Page 43 of Born a Queen

Chapter Twenty-Four

The following day Raina felt energetic and ready to get shit done in her new home. She researched designers in Miami and found one who came highly recommended, Daniela Velazquez. When Raina called, the woman was upbeat and intrigued by the project, asking a ton of questions, some that Raina had answers to and some she didn’t.

They agreed to meet in person the next day, which left Raina to explore on her own for one more day.

Raina was eager to do the one thing she’d been dying to do since her phone conversation with Casey; explore the underground bunker. Casey had told her of her traumatic time in the bunker and though Raina was saddened for the other woman, she was also wildly curious. What was it like down there? Would there still be a body?

Casey’s bodyguard had been killed in the bunker and as far as Casey knew, he was still down there. After the mob war, the mansion had been largely abandoned except for a cursory clean-up, which explained some of the outdated furnishings.

Raina wore a pair of sweatpants and a heavy sweatshirt. It was a bit much for the warm Florida day, but she was going underground. She wanted her skin protected from dust and sharp edges. She made her way down to the pool area, stopping to take inventory of the pool deck. She loved the pool itself and would enjoy it even more once she updated the furniture.

She made her way into the pool house, looking around in awe. Though she’d had a taste of how the wealthy lived when she was in Venezuela, she’d grown up on a farm where luxury meant there was enough hot water for everyone to shower. These past two years, when she’d gone on the run, exploring the world, she’d decided to live on less rather than more, though she had a healthy bank account balance thanks to her lucrative forging contracts. She hadn’t wanted to draw attention to herself by throwing money around like it was water.

She touched a shelf piled high with fluffy grey towels, but when her fingers came away covered in dust, she realized the towels were supposed to be white. They hadn’t been cleaned in years. She’d have to ask the housekeeper to assess the pool viability situation. It was becoming clear through her explorations that many things on the estate were suffering disrepair.

When she arrived where Casey had described the location for the entrance of the bunker, it took Raina a few minutes to find it. She had to shove one of the shelves out of the way and pull up a trap door. Her side twinged its unhappiness at the weight of the door, but she ignored it.

Raina peered through the darkness of the hole, trying to see into the bunker below, but it was pitch black. She couldn't even see the bottom. She chewed on her lip for a moment, thinking, deliberating on what to do. The smart thing would be to leave, tell Mateo about the secret bunker and beg him to let her come back here with the ladder.

Of course, Raina wasn't going to do that. There was almost no chance Mateo would let her go down into that hole until his men had secured it completely. But she wanted to be the one to explore it, to discover this facet of her new home. Casey had practically dared her by telling Raina about it.

She pulled her phone out of her pocket, tapped the flashlight app and shone if into the dark hole. She was relieved when it illuminated the bottom of the bunker, though she wasn’t certain how far away it was.

After another moment of deliberation, she decided to go ahead with her original plan. She couldn't see a ladder or stairs to get down into the bunker and realized she would have to let herself drop. Before she could overthink it, she took hold of the ledge, turned around and slowly lowered herself into the hole.

Raina groaned as her stomach teetered on the edge with her legs in and her torso still on the outside. The pain from her gunshot wound flared and she grunted, pushing herself further back and allowing gravity to pull her body down.

She gripped the rough edge digging her fingers into the dirty concrete as she dangled above the floor that was somewhere below her at an unknown distance. She was going to have to let go. Because there was no chance of her being able to pull herself back up. Even if she wasn't injured, she still didn't have the upper body strength for it.

"This was a bad idea," she muttered to herself as she let go of the ledge and dropped into the dark hole with a yelp of fear.

It was somewhat anti-climactic as the ground wasn't really that far down. She hit the floor, her legs buckled and she fell over, banging her elbow on a wall.

"Ouch." She sat up and rubbed the offended area. She glared up at the hole above her, it was maybe six or seven feet high.

Raina fished her phone back out and held it up. The room flooded with light and she realized she was in a corridor. She got to her feet and dusted off her pants then moved cautiously through the tunnel. The floor was on a slant and getting steeper the further underground she went.

"This is the part where the serial killer, angry clown, Predator, alien stalks me into a dead end and murders me," she said, hoping that by saying it out loud she would be making the idea ironic thus negating the possibility of it actually happening.

Raina decided that she thought she was a lot braver than she actually was. Obviously she was brave or she never would have gotten into the underground bunker, but that was the extent of her bravery. She didn’t want to go into the bowels of whatever it was she was following, but at this point she felt invested. It was either continue forward or admit she failed.

Luckily, the corridor ended shortly after that, leading into a big room with no other exits. Unluckily, there was indeed still a dead body in the room, as Casey predicted there might be.

Raina moved hesitantly forward, toward the skeleton on the floor. She crouched next to it, hovering her light over top. It seemed well preserved, with the clothing still intact and the bones all in one spot. That meant scavengers hadn’t gotten into the underground bunker. There was no smell. She had been half expecting there to be the stench of death. She supposed that he probably did smell when he was decomposing, but now there were only bones.

This person had been Casey's bodyguard before Reyes had taken her from the house. This man had tried to kill Casey, having gone insane with psychotic love. He had died in the attempt and Casey had lived.

Ignoring the corpse, Raina explored the room, running her fingers down the walls, looking for an alternate escape route. There was none. It was becoming clear that this room was meant to be some kind of bolthole, not an actual way off the estate. Still, it might come in useful in the future.

Raina made her way back to the hole under the pool house, her shoulders slumping as she approached it. She'd really been hoping that there would be an alternate way out, because there was no chance she'd be able to reach the hole, let alone lift herself even if she was able to. She was going to have to call for help.

Mateo’s phone rang twice before he picked up. "Raina?" he asked sharply. "Where are you? Are you safe?"

She chewed her lip. “Have you read Alice in Wonderland?”

“Yes,” he growled. “Answer my question, are you alright?”

"I'm in the back yard," she said, stretching the truth. Technically she was under the back yard. "I could use some help getting back out of the rabbit hole."

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