by Hannah Ford
The room went silent for a moment.
From down the hall, behind the door that the professor had gone through, I could hear the rattling of metal, and the wail of females. The other women who were being kept here. How many of them were there?
“You killed my wife.” Lameuix’s voice broke the silence. He sounded stunned, but a moment later, he lunged for Noah. Noah held the gun out and trained it on him.
Lameuix stopped. His eyes glinted, but he looked dead inside, just like Mikayla. He looked like he wanted to kill Noah, like he wanted to rip him limb from limb. But it was born of something else, some sick need to hurt him instead of concern or revenge over his dead wife.
“Charlotte, go upstairs,” Noah said. “Take the gun you have with you and get my phone. In the front pocket of my suitcase are handcuffs and rope. Bring them down.” He glanced at me, taking in the fact that I was wearing just a tiny nightgown. “And get a sweatshirt.”
“No.” I shook my head. “I’m not leaving you.”
“It’s fine,” he said. “Nothing’s going to happen to me.”’
I hesitated, but then I realized he was right. We needed to get his phone, needed to call the police. And we couldn’t just leave Mikayla and Lameuix down here by themselves – there were too many secret passageways, too many ways for them to get away. Not to mention the professor. I had no idea where he’d gone or where he was.
I raced up the ladder that led back to the room we’d been staying in, then grabbed Noah’s phone off the nightstand. I took a sweatshirt from his suitcase, hastily pulling it over my nightgown and shoving my feet into a pair of sneakers. I found the handcuffs and rope, then headed back down to the cellar.
When I got there, no one had moved.
Noah still stood there, pointing the gun at Lameuix while Mikayla filmed the whole thing. I was suddenly thankful she had her camera trained on everyone, was thankful that there would now be a record of everything that had happened.
“Do you want to call the police, or should I?” I asked Noah.
He ignored me. “Charlotte, shut the cameras off.”
“What?”
“There’s a main switch over there.” He nodded his head toward the door, where an electrical box was located. Next to it I could see the main power switch.
“Noah –”
“Do what I say, Charlotte.”
I hurried over to the door and hit the switch. The recording equipment shut down, the monitors going dark as a heavy silence filled the air.
“Take the camera from her,” Noah said, indicting Mikayla.
“No,” Mikayla said, holding the camera close to her as if it were a prized possession.
I pointed my gun at her, my grip shaking. “Give it to me.”
“No.”
Rage bubbled up inside of me, a rage I had no idea I could possess. I’d always wondered what would happen if I were ever in a situation where I had to fight for my life, if I’d be capable of actually killing someone. Now I was pretty sure I could.
Because the rage that poured through my veins like a river, shocking in its intensity, was directed at Mikayla.
She was the whole reason I was in this situation.
I’d been stupid to come after her, stupid to think she could be trusted.
Because of her, I’d put everything at risk.
Noah was right, a voice in my head whispered. You should listened to him. It’s not Mikayla’s fault you’re in this situation, it’s because of your own stupidity.
I turned that thought off, focusing my rage directly on Mikayla as I slammed the butt of the gun down on her wrist, hard enough for it to hurt but not enough to leave any permanent damage. The camera fell to the ground, and I picked it up and shut it off.
I thought about smashing it into smithereens under my foot, but I wanted to make sure we kept any evidence we needed.
“Over there,” Noah commanded Lameuix and Mikayla. “On the ground, both of you.”
Mikayla sighed and slid off her stool, moved over to the side of the cellar where Noah had indicated she go and sat down on the ground.
“Fuck that,” Lameuix said. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Noah backhanded him hard across the face.
I gasped at the shock of the gesture. “Jesus, Noah,” I said. “Was that necessary?” We had the guns. We had a phone. It was time to call the police.
“Get. On. The. Floor,” Noah said to Lameuix, ignoring my question as he shoved the butt of the gun against Lameuix’s cheek. Lameuix held his hands up and walked over to the other side of the cellar. He sat down next to Mikayla.
“On your knees,” Noah commanded. “Both of you. Hands behind your back.”
They did as they were told.
“Tie her up,” Noah said to me.
“Noah –”
“Charlotte.”
I sprang into action with the rope I’d brought downstairs.
Noah tied up Lameuix as I tied up Mikayla, listening to Noah’s instructions, watching what he did. When we were finished, they were on their knees, their legs tied together, their hands tied and cuffed behind them. I stood up, my chest heaving with exertion.
Mikayla stared back at me, glassy-eyed, but Lameuix glared, defiant.
“Okay,” I said. “Now we can call the police.” Maybe we’d even get the hell out of here, go wait in the car or something. Staying down here was creeping me out, although I guessed we couldn’t really leave the two of them alone. We had guns and they were tied, but who knew what would happen if they left.
Not to mention Professor Worthington.
He could be anywhere.
The thought of him sent shivers up my spine, and I kept glancing behind me, making sure he wasn’t creeping up behind me.
On second thought, I decided, I’d rather be in here than out there.
But Noah wasn’t moving.
“Call the police,” I said. I was still holding the gun, and it still felt strange in my hand.
