Pierce Territory

Chapter one - Secrets

"Marie-Louise please stop you're tearing them appart!" Isabella shouted at her little sister, trying to snatch her earphones from her tiny little hands. "Isabella don't be mean to your sister." "But mom! She stole my earphones!" "I didn't!" She spits back at her older sister, trying to push her hand away.

"Isabella. Were you using your headphones?" Their mother asked, looking at Isabella through the rearview mirror. "No..." She mocks. "Then you won't miss them when she's using them." "Okay, fine. But if you break them I'm taking all your money." Isabella snapped, letting go of her headphones and crossing her arms over her chest.

Isabella takes out her phone and starts scrolling through her social media platforms. Her mum and dad were police officers. At least that's what she thought they were, until she found out they weren't out on patrol that day, but they were just in the attic, electrocuting a boy that wasn't that much older than she was. They were hiding something and until now she had not been able to find out what that was.

"So, caught any criminals last week?" She asked, curious just how good they are at lying. "Yeah, 2 bank robbers yesterday and wednesday we caught a murderer." "Wow, that must've felt good." She muttered, staring out the window. "It did honey." Her mother softly says. It sounds like she's sick of all the lies she has to fire at her children everytime they ask how their day had been.

Sometimes Isabella feels like they're the bad guys. Because, who's parents keep a boy of around 18 years old in their attic and electrocute them?

"How long until we get home mommy?" Marie-Louise asked as she popped out one of the earphones. "We'll be home within an hour honey." Her mother answered, a smile covering her face. Something she doesn't do when she answers Isabella. Never a smile.

Isabella sighed and just stared out the window. Would the boy still be in the attic? After 6 months? She had no idea. She remembered seeing him, he looked her right in the eye, a desperate look all over him. She really wanted to help him, he looked so hurt. But then her dad came from behind her and told her that she shouldn't have been up there.

Her parents were pretending like nothing's there. Like she had gone insane, she hadn't seen anything, that's what they told her 6 months ago. But she just couldn't get it out of her head. It keeps haunting her. This cute kid, all hurt and desperate tied down to some electrocuting machine thing.

"We're home kiddos." Their dad sighed as he stopped the car on the driveway. The whole car journey back home Isabella had been thinking about that boy. She hadn't been able to get him out of her head, and she realy wanted to know if he would still be up there after all this time.

"Mom, I don't feel so good. I'm upstairs if you need me." Isabella muttered as she continued to walk up the stairs. She stepped into her room and closed the door behind her before jumping on the bed, never wanting to get up ever again.

She heard the doorbell ring. You'd say that's not that big of a deal. But an angry voice started shouting when the door opened. She couldn't quite understand anything more than something about a brother and someone being tortured. She heard the door slam back up and her Mother calling out to her Father. She slowly got up and walked through the hall. Peeking around the corner she could just see her father running down the hall, carrying some kind of gun. She felt how her heart started to race in her chest and her breathing got so heavy that it felt like her lungs were about to give out.

She watched someone breaking down their front door and he looked directly at her. She hid behind the corner and took a deep breath before running into her bedroom. She shut it and locked it directly after. Her eyes started watering up and not much later she heard several gunshots being fired. She screamed at the top of her lungs, frightened.

Isabella crawled into the corner of her room and started sobbing into her sleeves. She was so confused. Why the hell did her parents shoot a f*****g teenage kid? Only because he'd lost his brother and came at the door looking for him? She just didn't get it. Why would her parents shoot kids her age? She pulled up her knees to her chest and cried out in the corner of her room.

She had been crying for hours, it was now getting late and her dad had been trying to get to her for a while. She didn't say a word to anyone since she had locked herself inside her room. She got up and opened the door, walked down the stairs to grab a drink. She cleared her throat and poured herself a coke. "Isabella, are you okay?" Her father asked as he basically jogged into the kitchen to speak to his daughter.

"You shot a boy that was just over my age, do you think I'm okay after witnessing that?! In case you don't, the answer is NO! You need to hear it in Spanish?! Noh. NOW LEAVE ME ALONE."

She ran back upstairs and nearly dropped her drink. She put it on her bedside table and sighed deeply. Her parents were just one big puzzle and she was missing half of the pieces. One big mess of secrets and she wanted to know what they were hiding. She walked up to the bathroom door and opened it. She pulled out the key from the inside and ran the water down the shower. She put on the build-in radio and put it on her favourite radio station. "I'M TAKING A REALLY REALLY LONG SHOWER TO CALM MYSELF DOWN A BIT!!" She had shouted to her parents downstairs. "Okay!" She heared her father shout back. She had not heard a WORD from her mother since they shot him.

She locked the bathroom door from the outside and sneaked up to the stairs that lead to the attic. She needed to know what's up there.