Chapter 20 ~ On The Hunt

***

"I can't believe you just left her out and about, Ash." Luke scolded as they got in his Escalade.

    Ashton had left the house last night in a hurry, needing to be away from Sadie to think. He'd gone to Luke's to talk to his best friend and see what he thought about it.

    He obviously couldn't accept her offer. He knew he couldn't just leave, that was crazy, he thought.

    But according to Luke, it actually wouldn't be the worst idea. Luke had a plan.

    "Sorry,"

    "I know, baby. You were stressed. I should have been checking in on you more," Luke said, grabbing his hand over the center console as they raced to find their captive.

    The day after he'd kidnapped Sadie, Ashton had installed security locks on every door and window in his house, that way if she escaped while he was at work he'd get a notification to his phone and would be able to leave and get her. It was the only way Luke would even think about letting him go back to work full time.

    And clearly it served its purpose since that afternoon, Ashton got an alert saying the back door was open, and the security footage showed video of Sadie attempting to sneak out of the house. She didn't know about his security system. The two had instantly left the bank, claiming a family emergency and didn't give anyone time to ask questions before they'd hopped in the car.

    "Where is she now?" Luke asked.

    Ashton showed the driver his phone that gave updated GPS signal of where the runaway was. Ashton had also installed tiny GPS devices in all of her clothing. Just in case. It wasn't creepy.

    "Okay, I'm going to detour this way."

    Ashton was silent as he peered out the window, searching for the girl. On the security cam she was wearing a pair of grey yoga pants and a light blue hoodie, so he was on the lookout for those colors.

    "Do you see anything?"

    "N-no," he whimpered, trying not to cry.

    Luke sighed, bringing their intertwined fingers up to his face and pressing little kisses on his knuckles.

    "Please don't be upset, love, this wasn't your fault."

    "It was, if I hadn't left her, if I'd talked to her--"

    "You're not responsible for the actions of another person. She made this choice, but don't worry, we'll find her, okay?"

    Ashton was really glad to have someone else here with him to help him through his. By himself, he never could have gotten this far.

    "Keep a look out for her, and tell me if the route changes," Luke instructed, and Ashton squeezed his hand before letting go and pressing himself up to the window.    

    "Heading towards the police station." Ashton nibbled on his lip, showing Luke the route it seemed she was taking.

    "We'll intercept her, Ash, don't worry." Luke seemed confident they would be able to make it to her before she got to the cops. "Okay?"

    Ashton nodded.

    "Hey, can I just say something?" Luke asked after a couple minutes of silence. Ashton looked over at him. "I'm really proud of you."

    Ashton raised an eyebrow and cocked his head to the side.

    "You finally found another person you're comfortable with. You shared your story with Sadie, even though I don't know if telling your life story to our captive was the best idea," Luke smirked at a blushing Ashton, "But nonetheless, I'm glad you found someone you can share stuff with. Obviously I love being the one to take care of you, but if something were to happen to me, or if I'm busy, I'm glad you have another person to turn to."

    "Had." Ashton pouted. Maybe that's most of the reason he was upset, because he didn't think Sadie would actually leave him. She kissed him just yesterday, and then today she got up and left? How did that make sense?

    Maybe it's because you were an ass and left her first?

    Maybe it's because she finally realized how worthless you were?

    Maybe it's because no one actually likes to take care of you?

    Ashton shook his head. Those thoughts held no more power over him. He knew they weren't true. Luke loved him...and so did Sadie.

    "Think we can pull this off?" Ashton asked softly. They had created a plan last night about what they were to do, and modified it slightly when Sadie decided to ditch.

    "Of course, baby. It'll all work out."

    "Like it when you call me baby," Ashtons face heated up. He squirmed nervously in his seat, glancing at Luke before quickly looking away.

    "Then I'll do it more," Luke winked with a teasing smirk. Then he gasped. "Baby, there she is,"

    Luke pulled the car over to the side of the road, putting it in park before the two men jumped out and headed towards a girl running in between the trees.

    She noticed them the second they got out of the car and started to bolt away. She didn't want to get caught. She didn't know what they'd do to her this time.

    "Ash, you go that way, I'll go around here." Luke instructed, speeding up thanks to his long, lanky legs and sprinting around the building Sadie was heading towards. They were thankfully still a couple blocks away from the police station.

    Ashton pushed himself to go faster and keep up with her. He couldn't see her, but she'd gone this direction, into the small park. He slowed down, pulling his phone from the pocket of his jeans and checking the GPS.

