Her Silent Cries

  © Copyright 2020

  Amazon Edition, License Notes

  This book is protected by the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited.

  Disclaimer:

  The persons, places, things, and otherwise animate or inanimate objects mentioned in this novel are figments of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to anything or anyone living (or dead) is unintentional. The author humbly begs your pardon. This is fiction, people.

  A DAVID FOX NOVELETTE # 1

  HER SILENT CRIES

  SHAYNE HOUSE

  TABLE OF CONTENT

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  THE WORLD OF FOX

  AUTHOR NOTE

  BOOK # 2: HIS RESTLESS SOUL

  1

  Ursula Bates started to get worried as the sun started to set. She had still not reached Jacobsville. She finally accepted that she was lost. Somewhere during the journey, she must have taken a wrong turn.

  Nicole had told her that the journey would not have taken more than four hours. So, what else she could think of this never-ending road except to accept the only remaining possibility. But even after acceptance, she was unable to take a U-turn. The dirt road was surrounded by tall bushes which only allowed one-way traffic without any turns. Ursula thought what would happen if a car or a truck came from the opposite direction. There was no way two vehicles could pass each other on this road. She kept hitting the accelerator trusting her fate. The petrol tank was full and there were extra cans in the trunk, thanks to her ever-ready attitude.

  Ursula was a teacher and got recently promoted, transferred from her local school to another school in Jacobsville. Nicole was her point of contact in that new school. She found her through a mutual friend, and she gave a good feedback about the new school which motivated Ursula to take the offer.

  She turned the headlamp light brighter and pushed the accelerator harder.

  Finally, the dirt road ended on a wide concrete road.

  Now, she was fully convinced that she was lost. According to Nicole, the dirt road would have been ended on a vineyard.

  After driving for some minutes, she stopped her red Subaru on the side of the road to check maps She took the mobile from her pocket felt a pang of disappointment as there were no network signals. She stared absentmindedly in the darkness surrounding her. The only sound she could hear was the whimpering of the engine in the silence of the night. The only possible course of action was to now go back from the same road she came. Before she could hit the pedal again, she got bathed in the light of another vehicle. She quickly came out of the car and signaled the new vehicle to stop.

  The wheels of jet-black Rolls Royce came to a halt near her. She bent to the driver's side ignoring the unusual thing on the bonnet waving above the headlights of the majestic vehicle.

  “I have lost the way. Can you tell me, where am I?”

  A gentle masculine voice asked. “Where do you want to go?”

  “Jacobsville High School.”

  “You are too far from Jacobsville. The route is too complex to describe from here. Even if I tell you, you are likely to get lost again.”

  Ursula looked worried. “Then what should I do?” She tried to look at the man behind the wheel, but he had not lit the interior.

  “Let me drive you there. Please follow me in your car.”

  “Oh. Thank you so much.”

  The man said. “The pleasure is all mine.”

  As she retreated to her vehicle, she thought she heard a laughter inside the car.

  ◆◆◆

  Collins was feeling drained of every ounce of energy he had. It was not easy to take part in a dance-off after a tiring week at the Precinct. Timmy, the manager of Pandora Night Club, had arranged the competition. It was a matter of a challenge and Collins never shied away from challenges. Nancy challenged him that he could not dance for more than two hours and now they were dancing to prove each other wrong. Timmy had arranged the competition, but he was looking at him with curled lips. He was dating Nancy and did not like his closeness with Collins.

  Collins Hemsworth was a handsome adorable guy in his late twenties. Girls usually found him cute, charismatic, witty and trustworthy; yet he was still single and not ready to mingle.

  Flowing with the rhythm, bathed in the ecstatic blue light, they bumped onto each other and Timmy grinned his teeth one more time. Collins felt a gleam of satisfaction in his jealousy. A part of doing the challenge was to irritate Timmy jealous. He liked when girls preferred to spend time with her over their boyfriends. Even-though, he was not ready for a relationship.

  When the competition was announced, a lot of couples showed interest and participated, but now only him and Nancy were left. Somebody took his elbow and dragged him away from the dance floor. He was about to say something in anger assuming that it was Timmy, but ...

  It was none other than the crisis personified.

  Fox!

  He didn't even let him excuse to Nancy and dragged him in the same motion out of Pandora's main door.

  After reaching near his car, Collins took his elbow out of his iron grip shaking with anger. “I am going back.”

  “Next time, it will be a police unit dragging you out.” Fox smiled at his red face.

  “But why ...” He was unable to complete the sentence feeling helpless. After all, Fox was his senior officer regardless of their close bond.

  “There is a case.”

  “It is a Saturday night.” Collins sighed.

  “Criminals don't care whether it is a Saturday night or your wedding night.”

  “What happened?”

  Fox showed him a picture of a young blonde woman in his mobile.

