Chapter 235: Where it all started

Behind Lewis, police officers were already stringing up tape and blocking off the street. Their flashing lights bounced off the snow and the shop windows, making everything feel colder and more unreal.My stomach tightened as I looked from the uniforms to Lewis’s face. "Is it safe for me to be here?" I asked softly. "What if someone recognizes me?"

Lewis didn’t hesitate. "Don’t worry. All the cameras are off."

That one sentence settled my nerves more than anything else could have. Lewis never brought me into danger carelessly. If he said it was safe, then he’d made sure it was safe.

Still, the wind cut through my coat, and I couldn’t stop myself from frowning at him. "You should’ve been inside," I scolded, pushing lightly at his arm. "It’s freezing."

"I just wanted to see you sooner," he said, and there was a softness in his smile that made my chest ache in a way I didn’t expect.

For a split second, I almost forgot the old version of him I used to fear. I used to think Lewis was terrifying too calm, too sharp, too unreadable.

Now, standing under falling snow with police lights behind him, he just looked... steady. Like a wall I could finally lean on.

I guided him toward the entrance. "Tell me what happened," I said. "Why are the police here?"

Lewis’s expression tightened. "I had some people stir up trouble at the shop," he explained. "The moment they heard we might call the police, they tried to pay us off. When money didn’t work, one of them tried to force things."

I stopped walking. My heart dropped. "Force their way in?"

"Yes." Lewis nodded once. "A group of thugs. They thought we’d fold. They didn’t expect we were prepared."

He spoke like he was describing something ordinary, but I could hear the tension underneath. Like he was still holding himself back from snapping.

"We had backup outside," he continued. "When the scuffle started, they ran for the underground tunnel."

My throat went dry.

I had already figured out where that tunnel was. I had been there before just not with a body. The thought made my palms damp.

"Did anyone get hurt?" I asked quickly. The anxiety climbed so fast it almost made me dizzy. I had wanted noise. I had wanted pressure.

I hadn’t wanted blood.

Lewis’s face darkened.

My stomach twisted. "Lewis... what happened?"

"They’re badly injured," he said, voice low. "The people I arranged were supposed to scare them off. But the moment they ran into the tunnel... the situation escalated."

He looked toward the shop like the building itself disgusted him. "They broke into a secret underground base. If that secret gets exposed, the whole shop is finished. That’s why the people hiding down there never planned to let anyone leave today."

My blood ran colder than the weather. "So they were going to "

Lewis cut in, and his voice hardened. "Yes."

Then he added, quieter, "Do you remember the guy who used to fix our cars? The one who always laughed too loudly and called everyone ’boss’?"

I nodded immediately. I remembered him. I had even added him on WhatsApp once. We’d chatted a few times. He was one of those people who felt bright without trying like sunshine that didn’t know it was shining.

"He stepped in to protect them," Lewis said. "He got hurt, but he’s alive."

Relief hit me first, then guilt right behind it.

He hadn’t asked to be caught in this.

I could picture his face too clearly. His messy optimism. The way he talked about his younger sister like she was his whole future. The way he fed stray cats even when he didn’t have enough for himself.

And now he’d been dragged into hell because hell was hiding under a repair shop.

Inside the shop, the police had taken control. Officers moved with clipped voices and quick steps, taking photos, checking corners, shining lights into places that shouldn’t have had shadows.

Barricades sat at odd angles. The floor was stained with dark red patches that made my throat tighten.

Seeing blood like that always did something to me. It didn’t just make me sick.

It made me remember.

Lewis had reached an agreement with Nelson and the officers in charge, because they let us through after a brief check. Even with permission, walking into the scene made my skin crawl.

I swallowed hard and forced myself to keep moving.

"If Lewis’s bodyguards were badly injured," I murmured, more to myself than anyone, "then this fight wasn’t small."

"Where’s Captain Tucker?" I asked, my voice thin.

"He’s in the basement," Lewis replied.

I stopped again. "What’s down there? What secret are we talking about?"

Lewis didn’t sugarcoat it. He just didn’t rush me either. "It’s hard to explain in a few words," he said. "You’ll understand when you see it."

We went down through the hidden passage.

As soon as we stepped into it, the air changed. The walls were rough and unfinished, like someone had thrown cement on them and walked away. The scent was worse than I remembered musty, rotten, and layered with something metallic that made my stomach flip.

