Chapter 49
I looked from brother to brother. "Are you serious?" I zoomed in on Joel. "You really know?"
He shook his head. "Sorry. Not me." He flicked his head toward Bishop. "Him."
I looked to Bishop. "How wouldyouknow?"
"Because I looked."
The answer seemed woefully inadequate. I'd looked, too, several times, in fact. But there were so many things in play – the locks, the alarm system, the windows, the doors. Just last year, I'd had everything checked. I'd even changed the locks – not that it had done a bit of good.
"Wait a minute," I said. "Isthatwhy you told me to give it up? Because you think you know?"
"I don'tthinkI know," Bishop said. "IknowI know."
Desperately, I wanted to believe him. And I was dying to hear his theory. But first, I had a different question. I turned to Joel and said, "Isthatwhy you stopped me from pushing the issue?"
"What'd you think?" he said. "That we'd just shrug it off otherwise?"
Actually, Ididthink that, but I hated the idea of saying so. So instead, I asked, "But if you personally didn't know how they were getting in, how did you know thatheknew?"
"Bishop?" Joel said. "I knew, because he told you to give it up."
Trying to make sense of everything, I looked again to Bishop. "But if you knew at the time, why didn'tyoujust say so?"
"When you see it, you'll understand."
I had no idea what he meant. AllIknew was that it would've been really nice to prove my aunt and uncle wrong, right there on the spot, and more importantly, in front of the police. But it was no use arguing about it now. My relatives were gone – thank goodness – and so was Officer Nelson.
So all I said was, "Alright. So tell me. What's your theory?"
"A theory, huh?" He looked to Joel. "You've got a cynical one on your hands."
"I'm not cynical," I told him. I turned to Joel and asked, "You don't think I'm cynical, do you?"
"If you ask me," he said, "you're not cynical enough."
I turned to Bishop. "See?"
Bishop looked unimpressed. "You think that's a compliment? Now c'mon, lemme show you."
He motioned me and Joel toward the kitchen while Jake waited near the front door, just in case company showed up, whatever that meant.
A few minutes later, I was staring at a door that I hadn't seen open in years. It was the door to the wine cellar. And it was opennow.
How on Earth hadthathappened?
For the first time in forever, I peered down the cellar stairway. It looked the same as I remembered. Trying to make sense of this, I pulled back to give the cellar door a closer look. It didn't look damaged or anything – so that was good.
I gave Bishop a perplexed look. "How'd you do that?"
"Do what?" he asked.
I pointed to the open door. "That."
He followed my gaze. "The lock?" He shrugged. "That thing was a piece of junk."
I couldn't quite believe it. The lock was a big, steel deadbolt. It required a key, which I didn't even have. Wondering how the lock looked from the other side, I stepped through the open doorway to check it out.