The next morning, Marcus didn't come downstairs.
Neither did Evelyn.
I woke before sunrise with a pain in my lower back and the taste of metal in my mouth.
For several minutes I lay still, listening.
The house above me was silent.
Then I heard a cabinet close.
Someone was moving around in the kitchen.
I reached beneath the mattress.
The phone was still there.
One percent.
I switched it on.
No message.
No missed call.
Nothing.
I stared at the screen until my eyes burned.
Maybe Lena hadn't received it.
Maybe she had received it and didn't know where I was.
Maybe Marcus had found her.
I shut the phone off again.
I couldn't afford to waste the battery.
By midmorning, Evelyn finally came downstairs.
She looked as if she hadn't slept.
She placed a bowl beside the cage.
“You need to eat.”
I didn't touch it.
“Where is Marcus?”
“Out.”
“Where?”
She shook her head.
“You ask too many questions.”
I almost laughed.
“I'm locked in a cage.”
Her lips pressed together.
“You shouldn't make this harder.”
“For whom?”
She looked away.
I pushed myself against the bars.
“Did Lena call?”
“No.”
“You're lying.”
Her eyes snapped toward me.
“You don't know that.”
“I know you wouldn't look at me like that if you were telling the truth.”
For several seconds, we stared at each other.
Then she whispered, “He checked the phones last night.”
My stomach dropped.
“What?”
“He was worried someone had contacted the police.”
“Did he find mine?”
“No.”
I let out the breath I'd been holding.
Evelyn lowered her voice.
“You need to destroy anything that could connect you to him.”
I stared at her.
“Why are you telling me this?”
She shook her head.
“I shouldn't be.”
“Then tell me the truth.”
She sat on the basement steps.
For once, she didn't stand over me.
“I knew Marcus was taking money.”
“How much?”
“I don't know.”
“You do.”
She looked toward the floor.
“Enough.”
“From his father?”
She nodded.
The name Victor had never meant much to me before.
Marcus rarely talked about his father.
Victor owned the company Marcus worked for, though Marcus had always acted as if the business would eventually belong to him.
I had assumed they simply had a difficult relationship.
Now I wasn't so sure.
“What did Marcus take?”
“Accounts.”
“Money?”
“Documents. Access. Contracts.”
Her hands tightened around one another.
“He wanted control.”
“Control of what?”
“The company.”
I looked at the cage.
“And me?”
She didn't answer.
That was answer enough.
That afternoon, Marcus returned.
I heard his car before I heard the basement door.
He came downstairs carrying a black folder.
His expression was calm.
Too calm.
He placed the folder on the workbench.
“You've been talking to my mother.”
I said nothing.
“She tells me you've been asking questions.”
“She talks too much.”
He smiled.
“You're learning.”
He came to the cage.
“I need you to understand something.”
“I understand that you locked me up.”
“That isn't what I'm talking about.”
He crouched beside the bars.
“If anyone asks where you are, you don't know anything.”
I stared at him.
“What did you do?”
His eyes hardened.
“Careful.”
“What did you steal?”
He stood.
“You really think this is about money?”
“Isn't it?”
He opened the folder.
Inside were papers.
Contracts.
Bank statements.
Property records.
I couldn't read all the details from where I sat, but I saw my name.
My heart stopped.
“Why is my name on those?”
Marcus closed the folder immediately.
“Because you're my wife.”
“That doesn't explain anything.”
“It explains everything.”
He turned away.
I watched him carefully.
“Marcus.”
He stopped.
“You're afraid.”
His shoulders stiffened.
“Of what?”
“Someone finding me.”
He turned.
“You should be afraid too.”
Then he left.
The door slammed.
The lock turned.
I sat there staring at the empty staircase.
For the first time, I wasn't only afraid of dying.
I was afraid of disappearing.
If Marcus had forged documents using my name, then he could make it appear that I had willingly transferred money.
He could make me look guilty.
He could make me look unstable.
He could make my disappearance seem voluntary.
The thought made my stomach twist.
That night, I pulled the phone from beneath the mattress.
I turned it on.
One percent.
Still no signal.
I crawled toward the far corner of the cage.
Near the furnace, the phone briefly showed one bar.