  “Missing Person. Age 34. School Teacher. Name: Ursula Bates. Divorced twice. She was transferred to Jacobsville High School but never reported. Her car was found near the crossing of T123.”

  “Wait a minute.” Collins took the mobile from his hand. “I think I know her.”

  Fox smiled with mischief taking out the pipe from his pocket.

  “See, how useful you are for the investigation. Finally, we found one person who knows her.”

  Collins returned his mobile rubbing his hands. The cold was freezing his bones to the core.

  “I know her but not as a school teacher.” Fox looked at him questioningly but Collins was busy ogling at Timmy coming out of the club hand in hand with Nancy. He grinned his teeth. Fox had wasted a perfect weekend night for him. Fox followed his gaze and made a face.

  “Do you want to play riddles with me?”

  Collins laughed. He wanted to pay Fox back for ruining his dance competition.

  “Fine. Don't tell. I will find out.” Fox unlocked the car and took the steering wheel. Collins laughed even louder and joined him on the front seat.

  “She is Shyla Cox.” He said closing the window to get rid of the cold breeze.

  “And?” Fox still looked puzzled. “You are saying like she is a presidential candidate whom everyone knows.”

  “Seriously? You don't know her? What type of books do you read all the time? She is the bestselling author of the year.”

  “How come I don't know about that.” Fox looked worried.

  “There is just a small thing.” Collins suppressed a grin as Fox started the engine. “She writes erotica.”

  Fox chuckled.

  2

  “Let me skip over the part where I ask you in a shock that when did you start reading ero
tica and where you laugh shamelessly. So, she was living a double life. Nobody we interviewed knows about her author self. The school authorities would have never allowed an erotic writer to teach. This opens a lot of possibilities.” Fox said thoughtfully looking at the road ahead of them. The Impala galloped on the road effortlessly. It must be two o'clock in the morning, but they were heading for the Precinct instead of heading home.

  Working with Fox on a case meant sleep deprivation, food deprivation and, basically, deprivation of all sorts.

  “She is living a double life.” Collins emphasized on the present tense. “I don't think we have any reason to assume otherwise.”

  “How did you know about her?”

  “It was just a chance. PomTom brought her to a party.”

  “What animal is a PomTom?

  Collins laughed.

  “A friend.”

  Fox made a face, “and his name is PomTom? Oh, God! It sounds like a pet or worse: a Youtuber.”

  “Can you stop being a boomer today? He is a rapper.” Collins checked his mobile. “Let me check if he is awake now.”

  Fox took a deep breath. “If my name was PomTom, I would have been awakened.”

  Inspector David Fox was a tall, bronzed, well-built, muscular man serving the police detective unit for more than ten years. He was in mid-thirties but had earned more rapport for his work than many of his senior officers. Today, the Precinct considered him a department in himself. He was graceful in his demeanor and believed in living a traditionally disciplined life fit for a gentleman and an officer of law enforcement.

  “He is awake.” Collins informed him after talking on phone for a while.

  “We will check him later. There is another man waiting for us at the head office. He found the car on the highway.”

  “And?”

  Fox gave him a meaningful look. “Usually unlocked cars get vanished.”

  “And you are surprised that why did he inform the police? There are still some good Samaritans out there.”

  “He said someone paid him to guard it.”

  ◆◆◆

  Timothy Palmer was the heir of the Lord Baron Palmer of the State of Penpeygrave. However, in the Central, he was known as PomTom, the rapper. He left his estate some time ago and never went back. Receiving police detectives at his penthouse of a high-rise was an exciting prospect for him. Tall, bearded and shabby with lipstick marks on his chest, he wore a magenta fur around his naked shoulders matching with his pajamas. A cheetah print brassiere was hanging from a chair indicating Tom was not alone.

  “I doubt the kidnapping theory.” He moist his lips and clicked his tongue serving them coffee. One glance at Fox was enough to tell that he did not like the rapper himself more than his name. PomTom seemed to enjoy the situation too much to his chagrin. “You have never read her stories. Have you? Give it a try and you will change your opinion about the situation.”

  “I tried reading one.” Collins said going through his books collection. “What was the name of it... Oh! yeah, My Alpha Student, full of heavy bondage stuff.”

  “Exactly. I mean a woman like that does not get kidnapped.”

  Fox asked. “How did you know her?”

  “Mutual friends.”

  “How did you get to know about her pen name?”

  “We got along really well after the first meeting, and she told that herself.” PomTom took a sip from his whiskey. “She was not exactly shy about her writing. She just didn’t go along boasting about it. I don’t think it was a secret.”

  Collins finally found some books of Shyla Cox from the bookshelf and gave one to Fox. A bare-chested man with an intense piercing look was staring at him with a dimly lit mansion at the bottom of the cover. The title was My Loathsome Liege.

  “Oh God!” Fox sighed.

  “We need to do some research now.” Collins winked at PomTom. “See you later.”

