Hello again!

Happy New Year everyone! I hope you had a good end to 2023. I took a little break from this story at the end of the school year because my brain was FRIED! But the itch to write returned not long after Christmas and without anything better to do, I smashed out this chapter!

Just thought I'd also give a TRIGGER WARNING for the end of the chapter. We switch back to Bella's POV and her side isn't going to be happy or light for a little while.

EmPOV

I bolted out of the car as soon as Garrett started to slow down out front of Bella's apartment building. It was good that my partner drove because I could not concentrate on anything like road safety after Edward called. Garrett drove from the station to Bella's ten minutes faster than it would have normally taken, putting on the lights at one point to get through a busy intersection.

I hurdled up the stairs two at a time, not having the patience to wait for the elevator. I burst through the stairwell door onto the second floor and jogged to Bella's apartment.

The door was closed, but I tried the doorknob and it swung open. I'd pushed the door so hard, it made a loud bang as it hit the wall.

"Edward!" I called out, sounding more like a command, and he dashed out of the kitchen quickly, worry and fear etched on his face. "Show me," I barked.

Edward pointed down the hall to Bella's bedroom and I was off before he could say anything.

The first thing I noticed was the lamp knocked over on the hall table. "Did you touch this?" I asked over my shoulder as I slowed.

"I haven't touched anything," Edward swore.

I nodded at his assurance and marched the rest of the way to Bella's room. I pushed the door all the way open and my eyes scanned the room. I walked in carefully, making sure not to disturb anything. If it was a crime scene, I didn't want any of the evidence tampered with.

The blankets were tossed to the end of the bed and dragged onto the floor. The mattress and pillow were rumpled in a way that made me think whoever took Bella had to pick her up. Perhaps they drugged her? The curtains were still closed, so it had probably happened while she was still sleeping. Whether that was a blessing or not, I didn't know.

Everything else looked exactly where Bella had left it, including her purse and phone. Nothing had looked missing from the living room either, so I could only assume they got the only thing they came for. My sister.

"The only thing I touched in here was the light switch when I turned it on," Edward said from the doorway, his voice anxious. "I called you right away."

I looked him right in the eye and he almost flinched, as if my face alone confirmed his worst nightmare. "I-I think someone has taken her," I said gruffly, barely above a whisper.

"Swan!" I heard my partner yell from the front of the apartment and I moved past Edward to see what Garrett had found.

He was crouched, looking at the doorknob of the open front door. He stood and pointed a gloved finger at it. "The lock has been picked," he explained. Then he lifted a piece of duct tape attached to a rubber band and tied around the end of the chain that usually kept the door locked from the inside. "This is how they got the chain off."

It was an old-school burglar's trick. The thief would have to stick their hand in and tie the rubber band to the end of the chain. Then the tape would have been stuck to the door as far as they could reach, stretching the rubber band, and when the door closed, the chain would have come straight out of the bolt.

I was pissed with how easily it seemed some sick bastard could get into the apartment, but I needed to concentrate on my sister. She needed me right now and it wouldn't have helped anything to get lost in my anger at that moment.

"Call it in," I told him, then turned around and looked to see if there was anything else out of place.

Before he was far enough down the hall to make out his words, I heard Garrett saying, "Request assistance for a three-six-three, possible one-ten. Clear signs of break-and-enter." Before he was out of my earshot, I could hear him say. "Guys, this is Detective Swan's sister…"

Missing person, possible kidnapping. That's what Garrett called in. There was no 'possible' about it. Someone had broken into the apartment and Bella had been taken from her bed while she was sleeping.

I rounded back to Edward. He looked heartbroken, his hair wild from both hands tugging at it. I gestured for us to both take a seat on the couch. I doubted anything in this room had actually been touched, so we would disrupt any evidence by sitting.

"Tell me everything you can. When was the last time you saw or spoke to Bella?"

Edward practically collapsed in the armchair, like his body had given way under his immense emotions. "I spoke to her yesterday afternoon on the phone and I saw her here on Friday night. I brought her the letters from her aunt."

