Chapter 3

Chelsea's POV:

My spirit drifted, a weightless presence, following Corbin. The living room blurred behind me, replaced by the dimly lit hallway. With every step he took towards the room, an unsettling emptiness grew within me. It wasn't just the absence of my physical body; it was the hollow recognition of how utterly alone I had been.

Emilio and Erland were right behind him, their heavy footsteps thudding on the Persian rug. They reached the door to the room, the one with the secondary bolts Corbin had ordered. The air around it felt colder, heavier.

Corbin pounded on the thick oak. "Chelsea! Enough of this nonsense! Open this door right now!" His voice boomed, echoing in the suffocating silence.

No answer. Only the silence of a house that held a secret.

Corbin's jaw tightened, his face darkening like a storm cloud. He banged again, harder this time. "Don't test my patience, young lady! You are pushing your luck! You think this is some kind of clever protest? An act of rebellion?"

Still, nothing.

"She' s probably just sulking," Emilio scoffed, trying to sound confident, but a sliver of unease flickered in his eyes. "Trying to make us feel bad. She's always been so dramatic, so self-indulgent."

Erland stepped forward, his eyes narrowed, a different kind of anger on his face. "She thinks we'll just forget about the data leak if she hides away. Thinks she can manipulate us with her silence. She's always been weak, always running from responsibility."

The silence stretched, thick and suffocating. No defiant retort, no whimper, no sound at all.

Corbin turned, his gaze sharp and accusatory, landing on Mrs. Gable who hovered timidly a few feet away. "You said she was calling out, Mrs. Gable. That she was unwell. Was that another one of her fabricated stories? Were you in on it?"

Mrs. Gable trembled, her eyes wide with fear. "No, sir! Never! She... she was truly unwell. I heard her. I swear."

"She' s probably just run away," Emilio muttered, rubbing his chin. "That's her style. Cause chaos, then disappear."

"I wouldn't put it past her," Erland agreed, though his gaze kept drifting back to the door. "She' s never truly fit in with the family. Always the sensitive one, the artistic one, the one who couldn't handle the pressure." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Honestly, sometimes I wonder if she was really one of us."

One of you? My spirit scoffed, a silent, bitter laugh. I was more of you than you ever cared to see.

Mrs. Gable, her voice a reedy whisper, insisted, "No, sirs. She' s been in there. I've heard her. She hasn't left."

Corbin' s eyes lingered on the door, a flicker of something unreadable in their depths. A nascent worry, perhaps? A whisper of doubt in the fortress of his certainty.

He tried the doorknob, twisting it with a violent jerk. It held fast. He slammed his shoulder against the wood, once, twice. The door remained stubbornly shut.

"Chelsea, seriously!" Corbin roared, his voice laced with frustration now. "This isn't funny! You think you're clever, locking yourself in? Playing coy?"

Coy? My spirit echoed. If only you knew what was behind that door.

I remembered the last moments. The air, heavy like wet blankets, pressing down on my lungs. My body, writhing, desperate for a gasp of fresh air. My fingers clawed at the solid wood, leaving faint, bloody streaks. I screamed until my throat was raw, until my voice was nothing but a rasp.

The door, thick and unyielding, had been an impenetrable barrier. It was then that I realized the cold, hard truth: they weren't coming. They believed Ivy. They believed their own narrative about me. They were letting me die.

My last breath was a ragged, silent cough. My chest burned, then went numb. The light faded to black.

Just open the door, my spirit pleaded, a silent prayer to the men who could no longer hear me. Just see what you' ve done.

Corbin' s frustration boiled over. He kicked the door, a solid, furious thud. The wood groaned, a faint crack appearing near the top hinge.

Then, a smell. Not the metallic tang of blood, or the sweet odor of decaying flowers. This was deeper, fouler. A sickly-sweet stench, heavy and cloying, wafted from the crack.

Mrs. Gable gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "Oh my God! What is that smell?" Her voice was tight with rising panic.

Emilio and Erland, drawn by the sudden shift, rushed forward, their expressions mirroring hers.

"It's probably a dead rat," Emilio said, trying to dismiss it, though his nose crinkled in disgust. "Or she's spilled something foul in there. Another one of her childish attempts to bother us."

"Perhaps she's making some kind of... art project," Erland added, his voice laced with disdain. "Something to shock us."

The three Gibson men, their faces contorted with a mixture of disgust and irritation, simultaneously kicked the door. A loud, splintering CRACK echoed through the silent hallway.

The door lurched inward, ripped from its frame.

The stench intensified, a suffocating wave that assaulted every sense. It was the smell of something truly, horribly, irretrievably dead.

The darkness of the suffocating room was finally exposed.