Chapter 3 - Beneath the AltarThat brings the night back to its fractured, terrifying present.
Standing in the dim service alcove behind St. Gabriel’s Chapel, Evelyn clutched brass tag seventeen in her pocket.
The heavy chapel doors had swung open moments earlier, revealing Walter Pike and two armed guards inspecting the altar candles. Evelyn had managed to blend into the shadows, pretending to check the radiator valves until they finally retreated back out into the storm.
Now, she was alone again.
She dropped to her knees beside the carved oak heating grate, pressing her ear directly against the iron bars.
“Mr. Ashford?” she whispered into the dark metal.
A ragged, agonizingly slow breath answered her from the blackness below.
“Evelyn...”
“I’m here,” she said, her voice shaking despite her best efforts to stay calm. “Tell me what to do. How do I get you out?”
“The lever,” Gabriel croaked, his voice barely audible over the sound of rushing water beneath the floor. “In the alcove... behind the second pillar... pull it down. It unlocks the storm shelter hatch.”
Evelyn sprang to her feet, her heart hammering against her ribs. She rushed to the second marble pillar in the side chapel, running her hands frantically along the damp stone panels until her fingers brushed against a hidden iron lever covered in years of dust and cobwebs.
She grabbed it with both hands and threw her weight downward.
With a loud, metallic clank that echoed like a gunshot through the empty chapel, the stone floor beneath the altar groaned, shifted, and slowly slid open.
A plume of damp, icy air rushed up from the depths, carrying the heavy scent of river water, rust, and iron.
Evelyn grabbed a heavy flashlight from her service cart, dropped to her stomach, and aimed the beam down into the dark abyss.
There, standing waist-deep in murky, rising water at the bottom of a steep concrete ladder, was Gabriel Ashford.
His dark suit was ruined, covered in mud and grease. His face was pale, bruised along the jaw, and a deep laceration bled sluggishly across his forehead. But his dark eyes burned with an intense, unmistakable fire.
He looked up at her, coughing violently, and then offered a grim, exhausted smile.
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“Took you long enough, Mrs. Carter,” Gabriel rasped.
Evelyn didn't hesitate. She threw the heavy ladder bracket down into the pit, anchored it with her own weight, and yelled, “Grab the rung, Mr. Ashford! We’re getting you out before your family finishes your funeral upstairs!”
