“Did you lock both the sliding door and the front door this morning?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t see any evidence of a forced entry. So, if the doors were locked, how did someone get in?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Tell me you keep your windows locked.”
“I do. That is to say, I open them often when I’m at home. For fresh air. But then I close them and lock them.”
He began checking the windows. Locked, locked, locked.
When he reached the window nearest the kitchen table, it slid upward. Unlocked. Fury mounted in him like water flooding a room.
“Shoot,” she whispered. “I must have accidentally left that one unlocked.”
He shut it, locked it, and straightened to his full height. “Finley, we both know that someone else is after the treasure. Someone who might be willing to hurt you to get what they want.”
“Yes, and I didn’t consciously decide to be negligent. It was unintentional.”
“The intention doesn’t matter. All that matters is the result, which is that someone was in your house.”
“You’re right. I messed up.” She looked torn . . . as if she had another confession to make but didn’t want to make it.
His stomach turned to lead. “What are you not telling me?”
“When I came home from work the day we rescued Agatha, a strange feeling came over me.”
“What do you mean?”
“My animals’ behavior was a little ... off. It worried me for a bit. But nothing had been disturbed.”
“How come you didn’t tell me that at the time?”
“Because it was pretty easy to write off. My animalsdoact oddly at times for harmless reasons.”
His self-control felt as thin as a spiderweb. “When your father was dying, your safety was theone thinghe cared about. It’s the one thingIcare about.”Shut up, Luke. Don’t say anything else. But he couldn’t hold the words back. “Do you think that I could live with myself if something happened to you?”
“If something happens to me, it won’t be your fault—”
“The answer’s no. I will not be able to live with myself.” He’d failed to protect Ethan. There was no way he could fail to protect Finley. No way he could survive that a second time.
She searched his features. “I’m sorry.”
Strain grew between them, so strong it seemed to suck the air from the room. He strode to the doors, staring out, trying to make sense of the chaos inside his head and heart.
“Do you think the burglar left fingerprints on the keypad of the safe?” she asked.
“No. I think anyone careful enough to cover their tracks when they tried to breach my computer would also be careful enough to wear gloves.”
“But not careful enough to put the safe back in the drawer the same way they found it?”
He shrugged. “Maybe they did make a mistake. Or maybe they put it back that way on purpose.”
“Why?”
“To rattle us.”
