Chapter 10: Me & You
After all he had heard Zane couldn't just sit down and wait. He ran out of the room, and the others following him close after.
"Zane, Zane, wait!" Cleo shouted at him, almost out of breath, but he didn't listen.
Will who was faster than everyone else, caught his arm and the other boy had to stop.
"Do you even know where you're going?" He asked Zane.
"To save Rikki!" Zane shouted at his face.
"You don't even know where that woman is keeping her." Bella tried to reason him.
"Then I'm going to find out." Zane said quickly.
"How?" Cleo asked him.
Zane turned to look at her because he wanted to say something, but he couldn't. He realized he had no idea. Suddenly a thought came to my mind and he took out his phone, dialing a number.
"Dad, it's me. Please, meet me at Mako in an hour. I have to talk to you about something really important and it can't wait. Ok, thanks, see you there!"
He then hung up and looked at them. They were all staring at him.
"What?" Zane rasied his eyebrows at them angrily.
"What are you up to?" Lewis asked him.
"My father is a very powerful businessman. He has connections almost everywhere in Australia. Maybe he can help us." Zane explained.
"That actually is a really good idea!" Bella said surprising him and the others.
They looked at each other, but didn't lose time and went straight to Mako Island to meet Zane's father. On the way there only one thing was in Zane's mind; to find Rikki and save her.
{ . }
When Rebecca woke up the sun was already shining.
She lifted her head and looked at Rikki. The curly blond was still sleeping, her head leaned to the side of one of her shoulders. One of her curls was falling over her face, making her look even more beautiful.
Becca smiled.
She was happy that Rikki was her sister. She yawned and stretched her hands, before looking at her sister again.
Rikki's face had changed. It had some kind of a worried expression. Her fingers were trembling slightly on the floor. She then started murmuring something nervously in her sleep, in the beginning quiet, then louder until Becca could make out clear words like "Cleo" and "Mako". She realized her sister was probably having some kind of a bad dream.
Rebecca wondered who that Cleo must be. Probably her sister's friend. All of a sudden she felt a bit jealous. Rikki had told her that she had a couple of friends, best friends, but now the thought her sister might love her friends so much hurt Becca. She wished someday Rikki would feel the same way about her. They are sisters after all.
Suddenly Rikki opened her eyes and looked around then looked at Becca. The curly blond stood up on her feet and looked at the sun shining through the small window. Becca didn't know what to say or what to do and Rikki was the first to speak.
"This doesn't change anything." She said not bothering to turn around.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean us. Being sisters. It doesn't change a thing." Rikki turned around to look at Becca.
"How can you even say that? It changes everything!" Becca looked at her eyes with tears in her own.
She was so hurt by what the curly blond had said. How could she just say something like that?!
"No, it doesn't. I have a life out there, and you have too. As soon as we get out of here we'll carry on with our lives as if nothing happened." Rikki said.
Tears started rolling down Becca's cheeks.
"We're sisters!" She yelled to the other girl. "And even if you can carry on pretending nothing happened, I can't. Besides it looks like we'll be closed in here for a very long time. I don't think we'll be going out any time soon."
"You're wrong. I'll get us both out of here." Rikki said and stretched her hand towards the door.
But before she did anything else however, she turned around to look at Becca.
"You must swear you will never ever tell anyone what you're going to see!"
"Ok." Becca nodded.
Rikki turned around to the door again and curled her fingers against the locker. A stench of molten steel spread out in the cell. After a few second Rikki pushed the door open. She did the same with the door that was the exit of the basement they've been kept in.
They then carefully went through the door and up the stairs where Rikki stopped dead in her tracks. She thought she's been thrown into a dream. Her and Becca were standing in an old and beautiful big house. And from what they could see, they were the only ones there.
Rikki was looking around in something between shock and awe. She'd never seen a house like that one before. She made a few steps to take a better look at the room they were in. It had white walls and white, leather furniture. There was a glass table with a bottle of scotch with two empty glasses on it. At the other side of the room there were stairs that were leading to the up level.
"I can't believe this." Becca breathed, causing Rikki to turn around and look at her. "We're at our mother's house."
Without hesitation Rikki quickly ran upstairs to find her mother's room.
"Rikki!" Becca yelled and ran after her.
Upstairs there were many doors, so Rikki just pushed open the first one.
It was leading to a bedroom with one big bed, a wardrobe and a nightstand. One the nightstand there was a photo. Rikki quickly walked over to it and picked the photo up. It was a close up of her mother. Anger filled the curly blond and she threw the picture in the ground. Its frame broke on million pieces. But something else caught her attention. She reached for the broken frame. Behind the photo of her mother, there was yet another photo.
A photo of a 4-year-old girl with her dad on the beach. They were both smiling.
Rikki squeezed her eyes close for a moment, taking a deep breath and opened them again just when someone entered the room. She looked up and realized it was her mother.
Kyra froze when she saw Rikki holding the old photo in her hand.
"What are you doing here? How did you escape?" She asked both Rikki and Becca but the curly blond couldn't say anything.
She was just staring at her mother.
"Give me that." Her mother said and tried to pull the photo out of Rikki's hands. Her skin touched the curly blond's and the contact made Rikki tremble. In a heartbeat she felt so many things she couldn't even describe and when her mother moved her hands and the touch of their skin was broken, all the things Rikki had felt disappeared as quickly as they had rushed through her.
"How is it you have a picture of me and my father? Have you been keeping it all those years?"
Tears filled her mother's eyes.
