Running for my life

Empty space

Chapter Eleven

The suitcase was gone. That's when Jonathan knew.

He stood in the doorway of her room, staring at the empty space where her belongings had been that morning. Her handbag gone. The small pile of books on the nightstand gone. Even the scarf she'd draped over the chair was missing.

She wasn't coming back.

Jonathan had arrived for lunch as usual, calling out her name as he climbed the stairs. The silence that greeted him should have been his first warning. Now, as he took in the carefully erased evidence of her presence, a heaviness formed in his chest that made it hard to breathe.

How was he going to protect her when he didn't know where she was?

The arrangement had been simple: Scarlet and her brother Rex would watch over Rochelle. It was the bond that secured the family, a promise that kept everyone safe. But now that promise was shattered, and Jonathan had no idea whether she had run, whether she was safe, or whether her uncle had lost his temper yet again.

He knew her family would not be happy when they found out.

More than that he knew her father would be furious.

Rochelle was always his favourite child, even though she didn't know she had siblings. That's why Mr. Evan had disappeared from her life years ago to protect her, to keep her safe from the darkness that surrounded the rest of them. But now Jonathan had failed, and he had to make one of the most difficult phone calls of his life.

He had to tell Mr. Evan that his daughter was missing.

As he walked down the stairs, Jonathan took out his phone and scrolled to the number. His thumb hovered over it. This phone call was about to change a lot of people's lives, and not necessarily for the better. Mr. Evan would pull the whole world apart to find her.

But what if she didn't want to be found?

What if Jonathan never saw her again?

What if the only thing left to do was disappear himself and find her? Would he even know where to start? Where would she go?

He pressed the call button.

The phone rang twice before a cold voice answered—a voice Jonathan knew belonged to a very violent man.

"Sir," Jonathan said slowly, carefully. "I stopped by to have lunch with your daughter as usual today." He paused, swallowing hard. "She's gone. All her personal effects, everything it's all gone."

Then he waited.

The response was immediate and explosive. Mr. Evan flew into a rage, screaming at everyone around him. Jonathan could hear things breaking in the background, voices shouting, chaos erupting.

Within half an hour, there were ten men standing around Jonathan in the lounge. Every available person was being mobilized to search for Rochelle. Her father stood in the middle of the room, holding a photo of his beloved daughter a picture from years ago, when she'd been younger, happier, unaware of the world she'd been born into.

"If anything has happened to her," Mr. Evan said, his voice deadly quiet now, "you will all pay with your lives."

The room fell silent.

At that moment, Rochelle's mother Scarlet walked into the house with her arm around her brother Rex. She was laughing at something he'd said, her face relaxed and unguarded.

Then she saw the men. Saw her ex-lover standing in the centre of them.

Her face went pale.

She ran to him, her voice rising in panic. "What's wrong? What happened?"

Mr. Evan turned to her, and when he spoke, his voice was the coldest Jonathan had ever heard it.

"Rochelle is missing."

Scarlet's eyes went wide. Her mouth opened, but no sound came out. Then her knees buckled and she collapsed to the floor in a dead faint.

Jonathan moved to help her, but Mr. Evan held up a hand, stopping him. Two of the men lifted Scarlet and carried her to the couch.

She knew they all knew that Rochelle was the only thing that had kept her alive these past few years. Mr. Evan had lost his love for Scarlet long ago. She was only here, only tolerated, because of their daughter.

Rex's face had gone ashen. He stammered, his voice shaking, "She she couldn't have gone far. She doesn't have anywhere to—"

Mr. Evans's hand shot out.

The c***k echoed through the room.

Rex hit the floor hard, blood streaming from his nose, spattering across the hardwood. He gasped, clutching his face, too stunned to even cry out.

"You were supposed to be watching her," Mr. Evan said quietly, standing over him. "You and your sister had one job."

Jonathan knew this was only the beginning. The violence, the rage, the desperate search it would all escalate from here. And if Rochelle wasn't found soon, if something had happened to her...

He didn't want to think about what Mr. Evan would do.

All he could do was stand there and watch and listen, his mind racing through possibilities, through plans, through the terrible question that kept circling back:

Where are you, Rochelle?