Anything For Rachel

Chapter Thirty One.

            Pain, torment, anguish, misery, torture, helpless, paralyzed, debilitated, terrified, numb; they're all words that are supposed to describe how I was feeling when I saw Pedro walk through the door without Rose at his side, but yet all of them fall short of grasping the exact emotion that converged on me in that instant. My skin crawled with spiking chills over every inch of me and my heart felt like it had departed completely from my body as my eyes met with Pedro's, both of them filled with hot tears. I knew it without even having to think it. Not seeing her, but him being here, meant she was gone.

Taken.

My only daughter. My beautiful, smart, innocent, sweet little girl. It was all coming full circle, my life repeating itself in hers. I hadn't been much older the day I'd been ripped away from my life, and the indescribable pain that overtook my body in this moment, I realized, was probably the same pain my mother felt. The worry, the nausea, the shaking and chill that can't be warmed away.

I could hear everyone else crying too, and I vaguely felt Octavia's strong grasp around me where we were sprawled on the floor. Calvin's screams were the only things that seemed to cut through the fog I felt I could almost physically see moving towards me, ready to take me over and pull me into the darkness of a depression that couldn't be remedied by anything but my daughter's hand in mine, her smiling face peering up at me.

"Where is she?" I choked out, staring down at the floor.

Pedro cried harder, making my pain even worse. "Rachel, I'm so sorry." He told me through his tears. I couldn't look up at him for fear that I would manage to feel lower than I already did. "Everything was fine." He muttered. "She was laughing about something that Prince had done earlier, and I was watching her while she walked across the fresh snow..." His voice was heavy and I could picture her in my mind. She loved the snow, and she always wanted to walk in the untouched snow so that she could see her trail of footprints behind her. "They came out of nowhere, three of them, and I was fighting them off, and I managed to kill one, but the other two disappeared. I followed the scent as far as I could find it, but I couldn't find her...I looked everywhere..."

I heard footfall on the hardwood floors and I glanced up through my drenched eyelashes and my eyes burned slightly at the light, as Patrick walked quickly to Pedro, putting his arms around his neck and kissing his cheek. "I'm sure you did your best." He assured him. "We're going to get her back." He said and Pedro crumpled into his arms, his blue suit a mess and he cried loudly into Patrick's neck while Patrick held him and rubbed his back.

I let out another wailing cry when I saw the little puppy come into the room from the porch. Rose's little Prince. He still had a bright pink ribbon tied around his neck that I'm positive she had insisted on doing. His big brown eyes looked warily around the room and then he padded his furry little paws right over to me and nudged me with his little wet nose.

Logan was suddenly beside me too, picking Prince up carefully and cradling him to his chest while he cried, rocking back and forth. "What do we do?" He asked as helplessly as I felt. "She's got to be so scared."

More sick crying convulsions ripped through me and I looked up to the bed where Calvin was thrashing back and forth, his eyes squeezed shut but tears streaming both of his cheeks.

I found the strength to wobble to my feet and go to his side. "Calvin," I whispered because that's the loudest my voice would allow. "Help." I cried. "Where is she? Are they going to...?" I couldn't finish the question.

"No!" He shouted, and Pedro was behind me, his hands on my shoulder.

"How long has he been like this?" He sniffled.