That surprised me a little. Bella hadn't told me she'd received a letter back from her bio-aunt. I wasn't against my sister getting in contact with the last remaining members of her birth family, per se. I just wanted her to be cautious and to take her time in letting a stranger into her life.

"She got a letter back? What did it say?"

"It was about how her mom's family ended up in the cult, but she'd stopped reading when it talked about the man who… who hurt Bree." I could see Edward's Adam's apple bob as he gulped. "We were going to finish it together today."

"Did anything unusual happen when you were here? Or did she say anything when you talked yesterday?"

"Nothing strange happened when I was here on Friday. We just had dinner and talked." Edward blushed slightly, but then his eyes flashed as he remembered something. "Someone weird knocked on the door when we were on the phone yesterday. They were some kind of religious door-knocker, but Bella said they were really weird."

A religious door-knocker gave Bella the creeps on the same day she was kidnapped in the middle of the night? That didn't sound like a coincidence to me.

"What time was that?"

Edward checked the call log on his phone. "She called me just after three, so maybe around three-thirty."

He handed me his phone which showed their call started at 3:08pm.

"I'll go see if we can get the security footage from the hallway," my partner said, trying to be professional, like this was any other case. "Hopefully, we can get an image of whoever it was that's done this."

"Tell me what happened to Bella when this person knocked on the door," I directed Edward. I needed to know everything. See the whole picture. "Don't leave anything out."

"We were talking about why she was struggling to finish reading the letter when someone knocked on the door. At first, she thought it was me, but it was a woman. I could hear her saying something about the Lord's eternal glory. Bella said 'No, thank you', but the woman kept talking. She said that by submitting to God you are granted eternal life. Bella told her she was Jewish to try and get her to leave and was then able to shut the door. I told her to call me if the woman returned and not open the door again."

"Did she say what the woman looked like?"

"No. Just that she wasn't dressed like a Jehoviah's Witness or Morman, who are usually the ones knocking on doors."

"She didn't say anything else about it?"

Edward shook his head. "I just told her to check the peephole, in case the woman returned."

"My guess is she did come back. Probably even bringing someone else with her." A chill went up my spine at the thought of what could have happened to my sister. What could be happening right now. "Walk me through what happened this morning."

He told me about trying to call Bella but her not picking up. About finding the door open and walking into the scene in the bedroom. I asked him for details about what Edward saw and heard to flesh out the image in my head as much as possible.

We had finished going over everything when Garrett came back in with the crime scene investigators and another pair of uniformed officers, who he directed to canvas neighbors to ask if they heard or saw anything the night before. One of the CSIs got to work photographing and dusting the front door and the lock, while Garrett showed the other two back to Bella's bedroom.

When he came back, he had a grim look on his face. "I've got some bad news," he sighed, scrubbing a hand over his jaw. "I talked to the property manager and, apparently the cameras in the hallway haven't been working for the last few weeks. Which means we don't have a clear view of the front door."

My rage boiled over at hearing the property manager hadn't maintained the security cameras. "Are you fucking kidding me!" I yelled, startling the CSI dusting the lock on the door for prints. "What kind of shithole lets their security cameras laps?!"

Garrett laid a calming hand on my shoulder. "They're able to send us footage from the elevator and the camera showing the parking lot. We'll find something, man. Don't worry."

I laughed humorlessly at that idea, shrugging him off. "I'm not going to be able to stop worrying until Bella is safe."

"What about a Ring camera?" Edward asked. At the suggestion, Garrett and I both turned to look at him, making him seem self-conscious. "I mean, maybe someone in the hall has a Ring doorbell that captured a good enough angle?"

"That's not a bad idea," Garrett said, turning to me with a raised eyebrow.

It was probably the closest we were going to get.

I marched over to the front door and opened it to see which officer was outside. "Finnely," I called out to the younger man in uniform. "Have you noticed if any of the neighbors have doorbell cameras?"

