Chapter 8
The damp air inside the ventilation shaft burned Arthur’s lungs as he pulled himself upward, inch by agonizing inch. The metal sides groaned under his weight, but the brackets held. Pushing past years of accumulated dust and spiderwebs, he reached the upper terminal of the duct where the rusted iron grate opened directly beneath a workbench in the tool shed.
Through the narrow slats of the rusted grate, Arthur could see the dim interior of the shed. Sunlight filtered through the grimy windows, illuminating scattered garden tools, bags of fertilizer, and—crucially—a heavy iron padlock securing the exterior sliding door from the outside. Through a small gap in the door frame, he caught a glimpse of a familiar dark suit jacket. One of Victor Vance’s hired security operatives was standing guard just outside, smoking a cigarette and talking quietly into a comm-link.
“Everything’s secure down in the east sector,” the operative muttered into his collar mic. “Sterling and his little chef are boxed in. Vance wants us holding the perimeter until the corporate flight departs for New York tomorrow morning.”
Arthur didn’t hesitate. Using the heavy steel pry bar he had managed to wedge into his belt before the climb, he jammed the flattened end directly into the rusted bolts holding the floor grate in place. With a sharp, controlled twist, the rusted screws sheared off with a loud ping that echoed in the small shed.
The guard outside stopped talking mid-sentence. “What was that noise?” the operative muttered, turning away from the door and stepping toward the workbench.
Arthur kicked the iron grate outward with both feet, sending it crashing down onto a pile of clay flowerpots. Before the guard could draw his sidearm, Arthur dropped silently from the opening like a predator falling from a tree branch, landing squarely behind the operative. With a swift, decisive strike to the back of the man’s knee and a hard chop to the shoulder blade, Arthur sent the guard sprawling hard against the concrete floor, knocking the wind out of him instantly.
The operative gasped, his comm-link skittering across the floor. Arthur snatched the man’s heavy ring of master keys from his belt, bypassed the exterior padlock in seconds, and threw the heavy shed doors wide open to the cool afternoon air.
He didn’t waste a second celebrating. Turning back to the open ventilation shaft, Arthur dropped to his knees and called down into the darkness.
“Clara! The path is open!”
A moment later, Clara’s soot-stained face appeared in the opening below, illuminated by the beam of the flashlight she was holding aloft. She handed the waterproof canvas case containing the 1998 Blackwood ledger up through the opening, her grip steady and secure. Arthur grabbed the case with one hand and reached down with the other, hoisting Clara out of the subterranean vault and onto the floor of the tool shed.
Clara caught her breath, dusting off her jeans, her dark hair falling back into its messy bun. She looked down at the unconscious guard on the floor, then up at Arthur, whose knuckles were slightly scraped from the scuffle.
“Well,” Clara said, a faint, breathless smile touching her lips. “That certainly beats baking bread.”
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Arthur looked at her, the intense gravity in his eyes melting into something profoundly human. He reached out, gently brushing a smudge of gray soot from her cheek. “You are remarkable, Clara. Most people would have panicked an hour ago.”
“Most people don’t run commercial kitchens during a Saturday night dinner rush,” Clara countered smoothly, stepping toward the sunlight of the courtyard. “Now, Mr. Sterling, if we’re going to stop Victor tomorrow morning in Manhattan, we need to get to a secure vehicle before he realizes his man has gone quiet.”
