Chapter 22 · Second Clock

"Don't touch that." Knox's hand closes over my wrist before I even register I've moved.

I hadn't meant to reach for it. My fingers had just drifted toward the panel set into the door frame — gray plate, unlabeled, the paint around its screws scuffed like somebody opens it a lot. Not a keypad. Not the vault lock. Something else entirely, tucked low where nobody's supposed to look.

"What is it," I say. Not a question. A demand.

"Old fire relay." His thumb presses into the tendon under my palm, hard enough my fingers go stupid and loose around nothing. "Feeds the loft one floor up. It's not supposed to be live."

"Supposed to."

He doesn't answer that. His eyes go to the panel like it insulted him personally, like it's a man he's about to hit.

Then it clicks.

Not loud. A soft mechanical click, cheap and small, like a kitchen timer starting, and a red pinlight blinks awake in the corner of the plate. Steady. Patient. Counting.

"Knox."

"I see it."

"That is not the vault seal."

"No.