Officer Finnely pointed down the hall towards the elevator. "2B, a few doors down had one. But there wasn't an answer when I rang. It also looks like there's one at the end of the hall, but I haven't gotten there yet," he said, pointing in the other direction.

I could see the unmistakable grey and black rectangle on the wall beside the door at the very end of the hall. The camera would have caught the full length of the hallway, right down to the elevator.

JACKPOT!

"You keep talking to the neighbors," I directed, already starting to walk down the hall. "Garrett will go see if he can talk to 2B and I'll go check if anyone is home down there." I heard Garrett say something, but I was too focused to pay attention to whether my gruff attitude bothered him.

I knocked on the door first out of habit before I realised it was probably better to ring the doorbell. Only a few seconds later, a woman's voice came through the speaker.

"Hello?"

I looked towards the camera, making sure however the woman was, she could see the badge hanging around my neck. "Hello. My name of Detective Swan with Seattle PD. I was wondering if I could speak with you for a moment about an incident that occurred in one of the apartments down the hall last night?"

"Oh," the woman gasped. "Yes, of course. Give me a moment."

Less than thirty seconds later, the lock rattled from inside and the door opened to reveal a woman around the same age as me in pyjamas and a bathrobe, a chubby baby in her arms. "What's going on?" she asked, a worried from on her face.

"Last night, one of the apartments down the hall was broken into and the woman who lived there was abducted," I said as professionally as I could. Saying it out loud made me feel sick to my stomach and I wanted nothing more than to scream while punching something as hard as I could.

The woman's eyes shot open in alarm and her free hand flew to her mouth. "Oh my God!"

"Unfortunately, the camera in the hallway wasn't functioning and failed to capture evidence of it. I was wondering if you'd be willing to provide your Ring camera's footage for us to see if it recorded anything?"

The young mom held her baby tighter and kissed the side of its head, trying to comfort herself. "Yes, of course. Of course, I can. Let me just get my iPad." She put the baby down in a play-pen and quickly ducked out of the room into what I assumed was a bedroom.

She returned a moment later, typing on the iPad. "What time were you looking for?"

"The abduction occurred late last night or early this morning, but we believe the perpetrator visited the apartment earlier in the afternoon yesterday, around three o'clock."

She nodded and typed for another moment before she gave me the iPad, the video file loaded at the timestamp 3:00PM.

I started it, fast-forwarding a few minutes, focused intently on the elevator. At 3:21PM, the silver doors opened and a woman walked out, who then made her way directly to Bella's door. She was wearing a long skirt and a shirt with a vest, her long red hair tied in a braid down her back. The redhead put her ear to the door as if she was listening to see if anyone was home, before knocking and taking a small step back.

I couldn't see Bella from the angle of the doorbell camera, but their exchange didn't last for long before it looked like the door began to close. The redhead's hand quickly shot out, stopping the door from closing, and saying one last thing before Bella was able to shut the door on her. She left her hand on the door for another moment before she turned and walked back down the hall. Though, instead of going back down in the elevator, she slipped out through the stairwell door.

Eager to see the evidence of the actual abduction, I began to fast-forward through the footage again. The timestamp read 2:02AM when my suspicion that the redhead had been involved was proved correct. She wasn't alone this time, a tall black man joined her as they moved stealthily through the stairwell door. They were both dressed in dark clothes and had caps on their heads. It made them look incredibly suspicious, but I could still tell it was her by the shock of red hair coming from under the cap.

The man, who had long dreadlocks, got quickly to work on the lock, while Red leaned against the wall. It didn't take Dreadlocks long before he was standing up and turning the doorknob. They both paused when it didn't open all the way, but Red stepped up. She was already prepared, pulling a roll of tape out of the bag she had slung across her body.

As she was ripping the tape and securing it to a rubber band, I could see she was wearing gloves. They both were. That meant we weren't going to be getting any prints from the lock and inside the apartment. She hadn't been wearing them in her earlier visit, so hopefully, we'd be able to lift a print from the door.

