Forget Me Not - Chapter One
Aidan
The sound of gunshots and shouting filled the sprawling mansion. My feet continued their race, lungs aching for air, heart hammering in my chest. It was beginning to feel like my heart would erupt from my chest and fall still beating to the carpeted floor.
She was here somewhere, she had to be here. Paige had said she had seen her, spoken to her… She was alive, after all this time she was still alive. My brain could barely believe it but my heart, well that had decided a long time ago that Bella would be fine. She had to be. Because if she wasn’t then everything had been for nothing. Everything I’d done over the years would mean absolutely nothing.
Pushing open the double doors, a stretch of corridor lay in front of me. I knew from the layout plans of the house that Christopher’s office sat at the end. I could see the door ahead of me. Fear skittered up my spine. I wasn’t afraid of him. If I saw him and had my opportunity then I would shoot him dead. And I wouldn’t just stop there.
Since he had taken Bella, I consoled myself most nights with thoughts of what I would do to Christopher St James once I got my hands on him. Most thoughts revolved around intricate acts of torture, I didn’t want him to go easy. And then there was the other nights, when I dreamt of how I would save her. He was always there of course… And every time without fail I saved her. In my dreams I didn’t let him lay a finger on her, I always protected her… But what were dreams when the reality was so terrible. I’d failed her. I’d put my stupid job before her. I’d put something meaningless before the woman I loved and I’d lost her because of it.
My pace had slowed. I was desperate to find her, I’d practically torn the house apart looking for her… And now, here I was creeping forward, like a child afraid of what lay in the dark. A coward.
Pausing in front of the dark wooden door I let my hand rest on the handle. Would she still want me? How could she? I’d let her down, I’d let the monster take her, use her, I wasn’t a saviour, I was just as bad as him.
The air whooshed out of my lungs in one long breath as I pushed the door open and stepped into the room. Silence, eerie silence filled the room. If she was here then I had expected there to be some sign… A small noise… A breath… But there was nothing.
My eyes fell upon a shape in the corner and for a second my brain didn’t want to acknowledge what I was looking at. It didn’t seem to make sense, it couldn’t possibly be human?
But something in the back of my mind nagged at me. I’d worked some of Christopher’s cases, I knew what he was capable of. And this had his name written all over it. But I didn’t want to take another step. I didn’t want to walk any further into the room and for my eyes to suddenly make sense of what I was looking at.
Deep down I already knew the answer, but I didn’t have to believe it. I could ignore what my mind was trying to tell me. Couldn’t I?
It wasn’t her. It couldn’t be her. Bella’s hair was blonde. Whoever this was, her hair was dark, black… My Bella had blonde hair. It seemed like such a stupid thing to cling onto but I couldn’t help it. I had to hold onto something. This wasn’t her. I hadn’t let this happen to her.
Her feet and hands were restrained, pinned by the straps that lay across the wooden horse. Her back a criss cross of angry red welts and purple bruises. Blood had trickled down her face, from an open wound that ran from her hairline down the side of her temple. It had dried into a thick mass, clumping her hair and obscuring part of her face from my view.
Christopher was a monster, there was no question about that. How he could do this to another human being? It baffled me. Part of me had already decided that this wasn’t Bella. The part of me that favoured denial. She was obviously somewhere else.
I crouched down and brushed the hair away from the girls face. My stomach rebelled and I just had enough time to fall away from her before I vomited. I hadn’t cried since he had taken her. Until now, I sobbed as my stomach retched.
“Bella, sweetheart? Can you hear me?”
Scrambling on my knees I touched her softly, it was enough to make her whimper a sound that ripped through me, tearing my heart from my chest. My fingers shook as I unbuckled the straps that held her legs in place. The bruises that covered her body blurring together into one giant wound. I unstrapped her hands and she slid from the horse into my arms. Limp, lifeless. Tears slid from her eyes and it was the only thing I had. The only sign that she was still in there.
It broke my heart to see her like this. He had obviously tried to destroy her. She had risked herself for Paige.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid.” I murmured against her hair as I cradled her in my arms, my lips pressed to her forehead. “I was coming for you. If you had waited just a little longer. Bella, sweet, love, I was coming for you, why couldn’t you have waited?”
She gurgled and jerked in my grip, her entire body seemed to convulse and then there was nothing. Silence. I’d felt her breathing, held her body and felt a heart beat and now there was nothing.
“No, no, no, no, no. Not now, don’t you dare, not now! Not now I’ve found you. I found you, Bella, I’m here.”
My voice grew louder, more and more desperate as I pleaded with her to stay with me. I had found her, I was right here with her and she needed to stay with me. She had to let me save her. I laid her on the floor carefully and pressed my ear to her chest. There was still nothing, no sound, no breath. I wanted it to be like one of those stupid romantic films she used to love to watch. The moment where everything seems lost and then as if by magic, it’s all turned around and they get to live happily ever after.
Tilting her head back I sealed my lips around her mouth. The coppery taste of her blood filled my mouth as I pushed air into her lungs. I needed her to breathe, I needed to keep her alive, at least until someone came to help us…
Clamping my hands together I started chest compressions. But she was so small, so fragile, and I was such a brute, a monster, that the moment I started I heard the tell tale crack of bone as her ribs broke.
“Bella, sweet, breathe, come on for me, it’s Aidan… Please don’t leave me, not when I’ve found you… Not now I’ve finally found you…”
But this wasn’t the movies… She didn’t splutter suddenly and look up at me, love filling her eyes as she realised it was me. There was just nothing but the sound of my ragged breaths as I tried to bring her back. She was mine… I wasn’t going to let her die on me.
The sound of running footsteps in the hall had me hollering for help. My arms were beginning to tire but I couldn’t stop not now. Not when there was a chance.
“In here, we need help in here!”
I had a second to glance over my shoulder and watch as two paramedics came through the door. One of them immediately jumped on his radio, calling out commands and instructions as the other kneeled on the floor next to Bella.
“She just stopped breathing. I took her down from that… thing…” The words caught in my throat as I caught sight of the wooden horse again. “She seemed to convulse and then stopped breathing.”
“Right, sir, if you let us take over, assess the situation?”
“I think I broke her ribs.” I blurted the words out, if they were going to save her then they needed to know everything.
“Don’t worry about it, that’s perfectly normal.”
The medic who had given orders on the radio crouched down next to me and began pulling instruments from his case. I watched on as they started to work on, as they tried to bring her back from wherever it was that she had tried to go…
The air seemed heavy, almost unbreathable as I watched them. I needed to tell her that I still loved her, that I couldn’t live without her. I didn’t have a life without her in it. Standing I glanced around the room and anger swelled within me. How long had she been here, strapped to that thing as her body slowly gave up? What sort of a monster was Christopher that he had beaten her practically to death?
More people crowded into the room and suddenly they were hoisting her onto a stretcher. I tried to get closer, to hold her hand, to just be with her but strong arms held me back. I fought against them, fought them with everything I was worth.
“Let me go! I have to be with her, she has to know that I found her. I want to be there when she wakes up!”
“Sir, calm down. They’re doing everything they can but you need to let them work…”
I broke free of his grip and followed them down the hall of the mansion.
“We’ve got a pulse.”
Such simple words… And yet it was enough to drive me to my knees. She hadn’t left me… I wasn’t alone. She had a pulse. I buried my face in my hands and I cried, I cried like a small child and I didn’t care who saw me. All I needed was the tiny glimmer of hope that one day I might be able to make it up to her… That one day she might forgive me… That she might still love me, even after everything. Hope. It was enough to bring a man to his knees.
