Chapter Text
Chapter 1- WTF?
In a small room in the back of a coffee shop on LaSalle Street, Will Halstead shrugged into his suit jacket and moved to enter with less than two minutes to his meeting time. It had been last minute, and he hadn’t even really known what he was going into, no one wanted to answer his questions.
At least they had sworn to him that he didn’t owe anyone money.
When he entered the small room, he had almost expected to see the little man that reminded him so much of Dr. Stanley Stohl, he was almost expecting to be scolded for his lack of professionalism and his serious lack of clothing by way of losing his last clean dress pants to a passenger in the bus on the way there. He had had to hop into the nearest public bathroom to change into the jeans he had stashed in his go bag.
But instead of seeing the man, Scott, he was met by the equally surprised look of a familiar face.
“Jay?” Will stopped in the door.
“What are you doing here?” Jay asked, straightening up in the chair he had been seated in for the past twenty minutes.
“Me?” Will walked in and took a seat at the small table his brother was seated at. “I got a meeting for the –
“Barnett and Windom Law Offices, a Scott Esther?” Jay frowned at him.
“Esther?” Will leaned forward. “Is that his name?”
Jay gave one nod and leaned back in his seat.
“What does he want with you? Or me?”
“I couldn’t even find what kind of law this guy practiced,” Jay shook his head.
Will frowned. The meeting had been mostly in the back of his mind the last three days, he hadn’t thought much about it. But seeing his brother there brought more questions than it did give him, or probably his brother, any answers.
“I’m guessing this isn’t some civil case brought by some disgruntled patient then,” Will scratched at his head.
“Or a pending criminal case,” Jay agreed. “Seems like this is going to be something personal.”
Jay glared at his brother. “What did you do?”
Will straightened up and glared back. “Why do you think I did something? I thought we just agreed this wasn’t criminal or medical.”
“Yeah, but who’s the most likely of us to dash headfirst into a stupid situation?”
Will scoffed.
“Man, how many times do I have to say it? I’m a doctor, and Ray Burke was in need of medical ca-
“Not that,” Jay rolled his eyes. “But it does make my point.”
“Regardless, it’s not why either of you are here.”
Both brothers startled out of their conversation and stood up, turning towards the newcomer in the doorway.
“Scott Esther,” Jay greeted the man. He moved forward and, standing just a step in front of his brother automatically, placed his hand out in greeting.
“Japheth and William Halstead.” He gave the detective a quick shake of the hand. “Thank you for coming detective. And you, doctor, were nine minutes late.”
“What?!” Will frowned and shook his head. “No, I wasn’t. I was – maybe three minutes.”
“Um hmm,” the man said, pulling out his cell phone and making a note in it.
“What? What was that?” Will’s eyes widened. “What are you writing?”
It took a moment before the man stopped his note taking. Jay glanced at the man and turned instead towards his brother. Neither had any inclination to what was going on.
When he finally stopped, pocketed his phone, and looked up to see the two brothers looking back at him.
“Oh, I’m only writing every negative thought I have about how this is the worst idea into the possible ideas presented.”
“About what?” Jay frowned.
“Why negative thoughts?” Will asked instead. “And why me?”
Scott looked from one Halstead to the other. “Hmm,” he said instead.
“Is there more of a reason for us to be here, Mr. Esther? Because this isn’t exactly feeling like the kind of insult session I want to set my lunch hour for,” Jay crossed his arms.
“Well, it’s certainly not for your charm, detective. Or your style doctor,” Scott Esther needlessly added as he gave Will’s appearance a once over.
“Then why?” Will crossed his arms. “Are you here to sue us for something? Because I can’t think of a single thing that my brother and I have done together in the past year that could warrant any kind of legal activity against us.”
“I wouldn’t allow it,” glared Jay.
“I’m sure you’ve ran a stop sign if I look hard enough,” Scott Esther said with a demeanor that didn’t bother to withhold his displeasure of them in the slightest.
“Are you trying to threaten us?” Jay got within a foot of the smaller man’s personal space, looking down at least a foot at the dark green eyes of disinterest before him.
“If I wanted to threaten you, detective, there would be no try.”
The click clank of heels entering the space from the opposite side of the room stopped them momentarily; or at least stopped Jay’s retort and garnered Will’s interest enough to look over his shoulder and over at the approaching woman.
