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They’d ended up watching the house for two days, with a little sneaking around, testing the perimeter, and mapping the camera and sensor locations. Stine had to know they were aware of the place, but he’d made no moves to stop them. It made Livie even more curious about the house and convinced her there was no prisoner inside. Hopefully, there would be information if they got in before Stine could destroy it, which was why Mason and Faine had delayed giving the order to go in. They’d wanted more intel, to know if the place was rigged to explode or something, either by remote or if entered incorrectly.
Livie had her doubts about that, but there was no denying the house had the makings of an irresistible trap. Stine might be nuttier than a fruitcake, but he was a smart and cunning fruitcake. No, there was information to be found here. She was sure of it. Possibly buried under misinformation, or hell, in just how he operated.
Faine finally gave the order to go in, and everyone but her began to move through the woods. She stayed in the van, monitoring by radio and watching a screen showing each member’s location and approach. Okay, fine, one in particular had most of her focus. She switched to a second screen, which was broken into blocks, and showed the feed from each member’s camera. One thing she could say about the Elect, they had all the best high-tech gadgets, many not even on the market. Gabe’s inventions.
Everything looked normal, and there were no surprises as the team converged from six different directions. Carter and Jack took the front door. Jack watched the surrounding woods while Carter did his magic with a set of lock picks. The talent wasn’t courtesy of his military training, but what he called an adventurous youth in a tone that shut down any questions. It took him less than a minute.
They entered slowly and cautiously, scanning for threats. From what Livie saw on screen, the house was sparsely furnished. There was a table set up with a computer and an old landline phone, and a couple of chairs. They passed through it and into the empty kitchen, where they let Mason and Faine in. Gabe followed with a handheld gadget that checked for everything from explosives to listening devices. Kai was right behind him. The remaining men would keep watch from outside. It took a few minutes for Faine to clear her to drive up and enter the front door. The house reeked of bleach. The floors were bare concrete, and the walls were unpainted drywall that looked like it had recently been put in. It was overkill to merely protect Stine.
“He didn’t want any DNA left behind,” she said.
Jack shared a grim look with her, and she knew he was thinking the same thing as her. “Someone died here, or was held at least.”
“Hard drive looks clean, but I’ll work on it back at the compound,” Gabe said from the computer table.
“Make sure there’s nothing dangerous in it, then pack it up,” Mason ordered.
While he did that, Livie went through the rest of the house. There was no other furniture and nothing of interest until she reached the last room. There wasn’t even drywall up in it, a good thing it turned out. A stud towards the back corner was scratched with hundreds of tick marks, all in neat little rows starting at floor level. She counted one row and the columns, did some math. Two years, almost to the day.
Kai came in, lines of strain marking his face.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
He nodded. “I don’t have to touch anything in this house to read it.”
Kai was a psychometric and often had visions when he touched things. He was also a cop and wore latex gloves. She knew from a previous conversation they didn’t help much to mute sensations, and she doubted they’d help at all here. Even she felt overwhelmed and she didn’t have abilities nearly as strong as his. Kai knelt to examine the marks.
“Whoever was here marked his time, so maybe he left his name or something useful somewhere in here.”
“Definitely a male then?” she asked.
“Yeah. There’s a lot of rage, pain, and fear in this house.” He took a shaky breath and met her gaze. “No one died here, so there’s still a chance of finding him alive.”
In her opinion, that was slim to almost non-existent, but she started looking anyway. Beginning with the first stud, she worked her way around the room. There wasn’t anything on the two and half walls she checked before reaching the door frame. The front and sides of it were unmarred, so she reached up to run her fingers along the top edge.
“I need a chair,” she told Kai, not allowing herself to get excited yet.
It could be absolutely nothing. A mar in the wood or gibberish. The man who’d been imprisoned here couldn’t have been very sane at the end. Kai returned with the chair and Jack and Faine. She was the lightest, so she climbed onto the rickety chair while Jack steadied it. She didn’t want to touch it again, didn’t want to chance contaminating evidence any more than she already had.
The wood was old and dingy white. She saw a couple of darker spots she hoped like hell were blood they’d be able to DNA match, and thank all that was holy, there was a name, Meshadrack. It should be uncommon enough to give them a good direction to search. Next to it was the year 1949. She’d practically memorized the names of everyone who’d participated in the old military para-psych study, and his wasn’t on it.
“Let’s cut out this whole piece and the section over there, too,” she said. There was no telling what the lab could get from it.
“We’ve got company,” she heard through her earpiece.
Kai and Jack grabbed some tools from Gabe and went to work, and she and Faine went outside. Mason and some other guy were pointing pistols at each other.
“I don’t want any trouble. I’m just here to tell you to leave and watch you do it.”
“Who are you?”
“Toby Evans,” Jack said from behind her. “He runs security at the Institute.”
Toby glanced his way once. “I wasn’t told you’d be here. Where’s your shadow? Vin.”
Jack gave him a cold smile. “He’s around.”
Clearly, these two weren’t friends.
“Look, I don’t know what’s going on here and I don’t want to,” Toby said, though judging by his expression, she seriously doubted that was true. “Just get the fuck out.”
He was focused on Mason and didn’t seem to notice that he’d been surrounded, or that Kai and Gabe hadn’t come outside empty handed. They climbed into the van, and one by one so did the rest of them. It was the most anti-climatic end to a standoff she’d ever experienced.
