Chapter 20

1st October 2015: 19:00 pm.

As soon as I paid for the taxi and stepped out of the car, my dad was waiting for me. I had seen him with a cigar, sharing it with the one man that knew everything about my dad, Bentley. He was my dad’s best friend and lawyer. I felt as if there were any secrets in my life, Bentley would know and probably mother too. But most likely Bentley knew because Dad had told him, whereas mother would most likely know because she had found out.

“Good about time. You really pick the worse times to get away,” Dad cut his eyes at me. The same way he did the last time he helped me. He would pat me on the back and tell me that he was proud of me. Support me. But the minute I got into trouble, I became the thorn in his side.

“Glad you made it back safely,” Bentley reassured me as he shook my hand.

“Any news on Barbara?”

I was thinking that whatever trouble Emma had got herself into would have to wait. I had visions of her being picked up with a dealer or something. Maybe she was back on the drugs, but I just wanted my daughter back, safely, and I started to wish that I had never gone away. That was when my phone rang and Dad spat out, “If that’s not the police or your mother, I suggest you turn it off.”

I looked to see that it was Li who was calling me and I switched it off. She’d said that she would call me the minute that she had our daughter, but I couldn’t deal with that right now.

Right now I didn’t know if Barbara was safe and I had Dad breathing down my neck. I was stressed and my head was thumping from the stress.

“She’s still out there. No news. No one saw anything, it’s like she just disappeared.” Bentley stroked his chin and asked, “Do you think that it has something to do with what happened in the past?”

“I thought that was done and dusted?” Dad asked. “I can’t believe that someone would go out of their way to hurt a little girl. Society’s just sick these days. Just plain fucking sick.”

My Dad hardly cursed, and he never lost his cool. That was why he’d married mother, a woman who would never him give a cause to worry and would hide his secrets. It was just that as she got older she seemed to be in a bad position to hold them so well.

I was freezing my nuts off and with the traffic and noise coming from the passing cars, I just wanted to get inside the station and figure out what the hell was going on.

“Can we go inside now?”

Bentley and Dad looked at each other. “Not yet. We need to talk.”

I didn’t like the way he said it, but I listened, “Do you know if Emma has started taking drugs again?”

“Don’t lie Ted, just say it the way it is.” Dad knew me too well.

“I don’t know.”

I looked down at the ground, thinking about the fact that I hadn’t been a husband, let alone a father lately. Barbara was missing, if Emma had get involved with some dealer and traded her for drugs, then it would be on my head. Something that I would have to live with for the rest of my miserable life.

“So, you think that Emma took Barbara and exchanged her for drugs?”

I rubbed my hands together and that was when Bentley said something that I never expected, “It’s not as simple as that. They’re charging her for taking the other girl. We didn’t even know anything about this child. They think that maybe…”

Bentley found it hard to say so I turned to Dad, “Maybe she did something with Barbara and was using the other girl.”

“For what?” Dad asked before I could even realize that my theory was completely stupid. We were talking about a mother and a child, not a hedge fund.

They both shrugged. “We don’t know son. I just know that this whole thing is fucked up. And I just hope that my granddaughter is alive. Shit, if someone wants a ransom for her, I’ll fucking pay it.”

“What’s Emma saying?”

“Not much. She’s just as confused as we are, but then there’s something else,” Dad sighed and I felt as if I was in some suspense thriller and I hated the idea of it. Everyone was talking in riddles and not saying what was really on their mind.

Dad sighed, “Barbara hasn’t been seen in school since last week. When did you leave?”

Shit, fucking shit. The school had called, but then I’d thought that they would get a hold of Emma. They normally did that, so I just assumed that it was a case of Emma calling them back and sorting out the mess.

“Work’s been a mess..”

“Barbara is missing and you want to talk about work. I don’t give a rat’s ass about your business. I care about my Barbara. Just get that through to your thick skull.” Dad turned to Bentley and said, “He better get in there. He’s just fucking useless. I told you that he would be. He’s just been spending too much time thinking with his cock. He didn’t even know what was going on in his own home.”

“Sorry, unlike you I’m not good at keeping up a mistress and a wife.”

“Unlike you, I never lost a child!” he spat and then he walked into the station as Bentley patted my back. “He’s just scared. Let’s just work together to try and get Barbara safely back home.” I nodded, because all of a sudden I didn’t feel so cold, I was scared. Something was completely fucked up. Barbara hadn't been at school and Emma had managed to get another child that looked like her. I didn’t want to go into the station any more, I knew that it would result in more questions being asked. And the realization hit home that Dad was right, I was useless because I didn’t have a clue about anything any more. I hated the idea that I was probably feeling like Barbara, completely lost and scared out there.