“Must you be so endearing, Scotty?” the woman said as she got to their table and, placing her coat on the back of one of the seats, and her purse upon the table, sat herself down with a soft grace and elegance that Dr. Halstead could almost think of as timeless.
He turned a skeptical eye back to the troll-like Scott Esther and tried to think of one single endearing thing that could have come from their interactions.
“Hhhm,” scoffed Scott Esther, making a slow, deliberate walking track towards the new arrival and maintaining a creepy stare on Detective Halstead all the same.
“What is your problem?” Jay didn’t bother to hide his own ire of the situation.
“Who are you?” Will asked instead of the woman.
“I am Colleen Collette Winifred Barnett, nee Johansson, please do sit down,” she indicated to the three vacant seats still around the table.
“Of Barnett and Windom?” asked Will.
“Yes, but not quite,” Colleen Barnett shook her head. “You see, the Barnett that held up to that title was my husband’s father, Joseph Dean Barnett. A truly asinine man, but a brilliant lawyer. I am in fact granddaughter, however, of Clarence Profitt Windom, by way of his daughter, Jean Collette Grace Johansson, nee Windom. And my father Frederick Willard Johannson. You can see all of this through what I am sure will be a much in depth search of my person once you’ve had the time, detective.
“But for now, if you don’t mind, I can do but only spare some twenty minutes for my lunch. And the matter that I hold quite dear to my heart is much too grave and much too grand to be handled in the halls of Barnett and Windom. Please, take your seats.”
The brothers shared a look, Will’s much more skeptical to Jay’s much more practiced calm demeanor. But Jay gave a subtle enough nod and Will took the first step forward, back to the chairs.
“Scotty, please,” Colleen stated as the brothers were sat.
And with another audible scoff, Scott Esther took turn and left from the door he came from.
And now they were three.
“You had us summoned?” Jay said in a way that had him barely grasping at the strains of his patience or laxed demeanor.
“I wouldn’t call it that, but, well I do suppose in such a situation, the direct approach would have raised much more questions than the time allots. And then, there is the hefty manner of everyone’s safety at hand,” Colleen shook her head.
“What are you talking about? Are we in some kind of trouble here?” Will tried to assert.
“No, dear, we’re fine here,” Colleen insisted.
And the door opened again, this time to three waiters, all dressed up in black smocks and carrying covered trays towards the table.
“We didn’t- Will started to say.
“I ordered ahead,” Colleen told them. “We simply cannot waste time. You don’t mind.”
The trays were brought in front of each of them and as the three waiters were leaving, a fourth appeared with a single tray and three drinks atop of it.
“I guess not,” Jay say as he watched their drinks delivered and the fourth waiter leave without so much as a word.
“Marvelous,” Colleen said, pulling the top off of her tray to reveal her meal of a grilled salmon and a side of vegetables arranged in a swan like fashion. “Truly splendid.”
“Not all that hungry thanks,” insisted Jay.
Curiosity got the better of Will, however, as he wasn’t quite in the mood for fish, but he was also quite hungry and if someone else was willing to pay for his meal, then he was willing to let them. It was hard enough to put enough money together with his medical school debts, his medical insurance debts, his living expenses, and his car that he barely could afford to drive. William Halstead made life as a doctor look bad.
Taking the lid off of his own tray, Will found that instead of grilled salmon and vegetable swan, he found a large quarter pounder and seasoned potato wedges with a small special sauce on the side.
“Huh?”
“Well, I hope you won’t mind if I do continue, I had May make this special.”
Will nodded and picked up the fork beside him. Normally, he was dig hands deep into what looked to be quite the gourmet burger before him. But Colleen Barnett nee Johansson seemed like the kind of lady that was, well, a Lady.
After her second bite, Colleen took the napkin besides her and dabbed at her mouth. Jay raised an eyebrow and had to contain his own grin at the overly pleased groan that came from his brother’s first bite.
“I’m sorry to put you both out like this,” Colleen said. “And I’m sorry for not being more direct. I hope you can both forgive me.”
“It would help if we had any idea what was going on Mrs. Barnett,” Jay said as Will chowed down on his burger.
“Well, as you are both adults, I am going to overstep all of the sugarcoating and pleasant talk and assume that you are most experienced at having tough situations presented at you.”
“That’s certainly a given,” Jay nodded. “Still doesn’t answer any of the whys.”
