Chapter 51

chapter

fifty-one

Nia felt the anxiety bubbling inside her.

She didn’t know how this would turn out. She wanted to believe she was safe.

But ever since she’d woken with Rob lying dead beside her, safety felt like an illusion.

Instead, her gaze remained riveted to the camera.

One of the men stepped out of sight and into the closet.

Her heart thumped harder.

Would they discover the door? Try to get in?

She could hardly breathe. She waited to hear the lock on the door click. She imagined seeing the door opening.

Gage stood beside her with his gun drawn and ready to use, if necessary.

Thump. Thump. Thump . Nia’s heart was so loud she felt certain Gage could hear it too.

Dear Lord. Help us. Protect us. Guide us. In every way imaginable, we need You .

She waited, but she still didn’t hear the lock turn. Didn’t see the door open.

She glanced back at the screens again.

A moment later, the man stepped out of the closet and continued roaming around the room with his cohort.

They didn’t know about the safe room!

The air left her lungs, and her shoulders drooped with relief. Still, she knew she and Gage might not be out of the woods yet, so to speak. They still needed to wait to see what these guys were doing.

Were they here looking for Gage and Nia? Or were they looking for something else?

She didn’t know.

The men left Rob’s bedroom and went to search the guest bedroom.

Then they went into the bathroom. Back down the hall. Into the living room again. Looked around in the kitchen.

After a few minutes, the men looked at each other and shook their heads.

They hadn’t found what they were looking for.

They walked back to the front door, put their guns just out of sight, and left. The sight almost felt too good to be true.

Maybe she and Gage were safe . . . at least for a moment.

Gage wanted to feel relief, but he wasn’t quite there yet.

What had those guys been looking for? Information on the cyber key?

He had no idea. But Gage would need to remain on guard just in case the men had left any “presents” for him and Nia in the apartment.

He didn’t think that that was the case, but he couldn’t afford not to explore every possibility.

Nia turned to him, the relief in her gaze obvious. “I thought we were goners.”

He didn’t want to admit it, but he’d feared the worst-case scenario as well. “We’re still here.”

She rubbed her throat and dragged in a shaky breath. “So what do we do now?”

“I think we need to look around the space and see if we can get any kind of idea of what Rob might have been working on. We need to figure out if he truly did have a secret project, and if that’s what this murder and manhunt have been about.”

“Good idea. I can start with his computer if you want to look over some of these papers on the drafting table.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Gage began to rifle through the papers on the table, hoping to find something that might provide them with some answers. But much of what he saw was coding. There were a few hand-drawn diagrams. A graphic that maybe Rob wanted to use for a new app.

But most of it didn’t make any sense to Gage.

He hoped Nia was having more luck .

She searched the files on the computer for several minutes before sighing and turning toward the table in the middle of the room. “There’s nothing there—not that I can find.”

“That’s too bad, to say the least.”

“Most definitely.” She picked up one of the hand-held electronic devices there, hit a button on the screen, and frowned.

“You think the answers are on that?” Gage turned toward her, needing to clear his head a moment.

“At this point, I’m not sure of anything. What was the code to get into this room again?”

He told her the number combination.

She typed it into the tablet, and then her eyes widened. “I can’t believe it. It worked.”

She glanced at the screen when all of a sudden her face stilled, and it looked as if she was transported into another world.