Chapter 3 - The Basement Secret
Before Rex could corner me further, I pivoted sharply, ignoring his threats, and bolted toward the kitchen door leading down to the basement.
“Stop her!” Valerie shrieked.
Rex moved fast, but I had the advantage of agility. I slammed the basement door behind me, threw the heavy brass deadbolt—which Valerie had foolishly installed to keep Mom locked in—and turned the key just as Rex’s heavy shoulder slammed against the exterior wood with a deafening crash.
Bang! Bang!
“Open this door right now!” Rex bellowed from the other side, the wood groaning under his immense weight.
I didn't waste a second. I ran down the wooden stairs into the dim, damp chill of the basement. The furnace roared loudly, casting flickering orange shadows across the concrete floor. Mom was still lying motionless on the rusted camping cot, wrapped in her heavy winter coat, her breathing shallow and ragged.
“Mom! Mom, can you hear me?” I knelt beside her, shaking her gently by the shoulders.
Her eyelids fluttered open, heavy and glazed. She stared up at me blankly, her lips cracked and dry. “Nora... is that you? Did you bring the tea?”
“No, Mom, it’s me. I’m taking you out of here,” I whispered fiercely, my eyes stinging with tears.
I looked around the basement for anything useful. On the folding chair next to the cot sat a plastic medication organizer. I opened it and gagged. It wasn't standard dementia medication. It was a heavy cocktail of industrial-strength sedatives and antipsychotics—enough to keep a healthy horse in a stupor, let alone an elderly woman recovering from a stroke she’d had two years ago. Valerie was systematically poisoning her to keep her compliant and hidden from visitors.
Upstairs, the sound of splintering wood echoed. Rex was using a crowbar or his sheer brute strength to break through the deadbolt. I only had minutes before they breached the basement.
I slipped my arms under Mom, lifting her carefully off the cot. She groaned softly, her frail body impossibly light—too light. Malnutrition had hollowed her out.
“We have to move, Mom. Lean on me,” I urged, guiding her toward the small frosted glass egress window at the back of the basement.
The window led directly out to the side alleyway behind the garage. It was rusted shut, secured with a metal latch painted over with multiple coats of white latex. I grabbed a heavy iron wrench from Valerie’s makeshift workbench and began smashing the glass, ignoring the sharp shards falling around my hands.
Crash!
Cold night air rushed into the damp basement, carrying the scent of wet asphalt and pine.
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From the top of the stairs, the deadbolt finally shattered with a loud crack. The door flew open, and Rex’s massive silhouette appeared at the top of the steps, followed by Valerie’s screeching voice: “She’s escaping through the window! Grab her!”
Adrenaline surged through my veins. I hoisted Mom up, pushing her fragile frame through the narrow window frame just as Rex charged down the stairs like an enraged bull.
