"What do you mean there is nothing you can do?" Desmond responded agitatedly to the police officers standing in front of him. "My fiancé is missing and I know who took her and you're telling me that you can't do a thing about it."
"Sir," one of the police officers began, "We have to wait twenty-four hours before any investigation can start. It's protocol. She's not underage therefore she is not a runaway nor abducted as far as we know."
Desmond glared at the officer. The officer's partner looked up from his notepad where he was writing the situation down.
"I'm telling you that she was abducted." Desmond growled. "Zane Nikolias has taken my fiancé from her home against her will in the middle of the night! I had a witness tell you so!"
"You're witness didn't report any kind of struggle. She just said she saw Nikolias' car leave the premises. She didn't report seeing Miss Angelis in the car and there are clothes missing. I'm sorry but we can't do anything until tomorrow." The officer said trying to ease Desmond.
Desmond clenched his jaw tightly. "Very well. I will be in my office the rest of the day if you need me. Thank you for your time, officers."
"No problem, sir." The officer with the notepad replied extending his hand to Desmond who just stared at it. He retracted his hand. "Sorry for your loss."
The officers proceeded to the exit where Delia let them out. Desmond was furious.
How could she leave with that insolent piece of trash? Desmond thought to himself tapping a pen on the desktop.
He should have known better than to trust a mere boy. It wasn't the fact that she left that angered Desmond so much as the fact that he would be made a fool if it got out. No one leaves Desmond Aurelius, especially no woman. He would get her back and desecrate her in front of her peers. And, as for Zane, he would meet his end if Desmond had his way. He would get taught a lesson that he will never forget. Don't mess with Desmond Aurelius.
Zander tossed in the hand of cards that he was playing and stood from his seat at the head of the dining room table. "Well, this old man's joints are telling him to retire. I can't hang with such young people anymore." He leaned to his left, where Layla sat and laid a kiss on her forehead.
"Good night, Zander." Layla said, then touching her belly with one hand as she held a hand of cards in the other.
"Don't keep my grandson up too late." He replied, looking in Evan's direction.
"We won't." Evan said, glancing at his hand of cards.
Zander then leaned to his right where Shy sat smiling and kissed her forehead. "Don't let this one," he pointed to Zane, "keep you up late with sweet words either. We wouldn't want your beauty to fade due to lack of beauty sleep. Unfortunately, he will always look this way."
Shy giggled.
"Mother always said I looked like you." Zane retorted.
Zander smiled as he began walking away from the table. "All the more reason to apologize." He called back as he went up the wooden stairs of their large but modest home.
"Well, I think you're very handsome." Shy said, nuzzling into Zane's left shoulder while holding her cards away.
"Are you trying to look at my cards?" Zane asked, playfully, looking down at her and holding them to his chest.
"No!" Shy laughed, looking up at him so he wouldn't know he caught her.
"No!" Zane mocked her, kissing her lips once.
"Okay, okay." Evan tapped on the table. "Give 'em up. Show what you got."
Layla looked over at Shy and rolled her eyes to the ceiling to mock Evan's machismo.
Shy laid her cards out on the table and said proudly, "I've got two tens."
Zane laughed.
"What?" She asked, nudging him with her elbow.
"No offense, baby, but you suck at this game." Zane said, placing his cards on the table face-up. "Two pair, Queen high."
"Nice." Evan said with a nod. "But, not nice enough. Full house." He put his cards out and began to reach for the fake pot of poker chips when Layla smacked his hand.
"Patience, hubby. I believe your hand is in my pot." Layla laid her cards out to display a royal flush.
Evan slouched back in his seat as Layla and Zane had a laugh.
"I don't know much," Shy started, "but I know that many faces beat you."
Zane put his arm around Shy and pulled her into his chest as he laughed. Evan pursed his lips. Layla stopped laughing and reached for her stomach with a tiny gasp.
"The baby just kicked." She said cracking a smile and grabbing Evan's hand so he could feel.
Zane and Shy looked on as Layla gleamed and Evan smiled as he felt it. Zane looked down at Shy who was resting on his chest and saw how her eyes glaze over when she looked at Layla's stomach. She was transfixed, with a silly smile on her face and Zane realized that this was the happiest he had ever seen her. And he had something to do with it. This was the first time he had seen anyone in his presence as happy as she was and a feeling of contentment flowed through him. He had learned more about himself in the past couple of days then he has in his entire lifetime and it was because of Shy.
