Forget Me Not (Remember Me Series) (3 page)

It was the last straw. Rage boiled in my veins and I reacted. Drawing my arm back I let it go, my fist connecting with his jaw as it made a satisfying crunch. He staggered back away from  me, stunned for a second but I followed him. Tackling him to the floor we rolled together. He regained the upper hand momentarily as his fists caught me in the ribcage, knocking the air from my lungs.

Gasping I retaliated, one quick upper cut to the face followed by two rapid body blows. Strong arms wrapped around my body, hauling me up from the floor and back onto my feet. I fought against them, struggling to get free. Rage continued to flood my body. I wanted to kill him, to stop him from talking about Bella as though she didn’t matter at all… She mattered to me and that should have been good enough for all of them… And yet, it didn’t seem to be.

“What the hell is going on out here?” The chiefs voice cut in over the other cop’s noise, silencing the room.

I stilled my struggling, my body still tense, I was ready to pounce at the first opportunity. Arnolds stood at the opposite side of the circle of people that had gathered. He rubbed his jaw and swiped at the trickle of blood that trailed down from his lip.

“I said, what the hell happened?” 

The Chief Rexton arrived into the centre of the circle, his presence instantly intimidating and threatening. He hadn’t gotten the position because he was nice, or good at politics and P.R. He’d earned the position through hard work and steely determination. He didn’t take crap, and I’d always admired him.

“Detective Crantree here is drunk. I told him to go home and get his head sorted out before he came back, that’s when he attacked me.”

“You deserved it.” I ground the words out, from between gritted teeth.

“Come into my office, Crantree, I think it’s time we had a little chat.”

The other cops holding me didn’t release me immediately. They could sense the tension in my body and they knew what I was capable of. But the Chief Rexton simply raised one eyebrow and they released me. He started to move away and I followed him. He didn’t look back to see if I was following his orders. Other cops might have felt the need to check, but not him. He simply took it at face value that whatever he commanded would get done. And he was right, there wasn’t one man or woman standing in the room that would have gone against him.

He pushed the glass door of his office open and moved inside until he was positioned behind the desk. He waited until I’d closed the door before he sat down and gestured to one of the seats in front of him.

“Sit.”

It was an order, not a request but everything with him was like that. He sat back in the high backed leather chair and watched me. Much like a wolf might watch its prey. He was looking for my weakness, a way in. Something he could use to destroy me, and if he thought for a second that he could do it, then he would. He was the type of man that despised weakness in others.

“There isn’t a whole lot that you can do to me, that will make what I’m feeling any worse.”

I had nothing left to lose. I’d known the moment I’d drawn out and punched Arnolds that I wouldn’t be a cop for a very long time… If ever again. It was a strangely freeing feeling. It would make finding Bella harder in one sense but at least if I was free of the constraints of the law I could do whatever I needed to do, in order to find her.

“You’re a good cop, Aidan, a good detective. Why throw all of that away?”

“I didn’t consider throwing it away, Arnolds needed to be taken down a peg or two, he knew what he was doing was wrong. He knew I’d gotten my hopes up…”

“Hopes? You’re a cop, Crantree, you know as well as I that hopes and dreams don’t come into an investigation. Arnolds was right to refuse you access to the evidence. You’re drunk and you attacked another officer.”

I dropped my head forward into my hands.

“But he was wrong to give you false hope. I know what it’s like to lose someone special. I know what that feels like, and I know how important every little detail becomes.”

I jerked my head back up, my gaze trained on the man on the other side of the desk. What the hell was he talking about? He had a wife and kids… So who had he lost that made sympathise with me?

“I know what you’re thinking and I knew her before I ever married Clarissa. But she was special and what happened to her was my fault, or at least I believed that. I beat myself up about it for years after. I didn’t tell Clarissa about it for a very long time… And when I did she helped me understand that what happened wasn’t my fault.”