Blood.

The last time I was here, I was a spirit. I couldn’t smell. I couldn’t gag. I couldn’t feel the full horror of it.

Now I could.

Lewis glanced at me immediately, his eyes scanning my face. "Are you alright?"

"I’m fine," I said, but my voice came out tight, like it had to squeeze through my throat.

He didn’t look convinced. "Is this the place you’ve been before?"

I nodded and pointed down one of the paths. "Yes. The room I went to... it’s that way."

My steps slowed without me meaning them to. The closer we got, the louder my heartbeat became. My palms were slick, and I hated that my body remembered even when I tried to act brave.

"Don’t worry," Lewis said gently, patting the back of my hand like he was anchoring me to the present.

Then we reached the room.

The door was already open.

The moment I stepped inside, my breath caught. In the center of the room was the stone bed empty now, but I still saw it the way it used to be.

Not empty.

"I saw my body lying here," I whispered. "This is the same room."

My vision blurred. The memory slammed into me voices in the dark, cold laughter, someone talking like my flesh was just something to cut and trade. I didn’t even realize I was shaking until Lewis’s hand tightened around mine.

Theo, wearing gloves, opened a nearby cabinet.

Inside were tools sharp, clean-looking, lined up like this was a normal workplace.

The tears came fast, humiliatingly fast.

"They must’ve..." I choked, forcing the words out anyway. "They must’ve dismembered me in this room."

Skinning me.

Saying it made bile rise in my throat. Julian stood stiff beside us, his eyes narrowed, fists clenched like he was holding his rage by the throat.

Lewis didn’t move. His gaze went cold and distant, like something inside him had locked into place.

"This place," I said, wiping my cheeks quickly because I refused to fall apart down here, "it has answers. It has to."

There were more rooms. I could feel it. Like a hallway of secrets waiting to be dragged into the light.

I took a shaky breath and looked at Lewis. "What’s in the other rooms?"

"You’ll find out," he said, and his tone told me he wasn’t saying it to tease me.

He was saying it because the truth was worse than my imagination.

I stepped into the next room and froze.

The earlier rooms looked crude and unfinished. This one didn’t.

This one was filled with medical equipment machines, monitors, stainless tools, an operating table. It looked cleaner, more organized, more intentional.

Like it had been used often.

My voice came out in a whisper. "Is this an operating room?"

Lewis nodded once. "And more than one procedure can happen at the same time."

My stomach churned. My mind tried to reject it, but the evidence was right in front of my eyes.

What kind of operations happened down here?

I followed the sound of voices into another section. Nelson stood by a door, his face stern and heavy, like he’d been carrying this truth for too long already.

He looked up when he saw me. "Mrs. Hale."

I swallowed. My mouth felt dry. "Captain Tucker," I asked quietly, "what is going on here?"

He stepped aside.

And the world tilted.

Inside the room were rows of cages.

Real cages.

Each one held a person boys and girls, teenagers, young adults. Most of them looked under twenty-five. They were separated like someone had sorted them by age like inventory.

Their hair was matted. Their faces were dirty. Their bodies were too thin. The smell hit me like a wall sweat, neglect, and fear that had been sweating through skin for months.

But their eyes were clean.

Wide.

Terrified.

They huddled together like animals that had forgotten what kindness looked like. In front of each cage were stone troughs, and the sight of it made my chest hurt.

They weren’t being kept like people.

They were being kept like livestock.

My mind flashed to the missing persons reports. The students. The kids people stopped searching for because the world always had new tragedies to replace old ones.

My voice broke. "Who are they?"

Nelson’s expression darkened even further. "Most are orphans," he said. "No families to claim them. Some were adopted. Others were taken."

My heart squeezed until it felt like pain.

I forced the words out, even though I didn’t want the answer. "They were raised for this... weren’t they?"

Nelson didn’t flinch. He finished my thought with a bluntness that made me feel sick.

"Yes," he said. "It’s an organ farm. The repair shop is a cover. Down here is an underground operation selling organs."

My legs felt weak.

"And it’s not just transplants," Nelson added, voice turning even colder. "It’s worse."

Then he guided me toward another room.

And whatever was inside it made my stomach churn before I even crossed the threshold.