Sophia opens the door
to reveal a lean, tall man with reading glasses on and a black coat. He had a
moustache with a calm expression on his face. “Hello.” He says with a smile.
“Are you Sophia?” the man asks.
“Yes I am.”
“I have some valuable information concerning the man that you
are looking for.” The man said as he looked at her.
“Alright that’s
fantastic.”
The man nods and says “I have been walking for so long and I
am so tired. Can I come in?”
“Sure, sure, please do.” Sophia opens the door wide and steps
aside to let the man through.
The man walks in and sits on a chair, Sophia tries to study
him as he calmly looks around her apartment. He looks very much at home but she
could not read his expression or get a feeling of who he was. “I did not get
your name.”
“Do you want my real name or my fake name? I have plenty of
those. I have a question. Do you let everyone that has information into your
house or am I special?” The man said with a disdain look on his face.
“I do not understand you.”
“You are correct, you do not understand me. You also do not
understand the situation that you are in.” The man says as he stands up and
begins to move around the apartment inspecting her things. “You see dear
Sophia, can I call you Sophie? Sophia sounds funny. I prefer Sophie, as I was
saying my dear Sophie. The problem here is that you know someone that I have
been looking for.” He picks up a photograph of her and her mother placed on the
table. “This is adorable, very cute. Is this your mother? You definitely took
her looks, fine woman.”
“Sorry, I thought you came to give me information concerning
the person I am looking for.” Sophia says as she gets up from the chair.
The man ignores her and picks up the photos of her and Jake
she brought out earlier but had not put back. He looks at that very carefully
and then he says “Finally I see. You were there that day.”
“What day are you talking about?”
“The day he got arrested, the day he and his partner in crime
were found in possession of illegal substances.” The man says as he adjusts his
glasses.
“I do not know that. I lost contact with him the day he was
supposed to deliver….”
The man waves his hand to interrupt her and says “The
briefcase to your father’s friend in exchange for the money. I know all that,
how is Fred doing by the way? I hope he has stopped borrowing money from people
he is not meant to.”
Sophia just stood there not knowing what to say.
“Dear Sophie, I know you are a little confused about all of
this. You should take a seat. Do you want a glass of water? Let me pour
something for you.” He says as he heads towards the kitchen, gets a bottle of
water and gives it to her. The man holds her hand and sits beside her. “Sophie,
I want you to tell me everything you know about this man? He has done some very
bad things and he needs to pay for them. I hate to put you in this situation
but I have to because you seem to have seen him today judging by the picture
which you edited. Where is your phone?”
Sophia tries to get up but the firm squeeze on her hand lets
her know that would not be a good idea.
“Sophie, I need your cooperation. I do not want to do
anything to you; I have no problem with you. I want you to grow up, get married
to a fat, lazy man and have ugly children that run around the house disturbing
everyone. Why does your life have to end today because of your stubbornness? It
does not have to be that way.” The man says as he puts his hands on her
shoulders. He gets up and heads toward her bedroom, enters it and shouts “I
have found the laptop and the phone.” He walks out with the two items carrying
them up in the air like they were trophies. “Victory is mine.” He looks at the
pictures on the phone and says “He had a gun, which is the Jake I know. Never
goes around without a weapon on him. The man has no atom of peace in his body,
only violence.” The man shakes his head.
“If you know so much about him, why haven’t you found him by
now?” Sophia says as she calculates the time it would take her to reach the
door and get out of the apartment.
The man laughs loud and says “You say it like me and him are
friends. I have been chasing him for the last ten years and I still do not know
much about him except from his code name being Burner and….”
Sophia flinches. The man steadies himself as he watches her.
“Sophie, how do you know his code name is Burner?” the man
asks her calmly
“I do not know that.” Sophia immediately says.
“You are lying Sophie, you flinched when I said Burner. I
would expect you to know his name but not his codename. What are you not
telling me?” the man says with a look on his face that shows he is clearly
enjoying himself. “Okay you have to tell me everything. This is very
interesting; tell me what you know about Burner.”
“Everything I know, I wrote it down on a notepad in my room.
Just get it and you will know everything I know.” Sophia says in a rush clearly
displaying fear.
The man turns around and heads once again into her room. Once
he was out of sight, she gets up and runs as quickly as she can for the door.
Her hand is about to pull the handle when she sees a knife hit the handle.
Sophia yells and jumps back from the door and runs into the kitchen.
