Chenford Story ✔️

23

Tim's POV

"Wait what do you mean move in?!"
I was completely dumbfounded, Lucy was moving in with her parents?
Lucy's mother looks at me with false sympathy,
"Oh did she not tell you, Lucylu is moving in with us today?"
Mre Chen batter her eyelashes and pouted her lips at me in a way that showed she knew that I didn't know and that she enjoyed having the power.

Why didn't Lucy tell me?
Why did she even want to move in with her parents, they hadn't talked in years?
I needed to talk to her.

I left the hospital and drove to her apartment, then my apartment. I called Grey.
"Hey grey, Lucy's missing. I need a warrant to check the CCTV from the hospital."
"Granted"
Grey luckily granted the warrant almost immediately, usually you had to wait at least a day before someone was declared missing. We counted Lucy as missing after only a few hours.

Half the station was poured over the CCTV footage. The drops of blood as Lucy ripped the iv out of her arm, her leaving the hospital willingly. Getting on the bus.

Then the bus drove out of the cameras sight and Lucy was gone. She was crying but trying to hold back her tears. God I hated when she was sad.
No signs, no signals that she was being forced to leave. Just nothing.

Nothing that would lead up to find her, nothing that showed she was being forced, nothing that showed when she was coming back, if ever.

That thought was awful, that he would never see Lucy again.

The next day
Angela was looking through any card purchases Lucy had made, I was looking through any and all CCTV of the bus stops, seeing when Lucy got off the bus and where she went after.

Then I saw it, a rental car.
"Hey Ange, can you run a plate *******"
Angela ran the plate.
"Yeah, it was rented yesterday by a Clare Thompson..... Wait wasn't that one of Lucy's undercover identities?"
I ran to the room where we stored the undercover files, riffling through the files.
Shit. Everything about Clare Thompson was gone.
Lucy now had a passport, driver's licence, everything to start a new life as Clare. Was she going undercover again without telling anyone?
I looked at the file, Clare Thompson, infiltrated a child trafficking ring, everyone involved was arrested.
So she wasn't going undercover to finish anything. Everyone was still in jail.

I radioed Grey,
"7-adam-19, we suspect officer Lucy Chen is in rental car licence plate ******* can someone locate the car please"

Lucy's POV

The radio crackled to life, that was my licence plate. Shit. Already.
I thought I had at least a bit more time.
I pulled off the freeway at the next intersection, heading to another car rental place. I exchanged the cars, paying in cash this time. I would probably need a new car every few days. I couldn't keep one for too long.

I pulled into a motel. Renting a room. I would be staying in a lot of motels across America.
I just sat in the bathroom and sobbed. My stupid parents messing everything up. I was finally happy for once in my life and now I had to leave. I pressed the blade into my skin, leaving a small puddle of blood on the floor. I slashed again and again at my wrists, making splatters on the floor and walls. Housekeeping would think it was a murder scene.
The radio crackled again. It was Tim's voice.
"The car has been found at a rental place south east of here. We are now being helped by the local police force."
See now two police departments were after me. I felt like a criminal.

A few minutes later it spoke again. "We have located the new car be believe Lucy is in, it is parked at ****** motel just north of the car rental. Sending officers now"

Shit. That was fast. I started packing instantly. I had about five minutes.
I heard a knock on my door. "This is the police, open the door or we will break it down" great, escaping through the window it was. I slung the bag over my shoulder and hopped out the window. I really shouldn't have taken a room on the second floor. Slowly I shimmied down the guttering, I dropped about four meters. My shoulder was stinging. I hadn't looked at how badly the stitches were ripped yet.

I heard the sound of a breaking door above me. I breathed out and ran around the front of the building to my car. Luckily no one was around. I could have stolen a car, it would have got me further away before they found me again. But I was against that.
As much as I was running from the cops, I didn't want to become a criminal. Not unless absolutely necessary for my survival.

I got back on the road. Heading towards Phoenix again.

Tim's POV

I heard the radio again.
"Did you find her?"
"No, the room was empty, but there was a pool of blood on the floor and now her rental car is gone"
Shit. We were to late.
"It looked like she left in a hurry, the window is open and the guttering outside is dented, we believe that is how she left"
She knew we were coming?
How?!
Oh.....
I drove back to Lucy's apartment.
I remembered looking through her draws to find some shorts the other month when I saw a radio.
It was gone.
That was how she was one step ahead. She had a radio.
I went back to the station and sat alone in an interrogation room.
"Lucy? Please go to channel three"
No reply.
I didn't expect one.
"Hey Luce. Good job on the whole radio thing. I was wondering why you were always one step ahead. I don't know why you left, and I don't know if or when you will ever come back. I just...... I just hope your ok. I love you forever."
I heard a small crackle.
"I love you too Tim. Goodbye"
That was all she said. At least she was alive.
And I was right about her having a radio. That would make it infinitely more difficult for us to communicate about her whereabouts with other stations.

Lucy's POV

I chuckled. Maybe I had hoped that me having a radio would remain a secret for a bit longer but hey. I would keep it anyway. Just incase. Maybe Tim would take to me again. Maybe I would need to talk to him.
I just kept driving, hoping desperately that my parents hadn't told anyone about my secret.

I didn't even truly know if I could still be arrested for it. Probably not. I wasn't willing to risk it. I head read enough news articles about murders being solved after years to be wary. Even if I wasn't arrested I would loose my job. A murderer working as a police officer. My community would never respect my badge again. Not to mention my friends would hate me.

The guilt was eating at me. It hadn't been this bad since it happened. Even then I was more in shock. It wasn't like I was young and stupid. I knew what I was doing just letting him bleed out.

That image haunted me. His body slowly going pale and cold. A slowly expanding pool of blood covering the kitchen floor.

I don't understand how my parents cleaned that up. Obviously no one knew he was at our house, probably the only reason we got away with it.

I was at the next motel now. I pulled into the car park and turned off the car breathing out. Getting out I rented a room for the night. I would make it to Phoenix tomorrow. My roadtrip was beginning.
I opened out my maps, laying them out across the entire floor and drawing a line to all the places I wanted to visit. I gave myself a month to travel across America, back to LA and then up to Vancouver.
I sighed. Layed my head down on the bed. A spring dug into my back.
My head hit the pillow and I fell asleep.