“They got it in here somehow. It was either through the elevator or maybe a crane over the balcony. I’m just surprised they got it down the spiral staircase. Don’t worry, we’ll figure it out.” I close the doors and look around a little more.
On the side, like the room above, are two more doors. We didn't look at the ones upstairs, but I’m not skipping these. I leave Oliver and walk over to them. Pushing open the one on the left, I step into ahugebathroom. There’s a big sunken Roman bath in the middle, with a large vanity on the wall and a shower big enough for an orgy. Behind a half wall is the toilet. The room is done in white and gold. I’m not complaining about the break from the rest of the house’s dark decor, but I have no idea how this is what he settled on.
“The count must have been super paranoid to lock himself in here. There’s no way out except the way we came in. What if the house was on fire?” Oliver sounds perplexed, and a smile touches my lips.
Pulling the door closed, I open the next one. It’s a huge walk-in closet, exactly what I was looking for. “Oli, come here,” I call as I push all the clothes to one side. Dust flies up, filling the room, and I start to cough.
“Shit, I guess the cleaning service wasn’t allowed up here.” Oli waves his hand in front of his face as he stands at the entrance while I continue to cough.
Wiping my eyes, I seek out the panel I was looking for, and a circular piece of the wall drops away after I quickly tap out another code.
“What the fuck is that?” Oli asks, finally braving the dust to stand behind me.
“Thatis the way out,” I tell him smugly, and he steps closer, shining his phone’s flashlight into the hole.
“It’s a slide!” he gasps as the light drops away from him.
“Yeah, it goes down into a room next to the vault room.”
“We should do it!” Oli is practically vibrating with the urge to go flying down that slide, but I’m unsure.
“I was thinking that we should search for the map first. This was the only other secure place I thought it might be. I’m really worried that someone else knows the ins and outs of the tunnels, and I don't want them to have access to anything.”
I can see him struggle with the want to ride the slide and the need to do the right thing, but good Oli wins. He sighs and steps away from the slide. “I promise you can slide your little heart out as soon as we find the map.” I give him a kiss and press the button on the panel to close it up. There’s a time delay—likely to allow you to climb onto the slide—but it eventually whooshes closed again.
Oliver gropes for a light switch in the side of the closet door, and a moment later, the space lights up. “Okay, if you were the count, where would you hide an important document like the map?” he asks, and we begin to search the room.
Drawers are opened and shelves are searched. Pulling back another section of hanging clothes on the back wall, I discover a smaller version of the vault. “Oli, look.”
“What are the odds that the code to that is the same as all the others?”
“Only one way to find out.” He reaches over me, his front pressed to mine, and plugs in the code. Sure enough, the panel lights up. He spins the small wheel, and the safe pops open.
Inside is some paperwork, a hand gun, a passport, some stacks of cash, and what looks like a diary or maybe a book of contacts. I reach in and pull everything out, handing them back to Oli so I can get at the paperwork under it all. He opens the passport. “This is the count’s, so does that mean itishis body downstairs? His son lived with him. Would they have kept their passports together, or would they have kept them separately?”
“You all keep your passports together on the plane,” I point out, and he purses his lips.
“Yes, but we all get along. From what I understand, Dragos and his father did not have a great relationship. He spent more time at our place than he did at home. I mean, the twins’ father is looking like the perfect suspect. You heard how many properties they had overseas. I wonder if any of them are in countries that don’t have extradition treaties with the US…”
“You think Dragos killed his dad?” The thought hadn’t occurred to me before, though I guess maybe it’s not so surprising when I think about it. It’s not like Dragos had a great relationship with his father.
“Sure, why not? People can go to extremes to escape an unwanted situation.” He mutters the last bit, and a wave of guilt hits me. I wrap my arms around him, the passport jammed between us.
“Oh god, Oli, I’m not judging. I promise. Of course they do. It just hadn't occurred to me.” He shudders in my arms, his childhood memories likely flooding his mind. I hold him tight for a few moments, letting him soak in all my love. “God, I love you,” he whispers.
“I love you too.” He pulls back, and I kiss him softly on the mouth before wiping a stray tear from his face. “Come on, let’s check out these papers. Once we go over those, we can go back upstairs and see what’s through those other doors in the sex room.”
He breathes out a big sigh and nods, putting the passport and diary on a nearby chest of drawers. I grab the paperwork out and scan it. There’s the deed and title to the land and house, a birth certificate for Dragos Bucataru, and the last will and testament of Count Radicus Bucataru.
“Holy shit, that might change a few things,” Oliver says, eyes locked on the will. “Especially if that body downstairs is the count.” I pass it all off to him and reach for the last thing in the safe, a stack of laminated schematics. When I flip through them, there’s a layout of the house. Each floor is diagrammed, showing where all the secret passages are located and how to activate them in each room. The next one is an aerial view of the estate, including the house, lake, the little house on the island in the middle of the lake, and the zoo. Over the top of it is a clear overlay showing the layout of all the tunnels, where they lead to, and notations on how to activate them.
“Jackpot!” I angle it so Oliver can see, and he whistles, the sound sharp in the quiet between us.
“Yup, we wouldn’t want anyone else finding that. We’ll have to be careful that it doesn't fall into the wrong hands. Let's take it with us, and we can put it in one of the safes at home.”
“What about the will? Should we bring it?” I ask him as I pack the other items back into the safe.
“If we present this and it turns out to be different than the one the trust has on file, then Jax and Jazzy could lose it all. At this stage, maybe we should let sleeping dogs lie. Let’s put it back and not tell anyone for now.”
