Forever Mine (Joe & Ella 2)

“You fucked then killed my wife and my unborn child Joe. Now I’m going to do the same to yours. I’m gonna fuck Ella then I’ll cut out that bastard child you put in her and finally the grand finale, I’ll string her up from those rafters up there and watch as she hangs, every bit of life squeezed out of her body as she twitches until her last breath. An eye for an eye as they say. It’s quite poetic really don’t you think?” He grinned.

I could hear Joe’s cries now, he sounded wounded, like he was the one dying. The only sounds coming down the phone were growls, grunts and cries like a wounded animal.

“And the best part…I’ve got a web cam set up so you can watch the whole thing online and when you finally do get round to finding her in a few days or weeks from now you can shut it down. I think we’ll go viral on the dark web though, don’t you Ella? This time tomorrow we could be internet sensations.”

With that he hung up the phone and dropped it on the floor before stamping on it and crushing the screen into a million pieces.

“He won’t find you, I disabled your GPS tracker and your location services. So may as well sit back and enjoy the ride. It’s gonna be intense.”

39

Max

I could hear Joe chatting away on his phone in my living room, as I strolled in pulling my t-shirt over my head. I heard him huff and tell Ella he couldn’t see her face and ask if she’d rung him by mistake. I hadn’t seen or spoken to Ella for a while so I went behind the sofa to say hi and give her a wave, once she’d worked out how to use her camera. When the screen panned out onto her tied to that filthy mattress I started shaking, the panic inside me rising like a volcano. I loved Ella, the thought of anyone hurting her made my blood boil, I’d kill them with my bare hands.

I could see Joe was losing it big time, he was so focused on what that asshole Peters was saying that he was liable to miss any clues that we’d need to find Ella. I didn’t blame him, it was his girl and his baby being threatened. I kept my focus on the screen though and watched, trying to pick out anything that could give a clue to the location of the dump he was holding her in.

The sounds weren’t much help, just some dripping water, probably rain, with the occasional muffled scream from Ella. The flooring was standard concrete, no clues there.

Joe’s hand started shaking as he held the phone so I put my hand on it too to keep it steady, I had to try and find something to help us. This just couldn’t happen, not to her.

Peters went on and on crucifying Joe with his insane ramblings and justifying what he felt was his right for vengeance. We all knew it was Peters stalking Joe, but his I.T skills had eluded us for a long time. He was clever at covering his tracks. I knew tracing Ella’s mobile phone would be fruitless, as a renowned hacker he would have sorted that out even before he took her. This screen in front of us was our only hope right now.

When he started to detail his sick twisted plan Joe lost it completely. He was a mess. Cole lifted the phone to the ceiling to show the rafters he planned to hang Ella from and as he did he revealed an old piece of machinery with the brand name BOBST on it. I had no idea what it was but it was all I had.

At that moment Sam came charging through the door with Chris in toe, a look of sheer panic on both of their faces.

“He’s got her.” I said as Joe crumbled on the sofa, his head in his hands sobbing.

“I’m so sorry Joe, I was loading the car up I literally took my eyes off her for a minute and she was gone. I had no idea he was even there, no one matched his description from my initial assessments when we got there.” Joe wasn’t listening though as he was too caught up in his grief, so Sam turned to me.

“I’ll get onto my contact at MI5 see if we can track her phone and maybe use the CCTV for car number plate recognition.” I told him it would be pointless, Peters would have blocked any tracking capabilities, he was no amateur, but right now we had to try every avenue we could.

“We’ve got to find her, we have to.” Joe sobbed.

I grabbed my phone and googled BOBST.

“She’s in some abandoned warehouse somewhere. I saw an old piece of machinery in the background it had the brand name BOBST written across the side, but it was old, not in use anymore and covered in rust.”

Sam asked me what machine it could be but I had no idea. What came up on google was a website for a company that specialised in packaging and label manufacturing. Not a fat lot of help, so I clicked onto the images. As I scrolled down the images of different modern factory machinery Joe paced up and down wracking his brain for what to do. Sam barked down the phone to his contact in MI5 and Chris just sat and cried.

Then I saw it, a BOBST SP 1260-E a machine for die cutting and hot foil printing dated 1956.

“It’s a die cutting and printing machine. What time did she go missing from the office?” I asked Chris.

He looked at his watch, “About 4pm, I remember because she said she was getting tired and she always felt sleepy at 4pm just lately.”

Joe had gotten the phone call not long after 4.30pm so the timeline meant she couldn’t be that far out of the city.

“How many derelict old printers’ buildings are there in a ten maybe twenty mile radius of here, ones that have been empty since the 1970s or 80s?”

We all got our mobiles out and started searching disused printing factories. Sam found two possible sites, and since his men were on their way we decided to split into two groups and get out there to check both out. We were all frantic by this point, conscious of the fact that every second counted.

Once Sam had debriefed his men, all ex-service men or mercenaries of some kind, we split into two groups, with various weapons, guns and ammunition at the ready. I’d never even fired a gun before but I wasn’t going to let that stop me using it today. Chris stayed behind in my apartment, he was as much use as a chocolate tea pot right now, but Joe and I took his range rover. A group of Sam’s men were following us to the first site, Sam was taking a group to the second site.

I drove through the city as fast as I could. Joe sat beside me barking for me to go faster, run the red lights, and swerve around the slow drivers. I didn’t respond, I knew he was beyond terrified right now. My phone rang and I used hands free to answer, making sure Joe couldn’t hear Sam on the other side. If Sam had found anything I didn’t want to freak Joe out any more than he already was.

“They’re here.” Sam stated, “The Volvo is parked up round the side. Do me a favour and don’t rush here okay, I’ve told the men following you to get here now but I don’t want Joe seeing something he won’t ever get over, so try to ease up so we can secure the area.”