Chapter Forty-Nine
Dr. Patterson’s surgery still looked pristine from the outside, but the first thing Tobias noticed as the carriage pulled up several houses down from the residence was that the plain-clothed police officer he’d arranged to keep watch wasn’t at his post. Not a good sign.
“Our officer is missing,” Iain said, also noting the issue as he got out of the carriage to come to stand beside Tobias, while the two ladies alighted after him, both having refused to stay behind.
“I noticed,” Tobias replied, quickly weighing up options as the other police he’d told to follow them from the theater got out of the carriages and began assembling in front of him.
“I want this street closed off, and three of you at the front of the house, three at the rear. No one is to get past any of you, do you understand?”
All the men nodded before hurrying into position.
“What’s the plan?” Iain asked.
“If we go straight in and they’re in there, even in a subbasement, he’ll hear our footsteps from the floorboards.
” Tobias pressed his lips together for a second.
“And if he hears us, he might hurt Jack.” If he hadn’t already.
Damn it! He couldn’t think like that. He’d lose all chance of saving her if he did.
“What do we do then?”
“Jack said that magicians always have an escape route, didn’t she?” Tobias thought aloud.
“Aye, she did,” Iain confirmed.
“Then I’m guessing that if I’m right about there being a hidden room underneath the basement, there will also be an exit out of that room either leading to another room in the house, or possibly even out into the alley at the back of the residence.”
“That’s a lot of what ifs,” Miss Montague added, a frown marring her brow.
Tobias nodded. “I know. But we don’t have much else to go on. Iain and I will go around the back and see if we can find any hidden entry, and if not, we’ll force entry through the back.”
“And what are Cordy and I going to do?” Miss Montague asked.
“You two will wait right here.”
“No, we won’t—”
“Yes, you will!” Tobias cut off both of their protests. “Jack would never forgive me if anything happened to either of you. Do you both understand me? Her life is on the line here, and we’re only going to get one shot at this.”
Reluctantly, Miss Montague and Miss Fennessy nodded.
“Good.” Tobias turned to Iain. “Let’s go.”
Iain nodded and began to follow Tobias as he swiftly strode down the side street and into the alley that the doctor’s residence backed onto.
“What are we looking for?” Iain asked.
“A door that looks out of place or something in the alley that doesn’t belong,” Tobias replied.
“Right, well, that’s as clear as mud,” Iain replied.
Tobias’s three officers positioned themselves close to the back gate of the residence, leaving enough space so they could pull out their batons if needed.
He gave them a nod of acknowledgment before he swung his eyes around the alley, trying to see if there was anything out of place.
But he couldn’t see anything that didn’t look as if it belonged.
“Looks all normal to me,” Iain said.
“It does,” Tobias replied. Then he glanced into the back yard of the doctor’s residence itself, which was enclosed with a gate and a fence.
The bottom half of the fence was red brick up to waist height and the top half was wrought-iron poles, and through the poles, Tobias could see the small back yard.
A normal, small courtyard area, paved with stones and with a dog kennel sitting next to the back door of the house.
Everything looked normal and as if it belonged.
“I think we might have to force entry, don’t you?” Iain asked.
Just as Tobias was about to nod, his eyes were drawn back to the dog kennel.
Something about it wasn’t right. There’d been no dog in the house, nor anything to suggest one lived there.
“That’s not right.” He pointed to the dog kennel, then he launched himself up onto the fence, before straddling his legs over the wrought-iron poles and softly dropping down into the courtyard.
Iain followed behind him, while Tobias hurried over to the kennel and pushed against it. It slid effortlessly backwards on some sort of roller system, revealing a set of stairs that twisted down.
“Well, I’ll be,” Iain exclaimed as he came to stand beside Tobias.
“Stay here and keep watch. I’ll check it out.
” Tobias went down the narrow stone stairs and then turned to his right as the stairs continued down to another level.
There was a very solid oak door at the bottom with a brass handle.
Carefully, he reached out to the door handle and twisted.
He swore under his breath when the door wouldn’t open.
He quickly climbed back up the stairs to where Iain was waiting.
“Any luck?”
“It’s locked, damn it! Jack said I should learn the skill of lockpicking, and she was right.”
“Lucky she taught us how to do it, then,” Miss Fennessy said from behind Iain.
Iain spun around and Tobias glanced behind him and Miss Fennessy to see Miss Montague dropping down onto the courtyard stones, having obviously scaled the fence too. Jack’s agents clearly got up to a lot of bending of the law in their work.
“What the Devil are you doing here?” Iain harshly whispered. “You were both told to wait.”
“And luckily we didn’t,” Miss Fennessy replied, hurrying down the stairs past Tobias while reaching into her pocket and pulling out some wires.
He followed her down to the bottom and watched as she inserted the wires into the lock and got to work on twisting them. Unlike Jack, though, after two minutes, Miss Fennessy was still trying to manipulate the lock.
“I’m not as quick as Jack,” Miss Fennessy said with a grimace, but then about thirty seconds later, the lock clicked and she nodded at him.
Silently, Tobias maneuvered Miss Fennessy behind him and then pulled out his pistol.
He turned around and whispered into Miss Fennessy’s ear, “Go up and tell Iain to get the officers to breach the back door and the ground floor. Hopefully, the sound of their footsteps will distract Clorren and I can ambush him. Tell Iain to follow behind after. All right?”
Miss Fennessy nodded and hastily made her way back up the stairs.
Tobias reached his free hand out and grabbed a hold of the door handle. God, if you’re listening, please let her be alive, he prayed, right before he twisted the knob and carefully pushed open the door.