The Complete First Chapter

Finally! After writing some, not writing at all, and writing some again...I have completed the first chapter of the book!

It is spread out in pieces throughout my blog except for a little at the end, but for your convenience I am going to post it in its entirety.

Enjoy!

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So there he was. Just all of a sudden, he was there. He didn’t know how he got there, or why he was there, or even where "there" was. All he knew was that he was there for some reason but what that reason was remained a mystery to him. He tried to remember what he had been doing but he soon found that he had a throbbing headache that made it nearly impossible to think. Still he tried…. nothing. He didn’t understand.

“Nothing? How do you come up with nothing? It’s your life, you lived it, so how can you not come up with something?” he thought. So he tried again and it all started to come back. Slowly at first, but it started coming back faster, thinking became easier, he realized that his headache was vanishing, and he was thankful for that. With the headache gone it was easier to think. Then it hit him. He knew where he was, what he had been doing, and how he got there. He stood up slowly and looked at the man as he entered the room.

3 weeks earlier

Sam Fisher was a very confident man. He stood at six feet tall with dark brown hair, and with eyes so blue the likes of which have never been seen before. He had a great job, a great house, and a great family. Everything was perfect, he wasn’t in debt, his business was doing well, and his wife and kids were very happy.

Or so he thought.

Sam was a hard working man. One who often either stayed at work late or brought work home with him. His wife understood, she always had, and he had never heard her complain about it - or about anything for that matter. Come to think of it, his wife hadn’t said much at all the past week or so.

He would ask her about that later. Right now he had work to do.

Work. He chuckled as he walked to his car. Now that was an interesting thing. It was entertaining sometimes, at least. Some people probably wouldn’t think so, but then again, he wasn’t Some People. He pulled up to the front of the tiny block building that he paid way too much every month to lease. The size was perfect for him because he worked alone. He didn’t really need any help to do his job though he did get lonely from time to time. As he got out of his car he noticed that his little sign that told the world what he used this building for was missing a letter: : SAM FISHER - PRIV TE INVESTIGATOR. He would fix that later. Just another thing to add to his to-do list, which was already plenty long. He’d get around to it one day.

Maybe.

Sam looked around his little “office” and saw nothing but the flaws in it. That seemed to be all he ever saw in anything or anybody. He didn’t know why. He had just always been that way. He noticed the coffee stain on the blue carpet that really needed to be covered with something – but he had nothing to cover it with unless he rearranged his office, and that was something he really didn’t have time to do.

“Maybe someday,” he thought to himself. He chuckled at that notion. Seems Someday” was his favorite word lately. Even though he knew deep within himself that Someday would never come, he liked to think about what a great day Someday would be. He leaned back in his leather office chair, the one luxury he allowed himself, and he took a moment to consider all the wonderful things that would happen Someday.

Someday would be a busy day, no doubt. He would take a vacation Someday. He would spend more time with his family Someday. On Someday, he would fix that sign out in front of his office, he would cover that ugly carpet stain, but most importantly, he would have the one thing he most prized and yet which seemed to escape him the most: Time. Even though such a thing was forever unlikely, he couldn’t help but to catch the smile crossing his lips as he thought of it.

Someday he would have Time. The one thing people seemed to wish for more than anything else, and yet the one thing most often wasted whenever anyone ever got it. Well, that and
Money.

The irony was that when you get one, you don’t usually get the other. Time is a wonderful thing to have, and when you work for a living you don’t ever have enough of it. But if you’re unemployed and broke, Time begins to feel like The Enemy. That’s a cruel fact of life. Time is not to be taken lightly.

He was snapped out of his reverie by the sound of his office door opening. He leaned forward in his chair to greet this tall, burly gentleman whose imposing presence, one that could easily strike terror in the hearts of lesser men, was betrayed by the fear starkly evident in his own ice-blue eyes.

Intrigued and glad for the business, Sam rose to greet the man. “Name’s Max Thomas, sir.” Sam shook his hand, introduced himself, and then offered the man a seat.

Max took his seat and remained silent for a moment as if contemplating whether to say what he knew must be said. Sam wished he knew what was going through the mind of this obviously troubled man. The look in his eyes had softened from that of fear to one of confusion before turning downward and scanning as if to postpone the inevitable. The eyes locked on the coffee stain.

Embarrassed by the blatant oversight, Sam made a mental note to move “rearrange the furniture” a little closer to the top of his To Do list.

The man looked up, sighed heavily, and spoke in a hushed tone.

“It actually all started ‘round this time last year”.

Sam leaned forward to listen.

“I had been off on a business trip and was on my way home,” Max continued. “I was about halfway home from the airport when I realized that the same car had been behind me since I left the airport. Now it’s a 3-hour drive one-way so he’d been back there for a good piece of time. It had dropped a few car lengths behind me for awhile, but then he was back. At first I dismissed it as just another commuter who was going the same place I was. But as I approached my home, he was still there. And as I pulled into my driveway, he pulled to a stop in the middle of the road and stared at my house. Well now, by this time I was really curious, so I walked toward him but he drove away.”

Sam wrinkled his brow. “Are you aware of any reason why you may be followed?”

“No, sir. Not that I know of, anyhow.”

“How many were in the car?”

“As far as I can tell just one, but I didn’t get that good of a look.”

“Can you describe this one?”

“Yessir. He had short black hair, sunglasses, and you know? He had these really huge ears.” Max laughed. “I mean, he had some really HUGE ears! I woulda died laughin’ if I hadn’t of been worried about him followin’ me home! But them ears….”

“I’m sorry sir,” Sam interrupted with a grin, the ice broken. “I don’t doubt his ears were indeed enormous, but …if you don’t mind, continue your story.”

Max blushed. “Oh, yes, of course, sir!” He cleared his throat before continuing.

