Chapter 22

"Can you hurry up?" Heather demanded as she glared at Duncan and placed her hands on her hips. "What's taking you so long?"

"I'm already going as fast as I can," Duncan grunted as he tried turning the doorknob again. "And you telling me to hurry up every ten seconds won't make it any faster."

Heather rolled her eyes. "Aren't you supposed to be an expert at this?"

"Just because I went to juvie doesn't mean I know how to pick locks, okay?" Duncan stopped what he was doing and turned around to glare at Heather. "Talk about stereotyping."

Courtney glanced around at her surroundings and then back at Heather. "When you said you and Alejandro wanted to go on a double date with Duncan and I, I was expecting something a little more...normal? You know, like a nice, fancy meal at a restaurant or something, not trying to break into Nathan's house together."

"Well, if I had told you that upfront that would've taken out the surprise element," Heather innocently replied. "And besides, you probably wouldn't have agreed."

"We're literally breaking so many laws right now...trespass, breaking and entering...unlawful entry...stealing...oh my god, I could lose my practising license for this," Courtney nervously said as she counted each offence on her finger.

Heather rubbed her temples. "Court, relax, it's going to be fine and we're not going to be stealing anything."

"What if someone sees us?" Courtney cautiously glanced around again.

"If you're scared, princess, you can wait outside," Duncan smirked.

Courtney folded her arms. "I'm not scared! I'm just...thinking of the consequences."

"How are we going?" Alejandro suddenly asked as he walked up the steps to Nathan's house and joined the trio. "I've checked and the coast is clear for now."

"Nearly there," Duncan replied. He then turned around to face Heather and Courtney and held out his hand. "Ladies, bobby pin?"

Heather rolled her eyes. "Just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I always carry a bobby pin around. Talk about stereotyping."

"Well, do you expect me to have a bobby pin then?" Duncan retorted as he glared at Heather.

"Yeah, maybe, to pin that mohawk," Heather sarcastically responded.

"Don't bring my mohawk into this!" Duncan growled.

"Oh my god, stop arguing! What if someone hears us?" Courtney exclaimed. "Here, use this," she added as she quickly took out a bobby pin from her hair and handed it to Duncan.

"Thank you, princess," Duncan flatly said. "At least someone's trying to be helpful, unlike a certain somebody."

Heather glared at Duncan. "Oh yeah? You-"

"Alright everyone, let's all calm down," Alejandro quickly interjected. "Let's just focus on why we're here and try not to get too distracted. The sooner we get inside his house, the sooner we can get out and wrap this up."

"Listen to that, the voice of reason," Duncan remarked as he stuck the bobby pin into the keyhole of Nathan's door and twisted the pin gently.

Heather folded her arms and pursed her lips. I don't know how Courtney puts up with Duncan. He can literally be even more annoying than my siblings sometimes, and that says a lot.

At that moment, the four of them heard a small clicking sound as the doorknob successfully turned.

"Oh my god, finally," Heather said, rolling her eyes. "Took you long enough."

"Success," Duncan grinned, ignoring Heather's remark. He then turned to Courtney and smirked. "So what's it going to be, princess? Would you prefer to keep guard outside instead?"

"I'm not standing outside by myself," Courtney snapped, placing her hands on her hips.

Duncan let out a light chuckle as the four of them stepped inside Nathan's house. "Thought so."

"Alright listen up everyone, let's all split up," Heather immediately said as she clapped her hands together. "Courtney and Duncan, you guys take the downstairs area and Alejandro and I will search upstairs."

"You really still do like to boss people around, just like in high school and college," Duncan muttered.

"It's called leadership and taking charge, maybe I should get you a dictionary for your next birthday," Heather countered. "Although even then I doubt that tiny brain of yours would be able to understand the meaning of those words."

"Whoa, take a chill pill," Duncan retorted. "I'm here to help you and Alejandro, you could seriously at least be a little more grateful."

Heather rolled her eyes.

"Okay, that's enough," Alejandro interrupted again. "I don't think any of us want to spend any more time here than we have to so let's just work together and get this over and done with."

"I agree with Alejandro," Courtney added as she glanced around. "I'm getting kind of creepy vibes."

"Fine, Court and I will take the downstairs area," Duncan muttered as he folded his arms.

"Good. Now we should have about forty minutes until Nathan gets back from the gym," Heather said as she turned to face everyone. "That should be plenty of time for us to search for any clues about how he's connected to Gwen or any items that would make him look suspicious."

"Duncan, did you already disable the security cameras from outside?" Alejandro asked.

"You bet," Duncan smirked.

