That was louder than any of the previous, and it was a man’s groan. There was no doubt about it. Panic ran through me as I backed down, willing Dom to answer, but all I got was a ringing…and the far away ringtone of his phone muffled through the fucking walls.
“What the fuck?” Throwing all caution aside, I barged into the storage.
I switched on the lights and scanned the room. “Dom?” I made my way through the old furniture, gardening tools and boxes crammed inside, leaving the call going, following the chiming sound.
“Dom?!” I repeated, but it was obvious this room was empty, too. “Where the fuck are you, and what the fuck are you doing?”
I kept following the ringtone that became more than a muffled sound when I reached the back wall. I stared at it, my heart thrumming in my chest, and then I pressed my ear to it.
Suddenly, the ringing stopped. I glared at my phone, my finger ready to redial. The phone blared at me instead. “Jesus Christ!” Lina was calling again.
I ignored the call and tapped Dom’s number again. The ringtone came back as if from underwater, through the same fucking wall, but I heard it loud and clear. How the fuck was it coming from here?
I don’t mix business with pleasure. I have another room for that.
Fuck. Squinting at the mystery wall, I turned on the flashlight on my phone and pointed it at the ceiling and then the corners, testing what might be a crazy assumption; what if Dom, like he built the blue room, like Tino had the ceiling escape, did have a secret room built in for his red trips, too? That would explain the groans.
What if he had a man in there now, and he was too busy torturing him to answer his phone? Did I even want to know the answer to that question? Was I brave enough to go ahead and find out?
My stomach felt like ice. It was one thing to know what he did for a living, but seeing it for myself, happening right in front of me, was something else entirely. Something that could change the way I saw him forever.
Fuck, this was way worse than catching him having sex with someone else, so heart gutting that I kind of hoped he was just having it rough with some guy. God.
I should just listen to my sister’s advice and get out of here. I lowered the phone, the flashlight illuminating the floor. That was when I fucking saw it. The door to the secret room. It was on the floor, not buried covertly in the wall.
I didn’t need to see that.
My eyes darted between the storage door and the secret hatch, my heart begging me to just get out of here.
Bang!
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Another thought attacked me. What if Dom was the man groaning and banging that wall? What if an intruder was really in the villa and he got Dom?
“Oh my God.” I ran to the hatch without thinking. I tried to open it with all my strength, but it must have been locked from inside. I dashed to the old gardening tools and picked a shovel. Then I smashed the hardwood floor as hard as I could.
Once I’d made a hole big enough, I dangled my body down the hatchway, phone in my mouth to light the way, shovel in hand, my feet finding a navy ladder, grateful for all the hours I’d spent in the gym. Quickly, I climbed down and reached a dark, narrow hall that led to nothing but another ladder on the other side.
I climbed that one up, too, trying to call Dom again, but there was no reception down here. When I reached the top of the stairs, I followed the only path that was there.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Fuck. I jumped, stopping midway, another ominous door looming at the end of what felt like a fucking catacomb. I took a deep breath, my chest tight with fear and the stiff air in here. Phone in my mouth again, I held the shovel with both hands like a weapon and dragged my feet toward the door, eyes pinned to the padlock on it.
According to my calculations, whatever that door opened to, it was located right between the blue room and the storage. That explained why the sounds seemed to be coming from the walls. Dom took extreme measures to hide that room, though. I wondered how an intruder would get him trapped in there. It had to be someone who knew that room existed in the first place.
My assumption was incorrect. Dom couldn’t be trapped in here. Assuming the people who worked here knew about this room, they were allhispeople. There was no one in this house that would hold Domenico Lanza captive. Fuck, I should have minded my own business and left.
I shoved the phone halfway in my pocket, keeping the light, and wheeled back, my mind running in circles. Part of me was convinced I was making the right decision by going back to my bedroom. Another part was telling me to check anyway, just to make fucking sure.
This was the Mafia. Betrayals happened all the time. You’d hate yourself forever if you had a chance to save your husband and didn’t.
My fists squeezed around the shovel as I glanced back at the door over my shoulder. “FUCK ME!”
“Hello?”
I gasped at the stifled voice coming from the other side of the door. It wasn’t Dom’s, but it was so fucking familiar.