Love Beyond Death

Chapter Two

The police showed up first, and starting asking me questions.

"Where were you when this happened?" Asked an officer.

I pointed towards my house. "Everyone was at my parents house. Up on the top of the hill."

"What was everyone doing?" Asked his partner.

Was he serious? "Are you accusing me of my best friend's death? I loved her like a sister!"

"Sir, please calm down. We are trying to lower the amount of suspects, that's all," replied the second officer.

I gave them both my best "shut up, you ass" look. I think they got the hint. I did NOT want to talk about this right now. They backed off from me and starting asking Doug questions. Assuming he might be more emotionally stable, which he was.

When the ambulance came, they took Alice in as if she were still alive. They checked her all over and found a clue. The paramedics pointed out that there was a cross in the middle of her back. Upside down if she were standing upright that is. Meaning she had been killed by a deadly carving.

"Satan," I said under my breath, not knowing where I had known that from. Probably from all those stupid childhood scary movies.

"Or the cross itself" mumbled one of the paramedics. I thought his saying was a little rude, considering our minds were still registering from what happened.

Charles overheard his mumbling. "I don't know, and I don't care. But the one thing I know for sure, is that this was murder." Charles said, so angry that his face was turning red.

Amy wasn't saying anything, she was kneeling on the ground, facing to where Alice once was. She had her hands together on her chest. Sort of like she was praying. The only reaction from her, was a single tear rolling down her
cheek, onto the dry, cracked pavement.

For the first time, it felt like my heart broke. I felt my knees buckle, and I fell to ground. I could barely breathe, and with my mouth open gasping for air, I stared wide-eyed at the fresh blood spot, where the paramedics picked Alice up from.

The paramedics were just getting in the ambulance, about to leave when they had to come pick me up too. After that, everything went black.

• • •

After I had woken up in the hospital, I had found out that Alice was officially dead. I knew she was. I didn't need some hospital to tell me she was. I could feel her leave when she died. The feeling wasn't normal. The air felt cold for a few seconds after I closed her eyes.

I vowed at that very moment, that I would avenge Alice, no matter how dangerous, no matter how much of a risk, I will not give up. I had a feeling that Charles would do the same. For the past few weeks, they've seen closer than they have before. But hey, I'm not going to jump to conclusions. I'm not even going to judge. As long as we all got along together, everything seemed normal.

A few minutes after I had made the vow, Amy and Charles walked in. My mom and Charles never seemed crazy about each other, and things were always awkward between them. So seeing them come in to my hospital room together, seemed pretty amazing.

"Hey," Charles said in a low voice.

"Hey," I replied.

"You doing better? You gave us quite a scare sweetie," Amy, my caring mother said.

"I'm fine. I just blacked out for a little while." That's when I thought the question, how long have I been out?

"A little while? Dude, you've been out for 12 hours!" Charles exclaimed. I felt like he read my mind and then answered my question.

"What? That's crazy! I couldn't have been out that long,"

"You were sweetie," Amy said plainly.

"How could I have been out that long? I thought I was unconscious for a couple of hours!"

"Remember when I got my concussion last spring? I thought I was unresponsive for an hour, but it turned out to be 8 hours," Doug said.

"It was an hour," Amy said, a little bit of annoyance in her voice. She got a sharp, but non-aggressive look from Charles.

Well this conversation was going to nowhere useful. I needed to know about Alice. "Okay, okay, I get it. I was out for awhile. Can we talk about Alice now?"

They both went still. They looked at each other and Charles finally said, "Alice? She's.... She's dead Cole. There's no more to say except that I'm going to avenge her."

"Me too," I said.

"Are you sure?" Charles asked.

"I'm positive. If I don't feel 90% better by tomorrow, then you're on your own, for now."

Charles just laughed. "I know you're gonna go anyway, feeling good or bad."

"Okay, okay. You got me. But I am going to wait until tomorrow. All I can do is look at evidence so that way we know where to start."

"Evidence? I have some in my purse," Amy said.

"Oh yeah," Doug seemed really happy, the happiest I've seen him since Alice was pronounced dead. "Amy- I mean Mrs. Alph -was able to get in contact with the police and have them give her some photos of Alice in the morgue. Not weird nude photos, but enough to show us the wounds more detailed and closely."

Doug showed me the photos, and it was disgusting. I felt so disgusted that I felt like I was going to throw up. Alice was laid down on her side so we could see her back, enough to see the strange cross-shaped carving. I swear, I could've sworn I've seen that symbol before, other than movies and Halloween. But only if I knew...

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
Charles said.

"Possibly," I said.

"Satan," we said together. We never usually do that unless we're serious about something. Which really freaks me out actually. We had wide eyes, but we weren't stiff. We just knew that something was going to happen.