Page 9 of Gemini
“I was staying with a friend.”
“Can you let me in?”
She slipped over to the door and put in her keycard. I let her move inside first as I entered close behind her.
The apartment was dark, the shades closed all the way. Denise went over and pulled them aside.
The place was…messy. Not trashed. Or even dirty per se, just crowded with my sister’s things. Dresses and customs hung from a rack by one wall, more clothes hung on chairs and her sewing machine station was a mess of thread and cloth. Ribbons were strewn across the ground and hats were hanging off one lamp in the living room.
Denise turned on a light in the kitchen. “Maybe she’s in her room?”
We both glanced over at the closed door.
I moved first, creeping over and wrapping my hand around the handle. Cautiously, I turned it and opened the door.
The room was dark like the living room. I searched the wall and flipped on the switch.
The bedroom was empty. And, much like the living room, a mess. Only this time, I could tell something was off. Her normal clothes had been flung around the room as if in a hurry. Drawers were halfway open and one of her lamps was lying on its side on the floor.
I went to take a step further in when something crunched under my feet. I looked down and saw Trish’s lucky charm bracelet on the ground. The one she said got her the best tips at the Nectarine Lounge. She never went without it.
I picked it up and found the chain was broken.
I turned out of the room. My pulse was throbbing now in my ears as I met Denise in the kitchen.
“I think something has happened and we need to call the cops,” the words came out of my mouth as the panic started to rise in my throat.
Denise’s brows furrowed. “Call the cops? Lena, you sure she isn’t just out somewhere?”
I lifted the chain up and showed it to her. “I’m sure.”
I stood outside the hall across from the security office to my sister’s complex, back resting against the white and gray wall as I stared at nothing. The cops were talking with security inside, while Denise was talking to a neighbor a few feet away.
My head felt fuzzy as if a headache was brewing. Nausea danced in my stomach. I told the cops basically everything. How I worked at the medical examiner’s office and did an autopsy on my sister’s ex, how I was certain she was missing. I showed them the voice message and told them I couldn’t contact her otherwise. After they searched the apartment and questionedDenise, we headed down to the security office to review the camera feeds from last night.
Security fast-forwarded their recording until later in the evening. Everything was normal until they got to about two am. That’s when a group of men showed up, heads covered by the hoods of their jackets. The only way they could have gotten access to the building is if someone with the keycode let them in. They’d made their way around the back entrance and up the stairs and disappeared. Fifteen minutes later, they appeared again, only this time my sister was with them.
She didn’t struggle. Even as one man’s hand was wrapped around her arm tight. She stumbled a little as they got to the exit but swiftly they caught her and led her out, disappearing the way they came.
To the cops and security, it looked like she willingly left with them. After all, someone getting kidnapped would be struggling and screaming. Still, it was suspicious enough for them to make a report. And with her ex found dead, she was now part of the investigation.
The cops might think she had something to do with it. But I didn’t want to believe it, not for a second. I didn’t believe my sister capable of hurting anyone or being an accomplice to murder.
But those men…the ones who took her. I knew they were capable.
I watched as they took her and the first thing I noticed wasn’t the hoods or the dark clothes, but the patch on their jackets.
Twin snakes wrapped around a blade.
I hadn’t allowed myself to even think it until now, but I could no longer deny the ties that were forming.
The twins had something to do with this. That symbol was on them, it was seen on my sister’s ex, and now on these men’s jackets.
I shut my eyes and covered my face in my hands, trying really hard not to scream.
I thought they couldn’t hurt me more.
Why? Why the fuck would they do this? Was it to get back at me somehow? Was it some sadistic game?
