Missing

Happy Thursday loves!

Hope you enjoy!!

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Her panting breaths were like wispy ghosts in the cool Autumn air.

All was quiet but for the sound of her breathing and the beating of her sneakers on the pavement.

Enid had never been a fan of running.

Exercise of any sort had always felt more like a punishment than a fun activity to her.

Fiona had once joked that it was a miracle that she stayed so skinny with how lazy she was.

Enid shrugged it off, she just found reading books to be much more enjoyable than running or biking.

Yet, running was exactly what she needed this Friday morning.

Something to distract her from the swirling chaos in her mind.

A week had passed since she had been taken to the immortal estate.

Dante had driven her home that night and she had been unsurprised to find that his car was just as flashy and expensive as the other two had been.

The deep red color matching him well.

He had pulled up outside the deserted dorm building and brushed a kiss across her hand as he helped her out of the car.

"See you soon, little bird." Was all he had said before he was gone.

She hadn't seen any of them since.

Each of her classes with them had been canceled for the week.

Automated messages from the school had alerted their students they would be out due to "personal reasons."

Enid's heart had stopped.

The strange, surreal experience of that night was constantly in her mind.

She still wasn't sure what to think about it.

And now they had disappeared.

She couldn't help but notice the correlation.

With her school week so empty, she had many more hours to fill than she was used to.

She spent time practicing the cello, playing the songs for the Winter Gala over and over until she heard them in her sleep.

She got ahead on her studies for her math and history courses.

Enid did everything she could to keep busy.

But still her mind drifted back to that night.

Three men. Three sets of hands. Three pairs of lips.

Conflicting emotions warred inside of her.

Embarrassment, worry, joy, infatuation.

Her conscience reprimanded her for her lewd actions.

It brought forth images of Fiona looking down on her disappointedly.

It reminded her of the cultural standards that made such a relationship wrong.

More than wrong. Illegal.

But then there was her heart.

It sung tales of romance and kings.

Her thoughts consumed with the image of Dante clutching a book in his large hands.

Alexander on stage with his violin posed on his strong shoulder, his playing otherworldly.

Theodore pulling her onto his lap, his hand threading into her hair.

How could something that felt so right be so wrong?

She missed them immensely.

It had only been a few days, but she felt lost without them.

Drifting through life without reason.

She wondered how she had filled her days and mind before they had entered her life.

They had so quickly become the center of her universe.

She shook her head, trying to clear the thoughts.

Glancing up from her focus on the pavement before her, she found she had made her way into a neighborhood.

The homes were old and beautiful, the architecture rich with history.

They weren't nearly as big as the estate had been, though.

Ancient trees framed the homes, their leaves bursting with golds and reds.

A smile lit up her face as she noticed an older man working on his garden out front.

He gave her a friendly wave as she jogged past and she returned it with vigor.

She loved getting glimpses into other people's lives.

Families in the windows getting their children ready for the school day.

Teenagers struggling to wake up as they climbed into their cars.

Young parents with a stroller on the opposite side of the road.

So distracted by her surroundings, she did not notice the newspaper on the sidewalk until she was tripping over it.

Catching herself on her hands and knees, she slightly opened the scratches on her knees from the night of the bonfire.

Sitting and catching her breath, she glanced down at the thing she had tripped on.

The newspaper was slightly torn from her tumble, but the front page was still visible.

Her heart crawled into her throat and she nearly choked on it as she saw the photo taking up nearly the whole page.

It was the boy from the bonfire.

The one who had assaulted her.

The photo seemed to be from a formal event, as he was clad in a suit.

Dark framed glasses sat on the bridge of his nose as he beamed at the camera.

Her insides twisted.

"Patrick Thomas II, 21, son of Patrick Thomas Senior has been reported as missing as of Wednesday the 23rd. If you have any information about this disappearance, please call the..."

Her thoughts flashed back to the moment with her professors after the meeting with the Dean.

Dante promising they would take care of it.

And then Theodore saying, "He's going to wish he had never even looked at you, Enid."

Her heart raced, her grasp on the newspaper slackening as her hands shook.

Surely, they had nothing to do with that.

It must be a coincidence.

But then she thought of their absence this week.

"Personal reasons."

She felt like she was going to be ill, the back of her throat burning.

She brushed the dirt from her hands and knees.

Climbing shakily to her feet, she took one last glance at the boy's smiling face before taking back off down the road.

The beating of her heart pounding in her ears.

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Uh oh.

Looks like we have a mystery on our hands.

Comments fill my heart with joy.

All my love, Sappho *

P.S. Thanks to those of you who notified me of the glitch where the chapter was repeated!! Should hopefully be fixed now! Xx