Simon Says Die

certainly didn’t have any keys to her house. “I’m probably wrong about what I unpacked. I still have tons of boxes in the attic. I must not have brought down all the photos I thought I’d brought down.” Or at least, she hoped that was what had happened. It made sense. And it was preferable to the alternative—that someone had been in her house and taken the picture. She didn’t have to think very long about who that someone would be.
    She led the way up the stairs and down the long hallway. Stopping outside her bedroom door, she pressed one of the boards in the wall and it slid back to reveal the hidden staircase.
    Pierce’s face lit with interest as he stepped inside the little alcove. “Do these stairs lead anywhere besides the attic?” He ran his hands along the pocket in the wall where the door had slid.
    â€œJust the attic. You can only get to the basement from the stairs in the back hallway on the first floor. She led the way up the stairs with Pierce following behind. He kept running his hands along the wall.
    â€œAre there any other hidden passageways in this house?”
    â€œNope, sorry. Just the one.” She paused at the top to open the door. “No one could sneak in here without setting off the security alarm, if that’s your worry.”
    He stilled. “Did you change the alarm code after you moved in?”
    â€œOf course.” The way his brow tightened with concern had her feeling uneasy again.
    She slid the pocket door into the wall and flipped on the overhead lights. The two small dormers let in almost no natural light because of the centuries old oak trees that hung over this side of the house.
    He gently moved her to the side and made a circuit of the room, looking behind each stack of boxes, in every possible hiding place. “All right, come on in.”
    For once, she didn’t feel aggravated at his over-protectiveness. After everything that had happened today, his vigilance was reassuring.
    While she read the labels on the boxes stacked against one wall, he felt along the far wall—the only wall not blocked by boxes.
    â€œWhat are you doing?” She opened the box in front of her.
    â€œLooking for a hidden door.”
    â€œThere aren’t any others. And all the exterior doors, and the windows, are wired into the security system.”
    â€œWhat about the dormers?” He finished his examination of the wall and crossed to the small windows.
    â€œIt’s a three-story drop from the attic to the yard below.” She pulled an album out of the box and sat on the floor. “There aren’t any balconies, no access from the outside.”
    â€œWhat about gutters, downspouts? If they’re solidly attached to the house, someone could climb up those. Or they could climb the oak trees.”
    â€œI hadn’t thought about that,” she admitted, as she flipped the pages. “I suppose if someone was really, really determined . . .” She rubbed her arms and glanced around the room. The stacks of boxes suddenly took on more sinister shapes. She vowed to get better lighting up here once this was all over.
    Pierce crossed the room and sat on the floor beside her. “Did you find any pictures of Damon?” He peered over her shoulder at the album she was holding.
    She looked back down and turned another page. “Maybe I have the wrong album.” She quickly flipped through the rest of the pages, then set it aside and pulled another one out of the box in front of her.
    â€œWhat about framed pictures?”
    â€œI haven’t come across any yet.” She flipped through the album and sat back. “I must have mislabeled one of the boxes.”
    They searched together, opening up box after box.
    â€œHere,” she said, relieved to find another album in a box filled with winter clothes. “I don’t know how this ended up over here, but there should be plenty of pictures of Damon in this one. This is the album I made the first month after we got married.”
    She knelt on the floor with the album sitting on a box in front of her. Pierce knelt down beside her.
    She flipped a page and pointed to a photo. “This is Damon, but it’s not a very good picture. He’s looking away. You can’t see his face very well.”
    She frowned. “Here’s another one, but it’s not very good either, blurry. There have to be some better pictures in