“Sophie, do not be like this, I do not mean you any harm. I
did not aim for your body you know I aimed for the door and I got it. To be
honest, I was not really sure if I was going to get you or the door. Sophie,
please come out of the kitchen, I promise no more throwing sharp objects
around.” The man says as he walks into the kitchen and sees Sophia holding a
knife.
“Do not come close to me.” She says as she points the knife
at him.
“I have never had a woman say that to me.” The man calmly
looks at her and lifts the notepad in his hand. “Sophie you wrote something
down about another girl. What did she look like?”
“I am not telling you anything.” Sophia says holding the
knife.
“Have it your way, I like you Sophie. I do not like Jake but
I really like you. However you lied to me then you tried to run from me, only
cowards run Sophie and I hate liars, cowards and spies. You Sophie are two out
of those three.” He brings out his phone and punches in a number, “Come up now,
we are leaving.” He walks towards her gently and reaches out his hand to her.
“Give me the knife Sophie, you might be a liar and a coward but you are not a
killer. Just drop the tough girl act.”
Sophia waves the knife at him “Stay back.”
He holds his position and shouts “Sophie behind you!”
Sophia turns around quickly to see who is behind her. She
hears a sound and felt her leg give way under her as she hit the ground
dropping the knife in the process. The pain was sharp; she looks down at her
leg and sees blood seeping out. She lets out a cry.
“It’s obvious you did not play the game of look behind you in
school. The rule of the game is you never look. I lost so many times I learnt
never to look back in life.” The man says with a laugh.
Sophia cries out more as she grips her leg.
“You fell for the oldest trick in the book. Calm down it is
just a flesh wound. I did not hit anything serious, you will be fine.” The man
says as he places the gun with the silencer back under his coat. “You made me
do this, I did not want to but you are just so stubborn at times.” There is a
knock at the door. “Don’t move just stay there.” He says as he grabs the knife
from the floor and heads towards the door to let four men into the apartment.
“Check everywhere in the house, she knows more than she is
telling us.” The man walks back into the kitchen grabs a towel, gives it to
Sophia and sits down beside her. “Clean your leg and don’t worry about the
pain. I have all kinds of pain killers in the car; I take them for fun so you
are in good hands. Let’s focus on more important matters. I came here to give
you information concerning Jake and I have. You are supposed to return the
favor by give me information also but you have refused to cooperate.”
The ringing of a phone interrupts him. One of the men brings
the phone and hands it over to him. “Oh look Sophie you have a call coming in.”
he says as he answers the call.
“Hi Sophia, it’s
Alexia. I might have an idea on how to find Jake, my dad knows a private
investigator that he can contact. He has helped out on things like this in the
past. I want us to meet up with him together. I just wanted to know what you
thought about it before I contacted him.” Alexia pauses “Sophia, are you
there?”
“No she is not.” The man says as he looks at Sophia beside
him. “She is actually with a man at the moment; to be honest she is kind of a
bad judge of character when it comes to men. She just does not know when to
trust people plus she is really stubborn. I mean why does she insist on having
her way all the time? Anyways, I love the private inspector idea very much, I
will pass the message across to her and we will all meet up. I will be coming
with her.”
“I am sorry, who are you?”
“I am a very good friend of Sophie and I came to help her
find the man she is looking for. We are all in this together.”
“Alright that’s good. The more people we have looking for him
the better. Meet me at the restaurant at the bridge near the cinema. I am
sending the directions to you right now; I will be waiting for you there.”
The man says “We are leaving the house right now. By the way,
if it is not too much for you, would you be a dear and order chicken with fries
for me when you get there. I am starving and a juicy chicken sounds good to me
right now.”
Alexia laughs “No problem, I will do that.” She hangs up.
The man gives the phone back to one of the men. He looks at
Sophia “Guess we are going out Sophie and you have to change what you are
wearing. I will get a new set of clothes for you. Don’t worry; I have a good
eye for fashion.” He gets up and offers his hand out to Sophia.
Sophia reads the situation and knows that she has to
cooperate if she wants to live to see another day. She holds his hand as the
man helps her to her feet. There is just a little space between them when she
stands up. The man just stares at her “I must say that your perfume is
exquisite. I absolutely love the scent, you must tell me where you bought it”
he says as he turns around and heads for the door.
He gets to the door, holds it open and says “Come on Sophie,
we have a friend to meet.”