At the foot of the stairs I turned toward the back wall behind the furnace.

I shoved aside a heavy metal utility shelf loaded with paint cans and reached for the keypad hidden behind a cutout in the drywall.

My fingers found the rubber buttons from memory and punched in the eight-digit security code David had programmed two years earlier.

A soft solenoid click sounded inside the frame, and the concealed steel-reinforced door swung inward four inches.

I stepped into the windowless intelligence vault and let the door rest lightly against its magnetic strike plate.