“Yes. It controls the temperature in the house.”
Slowly, he turned, giving me a droll look. “That’s cute. This is one of seven control panels throughout the house. Once you set a panel, you’ll need to enter a series of numbers to make any changes, followed by a retinal scan and a blood sample.”
“A what?” I asked, sure I had heard him wrong.
“A blood sample. Do you want someone impersonating you?”
“And who would do that? Knight, we’re in freaking Montana. There aren’t many people out here trying to kill me.”
His eyes were hard, and his tone was dead serious. “It only takes one.” Turning back to the controls, he continued. “Now, once you’ve been confirmed as Michael Benjamin Parker, you will have control over the house.”
Mav raised his hand. “What if I enter the house?”
“Without him?”
Mav shrugged. “Yeah.”
“Why would you enter the house without him?”
“Because maybe he needs something and he asks me to get it.”
“I wouldn’t recommend that,” Knight said.
This was going too far. “Wait, so no one can enter my house without me?”
“Or Blake.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
Lethal silence filled the air as he stalked toward me. “Is your safety really so unimportant to you that you would allow anyone to enter your home?”
“I don’t allow just anyone?—”
“But you’re willing to let the sheriff?”
“I know him!”
Knight snorted in amusement. “You know him until he decides to plant evidence in your home, incriminating you for a crimehecommitted.”
“Now, hold on a minute—” Mav cut in.
“Or are you so willing to trust everyone around you?” Knight continued. “Do you not remember what you already went through when you thought you could trust the very people you were deployed with?”
Wow, talk about hitting below the belt. “That was the military. What could Mav possibly pin on me in our small town?”
“Corruption runs just as deep in small towns as it does in a military unit,” Knight said with all the seriousness in the world.
He had a point, and if I was being honest, my trust was still hard to earn. Turning to Mav, I shrugged. “He has a point.”
Mav scoffed. “I’m hurt. Truly, that cuts deep. We’ll see how much I trust you when I finally get married and have kids. Let me tell you something, it won’t be you I pick as the godfather.”
“Anyway, now that the corrupt sheriff is out of the way,” Knight continued, “can we get back to how to operate the system?”
“Okay, just for clarification, I’m not corrupt,” Mav said, trying to convince Knight, which he never would.
“Once you enter the main screen of the system, you can control everything from the fire suppression system to the escape hatch.”
That was a new one. “I’m sorry, the escape hatch?”
