“Yes.” My face burns. “I checked everywhere.”
Enzo looks over my shoulder at our house. “I’m sure they’re hiding in there somewhere. We will go look. Ada would not have run off.”
I can barely keep up with Enzo as he sprints across the yard to our front door. He stomps across the grass, smashing the blades with his boots—he must be really worried. Which in turn makes me even more worried. He’s generally the more laid-back parent between the two of us.
I trail behind him, and coming up from the rear is Suzette. Why is she following us? This is none of her business! I am tempted to whip my head around and tell her to get lost, but I’ve got bigger problems than Suzette right now.
Where the hell are my children? If they are gone…
The front door is still unlocked, and Enzo pushes it open. Just like before, the first floor of our house is completely silent except for the sound of my heart thudding.
“Was the door unlocked when you got home?” he asks me.
“No.” I distinctly remember pulling my keys out of my purse. “I unlocked it.”
“It’s a very safe neighborhood,” Suzette insists. “I always tell my clients that the crime rates are some of the lowest in the country.”
Shut up, Suzette. This is not the time for a sales pitch!
“Ada!” Enzo calls out. “Nico!”
No answer. My heart is beating so fast, I feel dizzy.
“Millie, can you call the school?” he asks. “Maybe we find out if they got on bus to go home.”
“The school will be closed,” I remind him. “But I can call the… the police…”
“The police?” Suzette bursts out, her blue-green eyes widening. “That seems extreme. You really want to bring the police over here? The kids are probably just out riding their bikes somewhere.”
Enzo gives her a sharp look. “Ada does not have a bike. And they would not have left without telling us. They would never.”
“Nico would,” she mumbles under her breath.
“Ada!” he calls out again. “Nico!”
I reach in my pocket again to pull out my phone. We have to call the police. Part of me doesn’t want to, because that will make it all real. They will not be two kids who just wandered off for a moment and are quickly found in a neighbor’s yard. They will actually be missing. But then again, the first few hours after children go missing is crucial. We don’t want to waste that time.
Suzette grabs my arm, her fingernails biting into my bare skin. “You’re being ridiculous. Don’t call the police.”
I look up at her perfectly made-up face, and for a moment, I see a flash of real fear. Why doesn’t Suzette want me to call the police?
Enzo is standing by the stairwell, frozen, as he stares at the wallpaper, his eyes narrowing. He is looking below the stairwell, although I can’t tell what has caught his attention. I shake off Suzette’s grip and join him. That’s when I see it.
There is a crack in the wallpaper.
No, it’s more than a crack. The wallpaper has been completely ripped in a straight line. And the pattern of the tear in the paper is the exact shape of a small door, the top of which comes up to Enzo’s shoulder. We usually keep a large house plant in that exact spot, but it’s been shifted over to reveal the outline of the doorway.
“Che diavolo?” he mutters.
He reaches out and pushes against the defect in the wall. To our surprise, the wall shifts and starts to push open. It takes him some amount of effort, and a terrible scraping sound fills the room.
And that’s when it hits me.
“Oh my God!” I cry. “That’s it! That’s the scraping noise I’ve been hearing!”
I wasn’t imagining that scraping sound haunting me during the night. That was real. That was coming from my own home. From this hidden door opening and closing.
Except who was inside my house, opening and closing this door while the rest of us slept?
TWENTY-TWO
I grab Enzo’s arm before he can wrench open the door. As much as I want to find the kids, I’m suddenly terrified of what’s behind that door.
“Please be careful,” I beg him.
He glances at me for a second, acknowledging my warning. Then he pushes the door the rest of the way open.
It’s a small room, not too much bigger than a closet. There are no windows, giving the room a stiflingly claustrophobic feel. I stare into the small space, dimly lit by a single flickering bulb.
And in the corner of the room are Ada and Nico, crouched on the floor, staring up at us.
“Ada! Nico!” My eyes fill with tears of relief. “What are you guys doing in here? How did you find this room? Your father and I were worried sick!”
The kids scramble to their feet, wearing identical guilty expressions. I’m not even sure which one of them to hug first, but Enzo hugs Ada, so I go for Nico. He stiffens at first, but then he buries his face in my chest. As I cling to him, I take a better look around the small room. It’s about half the size of either of the kids’ bedrooms, and it’s extremely dusty, like nobody has been in here for years. I’m surprised the light still works. In one corner of the room, there’s a little pile of rusty nails. In another corner, there’s a small stack of Nico’s comic books.
“I’m sorry, Mom,” Nico says. “I found this clubhouse to play in. I didn’t know it wasn’t allowed.”
Only my son would rip through the new wallpaper of our house to find some dirty, disgusting room filled with tetanus-riddled nails and then make it his clubhouse. And apparently, he’s been sneaking down here several nights a week to do this, based on how often I’ve been hearing that scraping sound, which nearly gave me a heart attack several times over.
