by Tate, Sennah
Don’t be ridiculous, he’s not going to murder me. He went through too much trouble to save me to turn around and murder me…
Don’t say I didn’t warn you…
Gemma rolled her eyes at the warring voices in her head. She was just over-analyzing things. Carson had yet to set off any alarm bells with her and Gemma typically had pretty good luck listening to her instincts with people.
Murder-basement, here I come.
As Carson’s head disappeared below ground level, Gemma took a deep breath to steady her nerves before following him. Basements weren’t common with the water table being so high. She wasn’t used to the dank mustiness that assaulted her senses and made her want to turn heel and run. The open plank stairs creaked underfoot as she descended and she didn’t even want to think about all of the creepy crawly things that would scatter if she turned a light on.
She reached the bottom of the dark stairs and collided with Carson.
“Careful,” he warned, steadying her before turning back to the door in front of them.
He found the breaker box next to the door and opened it, his fingers fumbling in the darkness. The metal hinge opened with a squeak and a faint light illuminated the numberpad.
Gemma couldn’t follow him as his fingers deftly typed in a code, but she knew he must have entered the right numbers because the door answered by snapping its lock open.
Her anxiety only intensified now; murder-basement was bad enough in and of itself; murder-basement with a keypad lock meant she would be trapped.
Still, she forced herself to take a deep breath to soothe her ragged nerves.
The heavy metal door swung open and Gemma audibly gasped. She had imagined plenty of things in the few seconds before the door opened, but none of them quite like this.
The space was large, open and brightly lit. A good portion of the room was dedicated to a full bar, stocked to the tee. Another section was a lounge area, complete with comfy-looking couches and too-big TVs. To the far right there was a conference table and a hub of computers hooked up to what appeared to be a surveillance system.
Gemma never would have imagined from the ramshackle facade that this building contained this sleek, modern, high-tech space. It definitely wasn’t a murder basement, but she wasn’t sure what it was, exactly.
Once her eyes stopped roving constantly around the room, she noticed that there were other people scattered about.
One man —with sandy blond hair and an effortless smile — turned his attention toward the two of them.
“Warning! Female in the clubhouse! I repeat, this is not a drill. There is a human female on the premises,” he waggled his eyebrows in their direction. Gemma stifled a giggle, but Carson was having none of it; he side-stepped to block anyone’s view of Gemma. She was his and he wasn’t going to let anyone else look at her if he could help it.
“Back off, Trick,” he grumbled, his voice nearly a growl.
His tone took the other man off-guard for a moment, but Trick recovered quickly and his smile was back in place. He shrugged and turned his attention back to the TV.
“Oh, how about that play, Dez? He’s gotta be crazy to not kick a field goal here,” Trick enthused, elbowing the brawny man next to him.
The man — Desmond — munched absently on a bowl of cheesy puffs, his fingers orange from his snack binge. He grunted in response.
“Nah, they have a minute-thirty left and a time out. Field goal would only tie it. You gotta go for the win,” he replied, his mouth full of masticated junk food.
“You’re disgusting,” another man — this one tall and slender with dark hair and bright golden eyes — said with disdain.
“Didn’t anyone ever teach you any manners? Don’t talk with food in your mouth,” he continued his scolding, punctuated with a roll of his eyes.
Trick reached his hand deep into the bowl of cheese puffs and shoved a fistful of them into his mouth, getting crumbs and neon orange powder all over himself in the process.
“I dunno wot yer talkin’ ‘bout, Aaron,” he joked, his cheeks swelled with crunchy snacks like he were a chipmunk preparing for winter.
Gemma stifled another giggle, taking in the whole scene. She didn’t know who these men were, but they certainly didn’t seem like they were going to kill her.
“I know that look,” a voice chimed in from behind the wall of computer monitors, “what’s going on, Carson?”
The tension in Carson’s shoulders seemed to melt away now that one of his friends had acknowledged it.
“I’m not really sure…” he muttered.
“There’s a big surprise,” Trick mocked, making Desmond snicker.
Carson glared in his direction; Trick nearly cowered in submission; he could tell that now wasn’t the time for levity.
The man behind the computers frowned, ruffling his ginger hair as he thought it over.
“Why not start with what you do know?”
“Or introducing your friend?” Trick added.
Carson gritted his teeth together; he couldn’t be angry, Gemma was kind of an afterthought standing behind him without saying a word. It wasn’t fair to neglect her.
“Right. Everyone, this is Gemma. Gemma, the asshole is Trick,” Trick inclined his head with a thousand-watt grin, “big guy is Dez…Desmond, Ty’s the nerd over there, and the Mistress of Manners herself, Aaron,” Carson finished, pointing at each of them in turn.
“Dick,” Aaron grumbled, but Gemma could tell he didn’t really mean it.
Ty nodded, looking over the group once more before turning his eyes back to the screen in front of him.
“Pleasantries aside, can we address the cause of your distress?” Ty asked with a matter-of-fact tone.
Carson made his way to the conference table with Gemma in tow and crossed his arms.
“Who said I was distressed?”
Aaron stood from the barstool he occupied and sat at the table opposite of Carson.
