Hiding Within The Betrayal

Chapter One: Hidden by the wallpaper

"Are you sure he's here?" The burly bloke scoffed in a belittling manner, his ignorant words were directed straight at me. His beefy arms were tensed behind his back as he guarded the door like some kind of unnerving bouncer at a nightclub.  Lingering on me were his hooded brown eyes. I hadn't even stepped up onto the platform of the property and here was Mr Big Shot acting like I was a nobody, just lurking around the scene aimlessly. Swaying side to side irrationally was clearly meant to make me feel uneasy but I could see his game. He wasn't taking me seriously.

Sonorously he didn't know who he was talking to.

Rolling back my tongue, trying hard not to come out with something as unprofessional as I deeply wanted to say, I ignored the false pretenses riding his tiny brain.

"Yes. I am certain. Thank you."

I intended to go by him, my eyes fixed on his callous expression. He didn't even move out of my way, stood directly where I needed to be so I had to edge by him just to get to the door handle. I reached out to open it but before my fingertips so much as traced it, I heard a sly comment slip through his wiry mustache, "She doesn't know shit"

I turned back around, to him. How dare he?

Other than the dick, there were two officers outside the property, they were by the front gate and were a lot more polite to me than he was, I simply flashed them my badge and they let me straight through. Both aware of who I was.

As I turned back to him, I caught a glimpse of them from over his shoulder. From the look on their faces, it was clear to me that they had both overhead the shallow remark. Eyes like the body of a puffer fish. All inflated and tense. Now was the time to really give them a scene...

"Excuse me?" I politely queered, quite sarcastically just to see how he would react.

He shrugged, not so much as giving me a meager response.

"Oi, Asshole," I raised my voice allowing my piercing tone to make me seem a little bit more intimidating. He hadn't expected it, was funny to see the shock in his eyes. I pushed out my chest and allowed my heels to make me that bit taller, my face up in his or as close as I could get anyway. He must have been at least six foot four, with heels I was only pushing six. Gruffly, "I think I've been doing my job long enough to know when I'm right, so why don't you shut your face and let the professionals do their work alright?"

Stunned, he briefly turned to the officers for some backup, unfortunately for him, they were clearly on my side. The female officer went as far to let out a chuckle which was met with a gentle nudge by her colleague causing her to correct herself.

He stared at me brazenly.  He hadn't heard the officer chuckle but he hadn't thought up a come back either. I smiled knowing he had no choice but to back down, "That's what I thought. When I find Matteo, I'll be sure to let you know how wrong you were to judge me."

Matteo Fisher was a young boy with a shaggy blonde bowl cut, he was the son of recently separated parents who couldn't afford a divorce.

He had been missing for twelve days.

Last weekend, out of office hours, I was at home by the TV when I received a phone call from my personal assistant Tess.  It was late in the evening but she insisted discussing the case. She told me how the company who took it on originally had gotten a week in and were struggling to make ends meet. They couldn't piece together enough evidence to so much as find out who took the boy let alone the motive for doing so. This young little six year old whose parents were very much at war with one another and yet both had no reason to take him, to kidnap him.