Jarek: December 25, 2015 9:45 a.m.
"God dammit!" my voice boomed into the chilly morning air as I violently jerked at the handcuffs that trapped me next to the charcoal grey Toyota corolla.
"Mother fucker!" I screamed, kicking Damien's car repeatedly. That son of a bitch was a cop. Did Alyssa know that? Was Alyssa undercover as well? Or was everyone made a fool of by the naive 21 year old?
That bitch wasn't even old enough to accompany a new driver as they drove on their permit. How the hell did he manage to fool the entire market?
With a burst of yet more anger at my situation, I ripped my hand backward, suddenly breaking the car door handle from it's place.
I smiled, shaking away the throbbing pain in my wrist, then studied the handcuffs and door handle still attached to me.
The sound of a rumbling engine caught my attention, bringing me to hurry inside my house. If its a cop then I needed to be ready for a fight. On the other hand, I was expecting a man I had been doing business with for years to be arriving soon. In fact, he was an hour late.
Focusing back on the task at hand, I pushed the sliding glass door open and stepped inside my house, hurrying to the back room without closing the door. I threw the torture room door open, quietly closing it behind me with my left hand so the handcuffs and door handle wouldn't slam into the wood and attract unwanted attention. I glanced around the room, trying to decide on what to use as a weapon. A gun would be most preferable as a cop would also have a gun. It would be hard to use a close combat weapon on the intruder if he was shooting at me.
So I targeted the last drawer on my metal cabinet, pulling it open and finding a simple revolver among needles and scissors. Why were they in this drawer? That's not how I had categorized them.
In a fit of anger, I slammed the drawer shut, mentally promising myself to reorganize the entire cabinet later.
Currently, I had a much more important task to attend to. I loaded the revolver and slipped back out into the hallway, slithering my way through the house so I could get a good look at who had arrived.
The red truck finally showed itself, pulling up to the back porch calmly, the bed of the truck carrying multiple dogs. Pure bred German Shepherds to be exact. It was easy to get your hands on animals. A lot easier than getting a human being. The consequences were worse as well. Chris, the man who had just arrived, had admitted it would have been a lot easier to grab mutts, though he swore pure bred shepherds had the best noses. He also mentioned they were a bit harder to train, though were loyal and brutes. Perfect for a hunt.
I had only used the dogs one other time in all the years I knew Chris and they came through for me. The kills may not have been clean but I never liked clean kills anyway. It made everything I had gone through worth it.
I lowered my revolver as I approached the back door, watching carefully to be sure no one had stolen Chris's car and dogs. I could never be too careful with how things were going now.
His tall figure rose from the driver's side of the car, rounding to the back of the truck before he rubbed the head of one the dogs.
I wanted to smile, though I couldn't help but be angry with him. He was an entire hour late.
Marching out the back door with a scowl plastered on my face, I slammed the glass door shut behind me, making my way to Chris. "Where the fuck have you been?" I spat.
Chris laughed, gathering the leashes of his dogs. "I wasn't told there was going to be cops all over the damn forest. I tried to call you to let you know I'd be late because I had to take a slight detour but you didn't answer." his eyes flickered to the handcuffs on my right wrist before a grin broke across his face. "Guess I know why you didn't. Looks like you found yourself a cop too, yeah?" he pulled a cigarette from his leather jacket, smoothing his dirty blonde hair back before placing the cancer stick between his lips.
I shook my head, grinding my teeth at the local law enforcement's involvement as well as the dirty nicotine he had between his teeth. He lit the end of the cigarette, blatantly disregarding my disgusted look.
After inhaling the suffocating smoke into his lungs and exhaled into my clean air, his eyes met mine again. "So we gonna hunt these girls today?" he snapped, a hint of impatience in his gruff voice.
I nodded, stepping forward to grab a few leashes. There were nine dogs total. I hated that number.
I jerked four of them from the bed of the truck, causing them to bark and jump onto the ground beside me.
"You have anything that belongs to them?" Chris asked as he held tight to the other five leashes.
I nodded, grinning as I pulled a small item I had confiscated from each of them the day (or night) I took them.
2 phones, a backpack, and a beanie.
