“I’ll be right back, and then we can pick a princess movie to watch while we eat lunch.” I press a kiss to the top of her head before scurrying back to Vince’s side, feeling much more ready to handle this than I had a few minutes ago.
Vince leads the way again, and with each step, my confidence wavers as we move through the house toward the basement. I’ve never been in the basement, never really had a reason to…
“Oh my God, there’s a pool down here?” I stop to look through the glass that separates the hall from the poolroom with wide eyes.
As if the pool outside wasn’t enough.
“There’s a lot of shit down here.” Vince shakes his head as if he thinks it’s too much, and I can’t say I don’t agree mostof the time. “I didn’t realize you’d never been down here,” he says, almost to himself more than me, before he glances back at me over his shoulder. “Remind me to show you around another time.”
I nod, unsure if my voice will work with the way his eyes bore into me.
The very last thing I should be doing right now is checking Vince out, yet here we are. On our way to Carter, who’s being held in the basement, ready to be killed for what he’s done to me…
Oh fuck, I shouldn’t have thought of it that way.
I follow Vince down the hallway almost blindly. I know we’re passing things that would usually get my attention, much the same way the pool did, but I just can’t bring myself to register it through my now growing panic.
I need to find a way to ground myself, to stop this panic attack from taking over, but now all I can think about is Carter and everything he’s done, or would have done, had he been given the chance.
The possibilities are terrifying.
So I do the only thing I can think of: I quicken my pace until I’m nearly running, move beside Vince, and reach out, catching his hand in my own.
Maybe not my best idea, with the way he stops dead in his tracks hard enough that he nearly rips my arm from its socket when I continue moving, but it was all I could think of, and despite the issue of my arm, it’s already working.
I feel better; Vince makes me feel grounded and safe.
Whatever he sees on my face must tell him how not okay I am because his usually hard features soften, and he squeezes my hand as he continues to lead us down the hallway with much smaller strides so that I can more easily keep up with him.
The far end of the basement opens into a large room with chairs, couches, and a bar on the far right wall, but even more impressive are the dozens of arcade machines, foosball, air hockey, billiards, and other games I don’t have a name for.
“Wow. I can’t believe I never knew any of this was down here.”
Vince huffs a laugh but doesn’t stop moving, and I can appreciate that. If he stopped right now, I might very well chicken out.
He makes a beeline for the bar, and for a moment I wonder if he’s stopping to get a drink before I realize that’s not it at all. There’s actually a door tucked in the corner that I totally missed at first and second glance.
As we get closer, I wonder if I should be the one to grab a drink; my nerves feel like they are on fire, and all I want to do is run away.
The door leads to another set of stairs, and I’m not sure how to explain it, but I know we’re deep underground now; the air feels different.
“It’s the wine cellar… mostly,” Vince explains, almost as if he can feel my confusion.
That lets me know that it’s not all it is, which makes sense because if it weren’t, we wouldn’t be down here right now.
I wish we weren’t.
We make it to the bottom of the stairs, and there really is so much wine.
I didn’t even know they drank like this…
“I think it’s just a rich person thing. They hardly ever touch the stuff,” Vince says, somehow reading my mind, and despite the graveness of where we’re headed, I can’t help but chuckle. I’m glad I’m not the only one who isn’t used to this lifestyle.
Vince leads us through the rows, and I see the heavy metal door before we reach it.
And then I hear him.
I can’t make out the words, but I know his voice; the way he sounds when he shouts has me flinching back, pulling my hand from Vince’s.
