Daniel
Everything is dark.
I hear raspy, loud breathing. Is it mine? I didn't think it was coming from me, but I can't see enough to identify a different source. All I can smell is a putrid, earthy stench like bodily waste mixing into sulfur.
I don't know where I am, but I have the vague inclination that I was drugged; my head feels heavy and fuzzy. It takes me a few minutes to remember what happened, and I grope around my surroundings in the meantime.
What was I doing before I blacked out? My hand grazes along a rough stone wall. Cold cement lies beneath me, its blanket of grime digging into a deep scrape on my knee. It stings like venom and gloves my hand in blood as I feel around it to see just how bad it is, but it's nothing I haven't handled before.
Finally, my memory drips slowly to my conscious, detail by detail until it becomes coherent and I understand what happened.
It was him. But why him? It doesn't make sense. I cannot begin to fathom how it all connects.
I never realized how tall he was until I met him in the forest. He overpowered me in moments. I'm just glad he didn't seem to see Casey.
But of all people, I would not have expected--
Something scrapes over filthy cement, producing a grainy crunching noise. Light douses the room through a wide door frame. The heavy door screams on its hinges.
I scramble to my feet, dizzy and staggering.
A low moan escapes from a shivering pile. I hadn't noticed it before, but I quickly scrutinize the lump now, in the soft light, and see a dark green letterman jacket. The type worn by our high school football players. The type Benny Duran can always be seen sporting.
I whip my head back to the door. A silhouette fills the frame with a halo of golden light behind him, casting a sinister shadow over me that stretches across the small space like a higher power.
Benny swears under his breath and whispers a quiet oath in Spanish.
The silhouette steps forward, grime crackling under his shining loafer. Something gleams at the bottom of his sleeve. A watch? No--a blade.
YOU ARE READING
Seventeenth Dawn
Mystery / ThrillerThere's a kidnapper on the loose with a taste for 16 year-old boys days before their birthday. When embarking on a search for two missing classmates, Casey Casperly and Daniel Oswald find themselves in a slippery situation that ends with one broken...
