AllFreeNovel
Share Us
There have been a few possible leads over the years but nothing solid, and even though they found traces of her blood at the scene that night, I refuse to give up looking for her. I refuse to leave her out there, dead or alive.
Spinning the car around, I head home. My mind is full of questions, questions I’ve asked myself a hundred times or more over the years. None of the answers my mind conjures are good.
As I turn down my road, I come to a stop, unable to go any further. The whole road is blocked, and the paths are lined with residents. Smoke plumes in the sky, spiralling upwards and carried away by the wind that’s picked up in the last hour.
Climbing from my car, I step around the fire engine blocking my way to see a house on fire. It takes me a second to realise whose house it is, and then my feet are moving.
“Get out of the way. Move,” I yell as I shove my way through the crowds lining the street. I skid to a halt as I reach the edge of the police cordon, almost ploughing into a copper preventing people from getting closer.
“Hey, hold it there—”
“That’s my house. Let me the fuck through now!” Before he can reply or stop me, I duck under his arm and run toward the house, only to be stopped a second later when an arm wraps around my waist, pulling me back.
“Sarge, it’s me, Smithy. Stop fighting. You can’t go in there.” Smithy’s voice finally reaches my brain, and I stop struggling. He holds me up as my knees almost give out when I see the smouldering remains of my home.
“Fuck!” The word is exhaled on a harsh breath. There’s a loud crash as part of the roof collapses, and dark black smoke billows up, curling around the clouds like a noose. And I can almost feel it as though it were around my own neck.
“I’m sorry, Sarge,” Smithy says as I find my feet again.
“I’m not your Sergeant anymore, Smithy. Just plain old Roxy now.” He releases me, and I take a step back.
“Nah, you’ll always be Sarge to me.”
“Thanks, Smithy.” I give him a pat on the shoulder as I turn and walk back to my car, ignoring him as he calls after me. I reverse the car back out to the main road and find a place to park while I wait.
Several hours pass by, and as I watch a fire engine pulling out of my road, I start the car and drive back to what’s left of my home.
It’s not a pretty sight. Black scorch marks climb the wall from every window, and the frames are charred and buckled. The acrid scent of burnt plastic lingers in the air accompanied by little flakes of ash that float down from the sky.
I watch the last of the firemen as they roll their hoses back up and load them on to the fire engine. I see Smithy talking to a fireman, and I walk over to him.
He introduces me, and I’m given a quick run-down on what they believe happened. Petrol bomb apparently. The building isn’t safe for me to enter, not that there’s anything for me to salvage by the looks of it. As the fireman walks away, I notice my neighbours, a family with two small children, huddled on the side of the road.
“Smithy, do they have somewhere to stay?” He turns to look at where my focus is before turning back to me.
“Yeah, they have a family member they can stay with for now. How about you, you got somewhere you can stay?”
I drag my eyes away from the family and look at Smithy. “I’m good, don’t worry about me. But do me a favour, send me the bill for whatever they need, okay.”
“Of course. I have to go, but don’t be a stranger, Sarge.”
Back in my car, I search for an Airbnb close by and manage to find one that I can have tonight even though it’s late.
With nothing but what I’m wearing and a boot full of food, I drive toward my temporary home.
ChapterTwelve
Maddox
Sweat glistens across my bare chest, and it heaves with exertion as I watch Axel’s eyes roll to the back of his head from the force of the hit Zak just planted on him.
“Are you ready to talk now, Axel?” He spits blood from his mouth, a tooth among the sticky, congealed mess on the floor.
“I can’t tell you why. It’s more than my life is worth,” he slurs, lisping due to the missing front tooth now lying at my feet.
“You have no fucking idea how true those words are.” I nod to Zak standing behind him, and he wraps an arm around Axel’s neck, squeezing until he turns blue and almost passes out from lack of oxygen. Giving him another nod, Zak releases him. Axel gasps and sucks air into his starved lungs, his head dropping, chin to chest, as his breathing begins to level out.
“Please, Maddox, you know me. You know I’d never betray you.”
