Even Thomas’s own children looked at him with a mixture of curiosity and trepidation.
“Damn, Daddy,” Seven muttered under his breath.
Thomas didn’t acknowledge what they’d all heard, but the smallest of smiles formed, then disappeared, before he cleared his throat. The screen lit up on the wall, drawing everybody’s attention.
“You there, Calliope?” Thomas called.
“Does Raggedy Ann have a cotton crotch?” Calliope chirped through the speaker.
Jericho snickered along with the others.
Lake nodded towards the speaker. “I like her.”
“Oh, my God. Look at all of you. There are so many,” Calliope said.
“She can see us?” Jericho asked, genuinely surprised.
Atticus shrugged. “Yeah, apparently.”
“That hardly seems fair,” Asa quipped. “How come you can see us but we can’t see you?”
Calliope made a dismissive noise. “You’re celebrities. I knew what you looked like even before I started working with Thomas.”
“Still, I don’t understand why we can’t just meet her,” Avi said.
“Because you can’t. It’s for her protection,” Atticus said. “Drop it.”
“Since when are you so concerned about Calliope?” Adam asked, narrowing his gaze at Atticus.
“I’m concerned about all of us. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t do well in prison,” Atticus said, shuddering at the thought.
“We’d do great in prison,” the twins said in unison.
Atticus looked them dead in the eye. “Not if you went to separate prisons.”
Jericho had to bite back a smile at the stunned looks on the twins’ faces. It was clear the two had never been apart for any length of time. Jericho couldn’t have ever imagined wanting that level of intimacy with another living soul before Atticus.
“Why would you even suggest that?” Asa asked, scandalized.
“Do you really think they let you pick your roommates in prison? With the amount of bodies we’ve dropped, they’ll put us underneath the jail. Eight different jails. So, how about we just don’t get caught?” Atticus asked.
August nodded. “Atticus is right. We’re wasting time. Let’s knock out a plan. Lucas and I have other, more important, things to do.”
Lucas beamed, his hand lifting to rub August’s back. “Let’s do this, quick and dirty.”
“Kinky,” Seven snickered.
“Calliope, pull up the blueprints, please,” Thomas said, a bit exasperated but in a fond way.
Schematics appeared on the screen.
“Shit, we need to get us one of those screens,” Lake said.
“Okay, these blueprints are from when the hospital was first built, so there’s no guarantee this is up to date, but it’s all we have,” Calliope cautioned.
“Noted,” Thomas said.
The schematic moved, becoming a three-dimensional model. “There are two ways into the building. There’s the main entrance, which requires you to enter through the hospital and take a staircase down to the sub-basement levels.” A red circle appeared around the space in question. “The other entrance requires parking in this garage”—another map appeared showing a square that Jericho assumed was the parking garage—“and taking a door that leads to a tunnel that leads to the second entry point.”
