Chapter 5 - The Midnight Trap
Ardan walked up the slate path of Birchwood Lane with her shoulders square and her head held high against the falling mist.
She did not try to soften her footsteps.
She deliberately allowed her heels to strike the wet stone with sharp, distinct clicks that cut through the silence of the night.
Marcus Reed moved behind her like a shadow, keeping thirty feet of distance while carrying a compact shoulder rig equipped with a low-light infrared lens.
Dorothea Payne remained in the idling vehicle, her phone poised to contact the county prosecutor the second the confrontation concluded.
Ardan reached the broad front porch and slipped her master key into the heavy oak door.
She turned the lock firmly, allowing the deadbolt to disengage with a loud, metallic clack that resonated through the entry hall.
She pushed the door wide open and stepped into the foyer.
The house was dead silent, smelling faintly of citrus polish and Crispen’s expensive sandalwood cologne.
On the console table near the umbrella stand lay Crispen’s leather weekender bag, unzipped and overflowing with manila folders pulled from the study.
Ardan reached over and pressed the main wall switch.
The massive crystal chandelier overhead flared into brilliant, blinding life, casting dazzling facets of light across the white wainscoting and the dark wood floor.
From the top of the stairs came a sharp, panicked intake of breath.
Crispen appeared on the second-floor landing, leaning over the banister with his tie undone and his white dress shirt drenched in sweat.
His face was completely drained of color, his jaw slack with unvarnished terror.
He stared down at Ardan as if she were a ghost rising from an unmarked grave.
He stuttered her name, his voice cracking like dry wood under pressure.
Ardan did not move from the center of the foyer; she simply took off her wet gloves, finger by finger, and dropped them onto the table.
She looked up at him with a gaze so steady and detached it seemed to freeze the warm air in the corridor.
She asked him how the weather was in Minneapolis.
Crispen gripped the banister rail until his knuckles turned as white as porcelain.
His eyes darted wildly toward the shadows of the hallway behind him, where the master study door stood slightly ajar.
He tried to force a laugh, but the sound emerged as a strangled, pathetic wheeze.
He claimed that his conference had ended early and that he had caught a charter flight home to surprise her.
He insisted he had wanted to be waiting in bed for her return tomorrow evening.
Ardan tilted her head slightly, her expression unreadable.
She asked why a man returning home to surprise his wife needed to disable four perimeter cameras at nine twenty-six.
She asked why he had sent a text message four minutes ago claiming he was going to sleep in an executive suite eleven hundred miles away.
Crispen took a hesitant step down the carpeted stairs, his hands held out in front of him in a posture of desperate surrender.
He stammered that the security system had suffered an unexpected short circuit due to the heavy rainstorm.
He claimed his text message had been sent automatically by an assistant who had misread his travel itinerary.
He pleaded with her to listen to reason, saying that he was exhausted, stressed about his business affairs, and simply not thinking clearly.
Ardan remained completely motionless beneath the glare of the chandelier.
She told him to stop lying because the sound of his voice was making the air in her mother’s foyer feel unbreathable.
May you like
She raised her voice just enough to carry into the shadowed corridor of the upper landing.
She commanded Cynthia Vane to stop hiding behind the linen closet door and come down the stairs immediately.
