“The senator said he keeps the ledger in a secure vault. Check the walls.”

The sound of wood scraping against stone echoed.

They were searching the racks.

They were getting closer to the Pinot Noir shelf.

I prayed Emma wouldn’t sneeze.

I prayed I wouldn’t make a sound.

“Hey, look at this,” the officer in the cellar said.

There was a pause.

“What is it?” the voice from the stairs asked.

“There’s a seam in the masonry here. Behind these crates.”

My blood ran cold.

I stared at the blackness where the door was.

The sound of heavy boots came closer.

A flashlight beam flickered through the tiny gap at the top of our hidden door.

It swept across the stone ceiling right above our heads.

“Give me a crowbar,” the officer said.

Just as the metal scraped against the wood of the rack outside, a sharp sound echoed from the top of the stairs.

It was the ring of a telephone.

Not just any telephone, but the loud, mechanical bell of the wall-mounted landline in the kitchen.

It rang once. Twice.