  Getting to the Impala in the basement parking, Fox bent and picked something from the floor. It was a shipping carton recently torn out. Mr. Timothy Palmer had received a package worth more than $200,000 last night.

  ◆◆◆

  “Just because she writes such stuff does not mean she participates in it as well. So far, we have no evidence that she had a debauched life.” Fox discussed with Collins going through all the statements.

  “What's her ex-husbands say in this matter?” Collins asked. They were at the Precinct discussing the way forward in the case.

  “The first one has no clue about her author identity. If we match the dates from her first published novel, she started writing much later after her first divorce. Samuel, the second husband, said he had no knowledge about her promiscuous activities, if there were any. They lived a fairly simple and traditional life until the divorce. Never participated in any sex games or parties.”

  “What was the reason of divorce?” Collins wondered.

  “She wanted to have children while he didn't.”

  “What about her family?”

  “Parents are dead; one sister who does not live here. She has a clean profile as Ursula Bates, the teacher. She was teaching at the local High School for last ten years. All her vacations are taken under her own name and accounted for. She was never charged with any indecent behavior in public. Her students loved her; parents also never complained about her. This brings us back to the kidnapping theory.”

  “But we don't know that whether she is kidnapped as Shyla Cox or it is just a sexually motivated crime.” Collins said.

  Tapping his pen on the table, Fox said thoughtfully.

  “I think we should pay a visit to Jacobsville.”

  3

  They started for Jacobsville just after dawn.

  Fox had to knock at Collins door for almost an hour before managing to wake him up. Collins hated early morning rendezvous. While he got ready, Fox prepared sandwiches and coffee for the journey.

  They lived together for a long time. After finishing the academy training, Collins joined the Precinct in the investigation department. Fox become fond of him in a short time and decided to train him, but he never managed to change his womanizing ways. Collins had heard of Inspector Fox before, and he didn’t look forward to work with him due to his strict image despite of his exceptional record of solving crime cases and his disciplined lifestyle.

  The only thing lacking in his otherwise perfect world was a woman. Collin never saw him with a woman, dating or casual. He was a celibate through and through which gave way to rumors.

  Fox never cared about what people say about his personal life.

  “One thing I don't understand is that why would a kidnapper bother to guard the victim's car?” Collins burped after having a handful of sandwiches.

  With Fox's expert driving, it took them less than twenty minutes to get out of the Central. Now they were on highway surrounded with lush green fields on both sides. The morning air was cold enough to not roll down windows of Impala.

  “I think it is kidnapping which someone wants to look like a runaway.”

  “You are stubborn.” Collins said.

  “Why would she want to show that she is kidnapped?”

  “It is a part of the story. She is an author. Maybe she wants to try some new story like My Charismatic Kidnapper.” Collins chuckled.

  “But she doesn't need to put her teaching career in danger for that. She could have simply resigned from school and gone to whatever adventure she wanted. She had no family to stop her. Why would she need to plan this kidnapping as a teacher especially when she was going to another school?”

  “It can be a part of the story. Kidnap of a teacher who falls in love with her kidnapper.”

  “You are an idiot. You see it her entire life as the life of an erotic writer because you want to have some spice in the case. A teacher's kidnap will be boring for you. I see it as a kidnap of a teacher because she is kidnapped as a teacher. It will be foolish to ignore her teaching life.”

  “What about the guy
guarding the car?”

  “He is a mechanic. Someone called him to repair the car and asked to stay with it until further notice. If he knew it would become a police matter, he would have never come.”

  “And you still think it is a kidnap?” Collins sighed. “Have we traced the guy who asked for repair?”

  “We are trying to trace the call.”

  It took them more than three hours to reach the Crescent Crossing from where they took left for Jacobsville. They discussed various aspects of the case along the way. Collins was still stuck on the idea that she had run away.

  “You think something is wrong with erotic writers which is actually surprising to me.” Impala's wheels made a screeching sound on the dirt as Fox quickly took it to a side and stopped the car. Collins almost got bumped onto the dashboard.

  “What the hell!”

  “Look.” Fox pointed to a dirt side road to their right. “The turn to High School is next. What if she took this turn mistakenly?”

  “She didn't have GPS in her car?”

  “She had it, but she never turned it on.” Fox hit the accelerator again and turned the vehicle to the dirt road.

  “She is a bestselling author which means she must be earning millions of dollars. Still, she lived like a poor school teacher. All of this is too hard to believe.”

  “What was the purpose of building this road?” Fox looked out at the tall bushes from the car window. “The floor is not carpeted but tall bushes are planted on both sides for what?”

  After driving for ten minutes, Fox stopped the car one more time and reached the bushes. Collins followed him with a slow pace. Fox took out a checkered piece of red satin from the bushes. It was so small that any other police officer may not have seen it from the car but Fox had an eagle's observation.

  “Is this a clue?”

  Fox didn't answer for a while.

  “I found a similar piece of red fabric in Ursula's car.”