Chris smirked, bringing the cigarette back to his mouth and taking a puff before searching the surrounding area. "Let's make this quick."
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Mona: December 25, 2014 12:22 p.m.
We were running again. I don't know when we had started running but I remember coming back down from my depression to be running along side Jenna again. We were running in a complete opposite direction than the way Aiden had said would lead us back to a town.
"Do you have any idea where you're going?" I asked. My lungs were burning and I felt an incredibly strong urge to vomit. How long had I been running?
Jenna shook her head, frantically looking around in all directions, maneuvering through trees and underbrush. She let out a frustrated groan, kicking at a nearby bush. "I can barely fucking move at all through this bullshit. Why is this everywhere?" she snapped at the undergrowth through exhausted breaths.
I shrugged. "I don't know, nature?"
Jenna dropped my hand, stopping for the first time in a very long time to catch her breath. "Mona." her voice called out to me. Her tone was exhausted but also held something else. Fear? It very well could be. Anyone who wasn't scared at this point had to be psychotic.
"Yeah?" I replied, also drinking in the dissipating chilled air into my lungs.
"I want you to know..." she paused, taking another deep breath. "that I'm sorry for what I said months ago." another breath. "in the basement." her eyes locked with mine, both of our chests heaving in sync. "It was a really shitty thing to say. Especially since you were so confused with what was going on."
She looked away then, brushing her long, mahogany hair back into place with her fingers. "Over these past few months..." she was looking everywhere but at me until her eyes met mine again. "If I get out of this, I need you with me. I need one of you with me. I can't handle any of this on my own."
I felt a smile creep itself onto my face. "I love you, Jenna." I mumbled. My relationship with these girls wasn't romantic. More platonic. But I did love all of them. We never would have made it this far without each other.
"I love you too." Betty Deville's voice cut in. She didn't sound exactly like the cartoon character. Definitely younger but she had the raspy tone. Close enough, though.
"You said he took you in the daylight?" she suddenly reminded me, causing me to recall a prior conversation with the girls. Most of us had shared what we remembered from being kidnapped. I was so close. So close to Brenton. But even being in his driveway wasn't enough. I regretted leaving my house that morning.
However, during that conversation with the girls, I realized now as I held the gaze of the winded girl in front of me that she hadn't shared her story.
Could that be what she was getting at? "Why?" the word left my lips easily, prying at her as a hint to tell me what she went through.
Jenna closed her eyes and sighed, raking her thin fingers though her dark hair again before her lids fluttered open and held my gaze again. "I was just taking a walk. I've never had bullshit home life problems. Everything has always been easy for me. My mom and dad were successful. I pretty much rubbed my higher social status in everyone's face..." she trailed off, her eyes flickering behind me.
I looked over my shoulder, my eyes meeting nothing of importance. Confused, I faced her again, searching her face for a sign as to why she had stopped. Her eyes held a distant, foggy look. She seemed to be disassociating.
"Jenna?" I asked, stepping into her field of vision.
She blinked and her eyes held mine again, though she still seemed to not be looking at me. She seemed to be looking through me. "I had taken walks all the time. My neigborhood was a gated community. It was safe. I don't know how he got in." she continued. "But he did. And no one saw a thing because I was stupid enough to walk at night. I don't know what happened to Venus..."
"Who's Venus?" I asked, giving her a curious look.
The haze in her eyes cleared just before a grin broke across her face. "My dog. I was walking her that night. I hope she's okay. I hope he didn't kill her."
A sort of discomfort hung in the dying chill of the Christmas air. There wasn't much you could say to someone in this situation. Nothing seemed right even if you were experiencing it with them. So I gave her no reply and she didn't continue, causing a heavy silence to weigh down around us.
The silence didn't last long. I wasn't sure what the sound was at first, but Jenna heard it too.
We both strained ourselves to focus on the noise.
The unknown noise sounded like it was gradually getting closer.
I felt a hand slam down on my upper arm, Jenna's fingernails digging into my skin. "Mona..." her voice wavered as her eyes widened in horror.
I could only stare at her in utter confusion until I too realized what the sound was.
Her small voice echoed what my mind had concluded the sound was.
"Those are dogs."