Colleen took another bite of her lunch. Will eagerly enjoyed his own meal and in the moments silence, and a bit of curiosity, Jay decided what the hell and pulled the lid off of his food. He was immensely surprised by finding neither salmon nor burger at his disposal, but rather a thick steak for his enjoyment.
Jay picked up his knife and fork, figuring that something looking that good and smelling that great deserved at least a trivial taste.
“You are well aware of your parents’ faults, something that is harboring to illogical for the young. But you both have lived enough, and heard enough, to know that surprising isn’t the same as regrettable.”
“Right, things happen,” nodded Will. “Might help if we knew what was happening now.”
Colleen watched a moment as the brothers ate. She placed her own cutlery down on her plate and grabbed her napkin again.
“This situation is that, despite our best efforts, Helena Marissa Sandoval succumbed to her stressors and passed away two nights ago.”
Both Halsteads stopped eating and, with a quick glance at each other, looked over at the elderly woman before them and watched silently as she watched them back.
“Uh, I’m sorry, are we supposed to know who that is?”
Colleen Barnett gave them a small smile.
“It would be wonderful, if you had,” she said sighing. “She was the greatest, you would have loved her. Everyone loved her.”
“We are sorry for your lost,” Will stated, softly. A phrase that said a hundred times didn’t make the situation any easier for any human, or any doctor.
“Charlotte was a beautiful girl, a graceful dancer, and the greatest opera singer you could have ever known. She was our father’s pride and joy. But when Charlotte fell in love, all my father could see, I’m afraid, was that the man his daughter loved was not quite up to par. At the time, I would have balked at any mention of my father to be a racist, I would have fought tooth and nail. But, Charlotte knew better. And she left everything behind to be with him. Carlos Ignacio Sandoval. Iggy. Helena was my Charlotte’s daughter, and Iggy was a doting father. They tried for years, and had five losses before Helena came. And Charlotte was so excited to be a mother.”
“So Helena was your niece,” Jay added in once Colleen seemed lost into her memories.
“The most beautiful of girls,” Colleen sighed. “She was two months early and still absolutely perfect when Charlotte held her in her arms. But before Helena was able to go home, Charlotte became ill and never got better.”
“That’s all terrible,” Will said trying to get to how this woman’s history tied in to him or his brother.
“What’s this have to do with either of us,” Jay said, trying to not sound as exasperated as he felt. His fidgeting hands gave away his discomfort.
“It seems that history for the females in my family has decided to repeat itself once more. Helena was a wonderful child to see, beautiful and graceful. And when she fell in love, I thought it would be like Charlotte and Iggy again. But it was hard to get a straight answer from her. And then, when the baby came, I thought I’d finally get to meet this mystery man.”
“Are, are we meeting this mystery man now?” Will turned from her to his brother.
“Don’t look at me,” Jay glared back. “I’ve never dated a Helena for months on end. If I had, I would have said something.”
“You are in the clear for Helena, Detective,” Colleen nodded at them. “You are, however, not I’m afraid, for the matter of Hadley.”
“Hadley?” both Halsteads asked back at the arrival of a new name into the story.
“Hadley,” repeated Colleen. “Helena’s daughter and my grandniece. Hadley is ever so much as beautiful, brilliant, and graceful as her mother, or as her grandmother. She is exceptional, and I love her dearly. But, as much as I would love nothing more than to whisk her away from all that is wrong and evil in the world – it was specifically marked in Helena’s will for you to be given the chance to contest.”
“Helena’s will? Contest it?” Jay frowned.
“How are we in her will?”
“You are listed as the inheritors of Patrick William Halstead, and this would warrant –
“Pat Halstead?” Jay leaned forward with his eyebrows raised. “Pat Halstead is your mystery man?”
Will leaned back in his seat. “Dad and Helena? Dad has a daughter?”
“Are you sure? Did he know?” Jay continued.
“I am most certain,” Colleen nodded. “Tests were performed for the clarification of all involved, and Patrick received confirmation immediately upon each result. There were four tests in all performed in the first two months of Hadley’s life.”
“And he knew?” Will questioned this time, not able to fully wrap his head around the situation.
“Indeed.”
Jay shook his head. This was not the lunch meeting either brother would have ever thought to be receiving. A girl. His father. A sister.
Nothing in his mind could seem to make the connections.
“How?” Will asked.
