The Dog, The Baby and The Criminal

Chapter 4

Dominic

It's been two and a half hours since I found out Nathaniel was missing. The worst two hours of my life. Fear and anger consumed me, he could be anywhere by now, he could be dead by now, and one of my most trusted bodyguards was the one to take him.

As soon as I realised Nathaniel had been taken, I went straight to my office to check the CCTV, at about four thirty this morning, Jason, the guard that was 'missing' could be seen sneaking out of my son's room with him in his arms. It was obvious that he had taken him but one thing that confused me was how he apparently managed to get past every maid and guard and not get caught. They're all either blind, incredibly stupid, or in on it. Since I was very aware that they could all see, it was clearly the latter two, I was going to question every last one of them, personally.

I knew I couldn't just blame all of my staff though, after all I was only in the room next door to his and I wasn't aware of anything till I was woken up. It was way more my fault than any of theirs, apart from the staff that were in on it. That's not going to stop me punishing them all though, they need to know that my son's protection comes above all else. I couldn't wait to get my hands on Jason, he was going to have a slow and painful death. I already had a plan, as soon as we caught him I was going to lock him in the cells, torture him until he told me who he was working for or with, then have a doctor treat his wounds, and torture him all over again. That could wait though, for now I just wanted my son back in my arms.

I focused my attention onto the phone in my hand, it was 8am now and we were no closer to finding either of them. I went straight to contacts to phone my righthand man, Luke, to see if he had gotten any further. I tapped the call button.

The phone didn't even ring twice and he picked it up. "Boss?" I heard at the end of the line. "Luke, have you found anything? Has anyone reported anything to the police yet?" I said into the phone, Luke worked as a detective on the side, he made sure we didn't get caught and reported any information to us that we needed from the police. There was a brief pause at the other end of the line, "No boss, not yet, it's like they've just disappeared, we've searched everywhere", I could hear the worry in Luke's tone, he wasn't just my right hand man, he was Nathaniel's God Father and cared for him deeply. "As soon as you find something, let me know" I said before ending the line. I took the bottle of whiskey out of the drawer in my desk and threw it at the wall, smashing it to pieces. I was at a complete loss and had no idea what to do, I had every single one of my men searching everywhere, hacking whatever they could, Luke had the whole of the police force looking for him, and I had searched the whole of the woods outside the house, and now the only thing I could do was wait for an update, I felt helpless.

About 15 minutes later, my phone started ringing, I picked it up instantly, it was Luke. "Boss, we received a call from a woman saying she had found a baby in the woods near her apartment and that she took him home, we have the address", finally we had something. "Meet me at the front of my house in five minutes". I demanded before ending the call and leaving my office.

Just like I told him to, Luke and another guard, Chris, met me at the front door in a black SUV. I got in the front and told Luke to drive. "Where are they?" I half asked, half demanded. "They're at the edge of the city about 20 minutes away, the woman claims she found him freezing in the snow in the forest close to her apartment building and took him home, she said she had baby clothes and nappies in her apartment so she changed him", he said hopefully. Why would she just have baby clothes at the ready? Something wasn't right here.

In no time, we were pulling up to an apartment building. The car hadn't even stopped completely and I was already slamming my door shut and walking towards the building, Luke and Chris were close behind me. I walked into the building and headed straight for 1A, when I got there I pounded on the door.

Not long after I knocked a petite blonde woman answered the door, she only looked about 5ft. I pushed her out of my way and walked into the apartment. She had to steady herself on the door, but I didn't care.

"WHERE IS HE!" I yelled, I didn't miss the way she flinched when I did, good, I thought, she should be scared.

"Are you here for the police sir? Are you a detective of some sort, because if not I'm going to have to ask you to leave", was she really trying to question me? Did she not have any idea of who I was? Stupid girl.

"I'm looking for my son, you either tell me where he is, or you don't even want to know what's going to happen to you" I was furious, who on earth did this girl think she was, if I didn't have my son in my arms in the next five minutes I was going to kill her.

Before she could respond, a big dog came barrelling into the room and started growling at me and my men. I stared at the dog for a couple of seconds before an idea hit me, if she wasn't going to give me any answers then I'd kill the dog, simple. I smirked pulling out my handgun and aiming it at the mutt's head, the girl's face dropped.

"Sir, please don't hurt my dog, he's just very protective" the girl pleaded, I just pulled back the trigger. A look of terror crossed her face, "Are you the man I spoke to on the phone? If you are I'll take you to the baby, but please don't hurt my dog, there's no need for violence", the girl was sobbing by the end of her little speech, finally I was getting somewhere.

"Tell the mutt to stop growling" I said, still holding the gun at his head. She nodded, "Milo" she said softly, the dog just looked at her and continued to growl, "Milo, it's okay" she tried again. The mutt looked back and forth between me and the girl before jumping onto the couch, still not looking away from me or my men, stupid dog.

"Now, take me to my son, or I'll shoot you and the dog" I said calmly. For a few seconds she just looked at me like I was an alien, my patience was running thin. As if sensing this, she nodded and gestured for us to follow her and walked out of the room.

We arrived at a white door, she turned the handle, walked inside the room and waited for us to enter. I was slightly shocked, it was a nursery, but there was no other baby anywhere, there were no baby photos that I had seen, and I was slightly confused. Before I could dwell on it any further, the small woman pointed towards a white crib in the middle of the room. I hurried over to it and there he was, my beautiful son asleep in the crib, I scooped him into my arms and a small smile made its way to my lips as relief washed over me, he was okay.

Some things just weren't adding up though, there wasn't another baby anywhere, there were no baby photos, she didn't look pregnant and the only sign of this room being used was the pulled back blanket Nathaniel had just been laying under. Why, if she wasn't trying to take my son, did she have this full nursery for no reason? I needed answers, I looked away from my son.

I nodded at Luke and Chris, "Grab her", I said. "What? Why? I haven't done anything, please I found him in the forest, I save-" I watched as she tried to plead with me, but it was no use. Luke grabbed her and stuck a syringe full of sedative into her neck. She tried to get away, but all she could do was stumble back a bit before Chris threw her over his shoulder. We walked out of the room and I watched as her eyes started to close, the dog started run after us, so Luke kicked it out the way.

I watched the look of fear on her face as her dog was kicked backwards and the door was slammed in his face. Her eyes dropped shut as the sedative kicked in fully.

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