“Don’t try and run away!” I said, a little nervously. I could hear my own voice, high-pitched and squeaky. I wasn’t in a position to do anything.“As if I could,” said the old man, as he sat down at the rock and lifted up his leg. I could see he’d hit it on a stone or something. It was bleeding.“Who are you?” I said.He looked up at me. I could see a sharp set of cheekbones between the lank, graying hair and the rough stubble. He’d been handsome once, long ago. And his eyes bore that familiar, icy blue, the same color as the lake that was shimmering next to us.“I’m Kiefer Cage,” he said. “One of the investors in Riley’s grandpa’s company.”My mouth opened, and I heard myself gasp.“What do you want?!,” I asked with authority“To help get every important document to win the insurance for the company,” said Max, looking down at the water.“I don’t believe you! ” I said.“No, I’m not here to hurt him. Or you, for that matter. Though Lena, Amanda’s mom would have paid handsomely for it.

I explained everything to his grandparents and told them I done being Mrs Anderson.He took me somewhere knowing I don’t know how to survive and that place could be dangerous for me.They pleaded with me but , I refuse, I took my kids and leave, I will start all over again.“My rent has due, I can’t go back to my house, even if I can, I can’t stay there for so long and I don’t want anyone coming to fool me”On the way back in the car, I felt like I was talking to him. At some points I imagined what I’d say to him if he was there.“Don’t you know?” I said to myself, sulkily, while I kept my eyes on the freeway. “Don’t you know I’d never do anything like that to hurt you?”“ Mom, you are talking to yourself” Henry says. I held their hand and pull them closer to me.I meant it, too. But somehow I couldn’t help feeling like I was getting what I deserved. My friendship, my relationship whatever I called the complicated mess that was me and Riley, had never once felt safe, never once felt se

I didn’t have time to get a driver and I wouldn’t have gotten one if I did. I sped into Queens through the rain, which was heavy now, verging on a thunderstorm. When I got to Chloe’s apartment,I dialled her line , no one was picking ,She wasn’t there then I called my friend who was seeing Sara, then I drove down there I sat in the driver’s seat, shaking with rage and something else. So this was fear, true fear. The fear of losing the things in the world which matter most to you.I slipped inside through the open door and bolted up the stairs. But when I got there, I could see the door to Chloe’s friend’s apartment was open.I went inside, and what I saw made me feel sick. The upturned table, the crayons on the floor. Little pictures of a happy sun smiling down on a house. A drawing of a lady with red hair that said Mommy next to it in childish, curly handwriting.Chloe and Sara were on the sofa, shaking. From the looks of it, they’d only just got back. Another man was standing by the

“I had a feeling that was something to do with it all,” said Kiefer. “He kept talking about a birth certificate and some other forgeries. But I never put two and two together.”“Well, she told me to go, as a matter of fact. Told me that I was no good, that it was all my fault.”“And you believed her, you left her?” Asked Kiefer.My phone began to ring, I bring out the phone and I check them, when I check the screen , my grandparents were calling, I didn’t want to speak with them but then I thought of their safety.I picked the call.“ Hello? My Grandmom began to scold me over the phone.“Riley, How could you abandon your wife?! Listen and listen carefully, I want my granddaughter in law and my grand kids back home, bring them back home” she said firmly.I hanged the call and look towards Kiefer.“ You can’t just sit here because she pushed you away?I scowled, then looked away. “I don’t have to justify myself to a man who walked out on his own family,” I said. “I did my best to help. B

Not until I know they are safe.Inside the tower, it was musty and damp, and water dripped from the tall places and plashed on the floor beside me as I climbed the metal staircase around the sides of the structure. It seemed to take forever, and more than once, I had to stop to catch my breath, which I was drawing in and out of my lungs in painful gasps. I tried to be quiet. What if Lena heard me and decided to act?What if she and Amanda and their men are there?Eventually, I saw a doorway to my right, and entered through it. But I almost fainted when I looked down.I was high-up now, on a gantry, some fifty or sixty feet above the ground. It ran around the whole length of the warehouse, and two platforms ran across its center, connecting the pair of them. I stepped gingerly back, trying not to look at the distance stretching down below me.“Well, if it isn’t Chloe.Chloe Anderson . Or is it Chloe Sam?”It was Lena. She stepped out from the shadows, calling to me. Then Amanda walked to