Chapter 20

I contemplated for a while, weather I should make a move or not, I wanted him back I did, but I wasn't desperate, I wasn't going to go sniffing around him, letting him know he still had a hold on me. The timer on the oven dinged, I bent down and opened the door the smell of the hot pizza filled my nostrils. The chicken and the onions both smelled and looked so appealing. I cut the pizza into eight thin slices, and placed it on a plate; I carried it back through to Cat, with some drinks she smiled at the food, her eyes never leaving the plate.

I sat down on the sofa beside her, and placed the plate so it was balancing on one of my legs and one of hers, this way we both had easy access to the pizza. She took a huge bite out of one on the slices, and spoke to me with her mouth full "What time do we have History tomorrow?"

I racked my brains trying to think of what it had said on the schedule, "Erm, first period" I concluded. She placed down her bitten slice of pizza and opened her can of pop, it fizzed over the metal lip of the can slightly she brought it to her lips and sucked the froth up, before taking a long swig from the can. It didn't take us long to eat the pizza, and even though it had been a large one, we still found ourselves feeling hungry, out of sheer boredom.

We spent the night as we had all the other nights, watching the telly and eating random shit, it was silent, for a while, neither of us really having anything to talk about, we had been spending so much time together recently because of this certain situation that we knew what was happening in each other's lives.

There was no really sound-just the low hum of the quiet telly we were using as background noise-until we heard a scratching on the window of Cat's living room, the curtains had been closed while we were watching a movie, so we couldn't see what was causing the noise, we heard it again, but this time it was like nails on a blackboard the sound made all of my bones and ache and sent shivers down my spine, the noise carried on for a while, first it was short, and then it became longer, more vicious; I crawled over to the window to see what it was, as Cat had checked the door, he wouldn't suspect us coming this time we could catch him.

I moved the curtain away slowly, and peaked over the edge of the windowsill; it was him alright, tall broad shouldered his hand pressed against the window his face was unable to be made out, he wore a hoodie with the hood up and a cap under it, all that could be seen where his lips. He hadn't seen me at first but his eyes snapped up and looked straight at me, cutting into me, I backed away from the curtain.

I turned to face Cat who stood looking nervous not knowing what had happened "We need to get up stairs" I said in a hushed voice I stomped passed Cat and grabbed her wrist dragging her with me, once we go into her room we could hear banging on the door, like someone was trying to knock it down, loud heavy banging, this person wanted to get to us, and they wanted to do it fast. Thinking about why he wanted us made me feel sick, I could feel the bile rising in my throat, I sat gagging while Cat just let out heavy uncontrollable sobs.

He began to rattle to door, trying every which way to get into the house, to get to the two of us who sat, in the corner of the small bedroom. Cat had her knees pulled up to her chest and she was rocking, sobbing she had her hands covering her ears as if to stop the noise and I could hear her whimpering 'Please leave us alone; don't hurt us' over and over again.

And then we heard a loud crashing noise, and the door knob twisted, it clicked open, and heavy footsteps could be heard as he walked slowly around the room, taking in everything; I looked at Cat and then out of the window "Cat" I whispered making sure he couldn't hear us, she still sat rocking in her seat. I grabbed her wrists and pulled her hands away from her ears, "You need to get out of here"

I could hear his heavy footsteps walking round the down stairs of her house. She shook her head, tears clouding her brown eyes. "Yes" I whispered through gritted teeth.

"I can't leave you" she croaked. I sighed knowing there was no point in arguing with her. I pulled my phone from my pocket, and handed it to her

"Hide in your closet, ring the police, but you have to stay there okay" I explained to her, she nodded and complied with my request, she crawled to her closet, and shut herself in, I could hear him, still searching the downstairs part of the house, I stood up and crept downstairs, to keep him from coming up, and possibly finding Cat.

I could see him in the kitchen, searching the all the drawers, I made a sudden movement on the bottom step, attracting his attention, he turned on his heel. His face still covered by his clothing, he walked towards me, his footing heavy. I recognised the way he walked, with a slight arrogance about him. I could feel his eyes roaming my body. He pulled down his hood and took off his hat revealing his face.

I couldn't believe that Mr Miller was stood in front of me. I could feel the bile rising into my throat; I gagged a little, but swallowed back the vomit that had surfaced in my mouth. I stood frozen to the spot, he approached me calmly, but that didn't stop my heart from racing more fiercely than ever.

"You?" I asked, not exactly intelligent, but it was the only thing I could think at this moment in time, he nodded, a small sleazy smile pulled up the corners of his mouth. I shook my head "But, the cars…" I started.

"I have two, well I say 'I' one of them is my wife's"

"You have a wife?" I asked, arching my eyebrow. He nodded again, before looking around the room shortly.

I could feel tears burning my eyes. There was about a foot or so between us, his eyes found my face, brown eyes cutting into mine. "Where's our little friend?" he asked, his voice seemed different than before, a lot gravellier, and much more full of venom.

"She's not here" I lied choking on my words.

"Really?" He asked doubtfully "Why is she not in her own home?"

"She had to go out" I said, swallowing hard once more, he took a step closer to me, closing the gap. His eyes looked around the room, as if she would magically appear in one of the crevices of the room. Another step forward. He kept getting closer, and closer, until we were stood face to face, I could feel his warm breath hitting my skin. Fight or flight. I thought to myself, I used the ball of my hand and jarred it against his nose; blood instantaneously began to flow out of it. I ran past him, and headed for the kitchen, I felt his arms wrap around me pulling me back.