Red stuck her hand in through the gap made by the chain. It took her a few tries, but she eventually got the right tension on the rubber band and the chain dislodged, allowing the door to swing open. It looked like Red laughed at that and curtsied to Dreadlocks like she'd finished the most amazing performance.

They went inside, closing the door behind them. They were gone for about ten minutes before Red came back out and looked up and down the hall, obviously checking the coast was clear. She started walking off but was soon followed by Dreadlocks.

My stomach plummeted when I saw my baby sister in his arms, her body limp. I couldn't see much else from behind Dreadlocks as he carried her away, but Bella was clearly unconscious, perhaps drugged. Her arm hung at an angle that would most likely wake someone who was only sleeping.

They left back through the stairwell. Once they were gone, the hallway went back to looking exactly the same as it always did.

I cleared my throat to shake off the tightness that had settled there. I had to be professional. I couldn't fall apart in front of this woman. "Can you send this to me?" I asked, my voice still gruff.

"Of course," she nodded, tears in her eyes as I handed her back the iPad.

"Thank you so much…" I left open as I realized I didn't know her name.

"Lessa," she filled in for me. "Leesa Nevaro."

I smiled at her, my saviour in that moment. "Thank you, Ms Nevaro."

I gave her my contact information and got hers in return, then quickly made my way back down to my sister's apartment. CSI was finishing up in the bedroom and was packing up their equipment. Garrett was on the phone in the kitchen, pacing back and forth. Edward was still sitting on the sofa, looking a bit shell-shocked. He looked up when I walked in, his eyes raging with reigned in emotions.

"Did you find anything?" he asked warily, like he was afraid of the answer.

"Yes," I nodded, rubbing my hand over the back of my neck. It was killing me from all the tension. "We got a clear shot of everything. It was the woman you heard at the door and a male accomplice. I will send it to the tech guys and get them to enhance it so we can put their photos through the database."

Edward looked like he might cry. "You have to find them, Emmett. We have to get her back."

"What the fuck do you think I'm doing?!" I snapped at him, my fear and anger boiling over. Just as quickly as it came on, my fury dissipated and I blew out a deep breath. "I'm sorry, man. I'm just trying not to freak out and all I can think about is what Bella could be going through."

"It's okay, Em. I-I'm sorry. It was a stupid thing to say." Edward hung his head. "I can't lose her. I just…I just got her."

I'd always suspected Edward had feelings for Bella that went beyond brother and sister-in-law, or the friendship they had developed. At that moment, looking at the distraught and heartbroken man, I knew he loved my sister.

I walked over to him and pulled him into a firm embrace, putting him on the back. "We're going to get her back. I promise."

I hoped more than anything that it was a promise I could keep.

~oOo~

BPOV

I lost track of time and in my exhaustion, I eventually fell back into unconsciousness. I didn't realize I had passed out until I was jolted from the comforting embrace of oblivion by a change in the car's movement. We began to slow and I could hear the sound of rough gravel under the tires instead of the road.

The whole car jolted to a stop, the music that was still blaring cut off. It was hard to tell what my two captors had said, their voices so quiet compared to the volume of the radio earlier, but it sounded like they had stopped for gas and because Vic needed to use the bathroom.

It was so quiet under the blankets, now that the car turned off. The heat started to make me claustrophobic once again and I started to panic. I screamed and thrashed, kicking my feet at the door with as much force as I could muster. My voice quickly became raw and hot tears streamed down my face. My arms, which had long since gone numb, ached and popped as I banged against the car seat.

The door by my feet suddenly opened, washing my bare feet in a cold breeze. A sob escaped me, wrenching my chest and making me feel like I was suffocating.

"What's with all this screaming, Little Lamb?" the man's voice asked condescendingly.

"Please!" I cried. "I can't breathe! Please!"

There was no other sound and I couldn't sense any movement. I sobbed harder, my panic starting to climb again.

Suddenly, the blankets were removed and pushed into the footwell and the icy air was only a blessing for a moment before I began to shiver, the contrast was so severe.