Sighing I brushed my hands back through my hair. I was glad that he had come to terms with what had happened in his past. I was even glad that he had found someone that he could share it with. But my situation wasn’t like that. Bella going missing was my fault. I was the one that needed to do something to find her. As far as I was concerned no one would find her but me. All I could hope for was that I would find her before Christopher had the chance to do any lasting damage to her.

Rexton sighed and leaned towards me over the desk.

“None of this is having any effect on you is it?”

I shrugged, what sort of an answer did he expect from me? What sort of an answer could I give him? It wasn’t having the effect that he wanted and that was for sure. All his story seemed to do was make me even more certain that I would do what I had to do.

“Did you ever find her?”

He quirked an eyebrow at me.

“Your someone special, did you ever find her?”

Chief Rexton stared down at his folded hands. I could see the way he clenched his jaw, the slight whitening of his knuckles. He didn’t need to give me the answer verbally, his body language had done it all for him.

“Yes. I found her. Just not the way I’d hoped I would.”

I nodded and stood.

“I’m sorry it worked out that way for you. But I can’t have the same result. It’s not something I could survive.”

“Life doesn’t always give us the things we want you know, Crantree… Sometimes it gives us the complete opposite. And often it’s for our own good, we just haven’t figured that part out yet.”

My back stiffened and I balled my hands into fists at my side. I could lose it with Arnolds, he deserved a punch. The Chief of Police was someone entirely different. And if I was honest, I wasn’t even sure I’d be able to take him.

“I’m suspending you, Crantree, pending a psychological evaluation, you need some counselling. Losing your partner and losing Bella has hit you hard and I understand that. But I can’t have loose cannons running around.”

I nodded. It was better than I’d expected. He wasn’t firing me, only suspending. It gave me hope for the future. Hope that I would get everything back on track. Back to the way it should have been. I couldn’t save Hunter, Christopher had fixed that, but I could save Bella. So that was what I would do.

“Aidan.”

Rexton’s voice halted my movement to the door.

“Yes?”

“Don’t do anything stupid. You’re a good cop, I want you back on the force. I don’t want to lose another good detective to this guy, alright?”

“You won’t.”

And it was true. Which part of was true? Well that was up for debate.

CHAPTER FOUR

Bella

Thinking about escaping was much easier than actually escaping. I ran until it felt as though my lungs would explode, and even then I kept running. I had no choice. Enough time had passed that I was sure they knew I was gone. 

The inside of whatever this place was, was like a labyrinth. Each door I raced through seemed to only lead to more corridors. There was no sound and it made me nervous. Surely there had to be someone who could help me? Someone who would take pity on me and help me escape. But there was nothing. I didn’t know if I was running in circles and I could feel myself becoming more and more disorientated.

Spotting one lone door at the far end of the corridor I stood in I ran towards it, my bare feet slapping against the cold stone floor. The door was heavy and made entirely of metal. I strained against it, heaving my entire body into it in an attempt to shift it just a little bit. When it did finally yield, the metal screeched across the stone floor.

If they hadn’t known I was gone before, then they certainly knew I was gone now. It would be impossible to ignore a noise like that.

The sound of shouting in the distance drew my attention. They were after me. They knew I was gone and I didn’t have much time. Cold air whipped around my body as I pushed the door again, opening it just enough to be able to see past it to what lay beyond.

There didn’t seem to be any moon light, but I could just make out a rough path leading away from whatever building I was trapped inside. I pushed again, the voices drawing closer to where I was. They couldn’t catch me now, not when I was so close to escaping, not when I was so close to finding my way back to Aidan.

Christopher couldn’t have taken me very far. I didn’t remember the journey but it didn’t feel as though he had taken me far. I pushed again, using all the strength I had left in my body and the door opened another fraction. But it was enough. Enough to allow me to slip out through it.

