Chapter 5 - Someone in Mara's Room

"That's not the estate manager," Mara whispered.

Through a pair of binoculars, Ethan watched the shadow move behind her curtains.

"How can you tell?"

"Mr. Keene is sixty-eight and walks with a cane. That person is moving fast."

Mara took the binoculars. A figure ripped through drawers and threw her mattress aside. They were searching for something.

"The pregnancy test?" Ethan asked.

"Bianca already has it."

"Anything I gave you that night?"

Mara searched her memory. Then she remembered the old silver lighter.

Ethan had left it on the motel dresser. She had slipped it into her purse, meaning to return it if she ever saw him again. It had his initials on the bottom.

E.H.

"A lighter," she said.

Ethan cursed.

"What?"

"It has a hidden storage chip in the base."

Mara stared at him. "You hid evidence in a lighter and then left it in a motel?"

"It wasn't my best night."

"Clearly."

"Do you still have it?"

"In a shoebox under my bed."

The shadow upstairs stopped moving.

A moment later, the room went dark.

"We have to get there before they find it," Ethan said.

Mara knew Greystone's service passages better than anyone. An old staff entrance sat beneath the east terrace.

Twenty minutes later, Mara and Ethan crouched beneath the terrace. She entered the old code. Red light.

"They changed it," she whispered.

Mara tried Bianca's birthday.

Red.

Nolan's birthday.

Red.

Then she remembered Bianca's favorite rule: Never trust people to remember new numbers.

Mara entered 0715, the time Bianca demanded breakfast, followed by 22, the year the security system was installed.

Green.

The door clicked.

"That's embarrassing," Ethan whispered.

"Rich people are not automatically smart."

They slipped inside.

The service hall was dark except for emergency lights.

At the first intersection, Mara heard voices.

Bianca's voice.

And a man's.

"The lighter isn't here," the man said.

Bianca answered, "Then Mara has it. Find her before Nolan gets home."

Ethan's face hardened.

Mara leaned closer.

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Bianca lowered her voice.

"And whatever you do, don't let Ethan reach the study."