    He stopped, noticing that the tracker was staying still. That meant either Sadie was hiding somewhere, hoping Ashton would run past her or she'd taken off all her clothing because she realized something was wrong.

    He guessed it was the first option, and slowly walked in the direction the tracker was telling him to go. It led him to a small storage shed that held some grounds equipment. He knocked lightly on the door.

    "Can I come in?"

***

Luke decided to plant himself in front of the police station. He was fairly certain that's where the girl was heading. He hoped Ashton would be able to catch up to her with his tracker, but just in case, he was there as a last resort to make sure she didn't get inside.

    He wasn't about to let Ashton go to prison because of this girl. They'd worked hard to make sure they were untraceable, and some quick decision kidnapping from some psycho that was in love with him wasn't going to be the thing that ruined them. He'd make sure of that.

    He hadn't heard anything from Ashton in a little while, so he sent the man a text asking what was happening.

    A couple moments later, he got a call.

    "What is it, did you find her?"

    Before he could answer, he saw Sadie turning the corner and walking down the street, seemingly without a care in the world.

    "I found her, Ash, she's here!" Luke said into the phone, exiting his car to stop her.

    "Luke, no!"

    "I'm going to--"

    "Listen Luke, stop!"

    Ashton's words registered and Luke stopped in his spot on the sidewalk, keeping an eye as Sadie got closer to the station.

    "What do you mean?"

    "We made a plan," Ashton said hurriedly. "Just trust me, let her go."

    "Of course I trust you," Luke replied automatically. "But can we trust her?"

    "Yeah, we can." Ashton assured. "Meet me by the park where you dropped me off, we'll plan what to do when we're all together again."

***

Ashton opened the door, finding the girl hiding in the back corner, frown on her face. He stepped inside and shut the door. There were two high windows letting in light. There were a couple things in here Sadie could use as weapons against him; a small shovel, a piece of broken plastic, a metal bucket. But he hoped they were close enough that she wouldn't harm him.

    "How'd you find me?"

    He held up his phone that was blinking, showing him that he'd made it to where the tracker was.

    "You tracked me?" She screeched in outrage. "You asshole!"

    "'M sorry, what'd you want me to do?"

    "How about not kidnap me in the first place?"

    He shrugged.    

    "Can't change it now." He took a step forward. "Come back."

    "No."

    Ashton was stunned. He should have expected that response, but he really had thought it would be as simple as that.

    "Wh-where are you going? You can't go back home, Sadie, it's not safe."

    "I was going to the cops, Ashton. I can't stay with you as your "captive" anymore," she did the air quotes, but her voice indicated she was hurt by something.

    "Is this because I said I wouldn't run away with you?"

    Sadie sniffled.

    "No, but yes." Ashton raised an eyebrow at her. "I just thought something was going on, but you love Luke." She shrugged. "I just needed to get away."

    "I love Luke, but I care about you too," Ashton mumbled. "And Luke and I have a plan."

    He explained an abridged version to her, letting her know the basics before they started to get things into motion.

    "I want to help." Sadie said when he finished speaking.

    "Absolutely not. You can come with us, but you can't do anything."

    "Why can't I? If I'm going to be part of this--"

    "You're not part of the gang, you're part of us."

    Luke thought that the three of them should run away. The two men had enough money saved up, and they had plans to take all the money from the vault at the bank. They'd be set for life, all three of them.

    "But I don't like to just do nothing, Ash," she smiled as she told him this, moving closer.

    "You know what," Ashton suddenly gasped. "I have an idea, I think we need you to do something after all."

    Sadie grinned.

    "Whatever you need, I'm your girl." she winked, causing the dark haired man to blush.

    "Okay, what you need to do is go to the police station."

***

"Hi, I'd like to speak to Detectives Clifford and Hood, please?" Sadie told the man at the front desk.

He hadn't looked up when she approached, but upon hearing who she requested to see, he looked her over.

"W-wait, you're..." he shook his head. "Right away, Ms Newell, I think they're in today. Would you come with me, please?" He got up from his chair and gestured for her to follow him into the precinct. She kept her head down as she walked through the bullpen, not wanting everyone to talk about her. Soon everyone would know she was here, but hopefully by then she'd be gone.

He lead Sadie into an interrogation room and told her to sit.

"I'm going to get Clifford and Hood for you, is there anything you need in the meantime? Water or a snack?"

"I'm okay, thanks." She nodded and he left, shutting the door behind him, leaving her alone.