I pressed my body into the tight space and squeezed my way through. A sharp edge on the side of the door dug into the soft skin of my stomach. I didn’t have any choice but to carry on. The further I squeezed out through the gap the more the metal tore into me. With one final strangled sob of pain I wrenched my body free. I gasped as pain lanced through me. I pressed my hand to my stomach and I could feel the warm sticky feel of my own blood. But it wasn’t bad enough to stop me.

I started to run. Dirt and sharp stones digging into my feet with each step I took. Trees surrounded me on all sides, pressing down on top of me. The air was heavy with heat and sweat trickled down my body. It ran into the cut on my stomach and the sting of the salt from my sweat made me chew my bottom lip.

The sound of running feet behind me had me veering into the trees. I had to stay away from the paths. If they knew where I’d broken out then it wouldn’t take them long to find me. And I had no intention of making anything easy.

I hopped over fallen branches and dodged in and out between the trees, my breathing ragged. I wasn’t a runner, and the pace I was forcing myself to keep up was wearing my body down. The only thing that kept me going was the urge to escape. I could practically hear Aidan in my mind, urging me to keep running, to get away, to come home to him. And I wanted to go home to so badly. My heart ached for him. What must he have thought when he arrived home and I wasn’t there?

If he came home.

The twisted voice in my head piped up, momentarily distracting me. My foot came down on a rock, wrenching it out from underneath me. I stumbled, my arms windmilling violently as I teetered on the edge of a steep slope. But I was too far gone and my foot refused to take my weight, making me lose my balance.

My body went over the edge, careening down the steep embankment. I didn’t make a sound, I was too surprised to even scream as I fell. Instead, my body tumbled head over heels, small trees, broken branches and rocky debris, biting into me as I fell.

I came to a stop at the bottom of the embankment. There was no air in my lungs and no matter how hard I tried to drag a breath in, I couldn’t. Tears trailed from the corners of my eyes. How was I going to find my way back to Aidan, if I couldn’t even run in a straight line without falling over?

Lights flickered through the trees, followed by the sounds of boots crunching through the underbrush. Rolling onto my side I crawled until I could finally drag my battered body onto my feet. The world swam around me, in streamers of colour. I still wasn’t drawing enough air into my lungs. I couldn’t hear whoever was behind me properly, my head felt stuffed with cotton wool.

But through sheer desperation I continued to run, each step a lesson in agony. But to me it was worth it. I preferred injuring myself, at least it was done at my own hands and it was while I was trying to escape. I didn’t want Christopher to brand me… I didn’t want him to use me up and then spit me out.

An image of Tanya floated in my head… The things he had done to her, he’d broken her completely and I didn’t want to end up the same. I would do anything to avoid a fate like that. Anything.

The trees opened up suddenly, open space spreading out around me. I continued to run. My lungs ached and the world was beginning to tilt but I didn’t care. I could escape, I would escape.

Headlights flared up a small road at my side, lighting the area in its golden glow and that’s when I saw it. I was running straight for it, and I hadn’t even realised. Would I have seen it in time if the headlights hadn’t appeared?

The large SUV veered off the road and onto the grass that I was running across. The headlights bounced crazily around me as the car closed in on me. It came to a halt as I reached the edge of the cliff. I was beyond dizzy as I stared over the ledge. It was a sheer drop below me, a drop that would kill anyone who went over it.

“Bella, what are you doing?”

Christopher’s voice rang out in the still night air.

At the sound of his voice I found myself backing up. I could feel the cool wind as it whipped against my back. It was an eerie feeling, knowing that there was nothing behind you. Nothing that could save you, and if you went over then that really would be it. Was I willing to do that? Was I willing to go over the edge and lose all chance of Aidan ever coming for me.

What would he do if he came looking for me and I was dead, dashed to pieces on the rocks below, killed on impact with the sea? Would it break his heart to know that I had jumped rather than just give him a chance?

“You have to let me go…” 

My voice shook, a mixture of fear and adrenaline. I didn’t dare take another step back, I was already far too close to the edge. And I didn’t know if the cliff was stable or not.