“I’m sorry… They took your daughter with them Mr. Soel…” His rough voice echoed sharply in my ear. The entire living room seemed to have quieted down completely as he finished that sentence. All I could hear was Amber’s crying being muffled slightly under my jacket and… those words. I noticed his mouth was still moving, yet I could not hear him. Everything felt so very wrong…
“Marshall, you there?” He said as I felt my mind enter reality once more. A female police officer approached Amber and offered to find her somewhere to sit.
“She’s… gone.” My lifeless voice spoke up. The man sighed heavily and put his hand to my shoulder.
“Listen to me; we will find her and stop them before anything happens, you got that?”
The conviction in his voice was apparent, as well as a small hint of anger toward the entire situation.
I couldn’t reply to the officer; my body felt frozen. With whatever strength remained in me, I nodded slowly back at him.
His hand was still locked on my shoulder, and I walked with him to the hall that used to connect to Lea’s room. About half way there the front door began to squeak open, and the officer turned lazily to see who it was. To be honest, I don’t know how or why I turned my head as well, my body being in such a traumatic condition, but I did.
It was Frank.
With a greedy smile he entered the apartment, but almost immediately it left him as he stood awkwardly in the living room, watching a number of officers taking pictures and obtaining evidence around the premise of the hall.
“Don’t worry about nothing, buddy! Got it all figured out, your little girl’s going to be famous!” His text message I received just a day ago clicked in my head.
“It was you…” My voice uttered.
The blood in my veins rushed violently to my head as I slowly approached Frank.
“Marshall, what the hell happened here?! Some friends from this modeling agency I found were s’posed to come here today!” He exclaimed.
I felt my fingers cut through the skin of my palms as my fist continued tightening. Every ounce of control I had was preventing me from killing Frank right then and there.
“You sent them… my directions?”
“Uh, yeah… They wanted to see if your kid was right for some campaign of theirs.” Frank explained cautiously.
That’s when I knew it; he was the key reason why all this had just happened. Had he not given away my information to a shady “modeling agency”, Lea would’ve still been here, and Toby wouldn’t have gotten hurt.
“They took her…” I snarled. “THEY TOOK HER BECAUSE YOU WERE FUCKING STUPID ENOUGH TO BELIEVETHEM!” My right hand landed a punch directly to Frank’s cheek. The force of the blow continued off of his face into the wall that he stood next to, creating a shallow dent.
Frank’s body tumbled onto the ground as he held with both his hands the bruise.
“Dammit Marshall; what’s gotten into you?!” His legs kicked the rest of his body around the floor in an attempt to escape me.
Everything felt numb, as all the times spent with little Lea flooded my mind and poured from my tears. My vision became extremely blurry as more tears continued forming, but I could still clearly see the treacherous, evil monster that lay before me.
“I’m going to kill you…” A sinister voice erupted from me.
“G-give me a chance to explain, Marsh!” Frank pleaded.
With one hand I flung him back on his feet and landed another punch straight to his nose. Frank’s wails of agony were responded by a number of police officers holding my arms down, attempting to restrain me. With one violent thrust, I pushed them all off of me and continued delivering punch after punch to the man who had officially destroyed my life.
“I-I’m sorry, Marshall-“Frank started up once more, but was cut short by my kick connecting to his stomach. He fell to the floor once again, bleeding from nose and mouth, when suddenly I felt a powerful volt of electricity hit my lower back. I groaned in pain as my hand desperately tried to pull out whatever was causing it.
Frank began to get up once more as the surge continued circulating inside me. His eyes connected to mine and with one last blast of energy, I landed a punch on the other side of his face, causing him to fall back down.
My body collapsed as I faintly heard a number of police approach Frank and arrest him.
Everything turned black a moment later.
The quiet chatter of people around awoke me once more. My body felt tingly as I attempted to look up at my current surrounding. I could feel that I was sitting on a hard wooden chair. With my old self returning I tried to get up, but a cold metal cuff locked to my right hand stopped me dead in my tracks. My other hand went to grab at it, but was halted by a familiar friend’s grip.
“Don’t.” Amber whispered.
“After what you did to Frank-”
The recent events that had unfolded before I passed out returned to me.
“Frank! where the hell is he?!”
