For being a cop car, the patrol unit came by incredibly slowly. Emma had paced for maybe the hundredth time in the living room before she heard the crunch of tires on snow right outside on her driveway.
She looked back at Hunter who was fiddling with the old TV box in her living room. It was one of those ancient machines that still had a retractable antennae on the top and a dial on the right hand corner used to change the channels. She took a moment to admire the moment, and the hunky man furrowed in concentration as he tried to fix the piece of junk. Once she’d committed the image to memory, it was time to get to business.
“They’re here,” she narrowed her eyebrows, “can you play with that later?”
His head was buried in the wires in the back, and he didn’t look up. “What’s the rush?”
“Are you kidding? Someone might be in there right now!”
“Nobody’s in there right now, and if they would, the detail would spot them leaving. Ah, got it!” He pulled some wire and the TV crackled to life. “Can you believe it? This thing still works. It’s gotta be from the 70s.”
“What are we going do? Watch the Flintstones on it?”
“It’s a relic, appreciate it.”
“It’s an old TV, Hunter.”
He was playing with the dial now, barely paying her attention, “Aren’t you even a little bit happy I fixed your TV?”
“The retail price of that thing is probably a penny, which we can’t even use in Canada anymore.” Hunter snorted, “What a princess.”
“Me?”
“Yep.”
“How?”
“Ah! Look,” he had tuned the dial to a fuzzy image of some news network. The sound of static
overpowered the voice and the screen was barely visible. “That looks like CBC.”
Emma rolled her eyes and let out a frustrated sigh. Ignoring Hunter, she pulled on her boots and went out without him.
Two of the officers she recognized, Dania and Robbie, and the third she hadn’t seen before – one a bit older, with grey peppering his hair. Jackson was just getting out of the car when she got there. Before she could open her mouth, Hunter spoke out from behind her.
“What took you guys so long?
Robbie winced as he fixed his holster, “Sorry, boss - Carol’s grandma had locked herself in the attic again and wouldn’t come down. We were short people.”
Hunter sighed as gave a nod of acknowledgement to Jackson, “Jesus, how many times is that woman going to do that?”
“She’ll kick the bucket soon.”
“Asshole, that’s my grandma too,” Dania punched Robbie in the arm who chuckled in response.
Emma watched on in silence, slightly envious of their friendship. How nice it must be to have friends who didn’t want you six feet under.
Hunter exchange a silent word with Jackson before turning to the group, “Miss Adenson noted that someone’s been fiddling with the window of the lighthouse. We have reason to believe that’s where the person may have been hiding.”
Jackson didn’t look like he was buying it, “the door was heavily padlocked. We had to knock it open.”
Hunter gave a slight shrug. “Well, unless the window’s been opening and closing on its own…” “Maybe this person has their own key,” Emma spoke up for the first time, anxious to get a move on. “Maybe my dad gave him the keys before he died. Or maybe they’ve only been going in once you guys knocked the door open. Either way - can we just check this place out?”
Jackson looked at her hard for a solid moment before nodding, “Okay. It won’t hurt to give the place a second check. Robbie, Hunter – you both lead. Zach and I will follow.”
“What about me?”
“Since when did you become an officer?” Dania asked, “You’ll stay out here until it’s clear.” Emma held in her frustration, and didn’t say anything in response. She knew how to choose her battles. Hunter saw her glare and gave her a small playful smile. She only rolled her eyes in response. “Really hope there’s something up there because Carol’s grandma is still in that attic,” Robbie said as they walked over, and Emma actually snorted.
“Why does she do that?”
“Believes her granddaughters are possessed by the devil.”
“Robbie, can you not disclose personal information about an ongoing case to the public?” “Calm down Dania, Emma’s not the public. She’s basically part of the police force by the amount of time she spends at the station. Anyway, apparently -”
“Robbie.”
“What?”
“Shut up you two. And Robbie, don’t talk about Dania’s grandmothers case.” Hunter silenced them both and Emma would have giggled had she not been so wound up by the situation in front of her. She was convinced that someone had been holing up there, from pure intuition alone. And she wasn’t usually one to buy into the whole ‘listen to your gut’ bullshit. Her gut had been wrong many times – more times than she count, and it usually landed her in more trouble than she cared for. But this time, she was sure. It wasn’t just her gut, it was every muscle in her body that was telling her that she was right about this. It was the only explanation that made sense. Of course, the lighthouse would’ve given the person a perfect vantage point to everything that she was up to. Maybe the reason that she’d never been harassed at Hunter’s house wasn’t because she was ‘safe at the sheriff’s,’ but simply because the person had no idea where she’d disappeared off to.
