Page 86 of The Eagle's Vault

Fear pricked at the back of my eyes, and bile rose in my throat. I didn’t want to know whatfunmeant to Pavel.

The generator roared to life and brilliant work lights flooded the room, so bright I had to shield my eyes. Noise bounced off the ancient walls, muffled by the earth surrounding us.

I blinked my eyes open slowly, adjusting to the near daylight. What was my next play? I was being held by two armed men, and I didn’t know if Daniel Weber was on my side, theirs, or somewhere in between. “It’s going to take time.”

“I know.” Enzo let go of me and crossed to the other side of the chamber where two folding chairs sat. “We have all night.”

“I don’t even have my tools.”

Pavel sat next to Enzo and pulled out his gun. He used it to gesture at a tool chest by the generator. “Good thing we brought some.”

Daniel walked up to me and handed me his notebook. He spoke loud enough I could hear him over the generator, but quiet enough the thugs likely didn’t. “I’m sorry, Leigh. I tried figuring it out so they wouldn’t bring anyone else down here.”

“It’s not your fault.” I gave him a tight smile and opened the notebook, flipping through pages and sketches. I plucked some photographs out of a pocket at the back of the book.

Declan had been right. It was too dangerous for me down here. I tried not to think of the pained look in his eyes when I left. When I told him not to talk to me anymore. He hadn’t wanted to tell me the truth, had he? He thought he was protecting me yet again.

“Isaac…” I closed the notebook, not needing to read it. Between storming off at Giovanni’s and storming into Declan’s bed, Jayce had given me her phone with the images of the notebook, telling me to study it. I’d suspected she wanted to bring me along tonight and wanted me prepared. “Why do they think you built the case for that manuscript?”

“I don’t know.” He stared down at the photographs in my hand, of a fresco somewhere in the catacombs. “I don’t even know how they know about it.”

“Because someone at Barton created a set of specs for it, with Fenix as the client.”

He stepped in front of me, dipping down so he could meet my eyes. “Seriously? Who?”

“Stop whispering,” snapped Pavel. Not a man I wanted to piss off. “Get to work at a louder volume.”

Keeping my lips as still as possible, I said, “I don’t think they’re going to let us go.”

“They will.” Isaac gripped my shoulders and gave a quick squeeze. “They said they would, so they will. As soon as we open the vault.”

Daniel tapped the stack of photographs. “We need to get to work, if that’s going to happen.”

“You’re right.” Slow work. Lots of thinking.Please, Declan, please come for me.“I noticed patterns that repeated in the notebook—a dodecahedron, stuff about a study of fluid dynamics, and mirror writing, like da Vinci did.”

“I copied some of those from the frescoes and etchings in proximity to this chamber. The study was from one of his works.” Daniel gestured to the top of the wall, where tubes had been carved, like terracotta gutters. Carved? Attached? “The fluid dynamics study was because of those.”

“What are they for?”

“I’m not certain, but there’s one on either side of the door, so I suspect—”

“It has something to do with how to open the vault?”

Daniel nodded.

“I also noticed a few illustrations of cogs and thunderbolts?”

Isaac strolled to the left side of the vault door. “There’s no evidence of hinges, so it might slide open? It would need cogs for that. Maybe the lightning represents a power source?”

Power source? I frowned inwardly. That was a modern convention. “Thunderbolts were used in…”

Goose bumps shot up my arms, and not from the cold. On the Roman standard, an eagle sat atop Jupiter’s thunderbolts. Could that really be what was inside?

Isaac, oblivious to my words, said, “The vault’s door mechanism must be more complex than anything I’ve worked with, despite its age.”

Internally, I was at war. My heart pounded a hectic rhythm against my ribcage, as if it were desperate to leap out and escape. But I wanted to dig in, ask all the questions, pop the vault open.

Was this a test of my newfound resolution? Or was it the universe’s cruel way of showing me I’d made the wrong choice when I’d gone to Declan’s room? The quiet, agreeable Leigh would’ve been safe at the hotel, not threading through catacombs with danger pressing closer.

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