,” my husband snarls at my father. Goosebumps break across my skin at his protectiveness over me. The fucker is still in the doghouse, but damn if my body isn’t catching up to that.
My father’s shoulders fall, and he looks contrite as he says, “Your mother had one exactly like it,” he explains. “It was handmade, and a family heirloom given to her by your great-grandmother. There are only two in existence.”
“Who has the other one?” I ask curiously.
“Your grandmother.”