Chapter 3 - The Wall That Shouldn't BeDeep within the eastern wing of the mansion, the air grew noticeably colder.
Nathan held his flashlight steady as Nero led him down a service corridor that ended abruptly at a heavy oak door marked PRIVATE - WINE & STORAGE.
The door was locked with a modern electronic keypad—an anomaly in a house where everything else dated back to the early twentieth century. The keypad’s green standby light was faintly illuminated, pulsing in the dark.
Nathan stepped up to the keypad. He didn't know the code, but he didn't need to. He reached into his coat, pulled out a small electronic signal interceptor he used during dock operations, and plugged it into the maintenance port beneath the digital screen.
Within ten seconds, the screen flashed green, and the heavy internal locking mechanism clicked open with a pneumatic hiss.
Nathan pushed the door open.
The beam of his flashlight revealed a small, windowless tasting room lined with empty mahogany wine racks. Dust was thick here too, but something else hung in the air—a faint, chemical trace of fresh plaster and solvent that didn't belong in a house abandoned for six years.
Nero did not enter the tasting room. He stood in the doorway, his whine growing louder, sharper, his front paw scratching anxiously against the floorboards.
Nathan stepped past him, sweeping the flashlight across the back wall of the wine room.
At first glance, it was just tongue-and-groove cedar paneling, matching the rest of the walls. But as Nathan moved closer, running his hand along the grain of the wood, he felt the subtle, undeniable difference.
The paneling wasn't old. The wood was kiln-dried white cedar, treated with a modern polyurethane finish that hadn't oxidized.
More importantly, when Nathan tapped his knuckles against the center of the wall, there was no hollow echo of an empty cellar behind it.
It was solid. Concrete.
He shined the light down toward the floorboards. There, cutting across the antique tongue-and-groove flooring, was a hairline saw-cut, filled neatly with dark gray silicone caulk.
Nathan dropped to one knee. He traced the line with his fingers, scraping away a strip of the flexible caulk. Beneath it lay a fresh, gray line of Portland cement.
This wall hadn't been built when the house was constructed in 1912.
It had been built six years too late.
Julian Ostrander hadn't died in September 2019. Or at least, not before he had someone seal off a portion of his own basement with three feet of reinforced concrete and lead-lined drywall.
Suddenly, a sharp sound echoed from the front foyer—the heavy front door swinging shut.
Footsteps. Heavy, hurried footsteps marching across the marble tiles of the entrance hall, moving fast toward the eastern wing.
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Nero’s hackles rose instantly. The big dog planted his feet, letting out a deep, chest-shaking rumble that sounded like distant thunder.
Nathan stood up, his hand sliding smoothly around the grip of his Sig Sauer as he turned toward the doorway.
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