RUNNING AWAY WAS not the answer to every one of Kiera's problems. But then again, confrontation is easier said than done. Even if she chose flight out of the fight, flight or freeze options of a reaction to panic, Detective Knowles would undoubtedly find a way to clip her wings.
Unconsciously, Kiera began to slowly close the door until only half of Knowles' face and the police car parked in the driveway could be seen. That was, until she saw that there was another car parked right beside it.
Her car.
Knowles put a hand to the door and pushed it back, snapping Kiera out of a daze and putting her back into a reality where confusion was to be dealt with now.
"Is there a problem, Detective?" She made sure to raise her chin and straighten out her back. A superficial display of normalcy would at least throw off any suspicion he had temporarily. Her eyes couldn't do the same. They directed themselves between the crooked welcome mat and repaired headlights of her car.
"Yes, actually. We're just checking around the neighborhoods because there is a report of a missing woman."
A report? Already? It hadn't even been twelve hours.
She was aware that Knowles looked directly at her with every word he said. She prayed her mother would interrupt and break the tension with a witty remark or even a gentle smile. It would calm the questions that were hammering in her head and begging to be answered.
"We keep to ourselves anyways. I don't think we can help," Kiera gulped, hoping he didn't see the tremble in the fingers that kept themselves on the door.
"Are you sure? At least take a look at the picture and tell me if you've seen her around?" Knowles dug into his pocket to take out a passport sized picture. He held it between his fingers and in front of Kiera's face.
It was the woman.
Kiera brought a strand of hair to tuck behind her ear and grabbed the picture with her hand. If she had stood still for another moment, she would've been frozen with established trauma.
The woman smiled into the camera and her shining eyes followed the person taking the picture. She had her wiry arm around someone, but the picture cut them off. Compared to the ostentatious impression she had given Kiera, she was modest in her appearance—her hair was longer and her face was free of makeup.
"She's Genevieve Burdin." Knowles took back the picture, slipping out of Kiera's hands like water, and put it away, all the while keeping his sight trained on Kiera's movements.
Another shock jolted her senses and she felt her grip on the door loosening. The woman was a person with a name. But most of all, she was Genevieve Burdin.
"I-I haven't seen her, sorry," Kiera told the worst lie of her lifetime.
"Don't worry about it, kid. You're not the first person to say that," Knowles sighed. He put his hands back into his pockets and looked around the Cohen residence's garden. It had a peach tree and withering tulips, but no weeds. That didn't mean weeds didn't grow there.
"What did the person who made the report say?" At the mercy of uncontrollable curiosity, the words flew out of her mouth before she could stop them.
"We don't know. It was anonymous. Someone from the station confirmed she was MIA when they called her boyfriend. She lives in West Vienna, not East Vienna, but somehow she was last seen here according to whomever called in."
The information was all too much to process. Maybe the woman had been going on a date but somehow ended up lost? That doesn't explain the fact she tried to kill her. She couldn't even prove Genevieve tried to kill her because she was gone.
Why bother solving a puzzle when more than half of the pieces were missing?
"Leave her alone, Knowles. She said she doesn't know where the woman is," her mother scolded, making her way up the porch and around the detective and putting her arm around Kiera in support.
"My apologies, Mrs. Cohen." He backed away and put his hands out in front of him in defense.
Her mother wiped the sweat collecting on the side of her neck before continuing to chastise him. "What business do you have bothering her?"
"Genevieve Burdin has gone missing," Knowles repeated, oddly emphasizing the first name.
"Genevieve?" Her mother raised her eyebrows and let out an audible breath of shock. "I haven't seen her in so long." She brought up the back of her hand to her forehead and looked down to her sneakers covered in dirt. Kiera saw him nod, but her mother didn't seem to need a confirmation.
"Mom? Are you alright?" Kiera couldn't begin to organize the events happening before her, let alone the jumble in her mind. Concern for her mother was all that could be prioritized, because it was the one thing that could be solved.
"No, I'm going to get some water. Goodbye, Knowles." She turned away, slipping into the kitchen and out of sight.
Detective Knowles made no move of leaving.
"Do you need anything else?" Kiera asked, puzzled by his behavior too.
"I was just wondering if I could get a sample of the blood on the taillights of your car." He gave a thin lipped smile while Kiera's heart dropped.
She wasn't sure if the birds chirping or the cars driving down the road stopped, but they slipped away from the boundaries of what she could perceive.
"Is this a joke? I thought we were being civil towards one another," Kiera's eyes narrowed to crinkled slits. Being mannered was what made her humane and that is why she tolerated Knowles, but even that was being blown away by fear.
