Page 16 of A Simple Mistake
“I’m sure he can, but traps on the stairs won’t help you escape from a fire.Besides, Jack’s traps only work if you know someone’s coming because you can’t use the room when he’s done setting up.But you’ve got some great ideas here.We can work with those.What’s your objective?”
Nico’s face creased in confusion.“What do you mean?We don’t want to be trapped.”
“If you just want to escape from your bedroom, then why do you need traps on the stairs?”
Nico traced the stairs on his drawings with his fingers.“Stop them from getting to us?”
Gareth waited while Nico worked through possibilities and distilled them into the important one.
“If there’s a fire, we need to escape from our room.A trap on the stairs can stop a burglar, but we’d still be in danger if there are two of them.So… use the traps on the stairs to slow them down to give us time to escape?”
“Okay, that works.The traps on the stairs buy you time.How are you going to escape?”
Nico reached for another set of drawings showing a rope ladder concealed in the windowsill of their bedroom.
Gareth nodded.“That’s a smart solution that will work for a fire.And you’ve put it out of sight, which is excellent.Sensible to have something up your sleeve that nobody knows about.”
“You don’t like it,” Nico said, proving that he was paying attention.
“I like it a lot, but you’re missing something important.”Gareth took the pad and pen and sketched the house and the surrounds.“Imagine you’re the attacker.What would you do?Where would you go?What do you need to look out for?”
“You want me to think like an attacker?”
“Yes,” Gareth agreed, part of his mind flashing back to the past.He’d spent twenty years bent over maps and drawings like this one, and some memories had barbs.He started when Jack’s hand settled on his shoulder and Jack slid a beer in front of him.Jack hadn’t been there for all of it, but he had enough of his own ghosts to know where Gareth’s mind had gone.
“What are we doing?”he asked, jostling Gareth half off the stool so he could squeeze one butt cheek onto it.
“I’ve asked Nico to make attack plans.”
“Excellent idea.”Jack turned to Nico.“You started inside, didn’t you?”
Nico looked up from his drawing.“At the bottom of the turret,” he admitted.“But I suppose there are better ways to slow them down than just booby trap the stairs.”
“Earlier ones, certainly.And Nico… do you remember what makes a top-notch hacker?”
“Doing what nobody expects.”
“Don’t forget it.”
Nico went back to his drawing and Gareth wrapped an arm around Jack’s waist to hold him on a stool that wasn’t designed for two grown men.For a little while, they watched Nico as he added details to Gareth’s drawing: the security cameras, and the motion sensors Jack had put in the garden that alerted them to the visits of foxes and deer.It didn’t surprise him when Jack began to fidget.
“While Nico is planning mayhem, shall we get that pizza oven going?Breakfast was ages ago.”
Not in the way Jack usually worked, but Gareth nodded and pulled Jack off the stool.Hovering over Nico while he thought wasn’t productive, while having Jack help him in the kitchen might come with some very pleasant benefits.
Jack stretched in the lounger and tilted his head, the better to appreciate the lights he’d woven through the bushes.He’d never articulated it beyond a single conversation with Rio, but lights were his solace.More even than lemon-scented sheets, lights soothed and grounded him, whether he felt adrift, furious, scared, or out-of-sorts.When he’d seen the strings of tiny, twinkling lights around the hot tub in Gareth’s Richmond home, he hadn’t wondered why his own house and back garden were bare.Instead, he’d stopped at a DIY store on his way home, had bought as many boxes of lights as he could carry on his bike, and had spent a couple of hours draping the walls from his hallway to his den.
It had been inevitable that he’d add them to their new house as soon as he was able.Just as it had been inevitable he’d sit out here and admire them long after everyone else had gone inside.
He should follow them, join Gareth in bed, lose himself in warmth and touch.The idea appealed, but he stayed where he was, unfinished drink in hand and gaze on the lights, wondering if his mind was playing tricks on him.
His instincts were rarely wrong, and he’d long learned to listen, whether he picked up chatter online, spotted patterns in Baxter’s reports, or sensed vibes of unease from Daniel and Nico.He trusted his instincts, even when he couldn’t decide what to do.
It wouldn’t be the first time he’d overreacted to a threat.
Rio had always known when Jack approached that edge, often before Jack had decided to act on the impulse.Gareth, even without the key to Jack’s history, had sensed when situations were about to go off the rails.Gatting hadn’t cared.
Jack knew he came with baggage, but—for once—that baggage had its uses.It helped him understand Nico and Daniel.Helped him answer the questions they threw at him and helped him keep them safe.
