Chapter 63 Nico #2
An hour later, Felipe and I pulled up a half-mile from the address. We went the rest of the way on foot, walking in silence, not discussing anything, simply doing what needed to be done. I loved Sebastian like a brother, but he liked to talk when he was nervous, and this was not the time for that.
The house looked safe. We made two different circuits.
Once at a five hundred yards out, and another at a hundred.
Neither of us saw anything that looked like a trap.
There were also no signs of the royals’ soldiers.
This place was clean. Felipe and I sat in the woods, and a quick glance at my watch told me it was time to move in.
“Ready?” I asked.
Felipe nodded but gave me a weird look. “I’m ready, but do you think anyone is in there?”
I glanced at the house again. Even from a hundred yards away, I could see what he was saying. The lights were on, but the house felt empty. There were no shadows passing by the windows, no lights turning off or back on, and there didn’t seem to be a car in the driveway.
“Only one way to find out,” I said.
The walk up to the house was strange. It felt like we were here to peddle something like traveling salesmen or religious missionaries.
Hello, do you have time to talk about our Lord and Savior Edemas?
I shook the thoughts away as we stepped inside the gated fence that cordoned off the front yard.
Felipe nudged me and gestured toward the porch.
The front door wasn’t fully ajar, but it was definitely open a crack, a sliver of light clearly visible.
I nodded to him, letting him know I’d seen.
At the top of the stairs, I took a tentative step up to the door. I gave the wood a single sharp knock. The front door swung in about three inches. Felipe nodded to me, so I pushed the door the rest of the way open. The brightness of the interior hurt our eyes after being in the dark for so long.
“Hello?” I called. There was no answer.
Felipe and I walked through the house, announcing our presence. There was no one here. Our instincts had been correct. I kicked a chair in the living room, releasing my frustrations.
“Nico? I found something,” Felipe said from the kitchen.
I rushed to the kitchen, where Felipe stood at the kitchen table. I looked down at what he’d found and released an irritated sigh. On the table was another damned envelope. My name was written on it in black marker.
“What is this damned woman playing at? I don’t like games,” I hissed as I picked up the envelope and opened it.
Felipe gasped, and my eyes widened. Maddy’s birth mother wasn’t playing games. She was giving us more information. Stuff we’d never have gotten on our own.
“You’ve gotta call Luis,” Felipe said as we dug through the contents.
I pulled out my phone and dialed. Miraculously, Luis answered on the second ring. “What the hell is wrong?” he asked, obviously barely awake.
“Call off the plan. Right now. We don’t need it. We’ve got something better,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm.
“What? Hang on.” There was a rustling as Luis probably sat up in bed. “What are you talking about?”
“Maddy’s birth mother. She just gave us the fucking mother load.
We don’t have to do a blind breach on these houses.
” I looked down at the pile of information.
“I’ve got pictures of the safe houses, pictures of Maddy’s parents and Abi.
Shit, man, her father was moved to a different house.
We didn’t even fucking know that. There are three houses, for Christ’s sake. ”
“Holy shit, are you serious? A third safe house? I… sonofabitch… what else is there?” Luis sounded fully awake and greedy for intel.
“There’s schematics for each house, bypass codes for all the security systems at each house—”
“Fuck me, Nico,” Felipe said, holding up a piece of paper. “Look at this shit. How the hell did she get this?”
The paper he handed me had a list of addresses. It was easy to see they were the three safe houses. Below each address was a list of names with times beside them. The times were for ten-hour increments. It took a second for me to realize what I was looking at. “Oh damn. Hot damn.”
“What? What the hell is it?” Luis screeched.
“It’s the security team’s schedule. The times they’re on duty, off duty, on break, and their fucking names!”
“You’re shitting me,” Luis said, sounding as stunned as I felt. “Do we think it’s legit? Is this good intel?”
“Listen, I have no way of knowing how the hell she got this stuff, but there’s no reason for her to lie.
No reason she’d give us all this only to send us to our deaths.
All this woman has done since the moment she got pregnant with Maddy was to keep her safe and out of the hands of the royals.
We have to believe this is accurate, but we need to move soon.
Who knows how long these schedules or security codes will stay up to date. ”
“Okay, okay. I’ll let the guys know the original plan is off. Do you want me to head back home right away?”
“Yeah, get back here. I need to think about this before we start planning something new. Once you get back here, we’ll make a plan.”
We hung up, and Felipe had all the items stuffed back into the envelope. One more check around the house, and we were out the door. I was exhausted, both physically and mentally, as we started walking back to my car. When we got to the end of the driveway, we heard a voice call out of the darkness.
“Protect my daughter. Protect her because I can’t anymore.”
Felipe and I whirled in the direction of the sound.
She’d called out from a pretty good way off, and the voice had been quieted by the surrounding trees and distance.
If it hadn’t been almost four in the morning, we probably never would have heard her.
There was a moment where I thought about bolting, shifting, and trying to chase her down.
Corner her and get real answers. At the back of my mind, though, I knew she’d have planned for that. She’d be gone before I ever got there.