The Chase by Amber Riel (story reading txt) 📖

bugling but it still hadn’t taken up a lot of room.  Right in front of me was a long, wide window which took up the middle half of the wall.  I walked over to it and looked outside to see what kind of view I had.  Trees filled most of the ground with a few houses, well other mansions, in between gates keeping the mansions away from one another and keeping security from having too much trouble with crimes.

          I looked up to the light blue sky which was starting to change from afternoon to evening.  It was a beautiful orange, purple, and pink as it changed and the sun was setting in the distance.  It was a beautiful sight to see.  I watched as a small white car pulled up to the gate which Louis had pulled up to earlier and without hesitation the gate opened and the car drove in.  After the car was parked, I watched as Ron had stepped out.  I smiled at the sight of the man.  He was like an older brother to me who I haven’t seen in a while and I knew I had to go say hello.

 

          I had found my way to the living room which looked like the family room with the couches and the chairs pretty much fixed the small but the only difference was the fire place at the far end which filled the other end of the room.  I turned to see Annie who had walked in with Ron at her side.  “Hey, Sam,” Ron said as he smiled.

          “Hello,” I replied, returning the smile.

          “How have you been?”

          “Pretty good.”

          “Can you talk to Louis, honey?” I heard Annie ask in a whisper.  She must have thought that I couldn’t hear her but I had.

          “Why?  Oh never mind,” Ron replied.  “I’ll try but you and I both know that he’s going through a tough time.”

          “I know but I think that….”

          “Excuse me,” I interrupted.  “I can hear the both of you.”

          Annie made a face that meant that she had forgotten that I was even there.  Her hazel eyes began to search the room for words but she frown when she couldn’t think of what to say.

          “Sorry your sister wants to play matchmaker so bad.”  Ron kind of smiled and shook his head.  “Don’t worry though if you do wind up liking Louis that would be your choice not ours…. Right, honey?” he asked, raising an eyebrow as he looked down at Annie.

          “Okay,” she spoke weakly wanting so bad to win the battle but knowing that was never going to happen.

          I smiled at my sister’s stubbornness.  She had always been stubborn which was about the only thing she had actually gotten from our father.  I could be stubborn at times as well but not that often.  I knew she meant well but her attentions weren’t agreeing with my thoughts about the man who I had met earlier that day.

          We heard the front door open and not even five minutes later Lainie had hurried into the room.  “DADDY!” she shouted as she ran over to Ron with excitement and wrapping her little, tiny arms around her father’s legs.

          “Hey, kiddo,” Ron replied.  “How was your day?”

          “It was awesome.  Uncle Louis took me to the park and we saw this man who was dressed like Charlie Chaplin.”

          “Really?”

          Lainie nodded.  “And he acted like him too…. Just like in those movies that you and mummy let me watch….” Her laughed filled the air and even muffed some of her words as she spoke.  “He blew up a balloon and drew Charlie Chaplin’s face on it…. With the mustache and the hat and bow tie….”

          By this time Louis was standing at the entrance of the door, holding a small, slim hotdog shaped balloon.  He wore a smile on his face and for the first time I actually saw his eyes.  They were a dreamy sea blue color and I could get lost in them for days but I shook off the thought as I reminded myself that he was a jerk and I didn’t need to be caught up in that mess.  “She enjoyed it…. I enjoyed it…. It was almost as if Chaplin himself came back to life just to perform for everyone in the crowd.  I’d go back to see the act again.”  He glanced at me for a brief moment then back toward Ron and Annie.

          “Louis, Sam would probably love to see that…. Why don’t you bring her some time while she’s here?” Annie asked.

          I dropped my mouth and stared at my dear sister in disbelief.  She wasn’t giving up and I couldn’t believe that she would even suggest such a thing.

Louis seemed to be as dumbfounded as I was at the thought as his beautiful blue eyes moved to my sister.  “I don’t think that would be such a good idea,” he responded with a tone of shock and confusion.  He looked at me with his eyes which wore the colors of a jerk but revealed some kind of pain which I couldn’t figure out what it was.  “I don’t want to waste time with an American girl.”

His words were cold and hurtful.  I couldn’t believe how rude one guy could truly be.  I had only met the guy that day and I hated seeing the attractive, bone structure of his cheeks and his eyes which made me melt every time that I looked into them.  He was making me hate him so easily but the fact that he was a very attractive man tangled my thoughts as if I were lost in a maze of vines and branches.  How could he have been so handsome but so ugly at the same time?  I sighed knowing that it was true when people said that looks could be deceiving.

“Louis,” Ron replied, “that was rude of you.”

Louis turned his attention to Ron and sighed.  “I’m sorry.”