Zane was never a believer of love at first sight. He was a skeptic about most things in his life and love was at the top of the list. He was convinced that everyone who loved deeply was a fool taking his father and mother as an example. His father loved his mother with every fiber of his being and she was taken away from him. Since then, Zane was sure that to love was to be destined for sadness. He thought about it as being a reality check. There was no way someone could be that happy without some kind of repercussions.
But now…even with the promise of some kind of punishment around the corner, Zane found himself thinking that he would never be unhappy again. Even if circumstances prevailed, Zane would have this moment in his mind and to him that was enough to last his lifetime.
He caught Shy's movement from the corner of his eye and came from his thoughts. She smiled up at him and he returned her gesture.
"Well," Evan said standing from the table, "I've had enough of my manhood taken from me tonight. I'm going to bed."
"I'm right behind you, Mr. Nikolias." Layla said as Evan pulled the chair out for her.
Evan held his wife's hand as they began to walk away from the table. "You guys got this?" He motioned to the table of cards and chips with his head.
"Don't worry about it." Zane said looking up at his older brother.
"Goodnight, Shy." Layla said, pulling her husband away. Evan put his arm around Layla's shoulder as they walked up the same stairs that Zander had taken earlier.
"Goodnight." Shy said sitting up and went around the table to begin gathering the cards from their places.
Zane leaned over and picked up the chips, lining them up into neat rows in front of him. He looked over at Shy arranging the cards carefully in her hands and placing them inside the box they came from. She looked up at him without raising her head and grinned.
"What are you looking at?" She sang, walking around the table to his side.
He didn't take his eyes off of her as she did it. "You."
She smiled, "What about me?"
"Just you." He looked up at her as she leaned back on the table beside him. "Wondering how I got so lucky."
Shy moved his arm from the table and put a leg on the other side of him and sat on his lap, facing him. She placed her arms on his shoulders. "Are you saying you like me?" She asked coyly.
Zane couldn't help but smile. "This much." He said putting his thumb and forefinger in front of her face as his other arm rested on her thigh and he caressed the bare skin of her lower back that her t-shirt failed to cover.
She narrowed her eyes at his fingers. "That much? That's it?"
"Yeah. How much do you like me?" Zane said, playfully as he put his hand down from her face and rested it on her butt.
Shy leaned over and kissed Zane softly on the lips. "I want to have babies with you." She whispered through the kisses. "And I want to start now."
Zane smiled through the gentle kisses and said, "We can do that."
He kissed her more deeply and picked her up so she could wrap her legs around him. She responded to his body and he started to walk to the stairs carrying her. She parted from his lips when they reached the stairs and kissed him once more. He held her up with one arm and held her cheek with the other as he looked deeply into her eyes and she bit her bottom lip.
"Lots and lots of babies." Zane said, huskily, leaning in to kiss her once more. He put his arm back around her waist and carried her up the stairs effortlessly to their room.
Peter Angelis lay motionless with the beeping of heart monitors surrounding his body and wires protruding from it at every angle imaginable. The quiet wisp of the respirator beside him accompanying the sound.
A shadowy figure, tall and thin, stepped in front of the bed and looked down at Peter who is dead to the world. The figure glanced at the door of the hospital room that lights only his deep blue eyes for the moment he looks that way. He put on a set of black gloves before turning away from the door and reaching into his pocket. He pulled a syringe from his coat pocket and took the top from the needle. He tapped the fluid before entering the needle into the IV connected to Peter's arm, making sure it all empties into the tube.
The mysterious figure then shoved the syringe back into his pocket and removed the gloves from his hands. He walked over to the door and looked out cautiously as he opened it to leave. He slipped out of the room and walked down the hallway towards the exit, nonchalantly. His face was visible now, tanned and chiseled with dirty blonde locks that were tied back into a knot despite his well dressed appearance.
A manic beeping began to come from Peter's room making nurses and doctor's flock to the room past the man that had just left. He stopped when he reached the entrance and looked back at the chaos he had caused. A slow grin spreads its way across his lips as the sound of a flat line resonates from the room. He rid his face of the smile and walked out of the hospital building into the night.