Chapter 4 - Heritage Hills
The drive from Edmond down into the historic district of Heritage Hills took twenty-five minutes in the late-night traffic. The streets were quiet, canopied by massive, ancient oak trees that cast gothic shadows across the empty asphalt.
We parked two blocks away from my father’s sprawling brick estate, walking the rest of the way in the cool night air. The house sat dark and imposing behind a wrought-iron fence, its tall windows pitch-black.
"Look," Glen whispered, pointing toward the side driveway.
My father’s black Mercedes sedan was parked in the detached garage, but the garage side door was propped open with a rubber wedge.
"They're home," I whispered back, my heart hammering against my ribs. "Or... at least one of them is."
We crept through the side gate, moving silently across the damp grass until we reached the back terrace. The French doors leading into the ground-floor study were unlocked—a careless mistake that immediately signaled panic on their part.
Glen slid the door open with barely a whisper of sound, and we stepped inside into the warm, familiar scent of old leather, pipe tobacco, and floor wax.
The study was dark, illuminated only by the faint amber glow of a streetlamp filtering through the heavy lace curtains. Rows upon rows of mahogany bookshelves lined the walls, filled with heavy legal tomes and corporate ledgers.
"Where is the basement entrance?" Glen whispered, scanning the room.
"Behind the sliding bookcase," I replied, my voice shaking slightly as memories of my rebellious teenage years rushed back—the times I had tried to sneak down those stairs only to find heavy biometric locks keeping me out.
We walked over to the far corner of the study, where a massive bookcase filled with encyclopedia sets stood against the wall. I reached out, finding the hidden toggle switch behind a brass globe that my father always kept polished.
With a low, mechanical whir, the heavy bookcase slid sideways along a hidden steel track, revealing a dark, descending concrete stairwell leading down into the bowels of the house.
A faint, sickly yellow light flickered from the bottom of the stairs.
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And as we peered down into the darkness, a sound drifted up from the basement—a soft, rhythmic scraping noise, accompanied by the muffled, unmistakable sound of someone weeping.
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