“The schematics of the relationship between your Patrick and my Helena, I’m not entirely certain. The wheres and the whens,” Colleen shook his head.
The wheres and the whens were making Jay think all kinds of things and some of them made him cringe.
He hadn’t thought that, after his mother’s death, their father would be seeking other companionship. It was logical, if Jay was actually willing to think about it. But, to think of his father with another woman was one thing. To think of his father making another child, and to keep that child a secret as if she was the black mark of his life, was shattering what little foundation his life had.
“I can’t believe it,” stated Will.
Jay couldn’t agree more.
Will Halstead was walking his dog Kol to the dog park. So many thoughts were rushing through his mind as he tried to piece together what he had learned over the weekend.
He had a sister, he was an older brother, and his father had fathered a secret child. Of course, it all amounted to the same thing, to the same person, but somehow each of the situations seemed to trigger off in his mind.
Kol was happily walking around, stopping to sniff at each and every tree and bush. He would glance back at Will every few steps, his face in a wide, pleasant grin. It was simple enough that the dog was happy to be near him and happy to be walking about that Will couldn’t help but feel happy too.
Seeing the park up ahead, Kol barked in excitement and the tug on the leash made Will pick up his speed.
Entering the gated park, Will closed the gate behind him and leaned down to let Kol off of his leash. The place was close to his apartment and Kol loved running freely through the grass and meeting the occasional other dogs around. Kol’s friendly demeanor had enabled Will to start off an exchange or two from local dog owners. It wasn’t that he was having any new friends pop up, but it was nice to have conversations that didn’t pertain to having someone’s life on the line.
“Does he like other dogs?”
Will was startled at the sound of someone else directly behind him. Turning he saw four feet of curly blond hair and big blue eyes.
“Uh, yeah. Usually.”
“Does he like cats?”
The little girl sprung forward and skipped towards Kol.
“I don’t know,” Will said frowning at the girl.
Her hair bounced as she got to Kol, who turned and excitedly approached the girl.
The little one knelt down and put her hand out for Kol to sniff.
“You, uh, you have a cat or something?”
Kol liked what he sniffed and licked at her hand.
“Not yet,” the girl said. “How’s it going, bud? How’s the day been treating you?”
As Kol grew confident, the girl reached over and started scratching at Kol’s ears, body and belly. Kol was more than pleased with his attention.
“Hey, you –“ Will looked around the space. No other dogs or people seemed around. It was possible that the girl was a neighbor, but there was something about the way she looked that had Will thinking that she wasn’t from around there.
Maybe it was fact that the little girl’s black coat probably cost more than Will’s car payments, or maybe it had to do with the intensity behind her eyes when she looked at him. Maybe he had seen her around the hospital, maybe she had been at the park before.
“I should get going,” the girl insisted and popped up, giving Kol a last scratch. “You have a wonderful day, you good boy.”
“Are you alone?”
“Uh, no,” she turned and gave Will a beautiful, big grin that tried to put Kol’s to shame. “That would be absurd. You have a good day.”
And she headed towards the gate, skipping ahead, and leaving the doctor wondering what had felt so odd about the interaction.
Sgt. Trudy Platt was having a long day, and the dreary hard pour of rain was making her gloom bloom.
The constant squeash-squeash of the officers' shoes coming in from the rain and already busy atmosphere was looking to lead towards a headache that Platt was not going to be happy about.
When she took a glance up from the desk and so many reports, Platt was surprised to see a little girl, seated on the bench alone.
Now that the girl was in her attention, Platt couldn’t seem to look away. First the girl was looking around the space, almost like she was looking for someone. Platt looked around too, but she couldn’t see anyone out of place. The child didn’t look familiar in the slightest, and when Platt looked back to the bench, the girl wasn’t there.
Platt straightened up, feeling alert. The girl hadn’t gone out the door, Platt was certain. There hadn’t been any movement in that area, but that still left a lot of space around.
Moving from her perch, Platt walked about and tried to not direct too much attention to her search. Once she got to the bench, she looked back and was slightly surprised to see the little girl up at her desk, leaving something on top. The girl looked up and smiled at her, but then, she was down from the desk again and Trudy moved forward, trying to capture where the little girl went.
She was attentive, but somehow the girl must have slipped past her, because Platt didn’t see her again.
