Runaway

Chapter 8

Chapter 8

A guy yanked the sack off my head. "Where's the money?" he asked but I couldn't see him. My vision was blurred. "What money?" I heard Sean ask, I could hear he was irritated. "The money you owe us." I could hear the impatience in the man's voice. "We don't owe you anything; you have the wrong the people." Sean tried to reason but it didn't get us anywhere. We were tied together and I could feel him freeing his hands from the rope. Therefore, I decided to play along.

"Let's make a deal, one of you tell us where our money is and we'll let you both go." Sean was silent for a couple of seconds and then spoke. "What about we don't tell you and you can just let us go." I laughed. "Yeah, he'll do that." I said sarcastically and he chuckled. "Do you honestly think I'll let you go, just like that?" the man was getting very angry and if he continued like this, one of us was going to get hurt. "I was hoping for it." The man took out his gun and pointed it to Sean's head. He just sat there smiling, didn't even flinch. "I know where it is." I blurted out. I knew Sean had my back. The guy smiled and lowered his gun. "Now that's a good girl." He said and walked around Sean to face me but before who could; Sean tripped the guy and freed his hands from the rope. The guy fell face first and Sean took the chair he was sitting on and broke it on the guy's head. There were two other men in the room and they ran our way. I had to admit that I was quite surprised to see the skills Sean had.

The one guy took a rope and started strangling him. The remaining one took hold of a phone and started calling for backup. I tried to get Sean's attention but he was too purple to even care about what was going on around him. I had to admit that purple was a good colour on him.

Sean managed to get the rope off his neck and strangled the guy. Three more men busted into the room and started attacking Sean. Suddenly there were gunshots and all the men fell to the floor, clutching their wounds. Including the guy Sean was strangling. He dropped the rope.

"Why do I always end up having to save you?" The sound of Kate's voice made me sigh in relief.

**

We were back at the precinct and I kept on staring at Sean. Trying to make him thank her for helping us but he refused. "Thank you for saving us back there." I said just to break the silence. "I could've handled it you know." He said and crossed his arms and I couldn't help but laugh. "Whatever Mr. EGO." She laughed and leaned against her desk. She knew how stubborn he was but it always amused her.

"Anyway, I'm taking her bowling tonight." She said and grabbed her purse. Sean's face lit up. "At Tony's?" she nodded. "At Tony's." we was now on his knees, practically begging her to take him with. "No, I'm not taking you with. I don't have the strength to look after you tonight." I laughed and stood up from the chair. "Bailey, you don't understand! They have the best fries there!" he was still on his knees and Kate agreed on his statement of the fries. "Fine, if you promise to pay for the game and fries, you're free to join." He hugged her and I laughed even harder. "Thank you!" he said and she pushed him away. "Don't make me taze you. Let's go."

**

We were at the bowling alley and luckily, it wasn't too busy. Sean instantly ran to the kitchen to order our fries and soon returned to where we were sitting. "You guys want anything to drink?" he asked and soon he was gone again. "What exactly are you and Sean?" Kate seemed to snap out of her thoughts and I waited for the question to sink in. "We are absolutely nothing. Just co-workers." She assured me but I didn't believe her. Somewhere there were feelings involved, they just hid it well. "Why don't I believe you?" Kate scoffed and ignored the question. She was denying her feelings for Sean and I made a mental note to ask him about his. He soon arrived with our drinks and we saw he was up first. He took off his shoes and slid over to the balls with his socks. He picked a heavy, blue one and rolled it perfectly, hitting seven pins over. He had style I had to admit. He threw his second ball but missed the remaining three pins. "You're up Kate!" he said and took a seat next to me. Kate took. "I talked to Kate earlier." He seemed puzzled. "About you two." He seemed to get it. The smile he wore faded when he let it sink in. "What did she say?" he asked but I didn't plan on telling him. "What do you feel?" he seemed a bit uncomfortable and leaned back in the chair. "It's a long story." He said and I decided to stay silent. I would ask them at a later stage. Kate was finished, with only two pins left and made her way to us. "Your turn."

I got up and got myself a lighter ball. I tried to remember how they did it and mimicked the moves. My first ball sadly went into one of the gutters and my second hit two pins. "Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it quickly." Kate said and smiled at me. I nodded and sat down next to her. We finished the game and they were right about the fries, it was heavenly. Kate ended up winning after Sean challenged her but he underestimated her skills. "Thank you, tonight was fun." I said and they both gave me a hug. "No problem." Sean said and looked at Kate. She quickly looked away, breaking the stare and pulled me towards the car. "Thanks again." She said and we got in the car. Sean stood alone on the dark sidewalk and waved us goodbye as we left. I smiled and looked at her. "What?" she said as she kept her eyes on the road. I shook my head and looked out the window. "Nothing, just thinking." She frowned and looked at me. The streetlights glistened against the window. "About?" she asked and returned her eyes to the road and I looked back at her. "You know what but there is something you didn't tell me." She sighed but stayed silent. "Sean said that there's a story behind it. What happened?" I asked and her expression seemed to soften. It seemed like she was preparing herself for opening a closed wound. She parked in front of a bar and switched off the engine.

"It happened five years ago. We were madly in love and my brother was just like you, always trying to put us together but we weren't ready. Or so we thought. We were both afraid to get hurt. Sean's parents passed away the year before and he was still trying to find himself. Every week he had a new girlfriend and I had to stand by and watch how he was throwing his life away. Eventually my brother got us together and we were happy. Sean and my brother were partners and best friends. It was a night in July. I remember it like it was yesterday. I was with Sean in Mexico for a week and he wanted to propose to me that night. That evening they got a call from the precinct saying that there was a murder and it was a serial killer they were trying to locate for years, a criminal mastermind that every officer that knew him or heard about him hated. He returned after years of silence. They wanted to get this guy so badly that Sean was willing to fly back to New York just to see to it that he got locked up but he thought of me and decided not to go. My brother said he would get him but we tried to stop him and tell him to let the other cops get him, he agreed and Sean took me on a sweet and romantic date. Just when he was about to pop the question, our phones rang... It was an officer, calling to tell us that the killer was in custody and that my brother was killed in the process. He went behind our backs and thought he could get him, without his partner, nobody had his back. We were devastated and flew back here straight away. I remember finding my brother lying in the middle of the bar, dead on the floor. His eyes still open and filled with shock, filled with regret.. For about a week, we didn't say a word to each other. We didn't know what to say. We were both hurt and broken and it just killed him inside. I reminded Sean of him, so he pushed me away and I didn't stop him. For years, we were strangers, only getting in each other's way. Sean still believes until this day that it was his fault my brother was killed." I was speechless. I was so touched by the story and a tear rolled down her cheek. "Wait, a bar?" I asked and she nodded, looking up and taking in the view of the bar we were parked at. It was the same bar. I couldn't believe that she was okay with being there. If I had to stand in front of my house again, I'd freak out.

"We tried to stay out of each other's way, that was until you came along." She said and smiled at me. "We didn't know that we still had feelings for each other, you showed us that we did and that we were, I don't know, after all these years, meant for each other." I felt happy. I was happy that I made a difference and that I wasn't a nobody and that I meant something to someone. We left the parking lot and went home. The road there, silent but comfortable. Kate also felt so much better for finally sharing it with someone.