by Logan Byrne
“Yeah, I like him a lot,” I said.
Were they right? Was I made just for him? I sure felt like I was. I felt like he was the only one for me.
The night went on and I had a great time. We sat around with our hair up with no makeup on just hanging out. We talked about boys and school. We watched girly movies and pigged out on ice cream and chocolates. We fell asleep on top of each other while a scary movie was blaring on Ariel’s big-screen television. We were girls, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
The next morning I woke up with drool on my cheek. I wiped it off and looked around to see everybody still sleeping. I got up and went upstairs to get some water. I looked outside the window and saw somebody in Ariel’s backyard. When I blinked it was gone. I didn’t know who or what it was, but I knew that it knew who I was.
I drank the water hurriedly and went back downstairs. I lay around until everybody woke up and started moving.
We all lay around the entire day watching reality television before starting to get ready for the track finals later that night. Ariel had two full bathrooms, but squeezing six teenage girls into two bathrooms to get fully ready was almost like starting World War 3. Elbows were thrown, and hairspray was accidentally sprayed into eyes. It was horrible, but it also felt good to be around my friends.
We headed out for the track finals hand in hand. We all looked our very best, with our school colors tied into our outfits. Taylor even had a little face paint on to show her support.
We got to the finals and the place was packed. I hadn’t been to many school events in my life, but none of them were like this. This event was a huge deal to the school and people in the area. They wanted to see the best of the best run the track and participate in the events. There were even a few recruiters in the crowd looking on.
We finally got our tickets and headed into the event. We pushed our way through the crowd and went into the bleachers. We were able to find some seats all the way at the top a few minutes before the events started.
We watched as each school dominated different events. They battled back and forth and each team would get a lead before the other team squashed it and got a lead of their own.
There was only one event left: the hurdles. This was the big tiebreaker, and everybody needed to be fully ready. There was a fifteen-minute setup time announced, which allowed us to have a short intermission.
I was feeling really thirsty and got up to go get a drink. Nobody else was thirsty, so I went to the concession stand and waited in line. On my way out of the bleachers, I noticed two guys getting up and following me everywhere I went. They looked vengeful, and I took a weird route to see that they were following me with every step I took. I picked up my pace and made my way to the concession stand. I stood in line before it was my turn. I looked back while the girl was getting my drink to see the two guys leaning against a chain-link fence fifty feet away.
I started walking off fast and got back up to the girls.
“I think two guys are following me,” I said.
“Oh, don’t be silly,” said Ariel. “There are tons of people here. They were probably just going to the same place as you. A lot of people are going to get drinks, it was just a coincidence.”
I knew it wasn’t just a coincidence. I knew they were following me: but why? They didn’t look familiar at all, but they had this look to them that I felt I knew. Their eyes were so familiar, yet so foreign.
The hurdles event started and I watched as Derek flew over the hurdles as if he was jumping effortlessly. The other competitors clearly struggled, but Derek flew past them to the finish line. It was as if it was nothing at all to him. Was I really the only one that noticed that he was different?
When the finals were over, we all walked outside the gates and talked for a few minutes. Some friends came and went, and we talked about how great of a time we had and how we all have to have a girls’ night again soon. I agreed with them, and we decided to all say goodbye and go home. I hugged them all and started walking home.
It was fairly chilly outside, but I was managing well. The moonlit sky was shining onto my cheeks as they turned a rosy shade of red.
My walk home wasn’t too terribly bad. It was around fifteen minutes and I didn’t have any big hills or problems. I got stopped at an intersection waiting for the light to turn so I could continue walking. I looked around while waiting to see the two guys from earlier. They were on the other side of the street and were staring at me.
My heart started slowly racing as the light changed for me to start walking. I started walking with a faster pace to lose them. I had to get away from them and I had to get away fast. I saw them pick up their pace and jaywalk across the street to come to my side. My heart was beating out of my chest as I turned the corner and ran into something.
It was a man. He was staring at me with the same vengeful look as the other men. It was then that the other two men came around the corner and they grabbed me. I tried fighting and screaming, but they put their hands over my mouth and overpowered me. They dragged me into a car and we started driving.
I wanted to cry and scream, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t do anything. My hands were tied and a cloth was around my mouth. I was being kidnapped, and I didn’t know why.
“We know who you are, Juliet LaVoe,” one of the men said.
“We know who your father is, and we don’t like him,” another man said.
I started yelling and talking, but my words were mumbled and muffled. One of the men removed the cloth from my mouth and I started talking to them.
“Why do you want me? I’m not my father!” I yelled.
“We know you aren’t your father, but we also know your father loves you. You are his only child and if we have you we have something to bargain with. Taking him wouldn’t work, but taking you does.”
“Nobody is going to save you,” said one of the men. “You can scream all you want but nobody will hear,” he said, laughing.
