Page 62 of Such a Quiet Place
CHAPTER 20
IT WAS ONE A.M.and the key ring lay before me on the kitchen table, drying on a heap of paper towels, after I’d run them under the sink—mud and sludge and dirt sliding down the drain. I went through the labels more carefully this time, making a list of each key:
T—Truett (Tina?)
B—Brock
S—Seaver
M—Monahan (Margo? Mac?)
C—Cora? Chase Colby?
I was betting on the letter being the initial of the last name; it seemed to be a pattern that fit with each name, though there were some with more than one possibility. And there was one easy way to check—as long as the bank hadn’t changed the locks after taking ownership of the house next door.
There was no way I was going to be caught out front, trespassing at the Truett house. Not with the cameras and people walking by, the neighbors not sleeping, watching out their windowsinstead. Not when the police were questioning us and what we were each doing. Charlotte might still be on watch, and I’d already evaded her once.
I knew the Truett fence had somehow become unlocked; I’d seen it swinging ajar my night on watch. As if someone else had been in there.
Maybe someone was able to jimmy it with a golf club from above.
I left through my back patio, but in the dark, I collided with the white Adirondack chair on the way to the gate, forgetting that Ruby had moved it from the other side of the yard. I cursed to myself, hoped Tate and Javier hadn’t heard me—or the wood scraping against the brick patio—then hoped they didn’t hear my own gate creaking open in the stillness. Tate had said noises woke her the last several nights, that pregnancy was starting to affect her ability to sleep.
I latched the gate carefully behind me, then peered once into the trees before sliding along the edge of the fence to the back gate of the Truetts’ house.
Their gate was easy to unlatch from the outside, without the lock engaged. But the squeal of the hinges through the night made me cringe. I left it ajar, so as not to create any more noise than necessary. Charlotte’s house was just on the other side, and her master bedroom was downstairs, near the back.
Key ring in hand, I walked up their patio steps. I slid theTkey into the lock, but it was unnecessary. I could tell before even attempting to turn the key. The handle moved freely, and the deadbolt lock had sharp gouges around the edges. So did the wooden strip where the door met the frame.
I twisted the key back and forth, just to check, but it wasn’t working. Either it wasn’t the key for this house, or the bank had indeed changed the locks.
But someone had been inside here. From the look of the deadbolt and surrounding wood, someone had forced their way in.
I ran my finger along the deep grooves, the wood splintered in sections. Wondering who had been in here. If they’d tried to force their way into my place, too.
I’d noticed the unlatched gate here a few nights ago. My own gate had also come unlatched, swaying loose in the wind, though I was always careful to keep it locked. It seemed likely that both had been opened by the same person. Like someone was spying on each place. Or like someone was moving back and forth between our patios.
Ruby had gone out back the first night she was here—I’d heard that creak of the back door. And the next morning, she’d been sitting in the Adirondack chair, her feet up on the wooden ottoman, while Tate and Javier were arguing next door.
She’d moved the chair, I thought, for the single square of sunlight on the patio. But maybe she’d moved it sometime in the night. The base of the chair was solid wood, and the arms were sturdy, and it was now positioned just beside the Truett fence.
Maybe, after looking for the keys and finding them missing, she’d decided to find a way in by any means necessary.
I shook the fence between our properties to check for stability. It didn’t budge. These fences were meant to withstand storms and wind and wear and accidents, connecting from yard to yard, reinforcing the strength.
I felt a chill running down the length of my arms, up my back. Like she was here with me now. Of course it was her. It was always her.
I could picture her clearly, her determination: Unlocking my back gate, to be able to return after. Dragging the chair to the other side of my patio, perching on the base, climbing on the armrest, slinging a leg over the sturdy flat-top posts of the fence, falling to the bricks on the other side, where I now stood.
The marks around the deadbolt—my knife in her hand to wedge her way inside.
Ruby had been here, I was sure. Ruby had gotten inside.
I walked up the brick steps again, twisting the handle, following her trail. Desperate to know what she had found, what she had discovered.
The door pushed open on the first try.
Inside, I was hit by a wave of thick humidity and uncirculated air. I flipped the switch on the wall, but nothing happened. The electricity had long since been cut. And with that, the air-conditioning and any hope of circulating air. I breathed shallowly into my sleeve, like I’d done that day when we’d found them.