“Not yet,” Noah said, licking his lips. A tight smile played at the corners of his mouth. “Not until I get the truth.”
“What? What are you talking about?” I asked, as trepidation clawed at my stomach.
“I’m talking about figuring out what this sick fuck has to do with the Lilah Parks case,” Noah said. He reached out and ran the barrel of the gun down over Lameuix’s face.
“I thought you were supposed to be a brilliant legal mind, Cutler,” Lameuix spit. “Can’t you figure it out yourself?”
Noah punched him in the nose, so hard that blood spurted and ran down Lameuix’s face.
“Noah!” I ran to him and grabbed his arm. “Noah, stop. This is crazy. Please, we need to call the police.”
“Charlotte, go upstairs.”
“No,” I said, shaking my head vehemently. “What are you going to do, Noah? Torture him until he gives you the answers you want?”
Noah stood up and gazed down at Lameuix, whose eyes now had the unfocused look of someone who was about to go unconscious.
“Yes, Charlotte,” Noah said, the tone of his voice sending shivers up my spine. “That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
And that’s exactly what he did.
He punched him, kicked him in the stomach, worked him over, threatened him with the gun until Lameuix was gasping for breath.
Mikayla was slumped against the wall, and she giggled like a crazy person as she watched the violence. The smell of blood in the air intensified, permeating the room so heavily I felt as if I could taste it.
Fifteen minutes passed.
Half an hour.
My throat went hoarse from begging Noah to stop, from pleading with him not to do this, to let me call the police. But I’d given him the phone and there was no way I was getting it back.
Lameuix had been adamant from the beginning that he wasn’t going to talk, that no amount of torture could make him, and I was starting to believe it.
“Please, Noah,” I said. “P
lease, stop. You have to stop.”
“Listen to your bitch, Noah,” Lameuix said, spitting a mouthful of blood onto the floor. “Stop.”
“Fuck you,” Noah said, and kicked him in the stomach.
“Please,” I said. “Please, stop, you’re going to kill him. Is that what you want? To kill him? You’ll go to jail, Noah, is that what you want? To be away from me?” This seemed to get through to him and he stopped for a moment, but I could see in his eyes that he wasn’t going to stop.
“Get me the lighter, Charlotte,” he said. “From on the work bench.”
“What? Absolutely not, Noah, this is fucking crazy, please.”
He ignored me and walked over to the workbench and grabbed the lighter. He returned to Lameuix, and held the flame to Lameuix’s arm.
Lameuix screamed.
“Okay, okay!” he pleaded. “Okay. I’ll tell you.”
“Talk,” Noah said, pulling back, the glow of the flame still burning in the dim room. “And hurry up.”
“The girls from Force are in the back,” Lameuix said. “What Mikayla said is right. We brought them here to make movies.”
“Of you raping and killing them,” Noah clarified.
“Yes.”
My hand flew to my mouth at the horror of the words. It could have been me. I could have been back there in a cage, waiting for them to come and get me, to get me ready for my scene. They would have dominated me, would have tortured me and then killed me, filmed the whole thing. Or would I have been kept alive by Professor Worthington, to use as his special pet?
“What does Worthington have to do with it?” Noah demanded.
“He had the connection to Force, he helped us get the girls.”
“And Lilah Parks?”
Lameuix groaned, and slumped over at the waist. He was having trouble breathing. I was pretty sure Noah had broken one of his ribs. “She was one of them.”
“Lilah Parks was one of the girls from Force?” Noah asked.
“Yes. But she was also helping us.”
I knew what that meant. Lilah was more like Mikayla than the girls I could hear screaming down the hall. She was one of them, one of the ones who got special treatment and helped them do the filming. One of the ones who thought she wanted this.
“And Josh Aquilino?” Noah asked, naming the man Lilah was accused of killing.
“He was one of us. He was helping us, but he… he started asking too many questions, started poking around, started letting his conscience get the best of him. Worthington was sure Josh was going rogue, thought maybe he was about to go to the police, maybe cut a deal. So we made a deal with Lilah. Kill him, and we’d do everything we could to get her off.”
“And if she refused?”
“Then she’d have to star in her own film.”
“Jesus,” I breathed.
Noah shook his head as all the pieces locked into place. “So you made sure that I was her defense lawyer. You wanted Lilah to do your dirty work. That’s why you got Bella to pose for those photos, so that Lilah’s story of self-defense would make more sense.”
“It doesn’t take a fucking genius to figure it out, Noah, you dumb fuck,” Lameuix said. He’d seemed to have gotten control of his breathing now, and he smiled up at Noah. His teeth were covered in blood, making him look a grotesque clown.
My stomach turned.
There was so much blood. Everywhere.
I was so nauseous.
“We had you running all over the city, looking for leads, and the whole time we were controlling everything,” Lameuix crowed. “You were nothing but a fucking puppet.”
Noah shoved Lameuix to the ground, then pressed his foot against Lameuix’s windpipe.
“Noah,” I said. “Please. He told you everything. Just stop.” I was pleading now, my voice shrill.
“Beg, motherfucker,” Mikayla said from the corner. She giggled again, a horrible high-pitched sound that echoed through my brain.
