The life seeped out of him. He slumped in his chair immediately, and I found that I was smiling again.
I loved a good neck snap. So much less cleanup than an arterial bleed. I already had my hands full with the amount of blood that had spilled from his left hand, but serendipitously, I had already cut off a bunch of fingers to try out on the control panel for the secret door.
Dope.
Being careful to wipe the fingers off so they wouldn’t dribble blood all over the floor, I collected them and headed downstairs.
Kyle’s basement was enormous and just as bougie as the rest of his house. There was a full home theatre and a massive bar crafted from white marble. Slipping behind the bar, I examined the wall until I found a small, unassuming black scanner. I guessed right the first time when I pressed his thumb against it, and I heard a series of clicks as the locking mechanism sprang to life. The door, which happened to be the entire liquor display of the bar, began to slowly open inward, revealing one of the most sickening sights I had seen since I escaped my own basement prison.
A strange, cold feeling rushed through me as I took in the various cages in this dark, secret room. There were also tripods and staged areas that I didn’t even want to fucking look at.
I walked right by them as I made my way deeper into the room and found Amanda blindfolded and chained to a tiny, single bed in the back. She was frail, blond, and wearing a long white nightgown that had seen better days.
“Mr. Bradshaw.Please.Let me see him. I’m so sorry. It’s my fault he got out. I wasn’t watching him. Please don’t hurt him.” She was begging, and relief flooded through me as I realized I had been right. This woman was Caleb’s mother, and she was clearly just as much of a victim as he was.
“Hey,” I said softly, and she stiffened. Though she couldn’t see me, she could tell by my voice that I wasn’t her captor. She began to cower and pull away from me. I noticed how she clenched her legs together tightly, and I gritted my teeth together at the sight.
She thought I was here to rape her.
“Amanda... I’m not here to hurt you. I’m here to set you free,” I told her softly, and her lip trembled slightly. She shook her head and shrunk farther into the wall by her bed.
“No… no. I don’t believe you. It’s a trick,” she whimpered. “Kyle!” I winced as she started screaming for her captor. Did she think he had sent me down as some sort of twisted test?
“Kyle is dead, sweetie,” I murmured, crouching down and tugging down her blindfold so she could see my face. I held out my hand, showing her his dismembered fingers. His wedding ring was still on the ring finger, and her eyes widened in shock.
She swallowed so hard I could hear it before turning those big blue eyes back up to me.
“H-he’s dead?” she whispered, and I nodded.
“Yeah. He’s dead. And your son is safe. I’m going to get you out of here, okay? I will have to touch you, but just soI can unchain you. I won’t touch you anywhere else. Do you know where he keeps the keys?” I asked, gesturing toward her manacles.
“With his car keys.”
My eye twitched again. Of course he kept the keys to his belongings together. Fuck. I was glad I killed him. Even more glad I made him cry like a bitch the whole time.
“Alright. I’m going to go find the keys. Once I untie you, you can come upstairs if you want, but I’ll warn you it’s a bit of a mess. I haven’t cleaned up Kyle yet, and things got a little messy,” I said, standing up, and she met my gaze head-on, her eyes burning with the type of fire only survivors seemed to possess.
“Good,” was all she said, and I smirked before turning away.
“Jesus fuck, Cal. You have to stop doing this!” I held my phone away from my ear to protect my eardrums from Cassandra’s shrill tone.
“What was I supposed to do, Cass? Just leave her down there?”
“Why were you there in the first place?”
“Just working, you know how it is.”
“Don’t pull that shit with me; you wouldn’t be calling me if this was one of those fucked up jobs you do for that twat waffle. You were hunting. Did you drag Naomi into this? I fucking told you if you used her as bait again, I was going to saw your balls off!”
Jesus…saw? She couldn’t justcutthem off like a normal sociopath? I cupped my dick over my jeans, soothing it gently as my balls tried to crawl up into my body and away from my scary sister’s voice.
“She’s notbait.She’s ascout.Anyway, it doesn’t matter. What’s done is done. I have to take out the trash, and my car needs a detail.” My not-so-subtle code for‘I need to dispose of a body and swap out cars.’The Bentley was hot now. I hadn’t been the most careful with this one, and I needed to cover my tracks.
“Can youpleasedig deep to find that dead, shriveled thing you call a heart and squeeze one tiny drop of empathy out of it? She’s a fucking sex slave, and he’s just a little kid, Cassandra. This asshole had her locked in the fucking basement. There werecages.”
The line went quiet, and I knew I had her.
I wasn’t the only one with triggers.
