Amber Alert [Published - Sample only]

Chapter 1 - "I'm sorry, I'm not Kelly."

The sunlight penetrated through the small breaks in my curtains. I closed my eyes tightly, fighting to go back to sleep, but the light had beaten me once again. I was awake, and I knew there was no chance I'd fall asleep again, at least until tonight. I silently wished that I could sleep late like my brother, but then again I didn't want to sleep until noon either. I sighed as I got up and rushed through my daily routine of getting dressed in a pair of shorts and a T-shirt before pulling my hair back into a tight ponytail.

I had to pass time until it was time to meet my boyfriend, Andy. He had come back from Germany last night, and I had returned from Florida to start school next week. He was getting over jet lag, so I wasn't going to be able to see him until after lunch. The wait was going to kill me though, I was so impatient. There wasn't much to distract me except the television, but after about an hour of me flipping through channels, I realized that I was just mindlessly staring at the television without really watching the show. I needed someone else to be up, maybe then I could make the few hours between meeting Andy fly by. Unfortunately, my brother was the only person available to fill the need for human interaction and he refused to get up unless I forced him to. 

It only left me with one choice; to wake him up. I turned up the volume on the television as high as it would go and waited.

I heard my brother's thundering footsteps, clearly angered that I had awoken him with the volume of the television. They echoed upstairsed until I finally heard Kendall's footsteps coming toward me. I was sitting on the couch, a book from the table next to me propped in my hands, when Kendall walked in with an angry gleam in his eye and turned down the music.

"Nice try, Anna, but it didn't work seven years ago and it doesn't work now. You hate reading, and that's a dictionary!" he said yanking the dictionary from my hands and plopping down on the couch beside me.

Kendall laughed at my stupidity, but I didn't mind. I had grown up slightly different, and I knew I stood out even if it wasn't always for a good reason. I had learned to accept it and not let it bother me.

Kendall changed the channel as a warning blarred through the speakers. A loud, annoying buzzing sound radiated from the  speakers before a newscaster started to speak.

"An Amber Alert as been issued for Jennifer Hastings from North Carolina. She is sixteen years old and was taken two weeks ago." The girl's photo flashed on the screen showing off her long wavy brown hair and tanned skin. "If you have any information please call the number below. She is suspected to be the most recent in a string of kidnapping of young females." Kendall changed the channel quickly to Phineas and Ferb.

He was attempting to shelter me as our parents had done for us. Why they did that, I wasn't sure. It would be better see the problems so we could be prepared for them, but instead they hid the real world from us.

"Why did it take so long for them to say that she was taken?" I asked Kendall making him groan. He hated these kinds of conversations, I'm not sure anyone did.

"There are certain criteria that it has to fit to issue an Amber Alert." Kendall said with a sigh, knowing I wouldn't stop asking until he answered my question. I was persistent especially when it came to curiousities

"Like what?"

"They have to be under eighteen, they have to be in danger of being harmed, there have to be witnesses to the abduction, and there has to be a description of the car or the person," he said flipping through channels, attempting to distract himself.

"Why that much?"

"To prevent "crying wolf" calls incase the person ran away and will eventually come back."