Time had run out.
“Fuck! We gotta go.” Cole stopped searching and ran toward the bar. He crossed the threshold of the passageway and pulled the secret door shut. Darkness blinded my eyes. His boots pounded down the small set of stairs. A small beam of light came from the cellar door.
Stepping into the room filled with bottles of expensive wine, Cole shut the door behind us, but he didn’t put me down. “The other one’s back. He’s breaking down the damn door.”
“Then get her inside,” Javier responded. I caught a glimpse of Van’s gun still in his hand. “Hurry. Watch your step. We only found one light in the cellar.”
Cole kept moving, taking us inside the old tunnel. Javier pulled the door shut behind us. The impact vibrated the walls for a moment followed by the rough sound of metal sliding as he locked it from the inside. The quarters were tight. The passageway was only about four or five feet wide.
My heart beat in my ears. The sound chanted in a rhythm. We made it. We made it. Ty’s dead. Ty’s dead. We made it. Ty’s dead.
Cole set me down. My bare feet touched dirt and whatever else covered the floor. But I didn’t care. It didn’t matter. I could be standing on glass shards and not feel them. I felt nothing but the pain in my heart.
Brenda held the flashlight in her fist. A shaky beam of light shot out from the darkness hitting the old stone walls. Patches of moisture sparkled with a faint sheen.
“He can’t get inside,” Javier said in the darkness. “The door’s thick metal and locked. He would need a bomb to bust it open. We’re safe.”
The stale air closed around us as the musty scent of the underground found its way inside my broken nose. The low hiss of someone wheezing came from somewhere by the flashlight. And off to the other side, the sound of muffled hiccups that only happened with tears.
The eerie quiet thumped harsh in my head. A constant ringing remained in my ears from the gunshots. I slumped back against the wall as I sat down on the ground. Across the passageway, my leg rested by Brenda’s foot.
Javier came over and sat down next to me. I felt his hand reach for mine, closing around my fingers. He was touching me. Should he be? After all of this? After what Ty had done to his family?
My thoughts were hurting my brain. I tried to breathe. I just needed air. I gasped. My lungs hurt and my shoulders shook violently, scraping against the stone wall. I needed out of this place. Out of this dark dungeon. Away from my thoughts.
We made it. Ty’s dead.
“What is this place?” Cole asked.
“An escape tunnel,” Elmore whispered in haggared breaths. “Mr. Hawthorn . . . Forest Hawthorn who originally built this house back in the early thirties. He got concerned someone would break in. Take his family hostage. Hurt his guests. He put in this escape tunnel.”
I wanted to laugh at the irony. Almost a century later, this man’s fear had proven to be true. My brother had made it come true. The emotions got stuck in my throat. I choked. And a small laugh formed in my chest, but the sound barely left my dry lips.
“It’s okay, Sarina,” Javier said, rubbing my hand with his thumb.
I couldn’t breathe through my nose. I couldn’t pull the air into my chest. The musk and mildew of the tunnel choked my throat. My hands were shaking. My knees were shaking. Suddenly, I felt everything, and it was too much.
We made it. Ty’s dead.
“I think she’s goin’ into shock,” Cole muttered.
“N-no . . . I’m okay.” I looked sharply over at him, but the walls blurred into the shadows and then spun in a circle. I think. “I just . . . can’t. I-I’m suffocating in here. No air. I-I can’t breathe.”
“Yes, you can,” Javier whispered.
We made it. Ty’s dead.
I shook my head, feeling dizzy. “Nooo. I-I can’t.”
Javier pulled me into his lap. I sat between his legs with my back against his chest. “Just take it slow. Breathe with me.”
My eyes tilted upward at the ceiling, seeing the mixture of darkness and spiderwebs as we sat beneath the earth.
“You can breathe,” he said it again, whispering in my ear. “Through your lips. And let it out slowly.” His voice guided, and I listened, following his command. “I know it hurts, Sarina. But you need to breathe. In your lips. And out. In your lips. And out. Focus on your breathing. Nothing else.”
