Chapter 27 - THE ESCAPE THROUGH THE CRAWLSPACE
"We can't go out the front," Claire ordered, her survival instincts overriding the crushing weight of Daniel’s betrayal. "Julian, where does the bulkhead in the sub-cellar lead?"
Julian pointed downward, his eyes darting toward the ceiling as the front door frame groaned under another colossal impact. "It exits behind the woodpile near the ravine. But the bolt is rusted shut from the outside. You need the brass key."
"I have the key," Daniel said, scrambling to his feet, pulling the corroded zero-key from his pocket. "Claire, take Lily. Go through the nursery hole. Julian and I will hold the stairs."
"No," Claire said coldly, staring him straight in the eye. "You don't get to play the martyr now, Daniel. You don't get to die here and leave me alone with the truth. You carry your daughter. If you let anything happen to her, I will kill you myself."
They rushed into the nursery. The hole in the floorboards gaped like an open mouth, the raw earth below smelling of wet clay and long-buried crimes.
Daniel climbed down first, his boots hitting the damp dirt four feet below. He reached up, his arms steady despite his tears, and lifted Lily gently from Claire’s arms. "I've got you, baby. Daddy’s got you."
Claire dropped down next, landing in the cold mud. Julian followed, his large frame squeezing through the timber opening just as the front door downstairs gave way with a deafening screech of ripping wood and snapping deadbolts.
Heavy, deliberate footsteps echoed across the foyer hardwood below.
Two men. Speaking in low, clipped murmurs.
"Search the ground floor," a gravelly voice instructed from the hallway. "Margaret said the ledger is either in the safe box or on the kid. Take the box, burn the rest."
Beneath the floorboards, Claire held her breath, her hand clamped gently over Lily’s mouth. They were crouching in a narrow, stone-lined trench that ran beneath the entire width of the house—a forgotten corridor built during the nineteenth century.
At the far end of the tunnel, illuminated by the lightning filtering through a rusted ground-level grate, sat a heavy iron hatch.
Daniel scrambled toward it, jamming the brass key into the lock. The cylinder resisted. Rust flaked onto his knuckles. He threw his weight against it, groaning in agony as the corroded tumbler ground against the iron.
Above them, the footsteps entered the nursery.
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The intruders were standing directly over their heads. Dust and plaster sifted down through the floorboards, coating Claire’s hair like gray snow.
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