I tried to squirm and get myself loose but it was no use. They saw me and made the knots in my restraints tighter. I thought about my life and how this happened. If I had just had a normal father, none of this would have happened. If I had stayed with James, this wouldn’t have happened. They would’ve saved me.
We drove for what seemed like an hour before finally arriving at their destination. It was a dark, cold warehouse. I was taken out of the car and sat in a chair. They tied me to the chair so I couldn’t run away. My legs and arms were tied to the chair as if I was some kind of animal. The chair was hard and cold, and the broken wood dug into my legs.
“You’ll never get away with this,” I boldly told them.
“Oh Ms. LaVoe, we already have. Your parents are probably at home worrying about where you are. Their only daughter isn’t home yet and there are bad guys out there. They are probably calling everybody they know to figure out if anybody knows where you are or who you are with,” one of the men said.
I put my head down in shame and continued to think of my life. I needed someone. I needed James.
Chapter Ten
Gathered
“James! Where’s James?” shouted Emma.
“He’s upstairs, what’s wrong?” asked Rosa.
Emma ran upstairs and flung open James’s door. She was out of breath and panting, a worried expression on her face.
“Emma, what’s wrong?” asked James.
“It’s Juliet, she’s gone.”
“What do you mean gone?”
“Some guys took her, I saw it.”
“Who took her, Emma? Where did they take her?”
“I don’t know. I saw her at the track event and these guys were staring at her and following her and I tried following her home but I saw them tie her up and throw her in a van. They drove off with her.”
James’s face turned emotionless. His fist clenched in anger from the thought of his beloved Juliet being taken. He ran out the door to talk to Rosa.
“She was taken.”
“Who was taken?”
“Juliet. Emma saw her getting kidnapped,” said James.
“Emma, where did they take her?” Rosa asked.
“I don’t know. I saw her as they grabbed her. There were a few guys in dark clothes. It all went by so fast. They looked like they were pros though. They looked like they knew her.”
“We have to find her, Rosa,” exclaimed James. “We can’t leave her.”
“I know James, I know. We have to be safe about it though. We don’t even know who took her or where they took her. All we know is that she was taken by a few guys.”
“Call everybody else. We need to have a family meeting. The longer we wait the harder it will be to find her. If we wait too long we might not find her at all,” said Rosa.
James and Emma ran outside to find the others. They needed to find the rest of the family before it was too late to save Juliet.
Back at Juliet’s house, her parents were starting to worry. They hadn’t seen their daughter since Friday after school, and it was getting close to midnight on Saturday. They looked outside the window, trying to get any kind of glimpse of her they could. Maybe she would turn around a street corner okay. Maybe she was just being a careless teenager like most of her peers.
As time passed, Juliet’s father started to worry severely.
“Wait,” he said to his wife, “I have that Ariel girl’s phone number. Maybe she is over there!”
He picked up the phone and dialed Ariel’s phone number and waited for it to ring. His stomach was flopping around at the thought of what she could say.
“Hello?” asked Ariel.
“Hello, Ariel, this is Arnold LaVoe, Juliet’s father.”
“Oh hi, Mr. LaVoe, what can I help you with?”
“Is Juliet over with you?”
“No, why?”
“She never came home and we are worried.”
“We all left separately after the track event. I haven’t heard from her since, but I’m sure she’s okay.”
He knew she wasn’t okay. Juliet never did this kind of thing. She always was careful and never would just leave. She would have checked in if she were going somewhere else. This wasn’t her typical behavior.
“You’ll never get away with this,” said Juliet.
“My, my, aren’t you a feisty one,” one of the men said, laughing.
“You know people are going to be looking for me, right?”
“We know. We took you very far away, though. They won’t find you all the way out here.”
Juliet wasn’t even far from where she had been kidnapped. The men drove around for an hour before circling back to the warehouse she was being kept in. She was still in town, hiding in plain sight.
She looked down at the dirty ground, wondering how she was going to get away. She was tied up tightly, her hands and feet tied to the chair. She was trapped; she was scared.
Across town, James and his family gathered together.
“What is going on?” asked Troy.
“Juliet was taken,” said James.
“Taken by who?” asked Troy.
“I saw some guys take her. They were dressed darkly and had a van. They took her really fast and drove off,” said Emma.
“Do we know of anybody that would want to take her?” asked Troy.
“A few groups might because of her father. I don’t think it was a vampire, though. Maybe the werewolves, but they don’t usually do these kinds of things,” said Remey.
“They usually don’t, but those rogue ones might,” said Troy.
“He’s right,” said Michael. “They have been causing destruction and they would be the ones to do something like this.”
“We need to search the city. I can’t imagine they would want to leave the city. They are after something, and need her father for it. They wouldn’t take her too far away in case there is a deal,” said Remey.