“Normally I’m the first one to say that Ty is worrying too much, but I have to agree with him on this one, man. What’s up?”
Gemma watched as Carson wrestled with how he wanted to word what he was going to say. His uneasiness permeated the air and made the other two men take notice, too.
Trick left his place on the couch and pulled a chair up to the conference table next to Aaron, his face suddenly serious. Gemma thought that the look didn’t suit him very well; his was a face used to smiling, anything less looked out of place. His somber expression seemed to resonate with Desmond because the hulking man lumbered his way over to join them all.
Carson glanced at Gemma, still searching for his words. She decided it was best to just rip the band-aid right off.
“My friend… Carson’s sister… Isabel, is missing,” she said, nerves making her voice shake. She’d never been much of one for public speaking or talking to strangers. Ten eyes looked at her and made her squirm in her chair uncomfortably.
Aaron was visibly the most alarmed by Gemma’s announcement, his eyes darted to Carson, looking for a different answer from him.
“Izzy?” he asked, his voice cracking.
Carson’s heart beat a frantic rhythm in his chest. This was his best friend in the whole world; they were closer to siblings than he and his actual sibling. Aaron had grown up with them, always like another brother. Then Izzy started getting older… things started to change and suddenly she didn’t want to talk to any of them any more. He expected Aaron to be upset; she was his little sister, too.
Carson nodded without a word. There were no words. They had to focus.
“She’s been missing for about a week —”
“And you’re only just now telling us?!” Aaron shrieked, color rushing to his face as all eyes turned to him after his outburst.
Carson cleared his throat calmly, his eyes pushing Aaron back into his chair with a silent command.
Gemma marveled at how easily the men defected to Carson as their leader. He was undoubtedly
in charge of their little group.
“As I said, she’s been missing for about a week,” he gave a warning glance to Aaron before continuing, “but I didn’t want to bring it up here until I’d done my own preliminary investigation.”
“Who’s ass do we need to kick?” Dez asked, his mouth still smeared fluorescent orange.
Carson waited for Aaron to chime in; he expected him to tell Desmond that violence wasn’t always the answer, he’d been staunchly against aggression since he’d gotten home. Aaron didn’t say anything; he looked like he was already plotting his post-murder clean-up.
Carson shook his head, resting his palms on the table. He was too restless to sit like the rest of them. He felt Gemma’s eyes burning into him. He wanted to look at her, but he couldn’t risk losing his anger right now. This anger was going to help him find Izzy; he couldn’t have Gemma putting out the fire every time he tried to start the engine.
“I don’t know what’s going on exactly. I have some theories. Gemma can fill you in on some of the details up to this point. Ty, I need bank records, phone logs, internet searches, whatever you can get me.”
“Already on it,” Ty responded without taking his eyes away from the bluish glow of his computer screen.
Carson rubbed his tired eyes, trying to coax them to stay open for just a little while longer.
“Hey buddy,” Aaron said, standing to place a hand on Carson’s shoulder, “how long have you been awake?”
Carson shrugged though a yawn, trying to keep his tiredness at bay.
“And what about you?” Aaron asked of Gemma.
Her eyes widened in surprise, “Me?” No one had been paying much attention to her after their announcement. She was busy thinking about everything that had happened in the past couple of days.
“Um… What day is today?” She asked innocently.
Trick grinned broadly, leaning his chair back on two legs precariously.
“I like this one!” He said gleefully.
“Dez, do you mind?” Aaron asked.
The behemoth of of a man shook his head.
“Nah, it’s all good,” he said cryptically.
“Okay, come with me, guys,” Aaron instructed, waving them along behind him.
“Where are we going?” Gemma asked, catching Carson’s contagious yawn.
“There’s an apartment upstairs. You’re both useless until you get some sleep.”
Gemma frowned, “Maybe you’re the useless one. I’m not tired at all,” she argued, despite her eyes drooping steadily.
Carson muttered something unintelligible as he followed Aaron.
“It’s fine really. Ty’s going to need a few hours to see what he can dig up anyway; Dez and I might start canvasing. None of us are very good at being stationary.”
They made it to the top of a steep flight of stairs and Gemma was once again taken aback by the stunning surroundings. Everything in the apartment was modern, sleek and built for comfort.
“Woah… who lives here?” Gemma asked, fighting against the weights on her eyelashes.
“Uh… no one really. Desmond owns it, but he doesn’t really touch it.”
“That’s…. Weird,” Gemma said with another yawn interrupting her sentence.
Running on autopilot, Carson already found a plush bed and collapsed face down on it.
“So… he was definitely good to keep going,” Aaron joked.
“Look, Gemma, I want to talk to you about…” Her head dipped forward as her exhaustion took over for a split second; she jerked her head back, startled for a moment.
“Yeah? What’s that?” She mumbled.
Aaron shook his head and led her to another bedroom where she promptly fell onto the bed.
“I’m really not tired,” she protested with another big yawn.
“Okay, well, sit here for a few minutes and if you can’t sleep, come back down.”
Gemma nodded, already wrapping her arms around one of the overstuffed down pillows, and nuzzled down in for a nice nap.