He walked down the hall and into the bullpen, where the officers were hanging out.

"Clifford, Hood, you're never going to believe this,"

"James, we don't care about your workout photos, please stop showing us," Michael groaned as the tall man approached. He liked to post hundreds of pictures on his Instagram account, and then show them off to everyone in the office.

"Yeah, mate, we're busy," Calum mumbled, not taking his eyes away from his computer screen. James shuffled over to see what Calum was working on so intensely and saw a video game on the screen.

"Bruh, you're playing Among Us." James accused.

"And I'm the Imposter," Michael said with a grin, and then Calum hissed, looking up at his friend in betrayal.

"You fucker, you didn't tell me! I buddied with you for safety,"

Michael beamed as he watched his screen, continuing to play the game.

"My ghost is stalking you," Calum sneered.

"Gents, there's someone here to talk to you," James growled, annoyed with the detectives inability to grasp the situation.

"Tell them we're busy."

"Sure, fine," James put his hands up. "I'll tell Sadie Newell to talk to you another time." he mumbled as he walked away. He was planning to go right to the captain and tell him about the officers goofing off when Michael managed to connect the dots. He stood up, his rolling chair being flung behind him and crashing into a couple file boxes behind him. He ignored it and rushed over to James.

"Sadie Newell? She's here? What the fuck, why didn't you say so?"

"I tried," James protested but Michael didn't care.

"Where is she, bring me there. Where is she?" He was causing a scene and Calum noticed how flustered he was at the moment, so he went over to his partner and put his arm around him.

"Bud, you gotta keep your cool or someone's going to do a psych eval on you." Calum hissed in his ear, smiling at the few people who had noticed Michael slowly going crazy.

Michael took a deep breath.

"Lead the way, James," he said calmly, but Calum didn't miss the way Michael was twitching in eagerness. Calum hadn't mentioned it to anyone, but he was kind of concerned about his friend. Michael was going a bit overboard with this case, he was so obsessed that he had been staying overnight at the station and dedicating almost every moment to figuring out the connection between Luke and Ashton and everything else.

They followed James into one of the interrogation rooms, and there she was; the face that had been flashed on every news station for the last couple weeks, online ads, and posters pinned up at bus stops and telephone poles.

Michael was surprised at the state she was in.

Her hair was neatly combed and pulled back into a low ponytail, with little whispy curls framing her face. It looked like she'd washed it lately, her face was bright and she didn't look like she'd been mistreated. Her face wasn't hollow, like he'd expected to find from someone who'd been kidnapped. She was also wearing different clothes than the ones she'd been wearing from the surveillance footage from the bodega--and it didn't seem to be someone else's clothes. The grey pants and blue hoodie fit her perfectly, like she'd purchased them herself.

"Sadie Newell?" Michael asked in shock, sitting in the chair across from her.

"H-hello," she nodded to the officers. Michael turned when he heard the click of the door on his left, indicating that James had left and shut the door behind them.

"I'm Detective Hood, this is my partner Detective Clifford. Feel free to call us Calum and Michael, okay, hon?" Calum smiled sweetly at the poor girl. He couldn't imagine what she'd gone through in the past few weeks, regardless of how healthy she looked right now.

"Thanks."

After a moment of silence, Michael cleared his throat.

"So, you asked to see us?"

"Yeah." she shifted in her seat before looking directly at him. "Uh, I guess I should start from the beginning?"

"That'd be great, love. Do you mind if we record this meeting, just for our own records and the investigation?" Calum asked, already getting up to get a recorder.

"Sure."

Calum returned moments later with a black voice recorder and a tablet so he could take notes. He knew this information was going to be important to their case.

"Okay, great. Let's continue. What did you want to tell us, Sadie?"

"So on the day I went to the bodega on 112th, I got tied up in the front of the store by these random people who I think were robbing the store."

"Yes, do you happen to remember what these guys looked like?" Calum asked.

Sadie thought about it.

"N-not really, it was a while ago and they wore all black and had masks on their faces."

Michael sighed.

"Please, think about it, were they tall? Did one of them talk a lot? Anything you can distinguish that might help us pull some guys out of a line up?"

Sadie bit her lip.

"I guess one of them was tall, the other seemed kind of feminine, small and I saw some whisps of straight brown hair come out of one of the hoods. That's really all I can recall," Sadie shrugged.

"Great, that's good, Sadie. We can use that." Calum smiled at her again.

