He leaped from the car and ran for the front door. It was locked. If he picked the lock, he’d waste valuable time and risk alerting the assassin to his presence. Nick abandoned the front door and dove around the side of the cottage.
Adrenaline pumped through Nick’s veins, powering his limbs into action. Every second counted. He raced for the back door and found it locked, the dead bolt as strong as on the front of the house. Windows were positioned high on the sides of the house, too high to make climbing in easy.
The tunnel.
Nick ran for the back of Christmas Towne and dug into the snow once again piled against the back door. When he found the elf statue, he reached inside the cavity for the key. His heart skipped several beats when he didn’t find it.
Dropping to his knees, he shucked his gloves and sifted through snow bare-handed, his search nearing frantic. Cobra wasn’t known for dragging out an execution. He wouldn’t hesitate to pull the trigger, an equal-opportunity assassin, he didn’t spare a second thought if his target happened to be a woman.
Nick’s freezing fingers touched on icy metal, and he pulled the key from the snow, a wash of relief quickly shoved aside. He inserted the key in the door handle and flung the door open. Without the alarm combination, he had only seconds to get to Mary.
He raced through the aisles of boxes and bins. When he reached the basement door, alarm signals blared to life, blasting his eardrums, red and white lights strobed at the inside corners of the building. Nick only hoped whoever was inside Mary’s house couldn’t hear the cacophony emanating from the Christmas Towne store.
Nick scrambled down the steps, closing the door behind him to douse the noise from above. In the basement, the alarm wasn’t quite as loud. He hurried across the floor to the closet in the far corner and flung the mop and bucket out of the way.
Something didn’t smell right. An acrid scent overpowered the musky, moldy smell of damp basement. Nick slid behind the water heater and pushed open the wooden door. Smoke filtered through the tunnel into the closet, burning his eyes.
“Mary!” Nick pulled his turtleneck collar up over his mouth and nose, ducked low and raced to the end of the tunnel. He still had to get through Mary’s cubby into the basement. If smoke already stung his eyes and throat, what would the basement be like on the other side of that hidden doorway?
His pace quickened. Mary needed him, he couldn’t just give up and go back.
When he reached the cubby, he curled his shoulder in and threw himself through the secret door. Unsure what or who he’d find, he hit the floor on his side and rolled.
Smoke hit him, burning his eyes and lungs. Crouching low, he shined his flashlight into the haze, unable to make out much. If he could get to the door leading up into the house, he might have a chance to get to Mary. Flames licked up a timber beam, racing for the floor joists that held the upper story aloft.
He didn’t have much time before fire consumed the house and even less time before he succumbed to smoke inhalation.
Nick blinked smoke-induced tears from his eyes and set off across the floor. Halfway to the staircase, he ran into something. He shone his light down at a body, sitting in a chair. A white-haired, bearded man.
Santa!
Nick pulled a knife from his boot, cut the bonds holding the man to the chair and eased him to the floor. Could Mary be down here as well?
Now crawling on his hands and knees, Nick felt around the floor, until he came upon a woman’s body. Blood soaked her clothing and Nick held his breath as he shone the light into her face.
Jasmine Claus’s blank eyes stared up into the light, the pupils unresponsive. Nick didn’t have to check for a pulse. The woman was dead.
Smoke filtered through his turtleneck collar, but he pulled it aside and yelled, “Mary!”
Coughing sounded from a few feet away. “I’m here.”
Nick scurried across to her and pulled her into his arms. “We have to get you out of here.” He tugged her collar up over her mouth and nose and, hooking an arm beneath hers, dragged her back the way he’d come.
When they passed Santa’s inert form, Mary dug in her heels. “I’m not leaving without my father.”
“I can’t help you both out at the same time. Let me get you out, and then I’ll come back.”
Mary pushed away from Nick, tears trickling down her soot-covered face. She reached down and grabbed one of her father’s arms and dragged him a few inches across the floor.
Nick handed the flashlight to Mary. “Hold this.” He lifted her father from the floor and slung him over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry and ran for the cubby, the smoke so thick that he hit the wall first and then had to feel his way along it to the portrait of George Washington.
Mary pulled the secret door open.
“You first,” Nick commanded.
Mary dove through and reached back as Nick dumped her father through the opening.
He fell like deadweight onto Mary knocking her to the floor.