Ron shook his head slightly.  “Don’t apologize to me.”

Louis made a face as he turned his gaze back toward me.  “Sorry,” he said, kind of rudely but it was better than nothing.

I eyed him up and down.  Anger had entered my mind and I could feel my cheeks burning with the hatred I was feeling toward the man.  “Fine.  I’ll accept but that was very uncalled for you, freaking jerk.”

“Hey, Sam, Elaina is right here,” Annie replied, gesturing toward my little niece whose wide eyes just stared at me with shock and she looked like she wanted to cry.

          “I’m sorry, Lainie,” I told the child as I looked down at her.  Thanks to Louis, I wasn’t making a good first impression with my niece who wouldn’t remember anything about me from the first time I had held her in my arms.

          “Lainie, why don’t you go ahead and wash up for dinner?” Annie asked, kneeling down beside the child.

          Lainie nodded.  “Okay, mummy.”  She left the room, leaving the four of us adults alone in the big room.

          “That was uncalled for from the both of you,” Ron replied.  “In front of the child?  Come on at least go outside or something.”

          Louis and I both looked away from Ron and Annie, keeping our eyes from meeting one another’s as well.  Neither of us knew how to respond.  We knew our behavior had to change or at least we couldn’t be in the same room as one another.  I had wished that I had knew what Louis’s problem was anyways, seeing that he had started the battle first.

“Sorry, guys,” I finally spoke, keeping my eyes on the red rugged carpet.

“Sorry,” Louis replied afterwards.

A maid with blonde hair which was placed in a bun walked into the room.  She wore a black dress with a white apron around her waist which indicated that she was a maid.  Her dress was about to her knees and kind of puffed outward at the bottom.  She looked around the room and could tell that something horrible had taken place.  “Dinner’s ready,” she spoke awkwardly and slowly made her way out of the room afraid of a fight breaking out or something.

Ron sighed.  “Please, you two, let’s get through this meal and if either of you have anything rude or snotty to say to each other then go outside.  I don’t want Elaine to have to hear you two argue.  Got it?”

Louis and I nodded in agreement.

 

          Dinner was silent and awkward.  I sat at the long table made for a palace with matching chairs which had lion paws for the feet of the chairs.  There were three chandeliers which hung over the table.  The each looked like the one in the family room but the two closer to the ends were smaller while the one in the middle was wider and seemed to take up more room than the others.  In the middle of the table was a glass vase which was filled with fake roses from red to pink to white.  Even though the flowers where fake they still seem so beautiful and I wasn’t surprised that the flowers were even there, knowing that Annie loved flowers and other plants and I was sure that there was probably a greenhouse somewhere in the mansion which Annie was going to wind up showing me anyways.

          Louis sat on the other side of the table, keeping his eyes down so he didn’t have to look at me.  I felt kind of offended like I was an outcast or something by the way he treated me.

          Ron and Annie each sat at the ends of the table, looking at each other with eyes of love and tenderness just like they had when they first met.  I had wished so badly that I would find that man…. The one who was going to treat me like a princess from the moment we met, not so much that he would buy me nice things but just treat me with respect and show me kindness and love.  I was bit of a romantic but the guys I’ve come face to face with were nothing but jerks and idiots.

          Lainie had sat next to me.  I was surprised because I had figured that she would want to sit next to Louis or close to one of her parents because she knew them better than me.  As we waited for the food to come in she looked up at me and just stared with inquisitive eyes.  “What’s it like in America?” she asked with curiosity in her little voice.

          “Well, it’s…. It’s nothing like this….”

          “I’ll bet,” I heard Louis mutter under his breath.

          I shot him a dirty look but I remembered the agreement with Ron and shrugged him off.  I looked down at Lainie and smiled.  “It depends on who you ask…. For me it’s busy…. I work and then I get home take my dog for his afternoon walk…. Then I---”

          “You have a dog?” Lainie asked with amazement.

          I felt my smile grow.  “Yea…. He’s a big dog too.”

          “What kind is he?”

          “He’s a German Shepherd….”

          “You got him from Germany?”

          I couldn’t help but laugh at the child’s question.  “No…. He’s from America…. His breed of dog is…. It’s kind of hard to explain…. But if you ever would to come to America, I’ll let you meet him….”

          “What’s his name?”

          “His name is Bruno.”

          “Wow.”

          The maid who had let us know that dinner was ready walked in followed by Heather.  Both of them were pushing silver carts with food.  The younger maid had walked past Ron and placed a plate of food in front of me and another plate of food in front of Lainie and then walked over to Annie and placed another plate of food down in front of her while Heather placed food in front of Ron and then placed another plate