Caged 2 (Caged Series)

by Destiny Hawkins

  My hands shook while I held the phone. I was trying to process what I had just read. She had really just told me that she was going to kill the people that have been hurting her. She had to protect herself, and this was the only way that she knew how.

  “Rose-”

  Aggravated by his voice I snapped my head up. “It’s Terry. The girl from last night,” I said. I grabbed my keys off of the dresser and jogged to the door where I had heard Abigale just close hers.

  “Be careful Rose,” Cameron said, standing in the hallway.

  I didn’t have time to feel bad about leaving him out of the loop, so I just nodded and left the Apartment. Abigale was already down the hallway and heading to the car.

  Once we got into the car we both sat there for a moment.

  “So fill me in,” Abigale said. She had changed from baggy sweats and a white T, into jeans and a red T-shirt. I still wore the clothes that I woke up with.

  “Yesterday, a girl was in trouble,” I started the truck. “She was being bullied, and it looks like she’s getting them back for it.”

  Abigale nodded, “Should we let the team know she’s a student. We could get cars up to the school pronto. If she’s still armed then we’re going to need backup.”

  I took a deep breath. Sending backup might end with Terry’s death, and that was the last thing that I wanted. I thought that if I could just talk to her, then I could maybe talk her out of hurting any more people.

  “Rose?” Abigale saw that I was lost in thought, and looked like she was worrying more about me than the situation.

  “She’s...like me,” I said. “I don’t want her to end up dead. She just needs some help,” I turned to look at Abigale and got the confirmation that I was hoping for. She was going to help me.

  “Okay, but if it starts to get dangerous, we are calling backup,” Abigale said. “Let’s go get her.”

  Chapter 7

  When we finally arrived to the school, we both jumped out of the car and ran to the door. I was surprised that we were buzzed in so quickly by the secretary.

  Mrs. Pond was walking down the hallway when she saw us. “Hey-” she stopped when she saw how serious we looked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Where is Terry?” I asked.

  Mrs. Pond looked worried. “I’m not sure. I didn’t see her in class today. Is everything alright?” She asked.

  I looked at the time and saw that it was only about ten O’clock. It was still early, and she could be arriving to the school at any given moment. Now it was okay to put the word out that the student was Terry. Since she wasn’t at the school yet, I didn’t have to worry about backup shooting her dead, and instead they could grab her and lock her up before she hurts anyone else.

  I looked over to Abigale who had read my mind.

  “I’m already on it,” Abigale said as she pulled out her phone.

  “Rose?” Mrs. Pond started to frown.

  “We need to clear out the school,” I said. If I got all of the students out, then I wouldn’t have to worry about a school shooting. Terry was only going for specific people, and she wouldn’t be able to pinpoint them if they mixed in with the crowd.

  “What do you mean? What the hell is going on!?” Mrs. Pond yelled.

  “I’ll tell you later.” I said.

  I spotted the fire alarm on the wall a few feet away and quickly went to slam down the lever.

  “Rose!” Mrs. Pond yelled.

  The fire alarm blared so loudly that it hurt my ears. I grabbed Abigale, who had just gotten off of the phone, and pulled her into the office. Mrs. Pond knew that things had to be serious for me to pull a stunt like that, so she just went along and guided the students away from the imaginary fire.

  The principal rushed out of his office, “Rose! Abigale!?”

  “Get everyone out of the school! Terry is the shooter, and no one is safe here!” I yelled back.

  The principal’s eyes widened when he realized what I had just said, then he nodded, waited for the secretary to grab her things and rushed out of the office.

  Abigale turned to me in question. “Now what-”

  Pop! Pop! Pop!

  Abigale whipped out her gun and nodded for me to do the same. I didn’t want to, but the sounds of the students screaming and running for safety made me. If I had to, I would shoot Terry, but only to stop her from killing anyone.

  “You get everyone out!” I yelled to Abigale. “I’ll get Terry!”

  Abigale nodded, and then rushed out of the office. I knew what I had to do, but I really didn’t want to. Terry was dangerous, but she was also a fifteen-year-old girl with a long history of abuse. What she was doing right now was all that she knew, and now that she had pulled the trigger, it was too late for me to keep her from going behind bars. The only thing I could do now was save her from being shot multiple times by my co-workers.

  I rushed out into the almost cleared hallway and waited for the last kid to pass me before I ran down the hall. I had to find Terry before backup arrived, or she would be done for.

  I stopped in the middle of the hallway at a dead end. I didn’t know if the shots came from either the left or the right of me. I jumped when I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket, and I pulled it out.

  Don’t try to stop me.

  I disregarded the text and put my phone back away. I heard another shot go off from my right and went into a full sprint down the hall. There was a faint scream that followed, but I could barely hear it over the alarms.

  My heart raced as I searched for Terry. She was close, but could be in any one of these rooms.

  “Wait!” I heard someone cry, “Please, wait!”

  I still couldn’t tell which room the screaming was coming from, so I went into a light jog down the hall and peeked into each one of them for an outraged student.

