Wrong Place, Right time.

XXXXI

      "Drive in movie? Those still exist?" I ask raising my eyebrow.

"Yeah! Not many people come in the winter so they always give great deals to those who do, plus they've been able to sync the movie audio with a empty radio frequency, so we can hear it without having to get cold by rolling down the windows." He says.

"Seems innovative." I say with a small smile.

"Definitely innovative." He confirms.

He starts humming to the Christmas music playing in the car. I feel a vibration in my pocket before I pull out my phone.

My face goes hot and my breath catches in my throat when I read the first line of the email I just received.

My stomach drops when I open the email and see that it's legit.

Teal,

Yes, I am Blake's sister.
Thank you so much for reaching out. Truth is, I haven't been in touch with my family for a much different reason.
Yes, I was very upset with my brother, and for a while didn't want anything to do with him. Then I heard he turned his life around and how sorry he was. He's not perfect, but he's my little brother and nothing can ever change that.
I've wanted to reach out for years now, but after the whole incident, I confronted some of the people the girl, Eliza, was associated with. I ended up getting myself into more trouble than I had realized.
For my families safety, I had to keep minimal contact with them. The people who I confronted were bad people and I was put into witness protection and even had to change my name.
This is the only social media I have under my real name so that the people don't suspect that I changed my name. I miss my family more than anything.
I just don't know how to get out of this situation.
If it's not too much to ask, do you mind telling me how my family is doing? Thanks.

-Hope.

My mind reels as I read the message. Witness protection?

How bad was Eliza? Who was she hanging out with that's so bad witness protection had to get involved?

Wouldn't Blake know weather or not his sister was in witness protection since he's in the FBI? What the hell is happening?

Suddenly, the movie isn't a priority. Honestly when I reached out to her, I didn't think I would get any kind of response.

I wonder if I can get her to come to Christmas dinner... how can I work around the witness protection program?

I look over at Blake before I carefully go over how I'm going to approach this situation.

"Hey Blake. This whole... bodyguard thing. Is it a fairly new program?" I ask him.

He raises his eyebrow "Yeah, I think it was created about a year after I became an agent." He says.

"Why?"

"Could people in witness protection come out of witness protection and be assigned an agent?" I ask.

He shrugs "Depends on the case. In your case, the criminal is a highly wanted one that is classified as highly dangerous. Witness protection wouldn't be as effective for your case, therefore you were assigned a different form of protection. Me." He says.

"So if someone where to get mixed up with a bad group of people, but they weren't high priority criminals... they would just get put into witness protection?" I ask.

He nods "Correct. If the criminals have a past of violence and if they are smart enough to know the system, more extreme measures are put into place." He says.