Chapter Three!

"Mom, what happened? Why is Jenny crying, and who was that girl?" Lucy Camden asked Annie, after she had managed to calm Jenny down a little bit.

"Well honey, I really don't know. Judging by the way her dad pulled her out of here, I might think he was an abusive father." Annie explained sadly. Lucy lowered her head sympathetically.

"Is that why Jenny's upset? Was that girl a friend of hers?" She asked, glancing carefully at Jenny. Annie nodded.

"So, what's going to happen to that girl? I mean, if she's being abused, we can't just leave her there!" Lucy cried out, feeling angry.

"You're absolutely right, Luce, that's why your dad went to see if everything was alright. Hopefully he'll see that this young girl is okay and if your dad has any suspicion that she's being abused, child services will be called into the situation." Annie explained. Lucy's eyes welled up with tears as her heart was filled with apathy for this young girl.

"Honey, are you okay?" Her mom asked. Lucy nodded.

"Yeah. Fine. Mom? Would you mind if I went to dad's office and prayed quietly for a bit before we go home? I'd...like to pray for her. What was her name?" She asked. Annie smiled, never being more proud of her daughter than that moment.

"Ronnie." She replied. "Her name is Ronnie."


"Ronnie." Eric whispered to himself as he drove down Oakdale Drive. "I pray that you're alright." He pulled up into the driveway of number 54, and shook his head as he stared up at the ratty old house.

"No girl deserves to live here." He said to himself.

He got out of the car and carefully walked up to the front door, which was opened a crack. Eric knocked on the door and waited. No answer. Do I have the right address? Yes. 54 Oakdale. He knocked again, still no answer. Somebody's gotta be home, the door is open. Eric knocked once more and when there was still no answer, he worried.

"What if something happened?" He asked himself. He felt rude about barging in, but he had a bad feeling and ran into the house.

"Hello?" He called. "Ronnie?" He walked into what appeared to be a living room. The room seemed to have been ransacked. Looks like her father was angry. He sighed as he saw the messy room. He looked on the ground and saw a pillow, with something under it. Eric carefully bent down and picked up the pillow. Beneath it was a dark gun! Eric gasped and his heart started beating.

"Ronnie!" He called. He picked up the gun and it was still hot. It had only recently been fired.

Eric leapt to his feet and saw a shoe peeking out from behind the couch.

"Oh dear God, no!" He prayed as he ran behind the couch. He found Ronnie lying on the floor, unconscious, bleeding at the side, lying in her own pool of blood.

"No!" Eric cried, as he reached for his cell phone and dialed 911, his hand shaking. As he waited for an answer, he felt Ronnie's neck for a pulse. There was one, but it was weak.

"911 emergency." A voice answered.

"I need an ambulance at 54 Oakdale Drive immediately. A young girl has been shot!" Eric yelled out quickly, barely able to get the words out between his heavy breathing.

"Sir, calm down. They're on their way." The woman replied. Eric hung up and bent down on his knees next to Ronnie. He gently stroked her hair.

"What did they do to you?" He asked the unconscious girl.


The paramedics arrived and pushed Eric out of the way to attend to their bleeding victim. Eric stood pacing back and forth, sweat forming on his brow, worrying that he had arrived too late.

"She's lost a lot of blood." Eric heard a paramedic say.

"Is she going to be okay?" Eric interrupted. The paramedic sighed.

"She's lost a lot of blood, sir. There's no telling how long she's been like this. We have to get her to surgery fast!" He exclaimed as he and the other paramedics carefully placed Ronnie on a gurney and wheeled her quickly to the ambulance.

"Sir, we need to contact this girls' parents! Could you give me their names?" The paramedic asked quickly as the others were loading Ronnie into their vehicle.

"We can't call her parents. I'm...afraid that they are the ones who did this to her." Eric replied sadly. The paramedic nodded.

"The only way we'll know is if she wakes up." He jumped aboard the ambulance and they quickly drove away.

Eric ran to his car and started driving to the hospital. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed his home number. Simon answered the phone. "Simon, put your mother on please! This is an emergency!" He cried.