“Shh, calm down. The police took him away. Apparently, conspiring in a kidnapping is a felony here.” Amber added with a weak chuckle. She attempted to add some humor to the situation even with its clear seriousness behind it.
“You managed to beat Frank pretty good even with five cops holding you down.” She said softly.
A silence followed her words.
“Lea is… gone.” I spoke up.
Amber sniffled briefly before replying.
“I-I know.”
The shame and regret I felt toward everything that had occurred made me look back down at the floor. My eyes felt hot and my vision blurred. If I could’ve just done… something, maybe this wouldn’t have happened. What could those monsters that took her be doing to her right now? The very thought consumed me as more tears continued forming. I heard Amber’s stifled sobs as I too started silently crying. The uselessness I felt at that moment was almost unbearable. Whether it was something witty, interesting, or smart, I could reply to virtually any comment or situation with enthusiasm; but now… nothing. There was nothing I could say to make this moment any better.
Before I even had a chance to say something, the familiar police officer that had informed me of things approached the two of us.
“Mr. Soel, I have to apologize for having you like this.” He said softly as his hand reached for his pocket and pulled out a silver key. “Unfortunately my associates and I agreed after the little stunt you pulled on that guy just an hour ago that it would be best to keep you restrained.” He continued explaining as his fingers fiddled with the key.
“I can’t imagine what you must be going through right now, but if you want me to unlock you, you have to promise me that you’ll keep your cool throughout our investigation, alright?” The man’s eyes seemed incredibly tired; quite possibly from lack of sleep, yet they also glimmered with strength as his stare connected with mine.
I looked away for a moment but knew that staying locked to my chair would not help our predicament, so I rose my head up once more.
“I promise.” I felt life enter my words.
He nodded confidently and quickly removed the hand cuff from my wrist.
The next couple of hours were spent talking with a number of officers and detectives now leading the case. Questions about family relations or unusual connections to certain people arose, but very few could be said. Amber was born and raised in California with a very small family of local pharmacists. My lack of family all together provided little-to-no solace towards catching a break. Suddenly, that man I saw at the park just yesterday clicked in my mind.
“There was actually someone I noticed late afternoon yesterday when I took my daughter to play at the park.” I told the detective.
“What made you notice him? Was he looking at you guys in a certain manner? Did he say something?” The officer asked as he scribbled some words on his notepad.
“No, he was just staring at us… and just before he left, I could’ve sworn I saw him like, crack a smile or something… I don’t know…” I replied hazily.
“It’s alright; could you describe what he looked like?” He questioned.
I briefly pushed my hair back in an attempt to remember every detail about the man at the park.
“Shaved head… kind of tall, maybe 6’4… looked pretty built; I’d guess about 210 or so.” My eyes strained to find the clearest image from my mind.
“Okay, I want you to explain every little thing you saw about this guy to one of our sketch artists.” He showed me to another man sitting nearby.
The balding artist asked me a series of questions about what I saw. By the end of it all, I checked my watch to see it was already past ten. The police knew Amber and I had told them everything we possibly knew, so they let us go. I was unable to stay at the apartment since they still wanted to run some tests on the unchecked rooms, so we simply rented a hotel. Everything turned silent the moment I turned off our lights. It wasn’t long before I heard Amber quietly sobbing once more. I turned the light back on to check up on her.
“I-I’m sorry, I-I didn’t mean to wake you…” She sniffled.
I quickly wrapped my arms around her in a warm hug.
“No, I-I know…” I whispered back.
Amber turned to look at me.
“You don’t deserve this.” Her eyes were glossy from recent tears. I quickly turned away from her to avoid being caught in such a state of grief.
“Marshall, I’m-”
“Don’t apologize again.” I interrupted. “None of this is your fault.” My face turned back to look at her.
Her hand slowly made its way to my tear-stained cheek.
“It isn’t yours either. We will find her.” She whispered.
My hand took a gentle hold of Amber’s.
“Yes. We will.”
Before another word could be uttered under the black skies, our lips touched. We did not say anything afterwards, other than just look at one another for a brief moment. She lay back down onto the bed and turned herself to me. Amber’s eyes were still wide open as she twisted her fingers around my hands.
The rest of the night wore on as the two of us slept peacefully in each other’s embrace. For the first time since the incident, I actually felt myself line a smile. Amber gave me the confidence to say we really could rescue my little girl, and with her by my side, I knew it was true.