I was amazed at how fast he had caught up to me. He pushed me against the wall, holding me there by my shoulders; his grip was as tight as a vice. I gulped, I could hear my heart beating in my chest, I silently prayed for the police to show up at any minute, hoping that Cat had already rung them.

I could feel the pressure of his grip starting to bruise the skin already. His face was close to mine, once more I could feel his warm breath on my face it smelt strongly of liquor. It turned my stomach. His face was crawling with anger, aggression, what had caused him to go this far?

"I've been watching you for a while" he whispered in my ear, I could feel his nose, against my jaw as he spoke. I couldn't stop the tears; they rolled down my face, dropping at my jaw. He breathed heavily; the smell of liquor once again filled my nose, and clung to the insides of my nostrils. I gagged again, the cause of the gag, was a mixture between the comment and the smell

"Why?" I questioned, trying to keep my voice calm, it didn't work each word trembled as they left my lips.

"Because I thought you would be interesting, both of you" his voice was louder now, as he moved his head so he was looking into my eyes. "You've proven that, they way you're personalities change when you think no one else can see you, the way you influence each other"

"Just how long have you been watching us for?" I asked I needed to know.

"A few month, but you had never seen me, until the night camping." his grip tightened and he pushed me, as if he could get me to further back. It angered him to know we had seen him, I could tell that much jut by his expression.

I felt disgusted, I couldn't handle him breathing on me anymore, and I sure as hell couldn't stand him touching me; I raised my knee pulling it up to his groin. This cause him to let go and double over, he made choking, noises, I headed back for the kitchen, and pulled on the drawers, searching for the best thing I could use as self-defence.

I found a small, knife, it was small enough to hide from his view, but if I used it, it would make a great impact, and if I needed to use it, I would. I placed it in the band of my jeans, the cool blade touching my skin I covered the handle with my shirt, to make sure the whole thing was concealed. I turned round to see him walking towards me, both injuries I had caused him were still evident, he still had a small amount of blood coming from his nose, the rest had dried up around the edges, and he wasn't moving as fast he had before.

He cornered me again, in Cat's small kitchen, my back pressed against the kitchen counter. I felt slightly more at ease knowing that I had the knife, if needed, but at the same time, fear laced around my thoughts What if he knows about the knife? What if he uses it on me? I couldn't win him in a battle of strength if he fought it off me. My thoughts were conflicting with each other, making it much harder for me to concentrate on his next move.

He grabbed hold of my neck, just under my jaw, not putting on enough pressure to choke me, but just enough to stifle my breathing slightly. He ran his thumb across my bottom lip gently, and looked in to my eyes.

"You're not going to get away with this" I said, my voice shaking due to the position of his hand, keeping the eye contact, not wanting to back down. He let out a smug laugh, and looked down to his feet before looking back into my eyes.

"And why is that?" he asked, putting a lot of effort on each letter.

My heart thudded in my chest "Because everything comes to light in the end" I said, I had a slight amount of bravado in my voice, letting him know I was confident.

His jaw tensed, at my comment, and he tightened his grip around my jaw slightly.

I heard cars speeding up the street and so did he, his head whipped around to the door, I could see blue and red flashing lights around the room, A smug smile crept along my face ad he turned back to face me slowly, his face looked horrified, I slipped out the blade, and held it raised up close to his neck.

The police kicked open the door, it thudded on the wall as it swung violently. They all held guns out in front of them, after the bang Cat appeared at the top of the stairs and ran down to the bottom of them. One of the police men I recognised as Mr Vega, he stood further into the house than the others, it was strange to see him dressed in his police uniform.

I looked at Mr Miller and laughed, it was caused by the adrenalin, and nerves. I lowered the knife, knowing I no longer needed it. I looked at him, as his hand slipped from around my face. I arched my eyebrow at him smugly; he turned his head to see the door. He swallowed harshly.

"Hands up where we can see them!" demanded Mr Vega, his voice wasn't as friendly as usual, this was also a shocking way to see him; being demanding, and aggressive.

Mr Miller complied putting his hands up and then placing them on the back of his head. He turned to face the men at the door, so that he had his back to me. I skirted around him to meet Cat on the stairs, keeping the knife in my hands.

I grabbed Cat's hand. We both stood shaking, looking into the face of Mr Miller, a man that had not only followed us, and been watching us, but he had gone so far as to get a teaching job at our school.

He was lead out of the house by the other police officers while Mr Vega stayed to talk to me and Cat about what had happened, It didn't take us long to relay everything. He contacted our parents; my mum was on her way over while Cat's mum dad and brother were traveling back into town. Cat, would be spending the night at my house, as the lock had been busted on the door, also we were under instructions to do so, due to the trauma of the events.

It was while Mr Vega was outside instructing the other officers that I really thought about what had happened, if they hadn't turned up when they did, how far would James Miller have gone, the thought made me shudder. I was just happy that now everything had been brought into the light, and Cat and I could start to move on from the darkest part of our lives.

A/N: The final chapter. I hope that this wasn't an anti -climax to the story. Thank you to everyone who has stuck with this story and read it to the end, and thank you to everyone who reviewed, your comments spurred me on to continue to write this story.

Thanks so much, I hope you have enjoyed reading this story.