There are dirty blankets in the center. A pair of buckets in the corner seem to be the most likely source of the foul odor. I bite back the revulsion. Unnerving black stains draw sharp contrasts against the grayish stone floor. The edges of the room are covered with a thick layer of dust, but at the far end, it’s been disturbed, like something large and heavy has been dragged across it. Somewhere to my left comes a steady dripping. I turn the light toward the sound, and it lands on a set of handcuffs nailed to the wall. I swallow. Next to the handcuffs is a riding whip and a pair of rusty pliers.

What the fuck?

But I know. Hazing. Here’s the proof. It’s like they took their cues from a bad horror movie.

I turn off the light and try to imagine what it would be like to be locked down here. Something scurries in the darkness. And I shiver. It’s involuntary, but now that it’s started, I feel my whole body shaking. The light from the slits around the kitchen door casts sharp shadows across the damp walls. My whole body is screaming at me to get out, run, but there’s nowhere to go.

I think of Jay’s secret. Of Tripp’s sycophantic smile. Of Michael’s smug arrogance. All future leaders. Corporate executives. Senators. Congressmen. The best and the brightest. And this is what they do to one another.

Above my head, the bass is pumping, people are dancing and shouting, clutching plastic cups with paper umbrellas, with this—this nightmare—the whole time festering beneath their feet. Would they have locked pledges up during a party? So they could shiver in the dark and listen longingly to everyone celebrating above like browbeaten prisoners on Alcatraz staring across the bay at the blazing city?

I am suddenly so angry I can’t breathe.

Fury is a wild beast caught in a trap biting its own limbs to get free. I can’t afford to give in to that instinct now, so instead I settle for rage.

I will take every one of these fuckers down, I think, as I flip the flashlight back on. I will leak this to every journalist I know so the world sees what they’ve done, and the school has no choice but to expel them all. They’ll never get hired to Dad’s law firm or whatever cushy job they have lined up for their future. There will be no house with the three-car garage, pretty spouse, and kids in private school. I’m standing in the shadow of the jagged steps, snapping photos, even though they won’t turn out in this light.

I’m still fuming at the tattered blankets when my phone rings.

“Marley?”