I rested against his chest. I felt the warmth of his body despite the chill of the tunnel. His whispers eventually turned into Spanish. I didn’t understand. I didn’t want to understand. There was nothing he could say to make this better right now. And maybe that’s why he chose not to say his comforting words in English.
I gripped his leg with my fingers, while I listened to the calming sound of his voice, rolling over the words. My heart began to calm down. My shoulders relaxed.
And then I passed out.
Present Day
I WASN’T OUT FOR LONG. Or maybe not at all. I think my mind needed to shut down for a reboot. To shut off the panic. The images. I still heard everyone despite my eyes being closed and my breathing leveling out.
I heard Cole speaking to Elmore. They didn’t know each other, yet they were carrying on a conversation about this tunnel. Just a few hours ago, the butler had tried to throw Cole out of the house. And now, they were here. We were here. All trapped together in some hole in the ground.
Brenda hummed another hymn. The low notes hard to understand. I lifted my head up from Javier’s chest. Wiping my eyes, I sniffled, tasting a little blood in my throat from my broken nose. In the midst of my panic, I must have cried deep sobs. But I remembered none of it.
My eyes struggled to focus in the tunnel. The little flashlight cast only a small amount of light. Virginia seemed like a ghost. Her pale face and light-pink housecoat were almost luminescent. And poor Scarlett. Her face remained streaked with dark mascara and her lips trembled in shock. Cole sat next to her with his arm around her shoulders. His eyes glassy, full of the emotions he refused to express or maybe even process.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“No, Sarina,” Javier said. His hand rubbed my bare shoulder.
“I-I need to say it. I’m sorry. My brother . . . he isn’t—” My voice cracked as another tear ran down my check. “I don’t know what happened to make him . . . be with those men. I just need you to know I’m sorry. And he’s not . . . I mean . . . he wasn’t that person you saw. He . . . he . . . ”
“Darlin’.” Brenda reached across the small aisle and grabbed my hand, giving it a squeeze. The flashlight cast a yellow-white glow that highlighted the tears in her own eyes. “It’s not your fault.
“No, but he k-killed her.” I choked as my head turned to Javier. My heart hurt so badly. “He killed her. I-I don’t . . . I’m so . . . so . . . I’m sorry.”
He shook his head. “No. He didn’t kill her. He didn’t actually pull the trigger. That was the other man.”
“It’s my fault, though. They came here because of me. My family did this.”
“You’re not responsible, Sarina.” It was Cole this time. “I know I’ve blamed you for months. For all the things goin’ wrong in his life. And tonight, I could blame myself too. But none of this shit is on us. Ty wasn’t a bad guy. He wasn’t like those others. But he got himself twisted up in their business. And that’s on Ty. It ain’t on us, Sarina. It just ain’t. We did—” His voice caught. “W-we did what we could. The guy made his choices.”
My breaths were growing ragged. I pulled away from Javier and sat up in front of Cole as I grasped for answers along with my brother’s best friend. “But how c-could he do this, Cole? I just don’t . . . understand. I mean, he’s Tyson. He’s not like this. I mean he wasn’t.” The past tense. I needed to get that straight in my head. In my heart. “I don’t know what I’m going to tell Granddaddy and Grams. I don’t know how to explain it to them.”
“We tell them . . . ” Cole gritted his jaw, but his façade broke as he stared at
me. A few tears rolled down his cheek. He flicked them away with his wrist. “He made bad choices. But he tried to help us in the end. That’s what we tell them. That he died trying to help us escape.”
I shook with another sob and I found myself reaching for Cole. His arms circled around me. And I felt his tears as his face buried in my neck. We clung to each other. Both giving into the emotions. The loss. The blame. Despite his bold words, I knew he felt the guilt. He felt it the same as me. We had failed Tyson.
And it hurt so damn bad.
Cole’s arms eventually loosened. And I pulled away. He gave me a firm nod. Almost like the truce of the past, but it felt so very long ago right now. Our fights petty and insignificant. We were the only two left now. And that thought made the pain surge and burn. I couldn’t look at him anymore.
