And Marcus looked up from the laptop. She's in. She's in, Victoria said. And she's going to enjoy destroying Adrien roughly as much as she's going to enjoy the fact that I had to crawl to get her, which is fine. I'll crawl.
I'll crawl all night if it works. She dropped into the chair across from him. How are the copies coming? Two done. Marcus nodded at the two thumb drives on the table and the padded envelope he'd already addressed to a name Victoria had given him, a reporter at the paper who'd been trying to crack the bridge story for months and getting nowhere.
Third one's copying now. Then we drive lawyer first. She's closest. Then the mailbox for the reporter's copy. Then we hide the third one.
And we come home and we lock every door in this house and we wait for morning. And Ava. Ava's mother-in-law texted 20 minutes ago. Marcus' face softened for the first time in an hour. They're on the road.
Ava thinks they're going to a water park in Chattanooga. She's apparently very excited about a water park. My mother-in-law says she hasn't stopped talking about a specific water slide. His voice caught just slightly. She's safe.
She's out. Whatever happens tonight, whatever Adrienne does, he can't touch her because she's 90 minutes north thinking about a water slide. That's the whole game, Victoria said quietly. That's the thing you did that I couldn't do for myself in 2 weeks. You got the most important thing out of reach before you started the fight.
I kept the proof in a box in the city and ran around it in circles. You put your daughter in a car to another state before you even made a copy. She shook her head slowly. You're better at this than people who do this for a living, Marcus. I'm not better at anything, Marcus said.
I just love harder than they're expecting. That's the only edge I've got, and I'm going to use all of it. The laptop chimed. Third copy done. Marcus pulled the drive and for one second, the whole thing felt possible, felt clean, felt like they were 40 minutes from having it all backed up and beyond Adrienne's reach.
And then the power went out. Every light in the house died at once. The laptop screen went black an instant later, running on battery, throwing a small blue rectangle of light across the dark kitchen. The refrigerator's hum stopped. The whole house went silent and dark and still.
Neither of them moved. Marcus, Victoria whispered. Did you pay your Yes. His voice was very low. I pay my bill.
And the rest of the street still got lights. Look out the window. The Robinson's got lights. Miss Eta's got her porch light. It's just us.
He was already standing, already moving, already reaching for the drawer where he kept the heavy flashlight. Somebody cut my power. Somebody walked up to the side of my house in the dark and pulled the meter or cut the line. "They're here," Victoria breathed. "Get the drives. " Marcus's voice had dropped into that flat calm again.
The scaffold voice, the voice that got quieter as things got worse. All three and the folder and the recorder and the envelope. Everything. Put it in the bag. Do it now.
Don't turn on your phone light. Do it by feel. Victoria's hands were already sweeping the table gathering. And Marcus moved to the front window and put his back to the wall beside it and looked out through the edge of the curtain and his heart stopped. There was a truck in his driveway.
Calvin's truck. He's here. Marcus said. Calvin's here. His truck's in my driveway.
He said 8 and it's not even 6. And he's here in the dark with my power cut. Marcus, we have to go out the back right now. There's somebody at the back. Marcus had heard at the softest scrape of a foot on the deck.
He'd built the deck. Calvin knew the gate. Calvin had the code to two of them. Him in front. Somebody in back.
They're not here to talk. His mind was moving fast now, faster than the fear laying out the house he'd lived in for 11 years. The house he knew in the dark better than any man alive. Okay, listen to me. They think we're trapped.
They think dark and two doors covered means we've got nowhere to go. But this is my house, Victoria. I built half of it with my own hands. I know a way out they don't know exists and I need you to trust me and move exactly where I move and not make a sound. Where the crawl space under the addition?
There's an access hatch in the hall closet floor. I put it in myself 2 years ago for the plumbing. It's not on any plan. Calvin's never seen it. It comes out at the side of the house behind the AC unit in the dark on the blind side of both doors.
He grabbed her hand. We go out the bottom of the house while they're watching the top. Bag over your shoulder. Tight. Let's move.
There was a knock at the front door. Slow, casual. Three taps. And then Calvin's voice muffled through the wood. Warm and easy and horrible.