I scream as loud as I can, but the sound echoes in my throat, never once leaving my lips.
My arms and legs feel cemented to the floor, and my heart burned with fear and self loathing as I desperately struggled against the chains I had created.
No one was around, no one was going to help me.
My strength gave out and I collapsed onto the cold stone floor, and I felt the icy draft draw the heat out of my body, leaving me shivering and heartbroken.
I felt as if my entire body was drained of any emotion except anger and pure terror.
Any sound I made was hollow and silent.
No one was around to hear my desperate pleas.
I lay still as an salty tear slipped down my cheek, falling onto the floor before dispersing into the cracks.
Finally, I willed myself to look up, to stop running.
And I looked her right in the eye.
"I'm so sorry Charlotte."
***
"Lizzie" Jessie snaps her fingers in front of my face, and I try and shake the unforgiving feeling that had overcome when I thought about this morning.
I woke up in my bed, struggling to breathe.
My window had blown open at some point in the night and the harsh winds had blown my duvet off.
Despite the paralysing cold, I was sweating, and couldn't stand immediately.
I felt Joel's absence more than ever.
"Lizzie you need to focus" Jessie stressed.
"Sorry" I mumble, pulling my hands to my chest in a feeble way of protecting myself from the demons.
She taps the book I had dropped on the floor before thrusting it into my hand, "keep reading."
Trinities.
The book we'd read 4 times between us, scouring for any possible leads.
Jessie is convinced that my dad was a drug lord, but I refuse to believe it.
We've tried contacting Marcus, but he appears to be off the grid.
We had one possible connection, a girl whom we identified as Marcus's assistant from over a year ago, but she was reluctant to give anything up and seemed thoroughly nervous about the whole situation.
Something we are certain on?
It has something to do with drugs.
Our APB was pitiful.
Mostly old news articles, the note from my dad, and a few quotes we got from the assistant.
Accompanying them are pages torn from the book Jessie and I had been scouring.
I couldn't find the original copy the page had been ripped from, so we'd bought two copies online, but it seemed like a regular book and we were losing hope.
"Hey Beth." My mum walked into the room with a cardboard box.
I sigh and slump backwards against my bed, too tired to answer.
"Well, when you were asking about Dad the other day, I remembered we had an old box of his stuff in the attic, and I wanted to give it to you."
My eyes light up and I see my own expression reflected in Jessie's face.
I leap up and take the box from her, saying a quick thank you before emptying the contents on my bed.
As soon as my mum leaves, Jessie and I pounce on the stuff.
There's an old digital camera, some photo albums, work documents from a time I'm guessing he actually did work as an accountant, old wallets, books, yearbooks, baseball memorabilia, letters, VHS tapes and a small notebook.
The camera was dead, so Jessie went downstairs to ask my mum to charge it while I flipped through the photo albums.
I briefly looked through it but found nothing out of the ordinary.
I was eager to look through the books, but to my dismay I didn't find the trinities book.
Jessie comes back, letting me know that my mum is sorting the camera, and we set to looking through my dads old work notes.
At first we don't see anything out of the ordinary, but when we start looking at the contacts, we realise that they don't match.
Instead of a constant phone number to reach the bank on, there are a random array of numbers and letters, which varied on each document.
"This makes no sense." I mumble.
"Maybe they're phone numbers?" Jessie suggests.
"But then what do the letters mean."
I run my thumb across the page, wondering if I'd ever seen the dates before.
Jessie had put down the documents, and was turning the VHS tape around in her hand.
"Do you have anything to play this on." She asks doubtfully.
I shake my head.
"We'll figure that out later."
I rifle through the pile again and come up with a few old wallets.
Many of them are empty, a few containing the odd coin or old receipt.
As I put the final wallet down, something slips out of a compartment I never noticed.
I pick it up curiously, and my eyes widen as I read it.
John *****
CIA Agent
Tier 4
Nova corp
FO27834N93
"What the hell?!" I say, louder than I intended.
Jessie drops the tape she was holding and peers over my shoulder.
Her jaw drops as she stares at it.
"Your dad worked for the CIA?"
The information bangs around my head as I try and process it.
How did this new information link with the drugs?
Was this ID even real?
My mind flashes back to when my dad was still with us and everything was normal.
I remembered when he told us he'd been made redundant from his accounting job, then three days later announced that he had another job.
Though he'd said it was also accounting.
That must have been when it happened, as we'd all seen his bank before the redundancy.
I wrack my brain trying to remember if I ever saw his 'new bank', but my mind draws blank.
"This is a major lead Lizzie!"
I nod my head, hope billowing though my body, giving me more energy than I'd felt in over a week.
Maybe everything really would be okay.