Chain Reaction 1.16: Frustration

If you are reading this after chapter 10: Truth and Lies, DO NOT READ FURTHER! Click here to go to chapter 1.11.  Blogger screwed up when I posted this Sept 4, 2015.

A/N: I make like a month goes by from Graham and Brielle's nighttime meeting to when her father is arrested. As I played, it didn't occur to me that it would seem cruel/odd/harsh/etc that she hasn't broken up with Grayson yet. I just flat didn't think about him. So, I am forced to create another flaw of sorts for her. She's still hanging onto him as a boyfriend. I'd love to have done this differently, but this part of the story was played over a month ago.

This chapter picks up right where the last one left off.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

       Graham charges into the reception room at the police station in Lucky Palms and stops in front of a vending refrigerator. That couldn't have gone any worse. He stares at the food, knowing he hasn't had any breakfast or lunch. His stomach growls, but all he can think about is the utter disaster in the interrogation room.
       He'd expected to be celebrating right now, calling Brielle to tell her the news. Over the past month, he's spoken to her on the phone about a dozen times. Each time, he kept their discussion on generic topics. He kept himself from saying all the things he really wanted to say, not wanting to cross the line but aching just to hear her voice.
       He'd also expected to be able to finally and officially compete against that Grayson. Brielle still hasn't broken up with him! Whenever Graham would carefully bring up the topic, she'd tell him she didn't want to hurt the boy since they'd been friends for so long. He did his best to explain to her that that was unavoidable. He'd keep his tone light and sympathetic when inside, he'd be screaming for her to stop using him as a crutch, stop using him period.
      Today, his life was going to change for the better since Mr. McKinney had been found and caught. Instead, he not only has a financial nightmare on his hands but also a threat from her father that he'll press charges. Nothing happened! It was only a few simple dates, right? Sure, they made out, but is that punishable by law? His hand runs down his face, and he decides he doesn't want to push his luck.
       That bastard is going to get what he wants and keep me from getting what I want.

       At the front desk behind him, a woman complains about something. He doesn't hear the specifics, not listening to the words. The officer behind the desk calmly tells the woman that they're working on it. He sounds annoyed and not afraid to show it. Glancing, Graham sees that it's the same officer that was in the room with him and Brielle's father. He must've just walked in here, handing Brielle's father off to someone else and walking in to relieve the guy that was sitting at the desk. That, and The Maker didn't feel like getting a new extra.
       Sighing agitatedly, Graham turns his head back to the fridge. Inside his chest, his heart screams in agony.
       Before that nighttime meeting, in the weeks after their breakup, he was in absolute hell living without her. The worst was the memory of him telling her that he didn't know her. The child in him screamed that he loved her no matter what and that included age difference. The parent in him told him that he needed to let her go, that they couldn't be together even if he loved her. It was when the adult in him sided with the child that she had said 'I'm still me; you're still you' that was the key factor that made him contact her again. He fell in love with her; it didn't matter to him when he thought she was eighteen. Why should it matter that she's only a year and a half younger than that?

       I have to talk to her again; I have to hear her voice. He pulls out his phone and stares at her number, grateful yet again that Nyla bought her a phone.
       How am I going to tell her what just happened? How am I going to tell her that I wanted to use a loophole, getting her father's permission? How am I going to manage to say the words that we can't be together, at least romantically, for fifteen months? What is she going to think when she hears that I tried this in the first place? His hand shakes as he touches the screen to call her.

      "Graham!" Brielle cries out into the other end of the phone call. She sounds breathless like she's been running, and his heart cracks down the middle when he hears her try to keep from crying too audibly.
       "What is it?!" he begs, hating he's a hundred or so miles away. His mind whirls as different possibilities spin around in his mind: her boyfriend broke up with her and she liked him more than she let on, she really misses him as badly as he misses her, her father managed to do something to make her life worse even though he's behind bars, someone hurt her... That one's the worst.
       She can't hold back the tears any longer, and she cries loudly into the phone. Someone sitting in the lobby picks his head up, able to hear her crying from where he sits.
       "Brielle, please tell me what's wrong," he pleads quietly, also turning down the volume of his phone with his thumb.
       "I'm running away!" she bawls.
       "What? Why?"
       "Fred...." She cries again, such awful, gut-wrenching sobs that tear him to pieces. Who's Fred? "He wouldn't leave me alone! I forgot to lock my door! I didn't know he was staying the night with Nyla again, and early this morning... This morning, he..."

