Abducted (Amber Alert Series Book 2) (12 page)

Chapter 22

I was radiating such anger that it ran the risk of becoming destructive. I watched Officer Rivers as he walked around the police station and produced a piece of paper from his pocket then handed it to another officer. They nodded to each other and nothing more as they passed. Then the officer stopped and turned to look at Rivers, clearly confused.

“She didn’t sign it,” the other officer stated.

“Then just go ask her to,” Officer Rivers said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

The new officer approached the office and caught my glare. He stopped momentarily before taking a deep breath and walking in.

“I’m sorry, I just have to have you sign the report.”

“I’m not signing it until I read it,” I stated forcefully.

“But you just helped him write it,” he stated in a confused tone.

“I saw him shred something and I want to make sure it wasn’t the real report,” I said as I snatched the piece of paper out of his hands.

“That’s a dangerous accusation, Audrey!”

“I don’t care,” I stated as I scanned the report.

“You don’t understand what you’re accusing!”

“I do, and I also know that I’m not the one being played. You are! Steve will run the first chance he gets!” I retorted as I continued to check the report.

All the facts were there except toward the end when he started to make it seem like Damien was keeping me from getting home and was holding me against my will. I grabbed a pen and wrote the same paragraph that I had done before then signed it and handed it to the officer. He looked a little less than pleased by my aggressive nature, but he took the paper and left. I watched him leave and head straight to a copier to make copies of my report before heading to the police chief’s office on the far wall near the entrance to the station.

I watched as he walked over to a couple of other officers and repeated my warning about Steve Bennett. They laughed and a few ridiculed me, until Damien was led past them. His head was held high, but then they started to deride him instead. Two armed officers led him down a set of stairs in the far corner of the building. I left the office and skirted around the police officers in the main room as well as the other two that took Damien down stairs. The room had one large holding cell and two smaller holding cells and a desk for an officer to sit at and watch the criminals, but they were too busy celebrating upstairs to be at the post.

“Damien,” I said as I approached his cell. He was lying on the cot with his hands over his eyes.

“Audrey, what are you doing down here? They said your parents had come to get you,” he explained as he jumped off the cot and slipped his hands through the bars to touch my face.

“I’ve been stuck in an office for what feels like days. They won’t tell me anything about you, and they don’t believe me about Steve.”

“Of course they don’t believe you. They think they have him covered, but they don’t. Don’t worry about me by the way, I’m doing fine. In my mind I’m back in that bed with you getting ready to wake up,” he said with a gentle smile, as he moved a few strands of hair away from my face.

“I wish we could’ve woken up like that. We would be half way to South Carolina by now,” I laughed lightly, knowing that’s not where he had been planning to travel.

“It just means a change of plans, Audrey. We’ll get out of this and get away from Steve before he can take you. We’ll just have to –“

“What are you doing down here?” Officer Rivers asked, interrupting whatever Damien had been about to say.

“I’m checking on him after police brutality,” I stated sourly, pointing at the bleeding mark on Damien’s forehead.

“Enough with your smart mouth. Get back to the office,” he ordered as he grabbed my arm and dragged me away.

“You’ll be fine, Audrey! This will all be sorted out soon,” Damien called as I was forced up the stairs.

Officer Rivers very roughly and publicly shoved me back into the office, slamming the door shut. I fell to the floor in a heap, hitting my head hard on the carpet and could hear him laughing as he walked off, but that laughter was cut short by a sudden roar of gunfire.

There were multiple shots in quick succession that barely covered the screams of the officers in the building. I was so terrified I couldn’t even think about moving from my spot. I didn’t know who was firing or what their goal was and right now I was probably the safest person in the building, except for Damien.

“Damien!” I said to myself. I had to help him. He was in a locked cell with no protection.

I silently berated myself for the stupidity of my actions as I made my way to the door. I opened it as silently as I could while remaining close to the floor and slowly made my way out of the office. The gunfire had ceased and there was a deadly silence in the air. There wasn’t any movement from what I could see, so I made my move. I ran out of the office and down the side stairs to find Damien, but when I got there he was missing from his cell. The door was ajar and he was missing. Where could he have gone? He would have had to pass me in order to get out of here, unless he got out and hid before escaping.

“What are you doing down here?” An officer asked from behind me. He glanced between the empty cell and me before grabbing me by the arm. “Damien Clark has escaped!” He called up to the other officers.

He pushed me up the stairs and into the crowd of police officers that were dusting off after their close call with a gunman. Some were searching the building, while others were leaving to look for Damien. I couldn’t believe that Damien had left without me. I had given up my chance to escape for him, but he had left without even looking for me.

As I was forced back into the main room, the first sentence that Damien had said to me when we arrived here repeated in my mind, “We’ll work this out just like your mom said.” What had my mom said, and how did he know what my mom had said? I had had a private phone call with her. There were no other phones in that house, so how did he know what my mom said? He couldn’t know, unless he recorded it.

I felt my eyes grow wide in realization. Damien had recorded the conversation with my mom and then tried to tell me what we had to do to escape by commenting on it. We had to part ways and escape on our own, but how was I supposed to know where to meet up with him? Where was I supposed to go?

“Where did Steve Bennett go?” An officer yelled out.

“I told you this would happen. Now you’ve put me and my family in danger,” I growled as I glared at each of the officers that had ridiculed me for my warning.

