Previously on Cash Legacy…
With help of the police, Eliza is found
Kristine keeps Eliza’s kidnapping a secret
Kristine is expecting again
Eliza starts school
Kristine has twins
Someone claiming to be Adrian takes Kristine from the hospital
Adrian finds out that Mallory bailed Clinton out of jail
Chapter 2.7: Separated from the Light
Ben and Mallory were woken up in the middle of the night by lots of loud banging on the front door and shouting.
Ben came outside in his boxers and was met with Adrian’s wrath.
“Where is Mallory? Tell her to come out here right now!” Adrian demanded.
“Whoa! Dude, relax. I’m not letting you see her if you don’t calm down. What’s the matter with you anyway?” Ben asked.
Seeing that he didn’t calm down, Ben went back inside the house and locked the door.
Ben’s dismissal wasn’t enough to get Adrian to leave. Although he was hungry and tired, he sat at the front door the whole night, waiting for Mallory to come out.
Dalia kept phoning him and sending messages, begging him and Kristine to come home wherever they were because the twins were a bit too much to handle.
When Ben saw that he was still out there in the morning, he made Adrian something to eat, feeling sorry for him.
“What’s going on, Ade?” Ben asked with deep concern.
“I’ve been trying to tell you that Kristine is missing,” Adrian said before tiredly explaining his suspicion of Clinton and how Mallory paid for his bail.
Adrian and Ben went inside and had breakfast at the dining table. Eventually, Mallory joined them. Adrian, too tired to argue, asked her about Clinton. Mallory explained that she didn’t know about Eliza being kidnapped.
Clinton told her that he had been framed and since Kristine didn’t tell Mallory about the kidnapping, she believed Clinton’s story.
Adrian apologized for yelling at Ben. They all realized that everyone was a victim of Clinton.
“The last time I spoke to Clinton about a month ago, he was living in a town called Handridge,” Mallory told Adrian.
“That’s on the outskirts of Moodwayers. I’ll go there,” Adrian said.
Ben shook his head, “No, you won’t. It’s better if the police handle it. You just brought home the twins. Go home and take care of them.”
“Ben is right, Mallory said, “Maybe you should take a nap in the guest room. I’ll drive you home when I’m taking Nick to preschool.”
Mallory didn’t seem too worried. In her mind, Kristine wasn’t in danger if she was with Clinton.
Later that morning, Adrian finally arrived at home. He headed straight to the babies’ room where he found the twins fast asleep.
He lifted up Gemma and said, “I’ll bring mommy back. I promise.”
The little girl woke up and began to cry and soon enough, Francis woke up too so Adrian feed them and coaxed them back to sleep.
***
She wasn’t sure where she was but the walls were made of wooden panels and the ground was bare soil. Kristine woke up to this strange place.
A sink and toilet were in one corner and a mattress was propped up on some crates and in the same room, several garbage bins were left full.
The big barrel doors that sealed off the place opened and in came Clinton.
“I hope you are enjoying your new home,” he sarcastically said.
“You can’t keep me here forever, Clinton. Someone is going to start looking for me!”
“And you won’t be found. I’m going to make sure that you suffer and your kids do not recognize you as their mother. You’re not going anywhere, sister,” he scowled.
She tried to escape but Clinton grabbed her before she even made it past the door.
“I had a life with a wonderful woman,” Clinton said as he squeezed Kristine’s mouth shut, “I could have started over somewhere nice. All you had to do was give me some money but no … You got me arrested and she left me. Now, I’m going to make you pay.”
He took a needle out of his pocket. One shot in the neck was enough to knock her out completely.
***
Six days and 14 hours. That’s how long it had been since Kristine’s disappearance.
It was especially hard for Eliza, who kept having nightmares about a strange man leaving her in the woods. As a result, she wasn’t sleeping well and it showed in her school performance.
Dalia tried to help Adrian with the twins as much as she could but the fact was that she wasn’t their mother and there were some things that only a mother could do.
Two weeks and four days. The police had combed through Handridge, the area that Mallory said Clinton lived at, but they came out with nothing. The people in Handridge had a “see nothing, hear nothing” attitude.
One month and two weeks. A dark cloud hung over the Cash household. It became a reality that Kristine might not be found alive.
Wherever she was, she was fighting.
One year and nine months. Every month, Adrian would light a row of candles leading to the front door, in the hope that his beloved Kristine would return someday. If anyone ever suggested that he moved on, he would respond with rage and disgust.
And then one evening, Adrian got a phone call from an unknown number. All that was said to him was an address and a time.
He showed up at the place but there was nothing. Suddenly, a car sped past the pavement and threw Kristine out onto the pavement.
For a moment, he just stood there in shock. She was unconscious and he feared what everyone else had been telling him to prepare for.
When the shock wore off, it eventually came to mind that he should take her to a hospital and so he did.
The agony of not knowing whether she was okay or not was enough to drive him mad.
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