Reaching her desk, Trudy spotted a small kraft box. Curious, but careful, she gripped the box, lifted it slightly, and noted that it wasn’t heavy. It was no larger than a cubed inch, and lifting the top, she was surprised to find a pin of a small tabby cat with a white shirt, black glasses and a black police cap.
Trudy Platt looked up and around again. There was no little girl and no one seemed to notice her own movements. It made Platt curious, and it made her nervous.
“Keaton!” she called out to one of her officers. “Desk.”
“Yes Sargent,” the man said, getting to his feet and taking her spot.
Platt turned, kraft box in hand, and headed to the back and towards the security tapes that would show her a better angle of her little ninja gift giver.
The next day, Platt sat at a more attentive stance at her desk, and if any officer blocked her view of the door, they were treated with a glare and the unexplained disapproval of their presence, along with a quick dismissal.
It was almost seven in the afternoon when Platt figured the girl wouldn’t appear that day, and that she would have to maintain the alert vigilance for a few more days to come. The best that Platt could figure it was that the little girl had been at one of the scenes of a situation that Platt herself had seen recently, but it had been raining a lot lately, and Platt had remained at her desk for the past two weeks as far as her position went.
There was a chance that the little one had been a part of a case prior to the two weeks. Even months back. The girl didn’t look to be older than ten years of age, and small at that. For all that Platt prided herself on her memory as one of her best attributes of her many, she couldn’t place the child anywhere.
“Officer Lowes, Officer Tildes, if you move any slower you will replace our scenic district plants – Let’s Go!”
Both officers looked up from their notes and their chat to see Platt glaring at their position at the top of the steps.
“Sorry Sarge,” said Lowes.
“Yes ma’am,” offered Tildes at same time.
But just behind them, as the area was clearing, Intelligence showed up, loud as always with Adam Ruzek’s complaints about having ran three miles after a fleeing CI and almost getting hit by a car filled the room.
“Aww, you want an ice pack for your booboos Ruz?” Jay Halstead said from a step ahead of him.
“Would a lollipop make it better?” Burgess offered next.
Platt knew that Kevin Attwater had already taken his partner to be seen at the hospital, so she knew that the teasing was being done out of relief for his clean bill of good health. Platt also knew that Adam Ruzek was the most likely offender in teasing his teammates whenever they were in the same position. Normally, she would join in with her own straight-faced zinger, but as she pulled out the nearest blank form – it didn’t matter what form it was since she was just going to ask him if he needed to file a complaint against the concrete he’d landed on – she looked up instead to see a little head of blond curls peek in and then dash off as if in a blink.
“How in the –
Platt turned from her desk, screamed “Keaton!” and received an “On it, Sarge,” from her officer as she dashed towards the steps and past a very confused Intelligence team.
Trudy Platt reached the district door just as Hank Voight was opening it to enter.
“Trudy!” Hank took a step back.
“Four feet, blonde curls, fast as a bullet,” Trudy said, looking both ways.
Catching on, Hank looked from one end and through towards the corners.
“I didn’t see-
“She is a quick one,” Platt sighed, placing her hands on her hips.
“What are we searching here?”
Platt glanced towards the street once more. “I don’t really know.”
The next few days, Platt could swear she was seeing the little blonde ninja around the district, but when she was seeing some surveillance videos, she couldn’t see anything for certain.
She was starting to fear that the thought of seeing the little girl again was causing Platt to see her often.
A week passed and this time, Will and Jay Halstead took a ride together to meet up with Colleen Barnett.
They had been instructed to keep the identity and information of their sister to themselves. It hadn’t been too hard to have kept this for Will; he lived alone, had no one to answer to, and his job kept him quite busy that he didn’t have much time to think beyond what he was doing when he was doing it.
And the fact that he was trying to make himself seem even more desperate and responsible as he had barely skinned back into Sharon Goodwin’s good graces also kept Will from rocking any kind of attention onto himself.
For Jay Halstead, keeping Hadley a secret was more of a headache.
Unlike his younger brother, Jay had a roommate and fiancée with his working partner, Hailey Upton – and the two weren’t exactly in the best of places at the moment. Jay and Hailey had just moved in together and things should have been going great for them, but the opposite was true. Jay had learned things about his partner and love, that he just couldn’t wrap his head around. The lies and the deceit were wearing down on him.