I typed a message.
Lena, I am in the basement. I don't know the exact address. Marcus keeps documents with my name. Please don't come alone.
I pressed send.
The message disappeared.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
Then a tiny symbol appeared.
Delivered.
I covered my mouth.
Lena had it.
I nearly cried from relief.
Then the phone went black.
I placed it beneath the mattress again.
I had no idea what Lena would do.
But she knew.
Someone finally knew.
The following morning, I heard Marcus arguing upstairs.
His voice was sharp.
“I told you to wait.”
A man's voice answered.
I couldn't make out the words.
Then Marcus said something that froze me.
“She cannot leave this house.”
I crawled closer to the basement door.
The voices continued.
“Once Victor finds out—”
Marcus stopped.
I heard a chair scrape.
Then the other man said, “Your father already suspects.”
My pulse jumped.
Victor.
His father knew something was wrong.
But why hadn't he come?
A few minutes later, the basement door opened.
Marcus stood there alone.
He looked furious.
“You've made this complicated.”
I backed away.
“Who was that?”
He ignored the question.
“Where is the phone?”
My blood turned cold.
“What phone?”
“The one you used to contact Lena.”
I said nothing.
He walked toward the cage.
“You're not as clever as you think.”
He grabbed the bars.
“Where is it?”
I shook my head.
He stared at me.
Then he kicked the cage.
The metal rang through the basement.
I flinched.
“Where?”
I backed toward the mattress.
“Marcus, you're hurting me.”
He looked at my stomach.
For a moment, something uncertain crossed his face.
Then it vanished.
“I'll find it.”
He searched the cage.
He overturned the mattress.
He emptied the bucket.
He pulled at the floorboards.
But he didn't find the phone.
Because I had moved it.
Before he came downstairs, I had slipped it into a narrow gap beneath the loose metal panel near the cage floor.
His hands passed within inches of it.
He cursed.
Then he stood.
“Your sister won't save you.”
I stared at him.
“You don't know that.”
He smiled.
“She won't even know where to look.”
He walked upstairs.
The door closed.
I waited until his footsteps disappeared.
Then I retrieved the phone.
One percent.
No signal.
But the message had been delivered.
That was enough.
Several hours passed.
The house grew strangely quiet.
Then I heard something outside.
A car.
It stopped.
Someone got out.
Footsteps crossed the porch.
The front door opened.
I sat upright.
A man's voice called from upstairs.
“Marcus?”
No answer.
The basement door opened.
I expected Marcus.
Instead, a stranger appeared.
He looked down the stairs.
Then he saw me.
His face changed.
“Jesus.”
I grabbed the bars.
“Help me.”
He froze.
“Who are you?”
“Please.”
He came down two steps.
Then stopped.
Behind him, I heard Marcus's voice.
“Don't.”
The stranger turned.
Marcus stood at the top of the stairs.
He was holding something in his hand.
A gun.
My body went cold.
The stranger slowly raised his hands.
Marcus looked at me.
“You see what happens when you don't listen?”
The stranger backed away.
Marcus kept the gun pointed at him.
“Leave.”
The man left.
Marcus remained.
For several seconds, neither of us spoke.
Then he lowered the weapon.
“You're going to stay quiet.”
I looked at him.
“No.”
His expression changed.
“What?”
I swallowed.
“No.”
It was the first time I had said it without whispering.
He stared at me.
Then he smiled.
“You think your sister is coming?”
I didn't answer.
He walked down the stairs.
“I hope she does.”
He stopped beside the cage.
“Because when she comes, I'll know exactly where to find her.”
My heart pounded.
But beneath the fear, something else had begun to grow.
Not courage.
Not yet.
Something smaller.
Certainty.
Lena had my message.
Marcus knew she might come.
And now he had made one mistake I hadn't expected.
He had admitted he was afraid of being found.
That meant someone was already closing in.
I only had to stay alive long enough for them to reach me.
Click here to continue reading: PART 3: The Welds Held, My Body Was Failing, and Then the Sound of Tires Outside Changed Everything I Thought I Knew
The Night the Welding Torch Went Silent, I Realized My Husband Had Finally Decided I Was Never Leaving That Basement Alive
Part 2 of 8