Chapter 9
Hours later, Gemma awoke from her nap feeling like she’d had a full night’s sleep. She reached for her phone and realized she still didn’t have it. It would probably be dead by now anyway. She definitely needed to go home to refresh and grab some essentials if she was going to be hanging out for a while.
The thought caught her off-guard. Why would she stick around? She had her own house not far away. There was no real reason to stay in the clubhouse. Except…
She had to admit that she liked being around everyone; so much of her time since Izzy’s disappearance had been spent in solitude and she wasn’t really used to being alone. She was used to being surrounded by three dozen hormonal children. She didn’t know how to handle alone time.
With a big stretch and a yawn, she navigated her way back downstairs, eager to see what everyone had found in her absence.
“Wow! That was a quick nap,” Ty said from behind his wall of monitors.
“Was it? How long was I out for?” Gemma asked, reassembling the bun in her hair.
“Three hours maybe,” Ty answered.
“Whoa. It felt like twenty. I guess I wasn’t as tired as I seemed,” she answered proudly.
“Guess so,” he replied, the computer’s glare reflected in his thin-framed glasses.
“Where is everyone?” Gemma asked, realizing they were on their own.
“Aaron and Dez went out looking for whatever they could find… I think Trick said he was going to check out her house again, they should all be back pretty soon.”
Gemma nodded without another word and took it upon herself to start looking around the giant open space they called the clubhouse.
It had everything a guy could dream of; like a frat house built by billionaires. She remembered Aaron saying that it was all Desmond’s and thought that was odd. She couldn’t quite make sense of the two opposing images of the kind of man that would own a property like this and the giant of a man covered in neon orange powder that she’d met a few hours ago. How could they possibly be the same person?
Never judge a book by its cover, Gemma, she scolded herself.
“Hey,” Ty piped up after a few minutes of silence, “when was the last time you received contact from Izzy’s phone?”
Gemma nibbled on her lower lip, trying to count back the days.
“Oh, she said she lost her phone the last time I saw her. I never heard if she got a new one or not…”
Ty frowned, actually looking up from his screen to stare off into space for a few minutes.
“It’s just not adding up. I’ve done consulting on missing person’s cases before and this is anything but text book.” His eyes still focused on some far off space that Gemma couldn’t see.
“So, you haven’t found anything?” She asked, crestfallen.
He sighed, removing his glasses to rub his eyes, postponing the confirmation of her worries.
“I’ve done what I can. I set up monitors on her identity and any aliases I think she might try to use. There’s not much history to really go on. Unfortunately, Hannaford Glen hasn’t caught up to everyone else with traffic cameras yet, or I’d have facial recognition set up to track her.”
He saw the hope drain from Gemma’s eyes and instantly felt a pang of regret for being so honest with her.
“Don’t worry though; I’m not the only brains in this operation. I’d be surprised if Aaron and Dez don’t find something.”
Gemma nodded, trying to find reassurance in his words. She wanted to believe him, but she didn’t know any of them well enough to have much faith.
Right on cue, the door opened admitting Aaron and Desmond back into the clubhouse.
“Holy shit!” Aaron said, his eyes wide and unfocused.
Gemma turned toward them, her heart beating wildly; what had they seen?
“It’s crazy out there!” Aaron finished.
“What do you mean?” Ty asked, pushing his chair back from the desk.
Ty turned his eyes toward Dez, raising his eyebrows in a silent question. Dez shrugged in response, but Gemma didn’t know what the exchange meant.
“It’s like the Police Station…” she muttered, drawing all attention to her.
“What happened at the Police Station?” Trick asked, walking in from the apartment side.
With all eyes trained on her again, Gemma took a deep breath to steady her nerves. Carson wasn’t here now to calm her; he couldn’t be her rock to lean on when he was upstairs snoozing. She was going to have to be her own support and just bite the bullet.
She launched into the retelling of the chaos they’d experienced earlier. The men listened with rapt attention and by the time she’d finished, they had plenty of questions. She filled in what she knew, but they all still ended with more questions than answers.
Her story sent Ty and Trick into a titter over possibilities, theories, conspiracies and the like. Everything from biochemical warfare to a zombie apocalypse was suggested as an explanation. Gemma didn’t have anything to add to their discussion and her eyes wandered over to Aaron who had resumed his seat at the bar, nursing a drink.
“Mind if I join you?” She asked, sliding into the seat next to him.
“Uh,” he grunted, swirling the amber contents of his glass around, seemingly mesmerized by the eddies the liquor created.
She took that to be a ‘yes’ and grabbed her own glass and a splash of liquid from his bottle. She took a sip and quickly sputtered, coughing and making disgusted faces.
“What’s in there? Jet fuel?”
Aaron chuckled, still staring deep into his glass like he was gazing into another world.
“Hey,” she said, nudging him with her elbow, “are you worried about Izzy?”
His golden eyes flicked up to meet hers, a hint of a shimmer returning to them.
“No. Well… yes, of course I am, but it’s not that…”
“Then what?” Gemma asked, testing the waters of his boundaries.
