She thought she was simply overworked—until Ethan discovered someone had deliberately scheduled her for nearly 36 hours straight.

When Maya was brought down to the private study forty minutes later, she looked small, wrapped in an oversized wool cardigan that one of the female security staff had lent her. Her eyes were still red-rimmed and swollen with sleep, but a cup of hot black coffee had returned a sliver of color to her cheeks.

Ethan was standing over a massive glass table in the center of the room. Laid out across the lit glass were expansive, yellowed architectural blueprints detailing the intricate subterranean grid of the Blackwood manor, dating back to 1894.

"Drink," Ethan said, gesturing to the coffee cup in her hand as she entered. "I'm sorry for waking you, Maya. But time is no longer on our side."

Maya took a slow sip, nodding nervously. "Did... did you talk to Mrs. Davenport?"

"She’s taken care of," Ethan said smoothly. "She won't be hurting you or anyone else ever again. But she confirmed what you suspected. You weren't overscheduled because of work. You were overscheduled so a group of men could access our underground infrastructure."

Maya’s hand trembled slightly, making the coffee splash against the ceramic rim. "What do they want?"

"That’s what I need you to help me figure out," Ethan said. He pointed to the luminous blueprints spread across the glass table. "Look at these schematics. This is the subterranean map of the estate. Here is the service elevator you took down on the second night. Where did you see the man with the silver case?"

Maya leaned over the glass table, her eyes scanning the complex web of lines, rooms, and corridors. The blueprints looked like an intricate maze of black ink on aged linen paper. She traced a finger slowly down the line representing the central elevator shaft.

"The elevator opened here," Maya murmured, pointing to a long, narrow corridor labeled Sub-Level 2: Service Corridor C. "I walked past the linen storage, heading toward the secondary archive vault. I heard the noise right around here."

Her finger dragged past the modern archive room, stopping at a solid black line that marked the boundary of the original 19th-century foundation wall.

"There's nothing past that wall," Ethan noted, brow furrowing. "That's solid limestone. When my grandfather renovated the estate in 1978, they sealed off the old mining tunnels that ran beneath the property."

"No," Maya shook her head, her voice gaining confidence as the memory returned. "There was a draft. A cold air draft coming from behind the old mahogany record cabinets against that wall. I remember because the dust was blowing toward me, not away from me. And the man... he had a silver case, but he also had tools. I heard a metallic clicking sound, like a drill or a heavy lock picking set, right behind those cabinets."

Ethan looked at Marcus, who was standing quietly near the door. "Bring the tactical illumination kits and thermographic scanners. We’re going down there now."

"Sir," Marcus cautioned smoothly. "If these intruders have established a breach point in the old tunnels, we don't know if the physical structure is safe—or if they have armed personnel waiting inside."

"Then we go armed," Ethan said coldly, pulling a sleek, dark semi-automatic handgun from his desk drawer and checking the magazine with a practiced click. He tucked it into his concealed shoulder holster under his jacket. "Maya, you stay here with Noah."

"No," Maya spoke up suddenly.

Ethan paused, looking at her in surprise.

"I’m coming with you," Maya said, her jaw setting into a surprisingly firm line. "I know exactly which cabinet was moved. I know where the air draft was coming from. If you go down there blindly scanning walls, you'll lose hours looking through hundreds of feet of storage. Let me show you."

Ethan searched her eyes. The terror that had consumed her hours earlier had been replaced by a quiet, burning resolve. She had been pushed to the absolute edge of human exhaustion, humiliated, and secretly drugged; she wanted answers just as much as he did.

"You stay behind Marcus at all times," Ethan ordered sharply. "If anything happens, you duck and retreat immediately. Do you understand?"

"Understood," Maya agreed.

Ten minutes later, the small group descended into the bowels of the Blackwood estate.

The air grew progressively colder and damp as the heavy metal elevator carried them down into Sub-Level 2. The brightly lit, modern whitewashed corridors of the upper house gave way to damp stone floors, exposed brass piping, and concrete walls lined with hums of industrial ventilation systems.

They walked in silence, the heavy footfalls of Marcus and Ethan sandwiching Maya between them.

When they reached Service Corridor C, the air smelled heavily of old paper, stagnant moisture, and copper. Maya led them past long rows of metallic shelving holding old estate records, heading straight toward the far back wall where six massive, heavy mahogany cabinets stood lined up like dark soldiers.

"Here," Maya whispered, stopping in front of the fourth cabinet.

Marcus stepped forward, gripping the heavy wooden frame of the cabinet, and pulled with all his strength. With a loud, grinding screech, the cabinet slid forward on hidden metal rollers that had clearly been freshly lubricated with silicone spray.

Behind the cabinet, where a seamless wall of ancient grey mortar and stone was supposed to sit, was a heavy steel door—painted black, fitted with an advanced digital electronic lock, entirely unknown to the house’s primary security schematics.

"A hidden access point," Ethan muttered, stepping close and shining his tactical flashlight on the digital lock keypad. The screen was dark, pulsing with a faint blue standby light. "This wasn't built by my grandfather. This keylock was installed within the last year."

"How could someone construct an entire subterranean entryway without security noticing?" Marcus asked, pulling his weapon.

"By using internal house maintenance crews," Ethan realized, his voice dropping into a dark growl. "Davenport handled all contractor entry logs. She cleared teams for 'plumbing repairs' and 'foundation stabilization' for months. She built them a private front door right beneath our feet."

Suddenly, the electronic lock on the steel door clicked loudly. A mechanical hum vibrated through the frame as the lock indicator shifted from red to green.