Torn Apart

Prologue

Dedicated to @neverlandbeauty24 for the AMAZING trailer!(on the right) Thanks a million!

It was a warm drizzly afternoon on the day Lilly's parents were murdered.

Lilly was sitting on the floor of her bedroom, softly humming a children's tune as she pasted yet another picture into her scrapbook. She was a girl of eight years, with auburn colored hair and striking green eyes. She was far too skinny for a girl her age, but with a very pretty smile that was contagious to all who saw it.

The picture depicted a scene from the previous year at the beach. Her Dad was laughing manically as her mom mock-strangled him. Lilly was sitting on her knees in the sand in front of them both, smiling prettily for the camera. Her hair was tangled and dripping wet from the ocean water. The top piece of her swim-suit was crumpled at the bottom, and the strap was straying down her left shoulder.

The little girl glued the picture down clumsily, missing the majority of the paper with her unsteady hands. Pulling back, she grinned at her collage of family pictures, which seemed to be growing at a rapid pace.

One picture showed her sitting on her dad's lap in the kitchen, his arms wrapped lovingly around her; another, her mom pressing a kiss to her forehead, Lilly sticking her tongue out in disgust; her uncle Henry with cotton candy glued to his upper lip, pretending it was a pink mustache and trying to kiss her. In the center of the mass of neatly arranged photos, lay a picture of the entire family at a gathering. The family on her Mom's side wasn't all that big, with only four cousins, and three aunts and uncles; but they were the only ones who accepted Lilly in the family. She had never met her Dad's family; nobody had ever spoke of them.

Downstairs, she heard the doorbell ring. She coolly ignored it; her parents would go see who it was. She knew her parents were downstairs, there was no point rushing downstairs when she would just turn back around and run to her room anyway. The bell rang again; her Mom yelled.

"Hold on! I'm coming!" The sound of whatever craft she was working on clattered on the table. The door opened, and then closed again, murmuring.

Lilly bolted up from the floor, pressing her ear against the door. Normally, she wouldn't eavesdrop, she was above that. Somehow though, this calling felt different. Wrong.

"He has nothing to do with this anymore. Leave him out of it," was her mom scared? What was happening?

"Wrong, you're all wrong. And now you will pay for your lies and deception," a shot rang out. The sound reverberated throughout the house, making Lilly ram her hands to her ears. The sound was almost unfamiliar, and surreal to her young ears.

It was a gunshot.

Lilly sank to her knees on the floor, trembling violently, still unable to remove her ear from the solid door. There were no more sounds coming from downstairs or, at all even. There were no singing birds outside, any cars on the street rumbling by as they usually did. It was dead silent; dead, being the crude pun.

The sound of things clanking around in the kitchen broke the silence.

"Goodwin. What have you done?!" Her Dad ran into the kitchen hurriedly. "Where's Karen?"

"You shouldn't have poked your nose into where it didn't belong." He didn't sound angry, or even sad, but a serious calm.

"What did you do to my family? Where's Lilly?" Lilly startled when her name was mentioned. "Where's my daughter?"

"I did what had to be done. I am making amends for your mistakes." Another shot cracked deafeningly to the young girl's already mute ears. Silence.

Tears flowed down Lilly’s cheeks. What was going on? She was confused, but she was lucid enough to know that there was an angry man with a gun in the house. Heavy thuds sounded on the wooden steps, like he was wearing steel-toed boots. He was coming up the stairs.

To the bed, she had to hide under the bed. Frantically, she crumpled to her knees to scoot under the bed, but was blocked by several stacks of books and clothing that she had neglected to put away properly. Somewhere else then, and quickly.

In the spur of the moment she shut herself in the closet, burying herself under a hoard of clothes and stuffed animals. Her breathing was painfully labored in her chest, terrified beyond comprehension.

The door slowly creaked open.

So this is the prologue to my novel (obviously). If you liked it, don't forget to hit that Vote button! Please, read on, more excitement awaits you!