The Missing: CHAPTER ONE: THE BEGINNING

I looked down at the blood dripping from his hands, the same hands that held mine. I felt my legs shake, I felt like jelly as I collapsed onto the wet cement.  Why didn’t he grab me?, I thought, why didn’t he help me up? I stared up at him as he looked at the dead body and gun, with his fingerprints stained onto the handle. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My love, standing over the dead body that I was looking for, his hands covered in blood dripping in time with my heart. I lay on the stinking ground unable to move. “Erin?” He spoke my name as he reach down to comfort me, I wanted to move away as his red hands came towards my shaking body but I couldn’t move all I could think about was the face of a killer lying over top of the face of the one who had been my one and only for so long now. I felt his hands touch my arms, I felt the missing girl’s blood roll down my arm. I couldn’t make sense of anything, did he kill her, why was he here, what happened I wanted to yell all of these things but I couldn’t make my body work. I managed to turn my head to face Mason as he stared at me worryingly, he didn’t look how I felt. You just killed that girl, I wanted to yell but my throat was dry so it came out as a shaking whisper. His eyes dropped and his hands fell off my now blood stained arm. He stood up like he had forgotten that he was late to a meeting and started to undo my belt. I made my arms move to stop him. His eyes shot to mine. I had never seen them so full of anger, they were a deep blue but as I looked now, they seemed like ice. I drew my hands back slowly so he could finish undoing my belt. I didn’t blink as he took out my gun from its holster, then he took my hand cuffs.

“What was her name?” he asked stuffing my gun and cuffs into his bag sitting next to the dead girl. I was dazed for a second that felt like a lifetime as I stared at the girls face eyes open staring into mine they were a deep chocolate brown but lifeless, I had seen it many times before but this time it was different it had happened by the hands of Mason, the one I trusted.

“umm” I stuttered before remembering the question “Jessica Smith, she was 15” I pulled my eyes away from hers and looked back at his, still as cold as ice. I wanted to ask so many questions but I knew it wasn’t the time. I sat up wearily, it felt like years not minuets since I had ran into the deserted warehouse to find the killer, but had I found him?

“I know you’re wondering what I’m doing and you might be confused, but we can’t talk here, you need to come with me before they send someone in after you and catch both of us” He was speaking low and I didn’t understand fully but I knew what he was talking about.

“What if I don’t want to go with you?” I tried to speak confidently but I was afraid so the words came out as a whisper.

“You don’t have a choice” he spoke unemotionally, like we hadn’t spent the last five years in each other’s arms, lip to lip and always hand in hand. His eyes drew slowly away from mine and towards the doorway I came through. His arm shot out to my hand and he pulled me swiftly off the ground, he pushed me in front of him as he broke put into a run, pushing me first through the ghostly warehouse. It was a horror movie scene as I looked back at the young girl lying in a pool of her own blood, spilling from the gunshot wound Mason, had inflicted. We ran towards and old dusty table, and as we drew closer I realised it concealed a roll up door. He let go of my hand and pushed the table to the side making a gap just big enough for us both to squeeze through one at a time. While Mason was making his way through the opening I heard voices behind the corner we just came from. I recognized Jim and Wayne, my two supervisors, shouting at each other. I heard footsteps growing closer, I didn’t know whether to turn and run with the love of my life or call out to my friends. Mason decided for me, he grabbed my arm and pulled me after him through the gap and out into a stinking alleyway. He didn’t stop running but increased as we turned the corner and I saw a new black 2010 Ford Falcon XR8 facing the opening to an abandoned street. The engine started as we got within 15 meters of the car. The windows were tinted so I couldn’t see who was in the driver’s seat. Who was Mason’s accomplice? Mason threw the back door open and shoved me roughly in to the other side the climbed in next to me. The man in the driver’s seat started yelling in a different language to Mason, I didn’t recognize him from any of Mason’s friend list stored in my head. Mason’s face grew angry and he started yelling back in the same language, I heard my name mentioned a few times, but I couldn’t understand what they were talking about. I knew that Mason’s family came from Brazil but he never spoke Portuguese around me so I assumed that he didn’t know the language. I was in Spain six months ago and the language both were speaking now sounded similar. The argument grew louder until the driver slammed his fist down on the dash. The car was silent; whatever had been said in the argument was finished for now. The sky started to darken as we drove breaking every speed limit. My eyes started to drag and I couldn’t keep them open for long. “Lay down” Mason said; he was started to remind me of his old self before this afternoon, “You need sleep”. I put my head on his lap snuggling up to his stomach for warmth. He wrapped his arms around my torso and warmth from his arm seeped through my thin uniform top. He started to play with my thick dark blonde hair before I fell asleep.