“Anyway. Life goes on, you know. And I forgot about the whole thing. But then I was coming home yesterday and the same car was outside my house again. And the same driver. I reckon he knows my car, ‘cause when I turned onto my street, he took off like a bat outta hell.”
Sam nodded, taking notes.

“So anyway, I had to go in and check on my girl. I got a 14 year old at the house, her mama’s away on a business trip herself. Very busy woman, my wife. Never home, it seems. So my girl was home alone. Had to check on my girl…” His voice trailed off.
Sam sat quietly as he watched a tear slowly roll down the man’s cheek and land on the floor.

Max stared intently at the fallen teardrop, as if this simple drop contained all of his hopes and dreams, and he watched helplessly as they shattered upon colliding with the cold, harsh, unforgiving ground. Sam knew what must be done. He knew he had to ask the question. He had hoped it wouldn’t come to this, he had hoped that Max would continue his story without this becoming necessary. Sam looked into the eyes of this broken man to see if maybe, just maybe, if he could see in his eyes the information that he must now ask for. Then he wouldn’t have to ask the despised question. In those eyes he saw grief, suffering, pain, fear….but underneath all of those emotions he saw the faintest hint of a much stronger, and deadlier, emotion.

Sam saw rage.

Not only rage, however, but also love. Sam recognized that emotion, for he had felt it before. A love driven rage will not be stopped by mere men alone.

It would take an act of God to stop this man…or death.

It seemed that Max could control his rage very well, he had thus far anyway. Which made this man even deadlier to anyone who stood in his way.

When dealing with an outraged man, it is normally quite simple. You either knock the man out, pay him off, or leave him alone. But a concentrated, focused, outraged man who is driven by love will stop at nothing until he has accomplished what he set out to do, and therefore he will not quit at the sight of money, fists, or guns.

A chill went down Sam’s spine as he thought of the things this man might do to the people who had hurt him so.

Sam was overlooking a very important thing though. The other emotions were still there also.

As strong as the love driven rage emotion is, the fear of losing said love is an emotion that balances out the rage.

This could very well be the reason that Max had sought Sam’s help instead of taking matters into his own hands. Which brought Sam back to the despised question.

Sam took a deep breath.

The question really was not that profound of a question. It was actually only two simple little words, but Sam had seen people who have been strongly affected by it and had responded to it in dramatically different ways. One lady he asked this question to broke down in tears and sobbed uncontrollably for two hours. After Sam finally calmed her down, made her some coffee, and made sure she was alright she informed him that her cat was missing.

Another time Sam asked a very nice looking man this same question. The man’s face became twisted with anger, and he is now responsible for the hole in the wall that the filing cabinet conveniently covers.

Sam looked at Max again. He was nervously wringing his hands and seemed oblivious to Sam’s presence.

The silence suddenly became unbearable and Sam had to break it no matter how much he hated the question.

“What happened?” Sam asked.

“Sir?” Max replied.

“What happened when you went into the house?”

A flash of rage went through Max’s crystal blue eyes, as if a fire had just swept over the serene, blue ocean.

Sam braced himself for the worst. Max did not sob uncontrollably or slam a chair into the wall, however. He took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly.

“There was blood,” he began, his voice trembling, “In the living room…on the couch. The recliner was tipped over, and the lamp was shattered. My girl may only be fourteen, but she’s a fighter, just like her momma.” Max allowed himself a small chuckle before returning to a look that was a mix of anger and terror. “ There was a note on the T.V. …I have it in my pocket.”

“May I see it?” Sam asked.

Max removed a crumpled up piece of paper from his pocket. Sam smoothed it out and began reading:

“We have your daughter, but that’s not what we want. We are not going to tell you what we want though because that just wouldn’t be any fun. If you do what we say then your daughter will be fine, but if you don’t we will kill her and dump whatever is left of her body in the river. That is up to you. Right now we only ask two things.
1. No cops. If we even see a badge then your daughter is swimming with the pretty little fishies that she likes so much.
2. Go to the park in two days and there will be a box by the fountain. Inside it will be further instructions

-Your new best friends.


The note was typed. To Sam this meant a few things. It meant that, more than likely, the kidnappers didn’t stop to type out the note at Max’s house…especially if his daughter had put up that much of a fight. That also meant that either they knew Max and his family or they had been watching them intently to know that his daughter liked fishes so much, if in fact she did.

Sam returned his gaze to Max who was failing in a battle with himself to keep his composure.

“Your daughter….what is her name?” Sam asked.

“Its Grace,” said Max, “Grace Elizabeth Thomas.”

“Do you have a picture of her that I may use?”

“Yessir.” Max reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He opened the wallet and drew out a picture.

“This is her school picture, it was taken about a month ago.” He said while handing Sam the photograph.

Sam looked at the picture and saw a beautiful teenage girl staring back at him, with a smile that probably turned many heads at her school. Though she was only fourteen she looked older. She has beach blonde hair and had inherited her father’s ice-blue eyes. She reminded Sam of his own daughter who was the same age, and, for the first time, Sam felt a singe of rage himself. He could not imagine what sick, twisted people could have done this. He felt the anger that Max must have been feeling. If there was ever a doubt in his mind about taking this case, it had been disintegrated with the sight of Grace’s innocent smile and the thought of what those people….no they couldn’t be worthy to be called people. Those…things may have done to her. Sam wanted justice.

And he wanted it now.

“The note said no cops,” Max said, “ So I came to you. I was hoping that maybe you could help. I know I can’t do this by myself, and my wife won’t be reachable for another week because of her business trip so…”

“Don’t worry,” Sam said, surprised by the malice in his voice, “we will get your daughter back.”




P.S. Chapter 2 is already underway. Updates will be posted when deemed necessary. Thanks for reading.