My eyes were blinded by the bright light streaming through the car windows, it made me dizzy. It took a few seconds for them to focus enough for me to make out the man who had been driving the car.

He was tall, with rich ochre skin and dark clothes. He looked down at me with an arrogantly curled lip.

"Please! I can't breathe under all the blankets," I sobbed again, my tears soaking the seat beneath my face. "I-I can't… please don't make me… Please let me go!"

"Shhh, shhh, shhh, Little Lamb," he tutted at me as he patted my hip. I was still only wearing my pyjamas and my skin crawled at the contact. "If you promise to behave, I will help you. That means doing exactly what I say and nothing naughty. Can you be a good girl?"

I hated that I did it, but I nodded in agreement. I was desperate and he was offering me help. I didn't know what he would give, but I'd take anything over being under the inferno of blankets again.

The man pulled on my arm, wrenching it painfully and forcing me to sit up. My head spun at the change of position and my hands prickled painfully as blood started to flow back down to my fingers. A few seconds or two, my vision began to clear and I got a better look at the man who had kidnapped me.

He wasn't unattractive, despite the look of contempt on his face, and he had long dreadlocks tied back at the base of his neck. He was wearing a black T-shirt under a worn leather jacket and loose jeans. I didn't know what I was expecting kidnapers to look like, but these two looked like they made their own granola, not abduct women in the middle of the night.

The man grabbed the back of my head while his other came up to my face from the corner of my eye. I tried to flinch away, but he gripped my hair to stop me from moving away.

Instead of hitting me though, he held a water bottle up to my lips. I froze for a second and ended up sputtering, but quickly recovered and gulped down the offered water.

"That's it, Lamb. I thought you might be thirty," he chuckled, loosening his hold on my hair.

He was right. After hours under the mountain of blankets and crying until there was nothing left, my body felt like it had dried up completely. My lips were cracked and bleeding at the corners, and the cold water stung and soothed at the same time.

I was grateful he had offered me water. I had expected he was going to assault me he told me I had to do exactly what he said, not show me any sort of kindness.

Just as quickly as the feelings of gratitude came on, they raced away again. Why the fuck should I feel gratitude to the psycho who kidnapped me?!

I hoped I hid my rage toward him well enough. I needed to be a 'good girl' for him. A Little Lamb. Submissive and meek. I needed to make sure he was comfortable enough to give me an opening to escape.

"Thank you," I whispered as he pulled the half-empty bottle away from my lips.

He smirked at me, but not in a charming way like Edward did. In a way that made him look more like a predator in their natural habitat. "You're welcome. Good girls get rewards."

My skin crawled again as his eyes swept over me, lingering on my exposed legs. I was wearing my usual pyjamas, one of Jake's old T-shirts and a pair of sleep shorts. At least most of my body was covered thanks to the shirt being huge on me, even if my legs were mostly bare.

"Who are you?" I asked, tears springing back into my eyes. Those they were now from anger instead of terror. "What do you want from me?"

"My name is Laurent. And you've met Victoria," he said, gesturing towards the small gas station behind him where the crazy hippy chick must have disappeared. "We came to take you home."

"My home is in Seattle," I whispered. "You took me from my home."

Laurent's face was so patronizing, if my hands weren't tied behind me, I would have punched him in his smug mouth. "We're going to the place that should have always been your home."

My throat ached uncomfortably and the water in my stomach churned. "The Sanctuary of the Dawning Light?" I guessed, dreading having my assumption confirmed.

He smiled a toothy grin. "You're smarter than you look, Lamb. He will be pleased."

"Who?"

"You're brother." Those two words stopped my heart and sent a shiver down my spine. Laurent continued on, not having noticed how the blood had drained from my face. "He has wanted to find you for a very long time. He sent us to bring you home to him."

I didn't know how to respond in a way that would get me in trouble, so opted to keep my mouth shut. My dad had always said that if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. The only words I had about any supposed brother of mine from the cult that destroyed my mother would be anything but nice.

