Running

Chapter 1

~ Hours before ~

Gracie's morning began like any other.

Her pager going off in the middle of the night.

She groggily sat up and stretched in hopes of getting more awake as she grabbed the offending thing off her nightstand and checked the number. Soon after, she stood up, still feeling half-dead, grabbed her phone, and quickly dialed the number.

As the soft ringing echoed in her dimly lit room, she changed into more appropriate clothes. I don't think Captain Allen would appreciate me showing up to a case in my pajamas. She entertained the idea, amused, for a minute before she became serious. Right. 3:00 a.m., pager going off. I have a job to do. They usually didn't contact her at that unholy hour unless it was a life or death kind of important. She wondered what she'd be getting into.

Just as she'd finished pulling her hair up into a somewhat decent ponytail, a familiar voice resonated through her phone's speaker.

"Good Morning, Gracie."

"Morning, Graham."

"Sorry to wake you up so early, but you know I wouldn't call unless it was an emergency."

"Don't worry about it, I was awake anyway." she lied through a muffled yawn "What's up?"

Graham made a tsk sound but otherwise said nothing about the obvious lie. "The short version? A father has his daughter hostage; he's threatening to throw both of them off the top floor if he doesn't get what he wants."

She inhaled sharply and tried to reign in her emotions as he told her the news. She absolutely despised when cases involved children.

"And what exactly is he demanding?"

"A getaway car so he can leave the country with his daughter. Apparently, he lost custody."

Never gonna happen.

Someone on the other end spoke to Graham, and Gracie could only hear the muffled sounds of the phone being pressed against his shirt. "I have to go, Grace. I'll send you the address. Get your butt here as quick as you can."

"Don't worry, I'm on my way." Gracie hung up and hurriedly finished getting ready, took her car keys, and locked her apartment on her way out, her mind already going through a million different scenarios where things could go wrong.

This is going to be a long day.

~

Gracie was in the South Hills Apartments' elevator, anxiously awaiting her stop at the penthouse.

Graham had explained the situation as soon as she arrived. Dana and Oliver Davis, divorced 5 months ago, had a brutal legal fight over the custody of their only daughter, Alice. Dana had gained Alice's custody, the court having decided that Oliver's decision to not continue his schizophrenia medication made him too unstable to have his child around.

These events set Oliver off, quite effectively proving the court's reasoning, causing him to break into his ex-wife's apartment, shoot the babysitter, and once he noticed Alice wouldn't cooperate and that he'd already attracted the neighbors' attention, he dragged the little girl with him to the big balcony and threatened to jump. As soon as they heard the shot, the neighbors had called the police. Gracie was sure that if Dana hadn't been out of town, they wouldn't be examining just one body that morning.

Gracie took a deep breath. Cases like these were nerve-wracking, especially if there were children involved. It made it hard not to think of cases that haunted her. Those that plagued her mind and kept her up at night because she was a second too late and everything went south.