AvNeil: Chase Against Time

Chapter Fifteen

Ananya groaned in pain as she felt her head splitting into two. Her eyes denied opening up. She couldn't help but squeeze her eyes tightly shut; as if that was of any help. God, alcohol never did that to her. Trying to recollect the events of the past night, she stressed hard. A quick flash of events ran across her mind. The encounter with the murderer repeatedly played in her head. She survived but.

"Ali," her voice trembled at the thought of her friend. The sudden urge to reach out to her friend gripped her when she heard someone grunt across the room. Her eyes flew open, only to have fluttered shut in a beat. She cursed, holding her head in hand once again. The throbbing ache in her head grew unbearable.

His voice smoothened, "Have these painkillers, you will feel better," the harshness in his voice was negligible. She forced her eyes open to meet his pointed stare. He stood right besides her holding the pills in one hand and a glass of water in the other. Taking those pills, she gulped those down.

She looked over at him who stood there with his hands stuffed into his pocket while he kept his eyes away from hers. She could see the hard edges to his features. It made him almost unapproachable, even intimidating. Though, she had a lot of questions that bothered her.

"You caught the murderer, right?" she asked expectantly. She knew he was the last person she saw before slipping into unconsciousness. The murderer couldn't be quick enough to escape Neil, she thought.

"No," his blunt answer stunned her. "The murderer escaped," disappointment reflected in his words.

"What?" She screamed in horror. "You can't be serious," and she hoped he wasn't. To confirm her suspicion she peered at him. If the tick in his jaw and the steely gaze was any indication, then he wasn't bluffing about the murderer. "For God's sake, you were barely 15 steps away when it took off," she added with a pinch of annoyance.

"And you were injured," he spoke. "So," she did not get what he was implying. He turned around to face her. Confusion scribbled all over her features, while his furious eyes pinned hers, "So?" He threw his hands up, unable to believe that she would actually question him through this. "Seriously, you have got the audacity to ask me 'So?' when you were lying there unconscious as I rushed in. I didn't even know how badly injured you were. We heard a gunshot, Ananya," he dropped his knee onto the bed, lowering his head to hers, "The last thing I would bother myself with is some stupid psycho killer," he gritted his teeth.

She gulped unknowingly at his sharp words. "I would not have been the first one to be killed but I could have been the last one," she mumbled back in response, "had you gone behind that stupid psycho killer of yours. Might have saved other lives," she pointed.

He opened his mouth to reply when she plopped another question, "I hope no one else was injured?" He shook his head in negation, 'No one but you,' he kept the thought to himself. The wheels of her brain rotated and her eyes grew wide, "Ali," she yelled in his ears as if reminded of something. "Is he fine? Goodness, he will be worried sick about me. I need to call him up," she looked around for her phone but she couldn't find it. He took a step back, straightening himself up.

"Do you know where my cell phone is?" she questioned while still searching for her phone under the covers. He shifted in his place. Ignoring her question, he informed her, "Ali knows that you are fine. So you need not worry."

"Okay, but my phone?" she flipped the covers aside and dug into the pillows. "You won't find it here," her questioning eyes shot right at him, "It wasn't on you on the crime scene," she waited for him to continue because she could surely listen to the underlying but there. "The murderer had taken it along," he fished his cell phone out and tapped a couple of times before projecting it in front of her, "I had received this when you were unconscious," he noticed her pupils growing wide as she read the content. "Your cell phone was later found in pieces, completely destroyed, at the premises."

He waited for her reaction only to have her curse out loud, "The fucking son of a bitch," not something he was expecting. More than him, the murderer was going to have a tough time.

*
Another chapter. I thought, why not upload the chapter before wrapping things up for tonight. So quite an early update for the day but hope this leaves you with more curiousity to dig in further. Because if it doesn't, I need to work on it.

Anyways, coming to the update, do you agree to Neil?
Is the murderer going to have a tough time?
Did it mess with a wrong person this time?

Share your thoughts here. You can surely put in your suggestions, opinions and of course, criticism as well. I would love to read some amazing ideas and also, to learn my areas of improvement.

Now, Have a good sleep if you can ;P