Page 5 of Wanted

It wasKael.

In myquest to save my woman, I’d completely forgotten he was following behind me forthe past hour.He’d called me while Iwas enroute and offered to come with me.At first, I was hesitant, not wanting to endanger anyone else’s life,but I quickly realized I could definitely use his help.With the two of us, we would surely be ableto locate Sara quicker.Plus there wasextra muscle in case we came face to face with her captor.

Thesounds above us brought me back to reality.While Samuel was distracted by his own paranoia, we went to find Sara. Wesearched all of the rooms downstairs but to no avail. Obviously, we weren’t goingto check upstairs because he was up there, so we headed off to look for abasement door. I was living in my own horror film, so I prayed my realitymirrored the movies and she was down there somewhere. Once I located it, Itwisted the handle slowly, the door creaking as it brushed across the floor.

Fuck. I hope he can’t hear me. Not yet.

The onlylight we had to guide us was from my phone. Thankfully, it was bright enoughfor me to see in front of me, but not too bright to bring any unnecessaryattention. We took the stairs slowly, unaware if there were any missing orrotten ones in our path. Once we’d safely reached the bottom, I made quick workof searching the darkened room.

All Isaw were old broken pieces of furniture and piles of boxes, with God knew whatin them, littering every corner of the room.

As we wereabout to head back upstairs and venture to the floor where Samuel was, I heardthe faintest of sounds coming from somewhere nearby. I strained to hear, butthe sound of my beating heart deafened me. Taking a couple of deep breaths, Iwas able to calm my anxiety enough to hear it again.

Thesound flitted in the air all around me.

Where the hell is it coming from?

A faintwhimper.

Headingoff in the direction where I thought I heard the noise proved to be correct. AsI came closer, the light whimpers turned into quiet sobs.

It wasSara.

She wascrying.

Where the hell is she?My fingers glided over the roughwall, feeling for any kind of secret passage. Finally, I found a gap betweenthe panels. When I pushed, it gave way to a door to another room.

Shiningmy small light through the darkness, my heart picked up pace as I saw a body lyingon a bed not twenty feet in front of me.

I foundher.

It tookeverything in me not to shout at the top of my lungs, but I had to be quiet. Ineeded as much time as possible to devise a plan.

As Iwalked closer, I noticed immediately her hands and feet were chained to theold, dirty bed. Rage instantly pumped me up, preparing me to rip him apart withmy bare hands. My breaths, although controlled, were short and choppy, a painradiating through my tightly coiled chest.

Calm down. You’re no good to anyone if you can’t focuson anything but your fury.

Talkingto myself proved effective. For the time being, anyway. I took three more stepstoward her, and although I was already teetering on the edge, it wasn’t until Isaw her eyes that I started to unravel.

Her gazelocked with mine but she looked straight through me.

As if Iwasn’t even there.

My heartbroke.

~4~

Sara

Surely my eyes were playing tricks on me. I saw a man standingnear me, but it wasn’t Samuel. At least it didn’t look like him. The smallamount of light which shone from something in his hand wasn’t enough for me todetermine who was sharing the same space with me.

As he moved closer, the feel of the air changed. I sensed who itmight have been, but I didn’t allow my brain to go there.

The more he advanced, the more the energy bristled between us. Still,I didn’t acknowledge who it could have been, there in the dark, musty old room,hidden in the basement of some crappy house.

Hope was the only thing I had left, and if he wasn’t really therewith me, then what was the point? I would beg for the cold hands of despair tostrangle me. My mental status would have been zapped from me, hallucinationstaking over and making me as insane as the man who took me.

“Sara. Can you hear me?” the man whispered, continuing to advancetoward the bed, toward my chained-up body. His voice sounded like Alek’s, butstill I didn’t give in to the dream of being rescued.

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