"This was the only memory of you I had." She said, and a tear rolled down her cheek. "And I didn't want to lose it."
Becca also had tears in her eyes, but she wasn't watching their mother, she was observing Rikki. The curly blond didn't know what to say so she just rushed past her mother towards the door, when her mother said something that made her stop dead in her tracks.
"I'm sorry."
Rikki was so shocked that she turned to look at her.
"What?"
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry for leaving you and your dad. I should've never done that."
"It's too late for that, isn't it?" Rikki had come to her contious again. "The past is said and done and your aplogize won't change anything. I have one question, though. Why? Why did you do it?" Rikki's blue orbiths pierced her mother's dark ones.
"I can't tell you." She said.
"Don't! Don't you dare to say that." Rikki yelled at her.
Her mother covered her face with her hands and her sleeves slipped down uncovering loads of severe bruises, some of which were newly made and many wounds. Rikki's eyes widened. Rebecca gasped covering her mouth with her hands.
"What the hell had happened to you?" Rikki asked her mother.
"Nothing." Her mother lied and tried to pull back her sleeves, but the curly blond caught her arm.
"You're hiding something." She stated. "You're covering for someone."
"No!" Her mother gulped, but the panic in her voice gave her away.
"You're being abused, aren't you?!" It wasn't a question. It was a statement.
Her mother shook her head frantically, giving out her panic. Suddenly her eyes widened as she stared at something behind Rikki. The curly blond spun around to find herself face to face with a man that had just entered the room. He laughed at the scene before him. A laugh, cold and full with hate, like it wasn't human.
"The two birds had flied out of the cage, I see." He said moving his eyes between Rikki and Rebecca, who in her panic stepped closer to her mother. Rikki moved stood in front of both of them protectively, facing the man.
"Who are you, what do you want?" She asked him.
"So, you don't know?" He asked with a smirk. "I'm your grandfather." He stated.
"You're my what?" Rikki asked, her eyes wide open.
"How did you escape?" He asked, making a step closer to the curly blond.
"Why does it matter?" She lifted her eyebrows, her blue eyes piercing him.
The anger was filling her again. It seemed he liked that she wasn't giving up and the way she was fighting back at his words.
"You're very pretty, you know that?" He suddenly said. "You remind me of her." And he looked over to her mother.
Again he came even closer. He tried to touch Rikki's leg, but she caught his arm shoving him away off her.
"Stay away from me!" She shouted at him. Then Rikki realized something. "You did that to my mother, didn't you? You were the one who abused her!"
He didn't say anything, only smirked at her.
"Well done. I see you've not only inherited your mother's beauty but also her brains." He said.
"You made her leave me and my dad, didn't you?" Rikki hissed at him. "And the one who kidnapped me and Rebecca locking us down in the basement wasn't her, was it?! It was you."
"Did you tell her?" He spat at her mother, trying to get to her, but Rikki pushed him back.
"Stay away from her!" Rikki shouted.
He angrily caught Rikki's arm roughly, pulling her close to him. Before he could do anything she curled the fingers of her free hand into a fist and made him let go of my arm.
"What the bloody hell was that?" He cried in pain, staring at his burned hand. He ran towards her, but she curled my fingers again and this time burned his face causing him to tripple over his own feet and fall on the floor.
The curly blond used the opportunity and turned back to Becca and their mother whispering quietly "Go!" and pushed them to the door. They all got out of the room but they heard Rikki's grandfather getting off the floor and they all turned to look at him. He took out a gun and pointed it at Rikki.
"You really pissed me off you know?! You're going to get what you deserve little bitch!" He shouted.
Suddenly everything went into slow motion. He cleaned off the guard, but before he pulled the trigger Rikki felt someone brushing her shoulder and she saw her mother moving to stand in front of her.
"No!" Rikki and Becca both shouted simultaneously.
The sound of a gunfire echoed and Kyra was thrown backwards, chest covered in blood, but before she hit the floor Rikki caught her in her hands. Tears started running down Kyra's face. She lifted her hand and fondled Rikki's cheek.
"Why did you do that?" The curly blond asked her, not realizing her voice was shaking. Her mother smiled at her.
"You're my daughter. I did it because I love you." She whispered. "I've always loved you and I've missed you every single day. There wasn't a single minute without regretting that I let this demon made me leave you and your father. I've never forgive myself for not being there to watch you grow up. But Terry did great with raising you alone, you know?! You've turned into the bravest and most beautiful girl. And I'm so proud of you!"
She was looking Rikki right into her blue eyes and Rikki was looking right back into her dark ones.
"I forgive you." Rikki said all of a sudden. "I forgive you for leaving me and my dad. Just don't do that again, ok?!"
Her mother kissed her forehead and smiled at her.
"I promise I'll always be with you."
Then she took Becca's hand and put it in the curly blond's.
"Love your sister and take care for her. She needs you."
"Ok." Rikki nodded. "I promise."
Kyra smiled at her and Becca for one last time and her eyes shut close, with one last tear sliding out of them. Her hands thudded to the floor and she moved no more.
Becca bursted into tears and Rikki just stood there with her mother's lifeless body in her arms. Right then and there the curly blond realized how much her mother loved her and that she'd never forgiven herself for abandoning her when she was a child. Now, however, her mother had redeemed her guilt giving her life to save Rikki's. Leaving her daughter...again.
The curly blond's crystal blue orbiths filled with wetness, and one small tear slid down her cheek, before she could try to stop it.