The door was unlocked, as it had been since the police had knocked the place open a week ago. Robbie opened it, and with guns in hand, both Robbie and Dania walked upstairs with Jackson in tow. Just before heading into the lighthouse, Hunter hesitated and turned back to Emma. “Don’t be stupid. Stay here until we say it’s safe to come up.”
“Yeah, whatever,” she shrugged as an icy chill from the freezing bay drifted across her.
“I’m serious.”
“Okay, I said yeah whatever.”
Hunter raised an eyebrow and she sighed.
“Okay. I won’t come up until you say so.”
He gave her a leveled stare before turning around and following the rest upstairs. One minute later, Emma was already feeling impatient. The land around the lighthouse was eerily empty and lonely, and the looming forest in the west and the endless ocean in the south only magnified the loneliness. Add that to the endless stretch of white snow, she felt small and displaced standing there. She shivered and looked around, looking at her house in the distance. She bit her lip, out of nervousness. How had she not clued in earlier? Her house was perfectly visible from here. The driveway, the backyard, the kitchen window, the bedrooms on the second floor. Not only would the person know literally everything she’d have gotten up to, he’d have known when she was alone, when she had people over, who she was friends with –everything.
The idea only made her more uncomfortable and she shifted her feet, trying to create some movement to generate some heat.
It was when she was standing there, feeling uncomfortable, that she felt it. As if someone was watching her, that she had eyes on her back. She crossed her arms and looked around, seeing nothing and no one for miles.
She shook her head and closed her eyes, convincing herself she was being paranoid.
She only lasted fifteen more seconds before she said fuck it. She wasn’t waiting.
Entering the lighthouse was a weird feeling. She’d been here before, when she was a kid, when the water was filled with boats and ships and the lighthouse actually had a purpose. It was one of the few times her dad would actually spend time with her. He’d bring the kerosene and she’d trail along behind him and she would watch as he would get all the wires, gas, and power in check before turning on the lighthouse light for the night. She hadn’t been here since she was ten, and she hated the feeling of sick nostalgia that filled her.
She made her way up the spiralling stairs quickly, noting how every crook and cranny was filled with dust, smoot and grime. Cobwebs dusted corners, the sound of the wind howled through the empty channels, and her heart ached at the decay of the place. The lighthouse had five levels, two of which were store-rooms, the third level being a make-shift living room and the fourth being a bedroom for lighthouse keeps to spend the night in. Each level looked like it’d been deserted long before her father passed away, and when she finally reached the fourth level, she looked up to hear voices coming from the light room.
She looked up, not liking how subdued and muffled they sounded. Hesitating for maybe a split second, she ran up without a second thought.
“Emma -.” At the sight of her, Hunter had held a hand out to stop her, but she saw it anyway.
Anger filled her. “How do you miss something like this?”
“This wasn’t here before,” Jackson responded, “you need to go back down.”
She pointed at the coffee cup, filled halfway with cold coffee and the dirty Tim Horton wrappers lying around the place, “You’ve had a detail on me for days. How did they miss someone walking in here
with fucking Tim Hortons? He was enjoying a god damn breakfast meal while harassing me!” Her life had officially hit levels of absurd she couldn’t deal with.
“Emma, go back down.”
“Tim Hortons, for god sake. He was literally enjoying a double-double while stalking me.” “Okay, let’s go,” Robbie took her by the hand and pulled her back. “Chances are the person
didn’t wear gloves while eating. We’ve got their fingerprints. Let’s go down.”
“Fucking hell,” was all she breathed out as she let Robbie turn her down and push her back down the lighthouse stairs.
x.x
“Is this a joke?”
“You were pretty hung up on the Tim Hortons, so I thought I’d treat you,” Hunter placed the fast food chain’s famous red cup and a brown Timmies bag in front of her and sat across from her at his desk. She glanced over and saw he’d gotten her a bagel, and she smelled sugar and cream coming from the coffee cup.