Laurent must have taken my silence as acceptance and took a step back to begin filling the tank with gas. He left the door open but was standing right in the way, stopping any chance I had of getting away from him.

I took the opportunity to look around. We were at a small roadside gas station on a deserted road, surrounded on all sides by tall trees. There was a large gravel area where truckers could park their big rigs to get some sleep, an old, broken-down truck parked at the back where the woods were thicker. No one else was around, save for the attendant inside the store.

I knew if I could get to the woods behind the truck, I could try to hide. I could stay out there until they either found me or gave up, and then I could find help. I didn't want to go into the store, just in case I ran into Victoria first. I also didn't know what those two were capable of. Would they murder an innocent person to keep me?

The safest thing to do was to run and hide. I repeated that to myself as I watched Laurent finish pumping the gas. I had to act quickly, before the psycho hippy returned. My chances were better with just one of them, even if it was the larger of the two.

As he turned back towards me, my instincts kicked in and, with a strength I didn't know I possessed, I kicked Laurent firmly in the chest.

The blow winded him and he stumbled back. The heel of his boot caught on the raised concrete platform under the gas pump and he fell backwards, knocking his head against the pump hard as he went down.

I didn't wait to see if he would get up, wiggling down from the seat and landing unsteadily on the stained concrete. It was awkward running with my hands behind my back and I was usually a horrible clutz, but I ran as fast as I could toward the old truck, hoping I could get behind it before Laurent recovered.

I'd just reached the gravel, my bare feet screaming in protest as I ran across the sharp rocks, when my luck ran out. I heard the squeak of a door and a thud of something hitting the pavement.

"Fucking bitch!" Victoria screeched in her childlike voice and started sprinting after me.

My feet started to fumble in my panic and I knew I would trip before I made it to the truck, let alone into the trees. I didn't even get the chance to stumble as Victoria caught up with me and tackled me to the ground.

The right side of my body took the brunt of the fall as we skidded across the gravel, small rocks tearing at my shirt and embedding themselves in my skin. I screamed in pain as Victoria put the majority of her weight on me to keep me down.

"Where the fuck do you think you're going, Pet?" the psycho bitch sneered. "You thought it would be that easy to get away from us? It wasn't for your bitch of a mother and it's not for you."

"Let me go!" I cried in desperation.

"Not going to happen," she sang sweetly in a sing-song voice.

Getting up off me, she pulled me to my feet by my bound hands, pulling against my shoulders painfully and straining my freshly grazed skin. I could feel the heat and sting that accompanied abrasions like that, and the trickle of blood as it pooled in my torn skin.

I gasped in shock and tried not to pass out as Victoria matched me back to the car, where Laurent was starting to stand, rubbing the back of his head.

"You promised to be a good girl but you aren't behaving like one," he growled as we got closer.

"Fuck you!" I spat at him and struggled against Victoria's hold. I wasn't going to show them any weakness. "Fuck you both! Let me go, you psycho assholes!"

Victoria slammed me up against the side of the car, my raw skin burning at the contact. I didn't want to cry, but I couldn't contain the yelp of pain that escaped me. She then spun me around to face them, the movement making my already light-headed brain even more disoriented.

The other woman flashed me a wicked grin, like she enjoyed my pain and misery. She brought her twisted face close to mine and pretended to bite at me.

"Bad girls get punished," Victoria cackled. Then she leaned back and punched me directly in the face.

An excruciating pain shot through my skull, the bones of my cheeks rattling with the impact of the hit. I fell back into the car, stumbling and falling onto the seat. I felt like I was going to throw up it hurt so much. I struggled to maintain consciousness, my shallow breaths sending my dizziness over the edge.

The darkness welcomed me back, singing to me dreams of a handsome man with emerald eyes and a life that may never be.

There you go! Dont hate me for the cliffhanger, tjough I'm sure many of you van guess where she's going and who her brother might be.

I love hearing your feedback, so please leave a review if you've got any thoughts or questions.

Until next time, Lovelies!