The four of them quickly split up, with Heather and Alejandro making their way upstairs to Nathan's room.

"I still don't think Nathan's related to Gwen in any way, they don't have the same last name," Heather remarked as she started digging through the drawers on Nathan's desk. Her eyes drifted towards a pair of black sunglasses, a bottle of hair dye and a pair of blue contact lenses. There wasn't anything particularly irregular about any of those items individually, but together it gave Heather suspicious vibes.

"They could still be cousins though," Alejandro reasoned.

Heather scrunched her nose as she turned to face him. "My theory is that they previously dated. Maybe Gwen dumped him but he's still not over her, which is why he still has that photo of her locked up. And so he was trying to use me as a rebound or make her jealous, but when I refused to give in he went all psycho and decided to screw up my business instead."

"You have a very wild imagination, mi amor," Alejandro chuckled.

Heather placed her hands on her hips and pursed her lips. "Come on, it's highly plausible. If they were just normal friends or acquaintances, why would he keep a photo of her locked up in a filing cabinet?"

"I still stand by my theory that they might be secretly cousins," Alejandro replied. "Either that, or they're acquaintances. Maybe Gwen has something to do with RFG Jewellery too."

Heather rolled her eyes as she turned her attention back to a notebook on Nathan's nightstand. "We'll see about that."

As she picked up the notebook, a tiny card slipped out. "A plane ticket to Seattle from a few weeks ago," she murmured. "The timing matches up perfectly to when Nathan took time off work."

Alejandro's eyes widened. "My informants told me that RFG Jewellery seems to be based in the US so that is definitely very suspicious. We should get a photo of that." He quickly took out his phone and snapped a photo of the ticket.

They continued digging around in Nathan's room for another fifteen minutes, until they suddenly heard Courtney's voice from downstairs. "Guys, come down! You cannot believe what we just found!"

Alejandro and Heather both instinctively turned to look at each other, before walking downstairs together to rejoin Courtney and Duncan.

"Spoiler alert, Nathan isn't even his real name," Duncan sarcastically said as Courtney handed Heather an old driver's license from several years ago.

Heather raised a brow at him. "Seriously? This better not be some prank." She took the item from Courtney's hand and her eyes widened when she read the name on his license. Alejandro curiously peered over her shoulder.

"What the hell? His real name is Joe?" Heather nearly choked.

"I immediately thought of someone else," Courtney muttered.

Heather rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I think we can safely conclude he's not the only creepy person named Joe," she said, to which Courtney let out a snort.

Alejandro gave both Heather and Courtney a puzzled look. "Qué? Who else called Joe is creepy?"

"Joe from You," Heather responded.

"Joe from me?" Alejandro said, confusion plastered across his face.

"Joe Goldberg is a character in the TV series You," Courtney explained. "He's a stalker and creep."

"Ah, I see," Alejandro replied as he scratched his head sheepishly.

"Anyway, we better get a photo of that," Heather added. She took out her phone and proceeded to take a photo of Nathan's old driver's license.

"Did you guys find anything?" Courtney asked.

Heather nodded. "Yeah, plane tickets showing that Nathan, I mean, Joe, was in the US recently. But we haven't really found anything yet which is direct evidence that he stole Illuminate's product designs and trade secrets."

Courtney was about to reply when her cell phone began ringing. She quickly picked up and held her phone up to her ear. "Hello? Mom?...Oh okay, I'll be there soon."

"Everything okay?" Heather asked her when the call ended.

"Just a family emergency," Courtney sighed.

"You guys can go first if you need to," Heather replied, gesturing to Duncan as well. "I think Alejandro and I might stay around for a bit longer. There's still some stuff we want to search through."

Courtney nodded. "Be careful, Heath."

"Don't worry, we've got it all under control. Nathan's not going to see us," Heather reassured as she leaned forward to pull Courtney into an embrace. "Thanks for coming today, Court."

"Anytime. This detective and partners in crime thing might've been a little more fun than expected," Courtney admitted, whilst grabbing Nathan's old drivers license back and carefully placing it back where she had found it.

"Maybe we can take it up one level," Duncan smirked at her.

Courtney rolled her eyes and pushed Duncan's shoulder playfully. The two then began heading towards Nathan's front door.

Watching their retreating figures, Heather hesitated for a moment. "Hey, Duncan," she then suddenly called out.

Duncan turned back around to face her, a brow raised. "Yeah?"

"Thanks for your help today too," Heather muttered.

Duncan smirked. "See? Now that wasn't too hard to say, was it?"

Heather rolled her eyes. "Don't make me regret it."

Duncan let out a light chuckle. "Always happy to help. See ya both around, Heather and Alejandro."