I moved back over next to Javier. He placed an arm around my shoulders, and I rested my head against his chest.
“I’m sorry about your grandmother,” I whispered. “I know how things were. But I know you didn’t want this.”
“My grandmother was not the kindest person on the inside,” Javier said pensively. “She wasn’t perfect. But I still loved her. Because she was my grandmother. She did many bad things just as she did many good things. I will choose to remember those good things. She too saved us in the end.”
“I’m sorry for you,” I whispered.
“And I am sorry for you too, mi Sarina,” Javier whispered back. His forehead touched mine as he placed a chaste kiss on my lips. Our wounds touched, and it tasted bittersweet.
The view down in the depths of the tunnel remained dark. Brenda kept the light tilted toward the ceiling, casting a faint glow over all of us. Time crept absently away. I assumed it was around four or five in the morning by now—not that we could tell down in here.
We stopped speaking. Everyone was exhausted. Emotionally worn out. I found myself crying again. The pain needed to find a path because my mind couldn’t handle it anymore. So the devastation flowed down my cheeks in silent tears.
I heard other sniffles. Yawns. This confinement provided a small amount of safety, but not enough for anyone to sleep. Terror still loomed outside that door.
I couldn’t bear to see the faces of the people around me. Instead, I stared down the tunnel path to where it disappeared into the darkness. My eyes drifted closed only to fly open as my body jerked back awake. The men in the house. Van. In my mind, we were hiding from Deuce, but I’d forgotten about their leader. The last I saw of him—
“Cole?” I whispered. “What ha-happened to Van? Is . . . is he dead too?”
His gray eyes raised in my direction. They remained dark as coal in the shadows of the flashlight. “The leader?”
“Yeah.”
“I stabbed him in the leg with his knife,” Cole said rather matter-of-factly without a hint of remorse. “Then I punched the bastard in the face because he was yelling.”
“He’s not dead?” I muttered.
Cole’s lips twitched as he contemplated my question. “Did you want him dead?”
“I-I don’t know.” And that was the truth. Maybe I wanted them all dead. They killed Ty. Or maybe I wanted them to rot in prison, only seeing sunlight through the sliver of a small window. I wanted them to pay for what they’d done to Mrs. Hawthorn. To my brother.
I swallowed hard. “When Ty had me in the library, he told me about the men. I-I don’t know their faces. But he told me enough. I can tell the police. They can find who did this. At least that’s something.”
For the first time since we arrived in the tunnel, Scarlett seemed aware of her surroundings. Cole still had his arm around her. She leaned back and stared at him. “You’re not the bartender. Who are you?”
His eyes shifted to me for a moment. I wasn’t sure what this man would say. But I knew what I wanted to say—for his sake.
“He’s a good friend. I’ve known him since we were kids.”
Cole gave me a brief nod in return.
A tear fell down my cheek. Deep in my heart, I felt a broken sadness for him. His life had changed just as dramatically as mine tonight. We both had lost part of ourselves—a part that could never be recovered.
Present Day
THE MEN WORKED TO FREE the four-inch-wide bar covering the entrance back into the house. In the musty and damp tunnel, the metal had grown rusted through the years. I wasn’t sure how they got the latch closed in the first place.
Brenda held the flashlight steady. The low hum of her soprano voice was the only other sound as we watched in silence. She serenaded us with hope, blocking the impending fear of what existed beyond the door.
Deuce could be waiting right on the other side with a gun pointed at the first person to step through the exit or maybe he sat at the top of the cellar stairs, ready to pick us off one by one. Or the man could have run away with the items he found in the safe, dragging Van along with him.
We just didn’t know.
Javier looked back at me. The sleeves of his white shirt were rolled up to the elbows. I wore his tuxedo jacket now. He held my gaze for a moment before going back to work with Cole. They had never met before tonight nor did they get the privilege of an official introduction. But now they worked together. Neither of them bickering or fighting. Just simply doing their best to hold all of us together.