  “Please!” Someone had backed up out of the last classroom and tripped over something on the floor.

  I knew that this was another one of the boys that were bullying Terry, because I could somewhat remember his face. It was covered in tears and had splatters of blood on it, but he was still recognizable.

  The dark haired boy scooted back against the lockers while still staring into the classroom. He was so afraid that he didn’t even notice that it was his dead friend that he had tripped over.

  “Wait!” He cried. He didn’t look so tough anymore.

  I turned to the doorway where I saw a small black handgun peek outside the door, and then soon Terry had stepped all the way out. I clenched my teeth when I noticed the smirk on her face, and it sent chills down my spine. The expression on her face reminded me so much of Jessie that it made me feel sick. They had the same sad look in their eyes, yet they both chose to smile...

  “T-Terry,” I stuttered. The image of a bullet cutting through Jessie’s head came to mind and I was frozen where I stood. This couldn’t have been happening to me right now, it was the worst possible moment for me to be having a panic attack.

  Terry cocked her head to the side and smiled, “Rose.”

  I knew that it was Terry that was looking back at me, but all I could see was Jessie. It shook me to the core to see a dead girl standing only a few feet away from me. I felt as if I couldn’t breathe.

  The alarms suddenly shut off and reality came back. Terry was still standing there looking confused, but when she noticed me go back to my normal self she smiled again.

  “Shoot her!” The boy against the locker yelled.

  I ignored him “Terry, put the gun down,” I said.

  Terry laughed softly, “You don’t give me orders. No one gives me orders anymore.”

  “Look, please just put the gun down. Back up will be over here soon.”

  “Oh, and they’ll what? Kill me? That’s what you’re worried about, right?”

  I sighed and frowned. She could read me like an open book. “Terry-”

  “Rose, I died a long time ago,” Terry laughed. “You don’t have to worry about me. It’s funny becaus
e you’re literally the only person that ever has.”

  I remember feeling the same way that she does now, and I could understand what she was going through. That’s why I wanted to help her so badly, but soon it would be too late and she would be dead. If I didn’t shoot her down myself, then she was going to be killed.

  “What are you doing!? Shoot her!” The boy cried again. I had forgotten that he was even right there.

  “Rose, I want to thank you again,” Terry said softly.

  From where I stood I could see the gloss in her brown eyes as she turned the gun away from the boy and pointed it at her temple. “Only one bullet left,” she said.

  My heart skipped a beat, but this time I wasn’t stuck where I stood. After taking a deep breath, I raised my gun and pulled the trigger twice. The first bullet hit her in her shoulder and knocked her off balance, and the second one drilled into her thigh.

  Terry dropped the gun and fell to the floor while grunting in pain. I thought that she would have been screaming, but she obviously was taught to take all kinds of pain.

  The boy against the lockers stopped crying and reached out for the gun that Terry had dropped, but before he could grab it I put the gun to his temple. “Touch it and I’ll blow your brains out,” I said in a low voice.

  The boy stopped midway, then got to his feet and ran down the hall.

  Terry laid on the ground with sweat dripping down the side of her head and tears welling up but not falling. I kicked the gun away, then put mine back in my waistband and stared down at her. She looked like she was in a lot of pain, but it went deeper than the bullets that I had just put in her. I could see the scared and angry little girl that I used to be.

  “I hate you!” Terry yelled through clenched teeth. She was holding her arm while leaning on her good side. “You should have let me do it!”

  I crouched down and rested my hand over hers. I didn’t know what to say. I just knew that I was happy that she was still alive and okay.

  “They’re going to put me in another cage now,” Terry’s voice cracked, and her bottom lip began to tremble.

  My mind went straight back to the cage in the basement. I had been locked up in there for months before Arnold had given me the privilege of sleeping in a bed. It was one of the worst experiences of my life.

  “I’m going to get you help,” Was all I could say. Yeah, she’d be put back in a cage, but there would be food, counseling, and possibly girls her age that she could relate to.

  Back up had finally made it around the corner, but they were too late. There was just me, a body, and Terry.

  Abigale stopped and watched me for a moment, then she nodded as if to say good job.

  “Get a medic!” Someone yelled.

  The boy on the ground was pushed onto his back. He was still breathing, but barely. No lives were lost. I was especially happy when I found out that the boy shot in front of his house had survived with only a flesh wound.

  Terry was collected and would be sent straight to jail after she was bandaged up. I made sure to remember to go visit her every now and then on account that no one else probably would. I was hoping that she would get a light sentence, or that the judge would be a little lenient due to her past, but she had taken it too far. Luckily, she wouldn’t be locked up forever. Since she didn’t manage to actually kill anyone, they would be letting her out when she turned eighteen if the psychologist said it was safe for her to be in society.

  The shooting was all over the news making Terry seem like some psychotic crazy person, and I was praised by many for stopping her. I explained her situation to everyone the best that I could so that they would have some sort of understanding about what she was going through, but they never did. It stung every time someone spoke badly of her, because I had once been in her shoes, and it almost felt like they were talking about me. People thought that what was happening to these children was sad, but they didn’t want to have anything to do with them.