       "Nyla's boyfriend?" he asks, trying to make sense of her scattered statements. A sickening picture starts forming in his mind. Please, let me be wrong.
       "Yes," she replies, her voice quavering. "He... I couldn't stop him! He said it was my fault!!"
       "No," he says, taking a physical step backwards. "Please tell me it's not what I'm thinking."
       "For once in my life, I wish I could lie my way out of this," she says in a voice that sounds eerily calm. "Am I a tease, Graham?"
        "No. How can you ask that?" he gasps out, thinking of the short skirts, shorts, her skin that glows in the moonlight and begs him to taste it, the silkiness of her hair, sweet lips that feel fantastic against his own. Oh, the many times he's fantasized about her, even after they broke up...but that was from his own imagination. He knows it was his own mind doing all that and that anything she did, she did unconsciously. Now, some Fred bastard thought she was teasing him on purpose?!
        "He said I was nothing but a tease and that he was going to teach me a lesson." Her calm voice cracks, and she starts bawling again.
        I can't stand it anymore. The whole damn world wants to hurt her, and I can't simply stand aside and let it. "Where are you, Brielle?" he asks, pulling his keys out of his pocket. Plans to drive like a maniac and risk several speeding tickets fly through his mind. He's going to convince her to go to the police and get help. After that, he doesn't know exactly, but it will be somewhere where she won't get hurt.
        "I'm not going to tell you," she whispers and sniffs.

      F---!!! "If you don't want me coming for you, go get help. You don't need to be alone."
     "No one is going to find me this time," she says in a hissing way and hangs up on him.
      He stares at his phone in a panic. NO! He tries calling her again, and it goes straight to voicemail. He listens to her cheery message before begging her to call him, to get help.
       Wait a minute... I'm in a damn police station! He puts his phone in his pocket, the volume turned all the way up again and on vibrate. He will NOT miss a call from her. Then, he walks over to the desk.

      The officer behind the desk looks up at him as if to say, 'you're still here?'
      "I just got off the phone with a -friend- of mine, and I think she's in some serious trouble," he states as calmly as he can, which isn't what he wants to do. What he wants to do is lean over the desk, grab the man's shirt, and yell at him to send out an APB so they can find her now!
      "Her name?" he asks in a bored voice.
      Graham takes a deep breath, wishing it were any other officer than this man. "Brielle McKinney."

     The man gives him a look. "McKinney?"
      "Yes," Graham replies impatiently. Why aren't you typing something?!
      The man asks him for some other details, and when he finds out that she lives in Oasis Springs, he picks up his phone. In a bored voice, he explains to the Oasis Springs Police Department that a man in Lucky Palms claims someone named Brielle McKinney is in danger.
      Furious with the man's attitude, Graham tells him, "From everything she just told me on the phone, she just got raped by some man named Fred, her sister's boyfriend apparently, but she won't tell me where she is and refuses to go to the police herself!"
      The man calmly watches him and relays the information to the OSPD. "Okay. Thanks a lot," he says into the phone. Then, he looks up at Graham and says, "They're checking into it."
      "That's it?! That's all you're going to do?!"

      Officer Sims puts his hand on his forehead. How do they find me? he thinks for the billionth time, referring to people that expect immediate action like it's a television show. He called Oasis Springs and let them know; what more does the man expect? For him to suddenly jump up from his desk, run outside, put his arms up, and fly away to the rescue like Superman? And for that matter, he personally suspects the man thinks they'll find her for him. After all, Sims himself knows that the girl is underage, and the man in front of him is in love with her, which in and of itself is questionable.
      "Sir, the officers in Oasis Springs have sent someone to look around for her. What more can I do from here?" he asks, wishing he weren't working the front desk at this moment.
      "She could also be in Willow Creek!" Graham snarls, remembering Brielle's last campsite and how surprisingly close it was to his house. "Maybe even Newcrest!"
      "She'll probably turn up somewhere, maybe listening to your advice, and maybe even showing up at the station on her own. We can't do more than that at this time."
       "Gee, thanks for your help,"" Graham growls sarcastically, knowing the officer is right but hating feeling helpless.
        "Anytime," he replies in an even voice and watches as Mr. Taylor barrels his way out the door to his car.

-------------------------------------------
CLICK HERE to go to Chapter 1.17: Dead Inside