The Test

Chapter Fourteen

Derek

It was a waiting game now, as they went through all the calls trying to find the right one that Layna was talking about. Every second felt like thousands as we sat in the meeting room. Humphrey and Justin had joined us, and we all sat in a tense silence waiting for the go-ahead to find Layna.

Allan rushed into the room, an excited look on his face. "We got it! We found the call and we traced it, and I've sent officers ahead of me. If you guys are ready, lets bounce."

We all got up at once, following Greene into the locker room where he distributed some bullet-proof vests to us and we loaded our weapons. We then got into his SUV and started to journey to the location of the accident.

It took about an hour to get to the site of the car accident. Since it was still dark, the officers on scene had set up lights around the perimeter to light up the area. As we got out of the vehicle, we spread out at the crime scene tape, waiting for Greene's instructions. As it wasn't our jurisdiction, and we were only consulting, we had to be respectful to the lead detective.

We had an officer come over to us, "Hello Detective. We've gone through the scene, and there isn't that much to go by. We found some blood on the road but other then that the car is clean, so we're going to tow it and clear up the area."

"Go ahead; we're just going to take a look around."

"That's fine with me. We've done the pictures and everything so you're good to go."

I took a look around the road. It was a small, two lane road with not a lot of traffic. It was surrounded by woods on either side. It was just on the outskirts of Toronto, in one of the more rural areas.

"She must have come out of the woods, and that's when Michael hit her. She was lucky because it doesn't seem like a very populated area," Amelia said.

I snorted, "Yeah, lucky is the word for it."

"Guys, I think I found something," Justin called from where he was looking around in the trees. "There's some broken branches over here."

I made my way over to where he was standing, and I could hear everyone following behind me.

As I looked through the small pathway, I noticed something hanging off one of the branches. Blowing softly in the light breeze was a piece of long, curly red hair.

Ignoring the sick feeling in my stomach I turned towards Greene, "Its her hair."

***
We made our way through the path in the trees, accompanied by the officer that had met us when we first showed up.

It took about fifteen minutes of walking, but finally we came up to an abandoned house. I glanced over at Greene, who was looking at the house with an unreadable expression on his face.

"How do you want to do this?" I asked him. It was important that we did this quickly and quietly so that we wouldn't tip Timothy off.

"Lets double up, and start at the main floor and move up. Stay quiet, unless we find them, and you have the upper hand. Our main priority is getting Layna out safe and sound. Understood?"

There was a chorus of quiet yeses, and then Greene opened the door and we split up. I partnered with Amelia and we slowly made our way to the room just off from the front door, our guns drawn. We were able to quickly clear the first floor before we made our way upstairs.

The second room we went to was the problem, because as soon as I opened the door I saw Layna lying asleep in the bed. Her face was swollen, and covered in bruises and it made me sick to my stomach to see her like that; I couldn't begin to imagine the pain that she had to be going through right now. Sitting next to her stroking her hair back from her face as she slept was Timothy. His back was to us, as he watched Layna sleep, so he didn't notice that we had entered the room.