Stolen Secrets

Stolen Secrets- Chapter 25

~Jeff~

Tuesday morning, we were all up on time to say goodbye to my parents. They left at eight. The only reason we were up was because Mum had come in and told us we better say goodbye to them.

Once we couldn’t see their car anymore, we all ran to our rooms and finished gathering all the things we would need.

Brandon took out his car and had it filled up so we were in no danger of running out of gas.

Natalie and I packed all the food that would keep and rearranged everything so it wasn’t obvious that we had only chosen some things.

When Brandon got back, we loaded up the car with all of our stuff and then made everything to make it look like it had been used. We put dry garbage, like empty chip bags and granola bar wrappers at the counter and couch to make it looked like we were here the whole time.

Once we deemed the house acceptable, we all piled into Brandon’s car and took off.

Natalie was sitting by herself in the back, and I was up front next to Brandon. I wanted to sit with my Angel, but Brandon needed a navigator. We weren’t using the GPS because our parents took it, so we were doing it the old fashioned way.

We arrived in the area that Dt. Greene had told me about a couple of hours later. I had to wake Natalie up. At some point she had fallen asleep. I wanted to leave her asleep, I had a feeling she didn’t sleep much last night, but I knew I couldn’t protect her if she was nowhere near me.

She was groggy when she woke up and just held my hand. She kept blinking against the harsh sunlight.

“Are you sure you want to come with us?” I asked her. I would much rather get her a cheap motel room and leave her there so she was out of harm’s way. “We could get you a motel room.”

“So you can be Superman? I’m coming,” Natalie said.

“You don’t have to,” I reminded her.

“I want to help,” she said. The way she said it I knew there was no arguing.

“Okay Bran,” Jeff said looking past me to him. “How are we going to do this?”

“We go into the buildings together. We separate in them. If there’s no life, we leave.” The town we were in was run down and looked like no one had lived here for years. I’m sure a natural disaster had happened here at some point. I think it was a fire or flood from the way the buildings were tilted and deformed.

Natalie and I nodded. I tucked Natalie close to me. I didn’t know what dangers were lurking in the area, and I didn’t want Natalie any more hurt than she already was.

Brandon went to the first building and pushed on the door. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t open. Then he took a small metal thing that kind of looked like a mini crowbar from his pocket and wedged it between the doorframe and the lock.

The door was kind of lopsided like it was sinking into the ground. It was also curved away from the door slightly.

The lock slid back and the door opened with a small click. But that was all the noise that was made. We listened for anything that would mean there was someone on the other side, but we heard nothing. The inch of dust on the door handle also gave us the impression no one was here.

Brandon glanced back at us before opening the door enough for us to enter.

The three of us entered cautiously, I made sure to keep a tight hold on Natalie. We inspected the house carefully, but we didn’t find any signs that anyone had been here for years; our feet were leaving prints on the floor from where we wiped away the dust. Unless they were Spiderman, it would have been hard for anyone to maneuver in here without making any trials.