“Noah, please,” I said for what felt like the millionth time. I grabbed his arm and pulled at his body, but he wouldn’t listen. He was in a different place, somewhere I couldn’t reach him. His strong frame, normally like granite, was even more immoveable now. “Noah, please!”
“Worthington,” he barked at Lameuix. “Where is he?”
“How the fuck should I know?” Lameuix managed to gasp.
“Best guess,” Noah said, and stepped on him harder.
“The boat house,” Lameuix wheezed. “In the back woods.”
Noah applied more pressure to Lameuix’s windpipe with his foot, and I watched as Lameuix’s eyes bugged and his face began to turn purple. Noah was going to kill him.
“Noah! Please, Noah, you’re going to kill him!”
Finally, Noah pulled his foot off Lameuix’s throat.
Lameuix gasped for air as his face started regaining back of its normal color.
I let go of Noah’s arm. My legs were spaghetti, and I fell to the floor.
Noah pulled out his phone and called 911.
The police came, their sirens flashing and brakes screeching as they skidded into the long driveway. I waited for them by the front door of the house while Noah stayed behind, guarding Lameuix and Mikayla.
I led the police to the guest room and into the bathroom, pointed them down the ladder, but I didn’t go back down there, couldn’t make myself face what had happened down there. I didn’t want to see more blood or violence or hear Mikayla’s insane laugh or her dead eyes.
I waited for Noah to come upstairs, but he didn’t.
They kept him down there, I wasn’t sure for what, but eventually, they led me outside and put me into the back of a police car.
I watched out the window of the cruiser as the cops kept coming by what seemed like the dozen, more and more being called as they realized there was a dead body in the cellar, that two people were tied up, that there were women in cages being kept underground against their will.
The police blended into one big blur of faces and badges.
One of them brought me a bottle of water.
One of them brought me a blanket.
One of them turned the radio on for me, even though the last thing I wanted to do was listen to music.
At one point there was a commotion in the woods near the back of the house, and officers went running. I heard the sound of gunshots, and I tried to get out of the car, but I couldn’t.
When an officer came back to check on me, I asked her what had happened.
She hesitated. “Colin Worthington,” she said. “He was hiding in a boathouse back there.”
“Did you get him?” I asked, holding my breath.
“Yes. We got him.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.” She refused to say anything more.
A little while later they took me to the police station, where they gave me coffee and interrogated me. They wouldn’t let me see Noah, not until I’d told them everything I knew.
It took hours.
Hours and hours of answering the same questions over and over.
I felt like I was in a fog.
I didn’t even think of trying to lie. There was nothing to lie about, except for maybe why we’d been there in the first place. I told them that we’d gone to see Lameuix about a case we’d been handling, to talk to him because of the tattoo we’d seen on Bella’s back.
I didn’t mention anything about how Professor Worthington had been the reason we’d gone there, that Noah had tried to lure him there so Noah could kill him.
I didn’t say anything about Noah torturing Lameuix.
They asked me briefly how Lameuix had gotten a broken rib and a broken nose. I told them it must have happened in the struggle for the gun, and they accepted this and moved on pretty quickly.
I was sure that they weren’t going to dig too deeply into how a man who’d been keeping women as slaves got his injuries.
After what felt like forever, I asked to see Noah.
&
nbsp; They made me wait longer, and told me he was still being questioned.
When they finally let me go, he was waiting for me in the waiting room of the police station.
He was wearing a navy sweatshirt they must have given him and the same pajama pants he’d been in when I’d last seen him.
His eyes were bright and his face was scrubbed of any blood or sign of what had happened, except for a huge bruise that was blooming under his eye right above his right cheekbone.
We stood there, staring at each other, and my eyes filled with tears.
Then I ran to him.
He wrapped his arms around me and I began to cry.
“Shhh, baby,” he soothed, his voice against my ear. “Shh, it’s okay. You’re okay, everything’s okay. You’re okay, we’re here.”
His voice was like a balm on my soul, the melodic cadence instantly calming me like he always did.
“I want to go home,” I said.
He took my hand and brought me home.
A day passed.
Then two.
The two of us became ghosts, floating through our lives. We didn’t talk about what happened. We didn’t talk about much of anything.
Noah had become withdrawn and seemingly out-of-sorts. He was short when he talked and quiet most of the time.
On our second night home, I woke in the middle of the night to find him gone from our bed. This in and of itself wasn’t that strange -- Noah often went to his home office to work, even at all hours.
Docket was at the end of the bed, curled up and sleeping soundly. I was thankful he was so relaxed, even with all of the tension in the apartment, and also a little envious that my life couldn’t be as simple as his.
The light was on in the master bathroom, and the door was open.
I could hear the sound of Noah rummaging around in there.
I got up and padded to the bathroom.
He was standing in front of the medicine cabinet, dressed in a pair of navy athletic shorts and a fitted grey T that clung to his chiseled muscles. Even in the middle of the night, even with the bruise on his face and everything we’d been through, he was still the sexiest man I’d ever seen.
“What are you doing?” I asked gently. “It’s three in the morning.”
