Chapter 14 - The Night Rowan House Fell
Victor attacked before their trap was ready.
At 2:13 a.m., electricity failed.
At 2:14, backup generators started.
At 2:15, three guards stopped answering.
Caleb woke to Jonah pounding on his bedroom door.
“They're inside.”
Elise came running from the east suite.
Barefoot.
Hair loose.
“Victor?”
“Who else?”
Caleb transferred into his chair.
“Elise, safe room.”
She didn't argue.
That worried him.
They moved through the corridor.
Then explosions sounded below.
The floor shook.
The safe-room control panel went dead.
Jonah swore.
“They cut the internal network.”
Elise looked toward the service corridor.
“Laundry stairs.”
“Too narrow for Caleb.”
“Freight elevator.”
“Disabled.”
She thought.
The mansion she had cleaned for days existed inside her mind like a map.
“West dumbwaiter shaft.”
Caleb stared.
“I don't fit in a dumbwaiter.”
“Not you. The old service lift beside it.”
Martha had shown her an abandoned mechanical lift used before renovations.
Jonah frowned.
“That hasn't worked in years.”
“It doesn't need power.”
They reached it.
Elise forced open the wooden panel.
A manual platform.
Hand-crank pulley.
Caleb looked at her.
“You're joking.”
“Do I look funny?”
“Frequently.”
Shots echoed closer.
They transferred him onto the platform.
Elise climbed beside him.
Jonah turned the crank.
The lift descended.
Halfway down, gunfire erupted above.
Jonah shouted.
The platform jerked.
Then stopped.
“Elise?”
She looked upward.
Jonah was gone.
“Jonah!”
Nothing.
Caleb tried the controls.
Manual.
No power.
They were trapped between floors.
Victor's men searched above.
Caleb looked at Elise.
“Climb down.”
“What?”
“The shaft ladder.”
“And you?”
“I'll stay.”
“No.”
“Elise.”
“We had this conversation.”
His voice sharpened.
“That's different.”
“Everything is always different when you want me to leave you.”
Footsteps approached.
Elise examined the pulley.
Emergency release.
If she disengaged it, gravity would drop the platform.
But there was a mechanical brake.
Maybe.
“Hold on.”
Caleb understood.
“No.”
She pulled the release.
The platform dropped.
Elise screamed.
Caleb grabbed her.
The brake caught after one floor.
Metal shrieked.
They slammed downward.
Caleb's chair tipped.
Elise braced it.
The doors at basement level were inches away.
She forced them open.
They crawled out.
Caleb's motorized chair had suffered damage.
The control panel blinked.
Then died.
He tried again.
Nothing.
“Elise.”
“I know.”
She grabbed the handles.
The chair weighed more than she did.
Without powered assistance, moving it was brutal.
She pushed.
Slowly.
They entered the wine cellar.
Gunfire echoed above.
Caleb said, “Leave the chair.”
“And do what?”
“I can transfer.”
“To what?”
He looked around.
Nothing.
Elise pushed harder.
“No.”
“Your hands are bleeding.”
“So?”
“You can't keep doing this.”
“Watch me.”
The floor sloped upward.
Her legs shook.
Caleb tried helping by pushing the wheels manually.
Together they moved.
One foot.
Another.
Another.
At the top, Elise collapsed against the wall.
Caleb looked furious.
“Are you trying to die proving a point?”
“No.”
“Then stop!”
She snapped.
“Stop what? Refusing to leave you helpless in a basement?”
His face changed.
She regretted the word instantly.
“Caleb, I didn't mean—”
“Yes, you did.”
“No.”
He looked away.
“I'm not helpless.”
“I know!”
“Then stop treating me like a rescue mission.”
The words cut.
Elise stepped back.
“You think that's what this is?”
“I don't know what this is!”
Gunfire sounded nearby.
Neither cared.
She stared at him.
“I have been scared every minute since I walked into this house.”
He turned.
“I stayed because you mattered.”
Silence.
“Not because of your chair.”
“Elise—”
“Not because I pity you.”
She wiped tears angrily.
“I stayed because you're infuriating and controlling and impossible, and because underneath all of that I saw a man trying desperately not to become his father.”
Caleb couldn't speak.
“And somewhere along the way, I fell in love with him.”
The words existed between them.
Too late to retrieve.
Too true to deny.
Caleb stared at her.
Then footsteps entered the corridor.
Victor appeared.
Gun raised.
“How touching.”
Elise froze.
Caleb reached for his weapon.
Victor smiled.
“Don't.”
Two men stood behind him.
He looked at Elise.
“You were always the weakness.”
She moved slightly in front of Caleb.
Victor laughed.
“Perfect.”
Caleb whispered, “Move.”
“No.”
Victor aimed at her.
“Your mother did exactly that once.”
Elise stopped.
“What?”
“She stood between Evelyn and Silas.”
“You were there.”
“Yes.”
“You helped kill them.”
Victor's smile disappeared.
“I helped myself.”
Caleb's expression hardened.
“Always.”
Victor nodded.
“Your father taught me.”
He approached.
“Give me Evelyn's evidence.”
Caleb said, “Federal custody.”
Victor slapped him.
Elise lunged.
A guard caught her.
Caleb looked murderous.
Victor smiled.
“There. That expression.”
He crouched before Caleb.
“Power used to mean something to you.”
“It still does.”
“Look at yourself.”
Caleb glanced toward Elise.
Then back.
“I am.”
He smiled.
Victor frowned.
Caleb pressed a small button beneath his armrest.
Lights exploded on.
Hidden shutters slammed down.
Jonah's voice came through speakers.
“Federal agents! Drop your weapons!”
Victor froze.
The basement corridor filled with armed officers.
The attack had been anticipated.
Not tonight.
But the emergency system had remained independent.
Victor grabbed Elise and placed the gun against her neck.
“Back away!”
Caleb's face changed.
“Victor.”
“Tell them!”
Caleb looked at Elise.
Fear.
Love.
Trust.
She gave him the smallest shake of her head.
Don't surrender everything.
Victor dragged her backward.
Then Elise noticed the floor.
Wine had spilled from a broken bottle.
Victor's shoe stood in it.
Slippery.
She remembered the first day.
Floors remember.
Elise stomped backward onto his foot.
He jerked.
His shoe slipped.
She dropped.
Jonah fired.
Victor's gun flew from his hand.
Agents tackled him.
Elise crawled toward Caleb.
He reached for her.
She fell against him.
“You're alive.”
“So are you.”
He held her face.
“You said something before Victor arrived.”
She laughed through tears.
“Terrible timing.”
“Say it again.”
“Later.”
“Elise.”
“Trust me.”
He stared.
Then smiled.
“All right.”
Above them Rowan House burned in two rooms where Victor's men had planted incendiaries.
Smoke filled the sky.
The fortress Silas had built around his family was literally breaking apart.
Caleb watched flames rise through the basement windows.
He should have felt loss.
Instead he felt free.
Until Jonah received a call.
His expression changed.
“Victor wasn't leading the attack.”
Caleb frowned.
“What?”
“Silas escaped federal custody forty minutes ago.”
Elise stared.
The man they believed captured was free.
And Rowan House was burning.
Silas hadn't sent Victor to win.
He had sent Victor to destroy the place while he disappeared.
Again.
Caleb looked at the flames.
This time, however, Silas had made one mistake.
He believed the house was Caleb's power.
May you like
He hadn't yet understood that everything Caleb truly cared about was standing beside him.
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