Chapter 45
The Lake Under the House
The water reached Claire's ankles before anyone moved.
It was not cold. That made it worse. Lake water beneath a winter cabin should have carried the temperature of stone. This water was warm, faintly metallic, and smelled of the diffuser from the clinic room.
“The floor is not breaking,” Ada said. “It is opening.”
Owen's guards entered through the broken windows. Daniel fired into the ceiling, not at them. The sound drove the men back for one second.
“Move!” he shouted.
Rowan took Claire's hand. Tess pulled Ada toward the doorway. Lucy and Noah held the guards at the living room entrance while Eli searched the wall for the old passage.
The spare room sank another inch.
Beneath the water, Claire saw the outline of a metal staircase.
“Down,” Rowan said.
“Into the lake?”
“Under it.”
The model of Mara appeared in the water's reflection. “You always chose the door that frightened you.”
Claire ignored her.
They descended.
The staircase led to a glass corridor beneath the cabin. Water pressed against both sides, held back by thick panes. Fish moved through the darkness, though there was no natural lake under the foundation.
At the far end stood a steel door marked 4:17.
Rowan placed the blue pencil against the lock.
The door opened.
Inside was a small room with a single chair. The chair faced a window into the artificial lake. On the wall, a clock showed 4:17.
Claire remembered the room.
She had sat in the chair. Mara had stood behind her. A child had watched through the glass.
Not Rowan.
Ada.
“You were both there,” Claire said.
Ada looked at the child behind the glass.
“I was the witness.”
“And Rowan?”
“Rowan was the one who opened the door.”
The glass filled with a face.
Rowan as a child pressed both hands to the other side.
She was not inside the room.
She was trapped beneath it.
The clock moved one minute forward.
The door behind them locked.