“Troy and I can search the area where she was taken from,” said James.
“I am going with you,” said Michael. “You need all the help you can get.”
“Here, take these,” said Remey. “They are walkie-talkies. We will search the city by car and if we find anything we can group up before confronting them.”
They all dispersed in search of Juliet. Every second that passed was a second without her.
Juliet’s father and mother started to believe she wasn’t coming home. They had called some of her friends and nobody was with her. Nobody had seen her since she went home. She wouldn’t get lost on the way home. She traveled that route twice a day, and she knew it well.
“We need to call the police,” her mother said.
“What are they going to do? I can call in my troops to find her!” her father exclaimed.
“No, you won’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“They aren’t some civilian search-and-rescue team. They are property of the military and aren’t for your own personal reasons.”
“We can find her faster with them!”
“Probably, yes, but I won’t have you lose your rank or your job over this. We will call the police and they will take care of it.”
“You’re wrong, they won’t take care of it. This city is too big for them to care about this. They won’t ever find her!”
“This is the way normal people do it, Arnold! I know you are out of touch with how normal people live, but this is how they do! That is the end of this conversation!”
Arnold looked at his wife sternly, as if he couldn’t believe what she was saying.
“Go find her,” she said, staring right back at him.
He grabbed his things and slammed the door behind him.
Juliet started to worry. It had been half an hour since she was taken here, and there was no sign of rescue in sight. Her kidnappers walked around doing their own business while she sat there. The cool night breeze drifted in through a broken window, dancing on her prickly skin. Goosebumps filled every square inch of her white porcelain skin.
“HEY! HEY!” I yelled.
One of the men strolled over with a smile on his face.
“What can I do for you?” he asked mockingly.
“I’m cold,” I said.
“You should have worn warmer clothes then,” he said, laughing as he walked away.
James, Troy and Michael scoured the town looking for Juliet. They jumped from rooftop to rooftop, trying to use their advanced hearing to hear if she screamed or yelled for help.
“We should go to the place where she was taken,” said Michael.
“Good idea,” said Troy. “Maybe there is a clue there.”
They made their way to the intersection Emma told them to go to. It was a quiet intersection, not a car in sight. Lights were changing as they looked from the rooftop all around to try to find anything.
“There!” yelled Michael.
They jumped down and James went and picked up the item on the ground. It was a colorful braided bracelet. He smelled it and could smell Juliet’s scent lingering on the bracelet.
“It’s hers,” he said.
“Are you sure?” asked Troy.
“I’m positive. She was here.”
“She might be nearby,” said Michael.
“Why would they stay in the area?” James asked. “Wouldn’t they go far away so nobody would find them?”
“Normally yes, but not this time. They seem to favor the city and everything in it. If they want Juliet for her father, they will try to stay close by. They have to be somewhere in the city. Maybe an abandoned house or business,” said Michael.
“He’s right,” said Troy with his arms crossed. “They want something, they don’t want her. If they were stalking her, they would have killed her and left her body here. They don’t kidnap people to eat them. Emma said they took her, so they need something from her. Don’t take it lightly though. They will still kill her once they get what they want. They don’t care about her.”
“I won’t le
t them!” exclaimed James. “She is my everything: my love, my life, my world. I will die for her before I let them put a scratch on her. My heart beats for her and my blood runs through my veins for her to feel. I will not lose her.”
“We need to canvass the area and look for abandoned places. It would make the most sense that they would be hiding in maybe an old house or warehouse or something of that nature,” said Troy.
James, Troy and Michael scoured the area before coming across an old warehouse a few blocks from the area where Juliet was taken.
“James,” Michael whispered. “I can hear talking inside.”
While Michael was closely listening, the three men inside were talking. They were talking about their next steps. They needed to get the word out so that they could get their ransom.
“Should we make a video?” one of the men asked.
“No, we need to make a phone call or something. We don’t want a video to show where we are. They will know it’s an old warehouse and they will find us too fast. We need to give a few unexpected verbal commands to him,” another man said.
“I smell something,” one of the men said. “It smells like death.”
The werewolves had a very keen sense of smell. Even in their human forms, they had the amazing ability to smell anything, and right now they smelled the three men on the roof.
“What is it?” asked one of the men.
“Probably just some garbage. I saw some outside in the alley when we came in,” another replied.
“When should we call him?” one man asked.
“In ten minutes,” another replied.
Troy grabbed the walkie-talkie and called for help.
“Remey,” he said, “we spotted the men that took Juliet, but can’t see her inside. We know she is in there though.”
“We are coming to help you. Don’t go in there until we get there. If they are werewolves then they will be too much for you three,” Remey said.
“Got it,” said Troy.
Ten minutes passed before everybody else arrived. They sat on the roof looking in through a dirty glass skylight. They saw the men arguing down below before one stormed off.
