No Heroes Allowed (student/teacher)

Chapter 14 - Have Faith In Me

“Who are you and why are you doing this?”

He laughed again and I heard Carly whimper. Stay strong baby-girl. I’m coming for you. “Because I can.”

“You’re one sick, evil person.”

“You better hurry, forty minutes left.” With that, he hung up again.

“A Butterflies Journey; what the hell does this have to do with anything?” I asked myself aloud. I opened the book back to the page and studied the underlined words. Some were underlined twice. I wrote down the letters with the pencil I found and thought hard. What word had H, C, R, C, U, and H?

A light bulb went off in my head. Church! Church had all those letters! That’s where she is! Which church though? There were three just in this city! I had thirty minutes to check all the churches! I ran out of the library and into Zack’s jeep. I pressed Zack’s number and waited. He answered on the first ring.

“Alex, where are you? What happened? Are you okay?”

“Zack, I’m fine. Listen, did you call Lewis?”

“Yes, now tell me what the fuck is going on!”

I sighed. “Someone’s got Carly. He has me doing these stupid quests to try and find her. I think this is it though. Zack, I think she’s at a church.”

“Which one? There’s like, five here!”

“That’s what I need to figure out. I have less than thirty minutes to find out or she’s dead Zack.”

“Fuck,” he muttered. “Lewis said he trust you to get her out alive. He’s tracing all calls you receive and is tracking your GPS on your phone. Alex, be careful. I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“I will Zack, I will. I love you,” I whispered.

“I love you too baby,” he said and hung up. I wiped the tear away and went into the first church. After a search for maybe five minutes, the place turned up empty. As pulling out of the parking lot, I saw someone tailing me. They flashed me their lights. They were FBI, with me. I sighed and sped to the next church.

When I left that one, my heart was racing. No one was in there. The next one had to be it. The clock struck eight-thirty. I had to find her in five minutes. Walking into that church, I was sure it was this one. The candles burned up ahead and people scattered around were praying. I walked down the aisle and all the way to the wooden door I knew would lead downstairs.

The steps creaked with each step I took closer. I heard whimpering and water drops. I raised my gun and walked towards the door. I opened it fast and stepped through. “FBI!”

The man turned around and looked at me. The lighting was bad, as the candle burned in the corner. Carly sat in the middle of the room with tape around her mouth and her hands and feet tied up. She looked at me and screamed.  I saw her eyes widen.

He stepped closer to the light but still shed his face. “Put the gun down,” he ordered. “Now.” He raised a black, small gun to Carly’s head. She whimpered and begged me with her eyes to help.

I held up my hands and slowly dropped the gun. “Okay, my gun is out of reach,” I stated after I kicked it away.

The man stepped forward and pointed his gun to me. “Good, I see you figured out the clues. You are smart Alexandra.”

I gasped. “Ian, why are you doing this?”

He looked at me like I was stupid. “I hate this bitch. She is so fucking annoying. Do you know what it’s like to talk to her? I just wanted to ring her neck.”

“Why were you dating her then?” I whispered.

He laughed again. “So I could get close to her and plan.”

“The FBI can give you money, anything you want. Just let her go.” I pleaded and looked at Carly. Ian stepped closer.

“No, you and this bitch will both die. You were just so easy to lure. It was like baiting a fish, only you were stupid and actually took the bait.”

“Please,” I whispered.  He smiled. It looked terrifying. He raised the gun again and pointed it at me. My internal clock ticked down and I knew the agent, with back-up would be in here in about a minute.

Everything flashed before my eyes. The gun he was holding went off. I gasped and fell to the floor as SWAT and FBI agents flooded the small room. Ian was shot, once, twice, before he fell to the ground. Someone untied Carly and she ran to me. I closed my eyes as the blood poured on the ground. Someone screamed for Zack to come over to me. My stomach was numb, the gun shot hitting right above my belly button.

I felt my head being lifted. I opened my eyes a little. Zack was crying, tears running down his face. “Alex baby, the medics are on their way. Come on, keep your eyes open! Alex! No!” He screamed as everything went black.