I found myself pacing back and forth in my bedroom, adrenaline still spiking even after Emily had finally gone to bed. It was clear that Sebastian and Joel knew something. It was equally clear that they didn’t want to talk about it. At least, not in front of Emily. 

But maybe…

I found myself rushing out of the room, jumping down the stairs two at a time in my bare feet. I didn’t particularly care about impropriety right now. I wanted answers. 

Maybe I was just delusional though? Maybe I had imagined the waves, and the scream, and somehow relayed those false thoughts to Emily. Maybe the men had been playing a trick on me. Maybe Curtis, the driver, really was pulling a prank. 

I looked all around the first floor for any sign of Sebastian or Joel. It occurred to me that I had never witnessed the door to the basement area where Sebastian seemed to dwell every day. No one had ever bothered to show it to me, and I hadn’t tried to go looking, since it was off limits. But my unease had me searching all around, checking room after room for any sign of this supposed basement door. 

I was getting tired, about to give up when I heard murmurs, somewhere down the hall. I followed the sound, and entered what I had previously assumed to be a closet, finding instead a door with a security system next to it. To my surprise, the door was left partially open, and I tiptoed over to listen in on what I could hear of the conversation coming from downstairs between Sebastian and Joel. 

“Sir, I don’t think it’s prudent-”

“She needs to know.”

“But if she panics, and leaves, what then? Think about Emily.”

Sebastian said something I couldn’t hear, and I realized they were walking further away from the door. After a moment, when I realized I could no longer understand what they were saying whatsoever, and curiosity getting the best of me, I carefully opened the door enough to slip inside and walk quietly down the steps into the basement. 

The stairs felt like they went on forever, and I began to hear their voices as a strange echo in the distance. I finally reached the basement floor, the cool concrete feeling nice under my bare feet. My heart was thrumming in my chest as I considered what it would mean to be caught. Would they kick me out immediately? Would I even get a chance to say goodbye to Emily before I left?

I continued along, adrenaline still in my veins, wanting answers. Wanting the truth. 

The voices were further along, and I was certain I had lost them when I turned a corner to find a hallway full of doors with locks on the outside. How fucking strange. Something dropped in the pit of my stomach, and I walked up to the first door, no longer drawn to the retreating voices. I wondered if this was the reason I wasn’t allowed downstairs. If this might be what they were hiding. 

I stepped up to the nearest door and pressed my ear to the wood. I could hear a shuffle. A slight moan. 

Let it be some weird BDSM thing, I thought as my fingers unlocked the deadbolt, as my hand turned the knob.

One thing was certain as I looked into the room at the shivering man shackled to the bed, crusted blood staining his shirt, a look of utter terror in his eyes. 

Whatever this was, there was nothing consensual about it. 

“You shouldn’t be down here,” came Sebastian’s voice from behind me.