A grinding bang echoed, bringing my eyes back to the task at hand. The bar finally slid free. Cole breathed a sigh of relief, wiping his forehead across the sleeve of the bartender’s shirt. “I’ll go take a look.”
“No. I’ll go.” Javier gritted his jaw. “It’s my house. My responsibility.”
“No . . .” My protest faded out, as I knew he was right. He was the only Hawthorn left in the house. Not that I really wanted Cole to go, either. But I knew someone had to be the one to step back into that nightmare.
Javier came over to me, putting a hand on each side of my face. “I’ll be okay. I just need to call the police. Then I’ll come back.”
“You promise?”
“Te lo prometo.” His lips pressed mine in a brazen kiss, lingering for a moment as his mouth took a stronger hold against mine before reluctantly pulling away.
Our goodbye. Short and passionate in front of everyone. But there was nothing to hide anymore. No reason to deny what we felt. Especially when my heart refused to be comforted by his words. I hated the idea of him going out there alone in the house with a possible madman looking for revenge.
Javier left me with the others. He did a quick comparison of the guns with Cole. They decided to switch, leaving us with the semiautomatic since it had fewer bullets left in the chamber.
“I’ll go call the police. You lock the door behind me. It should move easier now. But don’t open it again unless you hear five knocks. If not . . . I guess . . .” He glanced at me and then looked away. “I guess wait at least two hours before opening the door again. Leave them in here. Try for the neighbor’s house instead of the phones next time. You’ll need to go through the front gate. No other exit exists without climbing the ten-foot fence.”
Cole nodded. “Okay.”
I clutched the fabric of his jacket, trying to block out the hidden double meaning to those words. Javier had just told Cole what to do if he didn’t come back. I couldn’t face that thought. I couldn’t lose anyone else tonight. I struggled to get control of my emotions as panic crept into my chest.
Javier gave me a brief final look as he reached for the handle. Snuggling deeper in the tux jacket, I tried to smell his cologne in the fabric. My swollen nose couldn’t take in much of his scent. I closed my eyes, pulling in a deeper breath. I had nothing to do but wait now.
A loud noise came from the door followed by an angry sling of Spanish. “¡Pedaso de mierda! Se roto!”
I opened my eyes. The flashlight highlighted the place where the pull handle used to be. Javier held the old metal latch in his hand. “¡No manches!”
“What just happened?” Scarlett asked. Her voice
shook with each word.
“It broke in half,” Javier muttered as he tried to put the handle back on the door. But it just wouldn’t work. The rusted metal had snapped at the base.
I moved over next to Scarlett. We huddled together as a different kind of fear moved around us. If the door didn’t work, we couldn’t get out. I looked up at the ceiling and then down the black path of the tunnel.
Cole worked with the knife, trying to essentially pick the lock. If the blade could get inside, maybe it would turn in place of the handle. He tried for a while but eventually quit after having no luck.
“Darlin’, let me try. I’ve opened my share of locked doors.” Brenda passed the flashlight to me. I held it in place as she fiddled with the latch. More time passed as I watched in helpless frustration. The walls moved in on us, an illusion of the darkness and shadows.
Scarlett leaned her head against my shoulder, and I leaned my cheek against her head like broken dolls that were once pretty. The party clothes were ruined. Our hair fell in matted clumps and our faces were smeared in tears, makeup, and blood. But none of those things compared to the shattered pieces in my heart. They hurt with every breath, cutting into my lungs.
I just wanted this night to be over. I just wanted to go home. Not back to the estate. But to my grandparents’ house. I wanted to sit in my old bed, in the room I’d once shared with Tyson. I wanted Granddaddy to tell me it was going to be okay. I needed him to tell me my brother was in heaven with my father. I just needed to hear his voice say those words.
“There’s no reason we can’t go the other way,” Elmore said as he struggled to rise up from the ground. He couldn’t see very well, which made his idea even less comforting. A blind old man thought we should walk into a pitch-black tunnel.
I moved the flashlight to highlight the path. The darkness ate up the brightness until it fizzled away. “Where does it even go?”
“Somewhere that isn’t here.” His cryptic words were followed by a cough.
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