Chapter 11
The Basement
The stairs groaned under my weight like they were remembering something painful.
I'd been in the back room for three days—or maybe four, or maybe just two, time had stopped meaning anything—sleeping on the couch, eating Matt's soup, wearing the soft dresses I'd chosen at the mall.
The bear sat on the pillow beside me. I'd named him Mr. Beary, though I couldn't remember why that name felt right.
It just did. Like the dresses. Like the bar.
Like Matt, who didn't ask questions and didn't look at me like I was broken.
The basement.
Matt had mentioned it the first night. "There's a basement you can use for... whatever you need." I hadn't asked what he meant. I hadn't needed to.
Now I was standing at the top of the stairs, my hand on the railing, looking down into the dark.
"You want me to come with you?"
Matt was behind me, his voice careful.
"No."
"There's a light switch at the bottom. Left side."
"Okay."
"Bunny."
I turned. He was standing in the doorway of the back room, his arms crossed over his chest, his expression unreadable.
"You don't have to do anything down there. Not today. Not ever. The job is upstairs. The basement is just... space."
"I know."
"Do you?"
"I know that you're giving me a chance. I know that you're not asking questions. I know that you're not calling the police."
"That's not what I—"
"Thank you, Matt."
I turned back to the stairs and started down.
The basement was cold.
The air was thick and still, heavy with the smell of concrete and old water and something else—something metallic, something that reminded me of the warehouse, of the alley, of the room where Rue had died.
I didn't remember killing her.
But I remembered the basement.
Or maybe I didn't.
Maybe I was remembering something else.
The light switch was where Matt had said it would be—left side, just below a junction box that looked like it hadn't been touched in decades. I flipped it, and the fluorescents flickered to life, buzzing overhead, casting the room in shades of grey and green.
Concrete walls.
A drain in the floor.
Old pipes running along the ceiling, wrapped in insulation that was falling apart.
And at the far end of the room, a door.
Metal. Rusted. Locked.
I walked toward it.
The lock was old—a padlock, the kind you could buy at any hardware store, the kind that opened with a key or a strong enough pair of bolt cutters.
I didn't have either.
But I had Matt.
And Matt had asked not to know what happened down here.
"Every good hunter needs a place to process her kills."
The memory came without warning.
Gabriel's voice, soft and sure.
"A place where no one will find you. A place where no one will ask questions. A place where you can be alone with what you've done."
He was standing in front of me, his hands on my shoulders, his eyes the color of winter storms.
"Do you understand?"
"Yes, Daddy."
"Good girl."
I blinked.
The basement came back.
The drain. The pipes. The locked door.
Had Gabriel really said that?
Or had I invented it—pulled it from the fog of my fractured memory, woven it from fragments of other conversations, other rooms, other men who'd tried to shape me?
I didn't know.
I couldn't know.
But the words felt right.
The same way the dresses felt right.
The same way the bear felt right.
The same way Matt's silence felt right.
I walked back to the stairs and looked up. Matt was still standing in the doorway, watching.
"I need some things."
"What kind of things?"
"Tools. Cleaning supplies. A lock for the door at the end."
He didn't ask why.
"I'll make a list."
"Thank you, Matt."
"Don't thank me yet. You haven't seen the water pressure."
The apartment was smaller than I remembered.
I'd left it weeks ago—or maybe months, or maybe just days—and nothing had changed. The bed was still unmade. The dishes were still in the sink. The walls were still bare, and the air was still stale, and the only thing that felt familiar was the absence.
No Gabriel.
No collar.
No pink room.
Just me and the silence and the ghost of someone who'd never really been there.
"This is where you've been staying?"
Matt was standing in the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest, his expression unreadable.
"Yes."
"It's small."
"I don't need much."
"You need more than this."
He walked inside, his footsteps careful on the bare floor. He didn't touch anything. Didn't open the closet or the drawers or the refrigerator. He just stood in the center of the room and looked around.
"Where's your money?"
"In the closet. Top shelf. In a bag."
"A bag?"
"A duffel. The one I brought from..."
I stopped.
From where?
The Institute?
The apartment Gabriel had left me in?
The motel where I'd woken up with clean hands and no memory of how I'd gotten there?
I couldn't remember.
"The bag is in the closet," I said again. "Top shelf."
Matt walked to the closet and opened the door. The duffel was where I'd left it—black, scuffed, heavy with the weight of cash I hadn't spent.
"How much is in here?"
"I don't know. A lot."
"Where did it come from?"
"Someone who wanted me to stay silent and disappear."
He didn't ask why.
He just lifted the bag from the shelf and carried it to the bed.
"We should count it."
"Why?"
"So you know what you have. So you can plan."
"Plan for what?"
"For whatever comes next."
The cash was stacked in neat bundles.
Hundreds. Thousands. More than I'd ever seen in one place, more than I'd ever known how to spend. Matt counted it in silence, his fingers moving quickly, his eyes focused on the numbers.
"One hundred fifty-three thousand, eight hundred."
He looked up at me.
"That's a lot of money, Bunny."
"I know."
"Where did you say it came from?"
"I didn't."
He was quiet for a moment.
"Fair enough."
He set the last bundle on top of the stack and leaned back against the headboard.
"What do you want to do with it?"
"I want to pay you back. For the clothes. For the bear. For... everything."
"You don't owe me anything."
"I know. But I want to."
I walked to the bed and picked up one of the bundles. Fifty-three hundred, maybe, or fifty-eight hundred—I didn't know, and I didn't care. I held it out to him.
"Take it."
"Bunny—"
"Take it. Please."
He looked at the money. Looked at me. Looked back at the money.
"This is too much."
"It's not enough. It will never be enough. But it's what I have."
He took the bundle.