  Eventually, the hype of the shooting went down and everyone returned back to their normal lives. I spoke with the principal so that he would crack down on bullying with full force, and that the boys would still be punished for pushing Terry so far. I even went back to the school a little while after that to talk about bullying every now and then, and started to become popular with the students.

  Everything was going well. I could tell from my visits with Terry that she was getting the help that she needed, because she almost seemed happier. I saw little hints here and there of her other side, but it was nothing comparable to what I remembered. Besides, everyone has a dark side. Even me.

  ***

  Two years had passed since the shooting, and after serving and protecting efficiently, Abigale and I had finally made detective...

  “Stop! You fucker!” I sprinted after a young boy in his teens that just blasted into light speed after I flashed my badge. The boy thought that he could easily get away from me, but after two years of being on the force, there was no way that he was going to get away from me. “I said stop!”

  He made a right and hopped someone’s fence, but I was right behind him. After a while, you get good at jumping fences too. I followed him through someone’s yard and back into the street where Abigale hit the runner with the car.

  The boy landed on the hood and rolled off, then hit the ground with a loud groan.

  Abigale looked out the window. “Are you okay up there- is he okay?” Abigale asked. She got out of the car and pulled out her cuffs.

  “Abs!” I looked from the boy, then back to her. “You can’t just hit suspects with the car!”

  We grabbed the suspect, read him his rights, then took him back to the station where we would begin questioning. Apparently, this boy could tell us more about a shooting that happened a few days ago that took out a man and his family of three.

  Once we got to the station Miss Shy instructed us to lock him up, and then to meet her in her office. I had thought that it was because Abigale hit him with her car, which was totally out of protocol, but it turned out to be something much more serious.

  I sat in the lieutenant’s office and stared down at the picture that I was given. I had finally forgotten about her, and could live life without thinking about her, but after seeing Lorena’s face...it all came rushing back. That’s when the anger set in. Lorena was stuck in a tight situation with some French big shot named Roberto Bellerose, who brought his trafficking business to the states.

  “Rose? Are you alright man?” Abgiale asked.

  I stared down at Lorena’s face a little longer. They wanted me to go undercover, get close to Bellerose, and find out where he was holding the children that he’s kidnapped. That meant seeing Lorena again after seven years. I knew that I should have been thinking of the children, but someone that I had once loved was in trouble, and I would do anything to get her out of it. If I could bust Bellerose, then she would be freed.

  “You said that she was the one who gave you guys the information?” I turned to Agent Luis. He was an FBI agent that came all the way here from New York to tell me and Abigale that he wanted us to go undercover.

  “Yes, she didn’t give a lot of details. The call sounded as if she were too afraid to do so. We went ahead and did a little research on Bellerose and found out that since he’s arrived in the states, kidnappings of children and dogfights had picked up,” Agent Luis answered.

  I sighed and held the picture of Lorena tightly. They had come to me because I knew more about the dogfights and trafficking better than anyone else on the force. I was kidnapped and forced into them myself.

  “Rose,” Miss Shy gave me a worried look, “if this is too much for you to handle then you don’t have to do it. No one is forcing you,” she said in a soft voice.

  The sound of her speaking surprisingly calmed me down a lot. I could actually breathe regularly after a few seconds of thinking. I would have to leave Cameron to go out to New York to save Lorena and the children. I felt bad, but I had to do this.
I joined the force to help people, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do.

  I Looked up at Miss Shy, then Abigale, and finally to Agent Luis, “I’m in.”

  Chapter 8

  “So you’re just leaving, just like that?”

  Cameron was surprisingly calm about the situation. I guess after months of arguing about my job and how I’m never home, he didn’t have the energy to yell at me.

  I stood across from him and watched as he sat in silence on the couch. He looked a lot older than he did when we first started dating and I assumed it was just because of everything that I put him through. It’s not like I was ever hurt before, but I was always busy, and I never really had enough time to spend with him. I was told once before that being a cop wasn’t the type of job for someone in a relationship, but I didn’t listen back then.

  I took a deep breath, trying to think of the right words to say. I told him that I had to go undercover, but I couldn’t give him any of the details. It was mostly for his safety, but also because we couldn’t have any possible leaks of my going undercover. That could end with a lot of people dying.

  Before I could speak, Cameron spoke again, “When will you be back?”

  “I’m not sure,” I sighed, “but this shouldn’t take me long.”

  I felt horrible. Cameron should have left me a while ago, but he stayed because I told him that we could work everything out. I believed that we would make this work, but now I’m not so sure. I had driven him into depression, and I couldn’t even stick around to pull him out of it.

  “It shouldn’t take you long,” Cameron said as he clenched his fists on his lap and mumbled a few curse words, then he looked out of the window at the bright day with a sad expression on his face. “I don’t want you to go.”

  “Camer-“

  “You’re not going,” he stood up and walked around the coffee table to snatch my suitcase that was on the floor next to me.