Keeping away from home was difficult in the crazy times of the social distancing, and the only real places he could go to would be filled with people that he knew that would ask him questions. So, more often than not, Jay would find himself alone, over at Will’s empty apartment, hanging out with his brother’s dog and tidying up after his mess of a brother. He didn’t even complain about it anymore, since Will’s mess gave him something to do that wasn’t thinking about Hailey or Hadley.
Secret keeping in the Intelligence Unit was a tad harder. They were all very smart, and they had the tendency to butt into each other’s lives to the point where it was uncommon for a member of their Unit to do something without someone in their Unit. The amount of times that Kev and Adam would head out to do their grocery shopping together probably made many a cashier believe that the two were in a different kind of partnership all together.
Luckily, Jay was the lone wolf of the group. While he usually had Hailey around him, if he was moving about without Kev or Adam or Kim or Hailey, the others just assumed that Jay was in a Jay mood and let him be.
“I really can’t see how this is going to work in our schedules,” Will sighed as Jay parked his truck. “And I have a one bedroom.”
“I can’t see myself moving a little girl into the apartment and Hailey being oblivious to it,” scoffed Jay. “What are they expecting me to do?”
“As if our schedules cooperated with each other,” continued Will.
“This won’t work.”
The brothers sat in the truck for a minute, they had fifteen to spare, but said nothing. Each was still trying to get into the frame work of what it could mean to have a little sister, but neither had much of a clue what that could mean. Jay had been an older brother since before he was two years old. He couldn’t remember a life without Will in it. And Will had been a little brother since birth. Two brothers was a huge difference to being big brothers to a baby sister.
And with the age differences? People would automatically assume upon sight that the little one in question would be their child, whomever she was with.
“We can’t just-
“Absolutely not,” Jay agreed before Will was even able to fully form the thought that they were both trying desperately not to entertain. “Whatever crap Dad laid into having her, she’s our family. And we’re not exactly having a whole bunch of them around.”
“But Jay, how are we going to do this?”
Jay started to pull his jacket zip up and grabbed at his gloves to put on. Seeing his movements, Will followed suit.
“Nat raised a son on her own, and she had your crazy ass schedule,” Jay said as he put on the second of his gloves. “We’re not alone in this. We’ve got each other.”
“And that Colleen lady,” Will added. “She doesn’t seem the type to just drop the girl off and scram.”
“And Mrs. Barnett,” Jay agreed. “And who knows how many others from their lives. And our lives too.”
“But we can’t tell our friends,” reminded Will.
“That can’t be forever,” Jay opened his door and stepped out into the windy day.
Will sighed and followed his brother into the massive building. There was no marking on the outside of the large brown building, but once inside, the large BARNETT & WINDOM LAW let them know that they were in the right place.
Jay walked right up to the reception, Will a few steps behind him. Before he even opened his mouth, the receptionist looked up and stood up seeing them. She grabbed at a golden folder and held it up for Jay as he reached her.
“Detective Halstead, Doctor Halstead,” she greeted them both with a nod. “I’m Sabrina Madison. Mrs. Barnett will be up with you shortly. You can take the elevator through there.” Sabrina turned and pointed at a hallway away from the obvious lobby space.
“Thank you,” Jay said taking the folder and motioning his brother to the side.
Opening the folder, the brothers saw a large printed instructions to follow and a badge for each of them to clip on. They each took theirs, clipped it to their suit jackets, and headed to the hallway, following it until they saw a new lobby space, with a large golden elevator and large black couches.
Jay stepped forward and pressed the elevator button, which instantly opened as if waiting for them.
“Thirty-Five,” Will said, as if they hadn’t both just read the paper two minutes ago.
But when they stepped in and Jay moved to press the floor buttons where the button panels usually were, there were none.
“Uh, what the heck?” Jay said, causing Will to look up from the file folder he was reading over.
As Will looked up, the elevator doors closed and the smooth wall space Jay was staring in disbelief at overturned to reveal a touchpad panel instead.
“Fancy,” said Will.
“There’s no button,” Jay glared at the contraption.
But then, the panel read the number three and started to move.
“No, no!” Will’s eyes grew wide. “It’s going wrong!”
The whooo of the elevator movement and its quick speed wasn’t like what the brothers had ever experienced on any elevator before in their lives. Their stomachs lurched from the motion, and the sudden stop had them each stumbling slightly from the unbalance that the sensation created.
“I don’t think we’re on the third floor,” Jay reasoned as the gold elevator doors opened.