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Chapter 21
The beauty of my plan was its simplicity. In fact, I don't need so much of a plan at all. All I needed was the decision, strong will, and determination. I knew who my kidnapper was and even though I hadn't known his full potential, I knew the limits of what he could and couldn't do. I knew his morals held him from hitting women, much less commanding his men to do such.
On several occasions, which proved right. The first was when he inquired of his men why they had me tied and proceeded by himself to loosen the cord that held me bound. The most recent scuffle between us solidified my hypothesis. As far as physical harm was concerned, from him, I needed not fear. The only issue would be leaving with my child. As crazy as it sounded, having been here for roughly three months, I had never been outside the walls of this estate alone with my child. If Ricardo didn't accompany me when he was still around, no going out alone. It was "too dangerous" Alessandro would always insist.
To this end, all I had to do was time my exit to a time he wouldn't be around which would've been easy to miss in such a vast sea of people and activities if you weren't observant. My chance came quicker than I thought, and I grabbed it with fleet feet. Screw waiting for the iron to be hot before striking. The very next day, Alessandro went out with his mother, leaving the baby with Gretchen, whom he took out of kitchen duty to focus primarily on the care of Artemis since she was the only other person the toddler was attached to.
"Hey, is it okay if I take Artemis for a walk? You know I haven't been with her in a while," I said sweetly. Of course I didn’t have any aversion towards the woman, even though I admit I used a tone a little too exaggerated than my usual tone with her, but she didn't seem to notice...or mind.
"Sure," she gleefully handed me my baby, probably having enough of Artemis's mischief for one day. Who wouldn’t? The kid was carnage if you gave her too free a hand – something a lot of them always did. I’d attribute that to the fact that they haven’t had the direct attachment with the child to not feel bad for a proper scolding.
Heh.Who was their mother after all!?
Gretchen told me to bring Artemis to her for dinner by seven. My own child. She was asking...not instructing me to bring back my own child. I really have tolerated a lot from Alessandro in this accursed place.
I called the young driver as soon as we were out of the building and out of earshot from Gretchen. "Paul! I need a quick trip to the pharmacy." He almost came flying to me.
"Yes ma'am." He paused. "Alone?" he asked, unsure. He too must have received orders.
"Listen. Artemis is burning up and I think she has some parasites. It's making her diarrhea really explosive. That and we're running low on diapers." I tensed my voice and scooted from side to side to make it sound genuine. I had to say no more. He was in one of the numerous cars with the engine roaring to life in no time.
We got into the car and were off faster than I imagined. Since they didn't bring our clothes from home, I reckoned we both had clothes and didn't need to pack to avoid unnecessary suspicion, even though there were some clothes I utterly cherished.
"Listen..." I told him when we were approaching by coincidence, the mall I had worked in before. "I'm sure there's a pharmacy in the superstore just upfront. I used to work there before and I feel our little woman might need to change her diaper urgently," I winced for emphasis. "Just pull over and we'll be in and out in no time."
He obliged and soon, the three of us were in the store, heading for the restroom. Of course, he wasn't going to follow me in.My strike time.
In the restroom, there was also a staff only storage room where they kept the temporary go to supplies like toilet paper and detergent. It had another door leading to the main storage room that connected to the male restroom which was constructed in a thankful corner design away from the female restroom. Being a staff here for nearly six years, I was out faster than my brain was able to adapt to the familiar environment. Artemis was comfortable with being carried by me. Something I noticed since we first encountered Alessandro and was thankful for. The entire thing would have been messier for me if she suddenly felt like running on her own.
I felt entirely sorry for the poor driver I had stood up in the mall. It had been about an hour since I left the mall. By now, he'd have thrown the fear of embarrassment to the wind and entered the restroom, searching every stall, taking in a few slaps, and realizing the horrifying truth. I had escaped. He would have it really hot with Alessandro when he got back and had to explain that somehow, his daughter and her mother disappeared from under his watch. For his sake, I hoped for Alessandro's lenience.