“You have worse things to worry about. Your boyfriend has been accused of some very serious crimes and ran out without you. I’m sure Steve will find him and dispose of him before coming back for you and your mother. He has to make sure that she comes first,” Officer Rivers whispered to me, but another officer overheard him and slammed him against the wall.

"You're working with Steve, just like your dad!" the officer yelled as he pulled his arm back and hit Officer Rivers in the face.

It started another police fight and gave me the chance I needed to get out of the police station. Although, the second I stepped out of the building a pair of hands grabbed me.

“Well, Audrey, it’s time you came with me,” Steve said, as he held his hand over my mouth and dragged me away.

Chapter 23

"Now it's time for some fun. Don’t you think so, Audrey?" I tried to push off, but he wasn’t letting go. I struggled against his hold as he continued to carry me off. There was just no way that he would make it out of here with all these cops around us. They would see and save me, unless they all worked with Steve. “Audrey, don’t struggle,” Steve growled, as we got further and further toward the back of the police station and into the woods.

I opened my mouth to scream, but couldn’t with his hold on it. So I opened it as wide as I could and bit down. I heard him slam his teeth together as he tried not to let out a scream, so I bit down harder, causing him to let go of me. My right foot dug into the dirt, sending me forward in a mad sprint and trying to escape from him, but I didn’t make it away fast enough. I felt hands grab my waist and pull me backwards until I slammed into his body. His hand covered my face and I got a cloth with a strong scent thrown in my face. I tried to hold my breath, but he shoved the cloth in my face and soon I felt myself start to fade.

“Enjoy your sleep, Audrey,” he said deeply, as I fought to stay awake.

Fear was pulsing through my veins as he dragged my limp body toward a dark truck. There was no energy left within me to fight as the outermost parts of my vision slowly faded to black and collapsed until I blacked out completely. The last thing I remember was the slam of a car door and then I felt and heard nothing.

It took a few tries to wake up, each time I was thrown back into the darkness. I could hear the car screeching to a halt, the next time a slam, and then I wasn’t even sure when I opened my eyes that I still wasn’t passed out because of how dark it was. I was suddenly blinded by light before being shoved into the darkness again. The lights came repeatedly until I figured out it was streetlights and rolled over so they weren’t in my eyes. I could make a faint outline of another person and saw flashes as we raced past the streetlights. I caught sight of long blonde hair and the gleam of a familiar wedding ring before I finally realized who it was.

“Mom?” I asked as I looked as the body.

I forced myself to move, but every time I moved my body screamed out in pain. I took in a sharp breath and tried to make my way over to her. Her hands were bound and she had a gag in her mouth, while I was free to move around the second I woke up. I could only imagine the fight she had put up in order to be bound and gagged in the back of the truck.

“Mom, can you hear me?” I asked, shaking her as vigorously as I could. She didn’t move for a while, and it terrified me.

“Mom, get up!” I called a little louder and shook harder until she started to stretch and wake up.

“Audrey?” she asked through a cracking voice.

“Mom, you’re okay.”

“No, we aren’t. We’re in real danger, Audrey. This is exactly why we moved from here. I knew if he ever got out this would happen,” she said sadly.

“I’m sorry for everything, Mom. For what I said when I left and how I reacted when I found out.”

“It’s understandable, but now we have to focus on how to escape before we get to that old run down house of his.”

“We can’t be going to the house,” I said, as I started to help Mom untie the rope from her hands.

“What do you mean?”

“It caught fire when Damien and I left. That house is gone. Steve meant to destroy it and kill me inside, but Damien saved me. The house is gone and I don’t know where else he would be going,” I stated.

“I don’t either. He had lived in that house his whole life,” My mother sighed once her hands were released and her hands instantly went to her head.

“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

“Yeah, I was injured in the struggle.”

“What struggle? How were you captured?”

“Well, captured is a strong word. We had arrived at the police station to see a young man being thrown in jail for conspiracy. I wasn’t surprised to find the son of Chief Rivers there, but while we were shuffling through the area to look for you because you ran off, your father and I got split up, and I was hit on the back of the head, quite swiftly and hard I might add,” she said as she rubbed the back of her head.

“Is Dad okay?”

“I think so, we have to get out of here before we get wherever he plans on taking us.”

“I know, but what do we do?”

“We seem to be in the bed of a pickup truck, so we can kick out the taillight and that should get rid of the holder in order to drop the tailgate. We can slide out undetected and hopefully have him continue driving for a long time,” my mother said as if she had thought of the plan before.

“Wow, Mom, that’s impressive.”

“I tried telling you that you had to be prepared for anything,” she said knowingly as she moved and let out a loud grunt as she hit out the taillight.

“Now what?” I asked curiously.

“Now you kick out the other taillight and we escape,” my mom said with a smile, as if this brought her back to her childhood. I couldn’t figure out why that would bring a smile to her face. Unless she was thinking about outsmarting Steve, and that made her happy.

“I can try,” I stuttered, as the vehicle came to a sudden and quick stop sending us crashing into the back of the cab of the truck.

The engine shut off and a door slammed before my mother and I could recover. There was the distinguishable sound of footsteps crunching on gravel then a forceful slam of the tailgate opening.

“One of you owes me a new taillight,” he said as he reached in and grabbed me by the ankles. He pulled me out and had me fall to the ground in a heap before lifting me up by my hair and directing me toward a dilapidated house. It was falling apart from years of neglect.

“Welcome home, Audrey. I think your mother and I will like it here after I fix it up a little bit.”