"It's not," he gave a dry chuckle, "I'm still being courteous. It's just that if I have any suspicion you're following your father's footsteps, I think my actions are justified." An unrelenting stare maintained itself between the two of them. Manners were one undertaking, but trust was subjective.
"Of course, but I must warn you, the blood's probably one of the patients from the hospital," Kiera said, speaking louder because the booming beat of her heart was beginning to become deafening. The excuse was as poor as saying it was her blood—it could be easily proven she was very, very wrong.
"I'm sure you do a lot of hands-on work," Knowles supposed, arching a sly brow. "I'll see you around, Kiera."
Kiera gulped again and as soon as she saw his back, she locked the front door and ran upstairs to her room.
Pacing back and forth between her closet and window was not helping. The vast knowledge of horror movie plots and Twilight Zone episodes were all for nothing when it had to be palpable.
She knew she had to run. Knowles was going to get the blood sample, find out it was hers, and haul her away to prison.
She'd be protecting her mother too. If she's not affiliated with her daughter, she might not be a part of the consequences.
Kiera didn't want to know the extent of the consequences.
It was selfish, but it was necessary. Sometimes, when the circumstances had one between the devil and the deep blue sea, it only really concerned one. With that logic set in stone, Kiera went to the only person who could help her.
———
"You did what?" Kiera fumed, keeping her volume low so Taedyn's mechanic wouldn't yell at her for distracting him. He had already been glaring at her since she got here, or maybe it was just consequent of her becoming delusional. What was the difference between fact and fiction at this point?
"I dropped the car off at your place. I didn't know when you would come by so I thought I could just do it myself," Taedyn brought his head out of the front hood, holding a grease coated wrench.
Kiera tried to not pay attention to the way his white undershirt clung to his abdomen or his arms proved to have experience in handling heavy weights. More for herself than him, she snapped harshly, "You could've told me the night before."
"Do I seem like the person to think that far ahead?" He took off his synthetic gloves and wiped his hands with a cloth soaked in a bucket of boiling water. She wanted to ask why the local automobile repair shop couldn't get a proper wash station, but erased the thought because average conversations weren't to be acknowledged in her case. He was nonchalant to her distress, grinning as if nothing happened last night. "Go ahead and say touché."
Her brows bumped together in a scowl. She was frustrated because he wasn't terrified or traumatized, let alone accountable for his actions. "Well, you may have just screwed me over. Detective Knowles saw the blood on the car and even got a sample of it."
"You let him do that?" This time, he was the one sounding frustrated.
"Oh, I didn't know I had a choice," Kiera bit back. She didn't know what she did wrong to deserve everything that mattered to her to be unfavorable. Was he just so used to the world of crime that what she did was insignificant? Maybe she just had to be assertive to get what she needed. "I just need to run away and you're going to help me."
"I did enough for you and the debt for helping Taylor has been repaid." Taedyn sat down in a chair meant to used on beaches or picnics and looked right into her eyes.
She took the opportunity to maintain contact, countering, "This is your fault."
"Go find a hotel or something," he rolled his eyes and leaned back into the chair. The same person who carried her out of the house when she was sobbing her soul out and fixed her beaten car put his hands behind his head and squared an ankle over his knee. What could've brought such a change in demeanor?
Perhaps she had become too needy and asked for too much or he didn't want to affiliate with a fugitive. Nevertheless, a hotel wasn't an option. The result of that attempt had her finding a gun in her mother's bedroom. She briefly thought about it, coming to the conclusion that her mother might've kept it in self-defense and there was the end to one of the many controversies cluttering her brain.
"I can't afford it."
Taedyn drummed his fingers on the handle of the chair, looking back and forth between what anguish had done to her and his hand. He must've submerged himself in deep thought because the muscles in his face tightened. Kiera could relieve some tension in her shoulders knowing she wasn't the only one facing a dilemma. Finally, he spoke somberly, "I may have a friend up north in Ohio who might allow you to stay, but here's what you're going have to do."
Before he could continue, she avowed, "I'll do it."
He got up, coming face to face with her. "First, I'm coming too, if that wasn't obvious," he bit his lip before demanding, "Second, I want the car in return."
"But how will I get back?" Kiera couldn't help but believe in the possibility that she had a future in East Vienna. She had a job and a family here. No one could just abandon that. But, Kiera was the exception. She had to leave everything behind. "Never mind that. I don't need a plan," she inhaled a deep breath and blew out slowly, making up her mind once and for all, "I just need to get the hell out of here."
———
thank you for 500 reads and #350 on mystery/thriller. i am so grateful for your interest and support in run. i love you all. thoughts on the chapter?
~hestia