Sadie now knew what Ashton meant when he said Calum was kind of creepy. What kind of guy was so upbeat and smiley all the time? Someone who couldn't be trusted, obviously.

"So what happened next? They tied you up at the front of the store, then you ran out of the store, and what? They took you?"

Sadie shook her head.

"No, nothing like that. I'm a writer, and I had an idea in my head that I could be a hero or something if I ran after these guys and was able to take them out or something, like how people in books and movies do," Sadie admitted sheepishly, placing her hands on top of the cool, metal table. "But when I'd gotten outside they were gone."

"They were gone?" Michael repeated. "What do you mean they were gone?"

"I mean, when I left the building, no one was there." she said slowly, so he would understand.

"Did you see them running? Or maybe their car?"

Sadie shrugged.

"There was a car on the road, it was some dark blue car with an out of state license on it. It was too far away for me to recognize it."

"What kind of car," Michael pressed.

"I don't know much about cars, all I remember was it was dark blue."

Michael sighed. This wasn't shaping up to be what he wanted.

"So then where have you been for the last three weeks?"

Sadie bit her lip. She knew what she had to say, but she was enjoying her acting role and tried to prolong the fun as much as she could.

"Sadie, you're safe here. Whatever you say, we won't be upset. Do you want to tell us anything?" Calum asked calmly. Sadie looked away from his warm, brown eyes and glanced at Michael who had his arms crossed over his uniform, and he was glaring daggers at the recording device. She knew he was pissed she wasn't telling him what he wanted to hear.

"Well, m-my parents and I don't really get along. Wh-when I was outside in the back alley all by myself, I had a thought. My parents kind of just ignore me, and I wanted to know how long it would take for them to realize I was missing."

"Oh, Sadie," she heard Calum whisper. She frowned, but continued.

"So, I managed to get the rope off, and then I ran. I saw sirens in the distance and went the other way. I've been hiding out at motels and stuff when I needed to shower and all, just kind of doing whatever. I've gone walking a lot, hiking in trails, just thinking. The motels weren't great, and I lost my phone at the bodega, so I didn't really have much contact with the regular world. Sometimes I'd just sleep under the stars, because I didn't want to use all my money." She looked up and saw the anger on Michael's face and the concern on Calum's. "I was in a motel last night and saw the report on the news that you were looking for me, so I came in today."

Michael and Calum were just staring at her. They couldn't believe all this was because some petulant child thought her parents hated her.

"That's it?" Michael snapped. "Are you telling the truth?"

"Yes, sir. Why would I lie?" She looked right into his eyes. "Is there something going on that you're not telling me? You're almost like, trying to feed me information. Did you want me to tell you something else?" she accused, but made her voice sound like she was confused and curious.

Calum was quick to step in.

"No, no, nothing like that, we're just making sure that no one's holding anything over you, and that you're actually, genuinely safe. It's our job." Calum turned the tablet off and set it on the table. "Is there anything else you want to tell us? Otherwise, we can call your parents, let them know you're back and safe."

Sadie rolled her eyes.

"No, I'll just leave when you're done with this, they won't really care."

Calum wished he could protest, but upon meeting her father, he knew that was the case.

"Okay, well do you need anything from us?"

She shook her head.

"No, I'm okay, really. I had a good break, I was able to clear my head and all. I'm really sorry if I caused you any problems. I didn't realize that you were looking for me so much. I never thought anyone would notice!" she shrugged helplessly. "I honestly didn't mean to do all this."

"It's fine, kid, don't worry." Calum smiled. "I'm going to get you some food and water, and once you eat a bit, you'll be free to go." He waved her over as he stood up and opened the door. "Then I can drop you home and you can do whatever you want from there."

Sadie followed him, sending a confused glance to Michael who continued to sit in his seat. Calum brought her a granola bar and a bottle of water before asking her to wait a moment while he went to talk to his captain.

Fifteen minutes later, he came back and offered her a ride home, which she accepted.

After he walked her to the door and watched her get inside, Sadie went quietly up to her room to greet her guests, smirking.

Everything went exactly according to plan. She was better at this than she thought.

***

Yeeeeee so there's one chapter left! What did you think? (Also I love among us, my cousins and I used to play all the time, now we play every so often. On Christmas we called my moms half siblings, all my cousins, and my sister and the 9 of us played. It was magic.) 

Sooo we're pretty close to the end :D I'm really excited for y'all to find out how it ends!! I'm not sure when I'll be able to post, there's kinda a lot going around here rn, but I'll do my best to make it soon! 

~ashtonfortherwin