❤ Stockholm Syndrome 🔫 | ✔

🖤 Chapter 15 🖤

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Dinner - the meal of the day where family members sit together at a table to eat and converse about different things that happened, whether during the day or over the course of their lives.

As I sit at the dining table with James's parents, I reminisce about the similar moments I had with my parents, younger brother and older sister. We'd laugh at different jokes my Dad would tell, and torment each other; sometimes we even got into food fights, but we definitely had to clean up the mess afterwards.

"Do you think we should start eating, dear?" Alfred's voice catches my ear and snaps me from my daze, as he speaks to his wife. "I'm really hungry," he says. And his stomach proves that he is with the low growl it gives.

"We have to wait on James," she replies, giving him a look.

Oh, yes. James. You must be wondering where the man is...

Well, he took a detour from the dining room. I ran behind him as he stalked Francis's steps to go into the wine cellar. Before I could have told him to stop, his mother grabbed my arm and motioned for us to head to the dining room.

I followed her, glancing over my shoulder at James, whose red tux I got a glimpse of before it disappeared into the wine cellar.

I sit impatiently at the table, my stomach growling ferociously the more I wait to start eating. I rub it to try and calm it down, not that it was a living, breathing soul, but because any longer and it might eat me from the inside out.

Looking around the room, I see that it's not that different from ours unless you disregard the colour of the room. The table is almost as long as ours but had more of a black to it than brown. There are red and purple ornaments lining the table on both sides from one end to the next, and red-and-purple checkered placemats underneath the red, ware plates set in front of each individual.

By now you should have guessed the colour of the room. If you were thinking red, give yourself a pat on the back. It is a crimson red with trims of lilac bordering the edges.

I get fed up of waiting for James. "If you'll excuse me," I say, standing up. "But I'd like to use the restroom."

"Oh," Diana says. "It's just on your right when you go up the stairs, darling. The stairs are just past the wine cellar."

"Thank you." I take my leave and head out of the dining room, but not to the restroom.

I turn into the opened door of the wine cellar and go down the stairs. At the bottom, I am greeted by dim lights, bright brown walls, and multiple red shelves housing different wines.

I pick up a bottle and read the label: Napa Valley Meritage Red Wine. This must really be expensive.

A thud around the corner of the shelf makes me put back the bottle, gently, and peer around the shelf. James is pulling someone by their ankles into a dark corner of the cellar, a red substance smearing across the floor underneath them. At first, I think it is wine, but then I realize it is actually blood.

I gasp, shocked when I realize that Francis's body lies on the ground. His chest isn't moving at all and his eyes are still open. James looks in my direction and sees me with my hand over my mouth. His face grows pale, then flushes red with anger as he advances towards me.

I run towards the stairs to head back up, but he grabs my arm, pulling me back down. I yelp as his hold on me send pain running through my arm. "You saw nothing," he says, holding a knife to my stomach.

I nod frantically. Nervousness is all I feel, as well as the fear of James stabbing me to death.

I observe the red stain on the collar of his white shirt, his tux, and his face. His hands hold the same red-stained look, too.

For once, can something in this house not be red?

He notices that I am taking in his condition. "I think we should go." I nod in agreement.

We head upstairs and Alfred and Diana greet us with smiling faces. After they catch sight of James's bloody attire, they stare at us in worry and confusion.

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☆ MARDAIS ☆

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