"I'll put it in the safe. Behind the bar. It'll be there if you need it."
"The rest?"
"The rest can go in the safe too. Or you can keep it here. It's your money."
"I don't want it here."
"Then it goes in the safe."
He stood up and began putting the bundles back in the duffel.
"Matt."
"Yeah?"
"Thank you. For not asking questions. For not looking at me like I'm crazy. For... being here."
"You're not crazy, Bunny."
"How do you know?"
"Because crazy people don't worry about whether they're crazy. They just... are."
He zipped the duffel and slung it over his shoulder.
"Come on. Let's get this money somewhere safe. Then we'll go back to the bar and figure out what you need for the basement."
The safe was behind the bar.
Matt opened it with a combination I didn't watch him enter, and he placed the duffel inside among the other things—a ledger, some papers, a gun I pretended not to see.
"There. Safe and sound."
"Thank you, Matt."
"You've said that a lot today."
"Because I mean it."
He closed the safe and spun the lock.
"Come on. Let's go downstairs. You can show me what you need."
The basement looked different in the afternoon light.
The fluorescents were off, but light filtered through the small windows near the ceiling, casting the room in shades of gold and grey. The drain was still there. The pipes were still there. The locked door was still at the far end.
Matt walked to the door and examined the lock.
"Bolt cutters will take care of this. I've got a pair in the storage closet."
"What's on the other side?"
"Tunnels. Old bootlegging tunnels from the Prohibition. They run under the whole block, connect to the river. No one's been down there in decades."
"Except you."
"Except me."
He turned to face me.
"You can use them. If you need to. For... whatever."
"You keep saying that. 'Whatever.'"
"Because I don't want to know."
"Even if it's murder?"
"Especially if it's murder."
He walked back to the stairs.
"I'll get the bolt cutters. You think about what else you need. Tools, supplies, whatever. Make a list."
"Matt."
"Yeah?"
"Why are you doing this?"
He was quiet for a moment.
"Because I've been where you are. Not exactly. But close enough. And someone helped me when I needed it. Someone didn't ask questions. Someone gave me a chance."
"And now you're doing the same for me."
"That's how it works. Someone helps you. You help someone else. The world keeps spinning."
He walked up the stairs, and the door closed behind him, and I was alone in the basement.
I walked to the drain.
It was set into the concrete floor, a metal grate that was rusted around the edges. I knelt beside it and ran my fingers over the surface. The metal was cold. The grate was secure.
But it could be removed.
Bodies could be drained.
Evidence could be washed away.
I didn't remember learning this.
But I knew it.
The same way I knew how to hold a knife.
The same way I knew how to ask questions.
The same way I knew how to kill.
"Every good hunter needs a place to process her kills."
Gabriel's voice.
Or maybe my own.
Or maybe something I'd read once, in a book I'd never owned, in a life I'd never lived.
I didn't know.
I couldn't know.
But I knew the basement was mine now.
And I would use it.
The bolt cutters were heavy.
Matt handed them to me without comment, and I walked to the locked door and fit the blades around the padlock. The metal groaned. The lock resisted. I pressed down, and the resistance gave way, and the padlock fell to the floor with a clatter.
The door swung open.
Darkness.
Cold air.
The smell of old water and older stone.
I stepped inside.
The tunnel was narrow—barely wide enough for my shoulders—and the ceiling was low enough that I had to duck. The walls were wet, glistening with condensation, and the floor was slick with something I didn't want to identify.
I walked to the end.
Or not the end.
Just as far as I could go before the darkness became too thick to see through.
There would be time to explore later.
Time to map the tunnels.
Time to learn where they led.
For now, I just needed to know they were there.
An exit.
An escape.
A way to disappear.
I saw the shadow when I came back upstairs.
The bar was closed—the chairs were up, the lights were off, the door was locked—but I'd seen something through the window. A figure. Tall. Male. Standing near the back entrance, watching.
I ran to the door.
By the time I got outside, he was gone.
The alley was empty. The street was empty. The only thing left was a cigarette butt, still smoldering, lying on the ground where he'd been standing.
I picked it up.
A brand I didn't recognize.
Imported, maybe.
I held it to my nose and breathed in.
Tobacco.
Something else.
Something familiar.
"Daddy?"
No answer.
There was never an answer.
But I knew.
Someone was watching.
Someone was following.
Someone wanted me to know.
I crushed the cigarette beneath my heel and walked back inside.
The basement was waiting.
The tunnels were waiting.
The hunt was waiting.
And I was ready.
"Daddy."
The whisper was soft.
"Daddy, I'm coming."
"I don't know who's watching me."
"I don't know who's following me."
"But I'm not afraid."
"You taught me not to be afraid."
"You taught me to hunt."
"You taught me to kill."
"And I will find you."
"I will always find you."
No answer.
There was never an answer.
But for the first time in weeks, I didn't need one.
I had the basement.
I had the tunnels.
I had Matt.
And I had a shadow.
Someone to follow.
Someone to hunt.
Someone to ask about Gabriel.
The cigarette butt was still warm in my hand.
I dropped it in the trash and walked back to the back room, where Mr. Hoppy was waiting on the pillow, and the blanket was folded at the foot of the couch, and the dresses were hanging in the closet, and the bows were arranged on the shelf.
This was my life now.
Not the life I'd wanted.
Not the life I'd expected.
But it was mine.
And I would use it.
To hunt.
To kill.
To find my way back to the man who'd made me.
"Daddy."
The whisper was barely a breath.
"Daddy, I'm coming."
"Wait for me."
"Please."
"Wait for me."
No answer.
There was never an answer.
But I knew he was waiting.
He had to be waiting.
Because if he wasn't, I didn't know what I was doing anymore.
I didn't know who I was.
I didn't know why I was still alive.