The first place I went to after fleeing the mall wasn't my house. That'd be a waste. They'd literally come and pluck me off like they did the first time. Maybe even easier. I was at the police station soon enough and I realized that Casey and Mrs. Margret had filed a missing case for me but somehow, it had been closed when a phone call had been made by "me"saying that I was fine and didn't need help in anyway...even stating the address of where I was currently staying... which was false of course but somehow, it worked.
When I told them what actually happened to me, I made sure to avoid making it look like a flat-out kidnap. I didn't want to stir up trouble, especially knowing Alessandro's line of work. I wasn't going to be the snitch. Besides, I doubted these police officers were oblivious to the Aurora Syndicate and its current leader. The best I got out with was a restraining order from them, preventing Alessandro from ever coming anywhere nearer than four hundred feet of me or my child.That'll do.
Getting home was the biggest breath of fresh air ever. We had to stay for another week at a hotel to allow the police and law officials to deliver the news and developments to Alessandro and also to prevent any reprisal lash in anger or something similar. Although this time, it was clear that Artemis was uncomfortable and that was my biggest headache. She'd cry sometimes for hours on end, and it'd take the best of my mothering skills to keep her quiet, especially when she made it clear that nothing was wrong with her, and she just wanted to go home.
It tore me up to see how excited she was when I opened the front door to our home. She ran all around the place in intense delight and I had to keep with her to avoid her getting into one of those childish unnecessary accidents that'd just be a pain later. The house was largely untouched when we got back. Asides from trying to keep it to the bare minimum so that people wouldn't notice we were taken by force - like closing the curtains and turning off the necessary equipment that needn't work while we were away, the house was in the same mess…ishI left it.
The dishes from three months ago remained undone. The food in the freezer was still there although some of it expired. The bed was still unmade, basically everything that wasn't needed to beseen wasn't touched and so, although there wasn't much to be put in place, apart from ridding the house from dust, it still took a lot of energy to do so. The fact that for the past three months I hadn't as much as lifted a finger to do a thing didn't help either.
The next day, along with others, were filled with me going through job interview after job interview and ignoring Alessandro's countless calls. I had literally blocked his number from calling me more than seven times and the bastard still had the resources to call me again. I would've switched off my phone or stopped handling calls from unknown numbers if I wasn't looking for a job, but the moment I found one as a secretary to a female director of a small financial firm, I was able to track and stop the phone calls from him. I was tired of hearing his pathetic fake pleas.
The next couple of months passed on a blur. Even Christmas and New Year’s was completely uneventful. The job I had gotten was extremely demanding and something else craved my attention... someone else. Artemis was growing fast. Now, she'd even already entered the stage where her speech was clearing up. We celebrated her third birthday on the twenty sixth of May and it was a blast!
If you call a total guest number of seven a blast. I didn't mind though. It was the most we've had so far for her birthday, and I was glad.
She was growing fast, learning fast, and demanding more and more of my time. There was nothing greater on my mind than she was. My world.My light. If I thought I could give my life formy Dad, she was a certainty. It was due to this reason that I gave up Fauxwood for a very long time.
"Till she probably grows old enough to be left properly alone without any particular fear, you know." I told Carlos when we met outside of the club. Carlos was becoming a more permanent fixture in my life. If life had been some way, I'd have tried out a shot on him, but given my love trauma with Alessandro and the fact that Carlos wasmightygay, none of my erotic plans for him would come to pass.
"Even then, you should abstain from this place, you know. Messes with your psych... reduces productivity." He pointed at his head with both hands and twirled them, crossing his eyes simultaneously, making Artemis laugh.
That was his connection with the girl.Humor. Artemis reciprocated her admiration for the Latino bartender by trying as much as possible, amidst laughter, to imitate him as well, causing them to sometimes go into a spiral of mimicking wars.
"Yeah. And I wouldn't want to be a bad influence either," I nodded.
"Aha! Now you get it!" he high fived Artemis for my brilliant thinking. "All you have to do is have a mini bar at home, stash up on your Bulleit and take sips whenever you can," he advised. "You don't need to be coming here paying twenty bucks for a shot when you can get bottles and save money in the hundreds."
