I tentatively felt my watch-face again. Now, it was 12:30. Something was wrong...very wrong.

In the few months that I had known Kayley, she had been no more than five minutes late, if even that.

I pulled my sidekick out and made my way to the park's exit. Listening very closely to all that was going on around me, I kept on thinking of scenarios that might have happened that prevented her from coming.

1: She never got the email.

2: Deep down inside, she thought I was a freak of nature.

3. Maybe she did respond, and I was too stubborn to check and see if she had.

4: She overslept due to illness.

5: She was sick of me.

Ugh, I hate it when this happens!! A change of events comes and my mind spirals into chaos.

If I would never have met Kayley I wouldn't be in this predicament!!

Then again, had I never met her, I would've missed out on the most amazing summer of my life.

My thoughts about Kayley followed me into my flat.

I sluffed all of my carryon onto the couch.

Normally, I would never perform such a slobbish act, but today I allowed it to happen. I have more to care about now than it being placed properly.

Honestly, it isn't even that I have more to care about these days. Rather, I have SOMEONE to care about.

Hmm, there is a new concept. A lady to care about.

Not just any lady either, MY LADY.

I felt my shoulders tense against the back of my desk chair at that thought. Did I really just confess to myself that I thought of her as MY LADY?

Apparently, I did.

I wonder if she has ever thought of me before as her man? That would be brilliant!!

Suddenly, a quick DING pulled me out of my thoughts. I had a new message on my computer.

After I opened the email, the JAWS program informed me that it was a video.

I drew the mouse hand over to it. As I started the video, I experienced the most unnerving feeling since my mother had passed. This feeling was brought on by the rasping, muffled breaths of a woman. I knew without a shadow of doubt that the woman was Kayley.

A voice started speaking. One eerily familiar to a voice I had not heard in a long while. It was male. His voice was deep. Indicating that he was most likely of a well proportioned frame. He spoke with confidence. Not the good kind from lessons well learned, but the kind that is egotistical. So egotistical in fact, you could point a pencil in the direction of his head and it would pop from being grossly inflated.

These are the foul words that proceeded out of his vile mouth,

"Hello, Garrett. It has been a long time since we have seen each other. But, then again, we still aren't seeing each other now!!! Nor shall we ever!!

Another person of whom you will not see, pardon my mistake there; another person you will never speak to again is visiting me.

She is oh, so lovely. Her skin feels like velvet. Her lips look so pink and tender. She has eyes like a beautiful doe, Her hair is long, lush and curls in all the right places as they falls over delicate, shoulders. Her eyelashes are fluttering against my hand because I am applying so much pressure over her mouth and nose. I told her earlier that she can not make even a single peep. She reminds me so much of her beautiful mother...Except for one teeny, tiny detail, she has brown eyes. Brown eyes...just like her father, Detective Lionel Reeves. He worked as an undercover agent for the London police...who were in cahoots with MI6. He was all buddy, buddy with his partner, Secret Agent Arthur Pen. Lionel was second in command under Secret Agent Pen. Pen's instincts and fighting skills were so fierce that people in the agency dubbed him, "The Dragon."

The Dragon just so happened to introduce Lionel to his cousin, Julianna Smythe. She was the woman whom I was seeing. I loved her more than anything.

Had she chosen me, then this pretty, little wench would have been my spawn.

Yet, she fatefully chose Lionel over me.

This wench would have had my green eyes, instead of these blasted brown ones!!!"

My hands were clasped so tightly against my desk that I thought they would explode from the pressure. How dare he call her that!! How dare he defame Lionel, his family, and friends??!! I could not bear to listen any longer, yet I had to. I had to know what became of Kayley.

"Your little wench has something to tell you, Garrett!" The man declared.

His hand was now apparently off her mouth because she spoke...or rather gasped.

"Garrett!! He forced me to give him your email! I am so sorry!!"

Then there was a blood curdling SMACK!!!! Did he slap her? Oh...if he laid one hand in violence to her...

"You Spoiled Wench!!! That is not what I told you to say!!! Speak what I told you to, or your life could end sooner than expected!!!" The ogre commanded.

I could hear it in her voice. She was holding back her tears- trying to stay strong.

"Garrett, he wants you to contact Agent Pen. He is holding me hostage for 3,000,000. Pen and my mother have to bring the money by Friday. If the money is not here by 2:00 p.m. Friday, he is going to kill me!!" she cried.

The man started speaking again, "Listen closely, Loverboy," he paused. A moment later there was an ear splitting CLANK!!! He began speaking again, "That sound you just heard belongs to the blade of my sword. It is the same blade that will stab your darling in the back. Just as her mother stabbed me in mine!! You have two days to save your little pretty. I suggest you start following the path to save her. Follow the bread crumbs that I leave for you."