“You have a terrible sense of humor, Hunter.”
“You still seem to like me, for some reason”
“Don’t push it.”
“I got you a breakfast meal and a double double. There’s a hashbrown in there too.” Emma almost smiled. “It’s not that I wanted Tim Hortons. It was just the idea… fuck it. Never mind.”
They were back at the police station, and she was, once again, in Hunter’s office. Jackson was having a field day with having found some tangible evidence, and the lighthouse had been taped off with police tape.
Emma had definitely snapped. There was something about constantly trying to keep your chin up, acting brave, and going on with your life while having someone after you that drove you slowly crazy from the inside. She was definitely always on the brink of losing it, and after seeing that the asswipe had been fucking eating a happy meal while keeping an eye out for her, it had just set something off inside of her. She’d gone off about it for way too long, and had only shut up when Hunter forced her to sit in the back of the patrol car while they began to call additional units in.
“Is there even a Tim Hortons here?”
“There’s one off highway 28.”
She raised an eyebrow, “you drove out of town to get me timmies?”
“Calm down. The office wanted donuts.”
She smirked at this, “Okay.”
He paused mid-paperwork and glanced up at her, “what do you mean, okay?”
“I mean, okay.”
“You don’t believe me?”
“I believe you.”
Hunter leaned forward on the table, “then what’s with the smile?”
She shrugged innocently, “nothing. I’m just saying it was nice that you got me Tim Hortons.”
“I got it for the office too.”
“Why are you freaking? I believe you.”
He gave her a heady stare, “if you don’t, I have more than just the handcuffs in my house to convince you otherwise.”
She felt a chill shoot through her, but she maintained her reserve. “You think that throws me off.”
“Someone’s feeling a little brave.”
“You think you’re the boss of me.”
He feigned concentration, “if I remember correctly… weren’t you the one on your knees last night?”
She gasped, “Rude!”
He actually laughed, and then gave her a playful wink as he picked up the rest of the papers and walked out.
She shook her head as she watched him leave, still shocked by his audacity and nerve. Fuck. That man simply never lost his resolve. He gave as good as he got, and he didn’t hesitate either. In a way, it drove her off the walls with irritation but at the same time, she appreciated that he didn’t feel like he had to treat her like porcelain.
She sat there for a good half an hour, staring at the clock, staring at the people walking by and at the papers on Hunter’s desk. It was around eleven in the morning, and when her stomach began to grumble, she began to unwrap the Tim Hortons bag and eat the bagel and hash brown inside. Hopefully this would be over soon. They’d get the fingerprints, they’d find a match, and it would be over. She released a shaky breath and took a bite of the bagel when Kat burst into the door. She nearly jumped out of her skin seeing her, and dropped the bagel on the table.
“Emma, I had nothing to do with it!” Kat’s eyes were red and her lips a little pouty. She’d been crying. “Honestly, someone sent me an email and -.”
“Kat, I don’t want to talk to you,” She could hear officers running down the hall after Kat, who had clearly wrestled free to come here, “I don’t want to hear it.”
“Listen, someone paid me a hundred bucks to put that letter there. They emailed me. I didn’t know it was anything bad. I needed the money. You know I’m broke as fuck -.” She was cut off as a cop came and grabbed her arm.
“Let’s go, Kat.”
“Just let me fucking talk -.”
“You don’t want to be arrested for defying an officer.”
“Let me talk to Emma!”
“Hands behind your back.”
“Fucking hell,” Kat sighed in irritation, growling. “Emma, you know I wouldn’t hurt you. This was before we were even friends. I just,” she was pulled away before she could finish, and all Emma could hear was Kat mouthing off the officer in the hall.
Sitting back in the chair, Emma wrapped the bagel up again and put it back in the bag. Numbness had begun to seep through her and she’d lost her appetite.
x.x
Sniper014: Wishing you a speedy recovery and a smooth treatment process. 40 years of jumping out of planes. I’ve only done it once, and just know I’m very, very envious.
Bookworm: Hope the first day of classes went well! First days of anything are the worst. And yes, your theory is correct. It is, in fact, the Demogorgon.
Du: hahahahha, thank you for clarifying that Hunter is off limits in terms of corruption. I’ll keep that in mind!