"Appreciate it, amigo," Alejandro nodded at Duncan.

Once Duncan and Courtney left, Heather and Alejandro made their way back upstairs.

Heather opened Nathan's closet and searched around, her gaze eventually falling to a large box hidden in the corner. Frowning, she took it out and was about to open it when she suddenly heard the sound of a car parking in the driveway. She stopped in her tracks and immediately met Alejandro's concerned gaze. They both froze. Nathan.

"Seriously? Why is he coming back so soon?" Heather hissed as she quickly placed the box back in the closet and promptly shut the door. "What do we do now?"

Alejandro glanced quickly around, his emerald green eyes darting around. His gaze then shifted to the window in Nathan's bedroom. "Quick!" he exclaimed the next moment, as he began pulling open the window.

"What are you doing?" Heather whisper-yelled as she turned to face him.

Alejandro turned around to face her, a smirk on his face. "You jump, I jump?"

Heather's eyes widened. "Are you cracked?! This isn't the Titantic!"

"And it's not, because the Titantic ended in a tragedy whereas there are only happy endings under my watch," Alejandro stated matter-of-factly as he then reached for a stack of ropes in Nathan's room which he had found earlier. "Here, we can both use this rope to get down."

Heather was about to protest when she suddenly heard the sound of the front door unlocking and then brisk footsteps heading up the stairs.

"It's either this or we hide in his closet," Alejandro whispered. "There's no more time."

"Ew, there's no way I'm hiding in his closet!" Heather hissed.

At this point, the footsteps were getting closer and closer, louder and louder. Standing in Nathan's bedroom, Heather felt a wave of uneasiness take over her. She craned her neck towards the sound of the footsteps and then stared down the window. She realized Alejandro was right; they could probably use the rope to successfully sneak out of Nathan's window.

The next moment, Heather took a deep breath and tightly gripped onto Alejandro's hand as he helped her up the window.

"Ouch!" Heather muttered as part of her hair briefly got stuck. She tugged at it and then used the rope Alejandro had set up to smoothly slide down to the ground. Alejandro followed after her, quickly closing the window after him and taking the rope with him so as to not leave a trail of evidence.

Hand in hand, they then sprinted together towards the front of Nathan's house and back towards the street.

Meanwhile, Nathan walked back to his room and looked around inside, a frown on his face. Something about it seemed different to him, but he couldn't quite put his finger on what exactly. He walked over to his closet, opening and carefully scanning the contents inside; everything still looked perfectly in place.

He then walked over to his window and peered outside. The coast was all clear.

Just as he was about to turn back around, he suddenly noticed a piece of long, black hair on the window sill. He picked up the piece of hair, realization dawning upon him.

Clenching his jaw, he took out his phone and tapped on a number saved in his contacts. "Hello? It's time for the second part of our plan."

***

Later that afternoon, Heather had just finished her grocery shopping for the upcoming week when she suddenly heard loud meowing sounds close to the supermarket.

She immediately shifted her gaze to the source of the sound; it was a white cat in a nearby deserted street. The cat looked frightened, scared and disturbed. Appearance-wise, the cat reminded her a bit of her old cat, Bruiser, back when she still lived at her parents' house.

Without thinking, Heather's first instinct was to cross the road and make her way to said street, where the cat was.

She then crouched down next to the cat and began gently patting its fur. "Are you okay, buddy?"

The cat kept meowing, the sounds it was making seemingly only getting louder and louder. "It's going to be okay, let me see if your owner is around," Heather cooed.

At that moment, the cat let out a final loud mew before curling up into a small ball. "Hey, hey," Heather gently said. "I'll make it alright."

Heather stood up and took a few steps, before suddenly freezing in her tracks. There was no one else within sight, but she immediately sensed an eerie presence behind her and felt goosebumps all over her body.

Run. A loud voice in her head was telling her, screaming at her, begging at her to move.

She turned her heel to move.

The last thing she registered was a firm hand over her mouth, before she dropped the bag of groceries in her hands, and before she felt herself blacking out.

--

A/N - thoughts/feelings/emotions/predictions??!!

Just to confirm, Heather is alive - there are only happy endings under my watch even though the characters do go through pain :P

Who do you guys think Nathan was on the phone with? Why did he undergo a name change? Is one of Heather or Alejandro's theories about Nathan/Gwen correct or did I just randomly put that in to mess with your minds?

Also, if you guys remember Nathan's creepy scrapbook from chapter 8, it was the same one that Heather was very close to discovering when she found that box in his closet.

Thanks for reading & stay tuned :)

Grateful for all your support <3