I kept my bat raised, watching the stranger carefully, as my eyes adjusted to the scene before me. I jumped back, dropping the bat to the floor when I realized who the man was.
"A-Adam," I said, gasping in shock. "You-your supposed too be in jail after..." I trailed off, staring at the man who had been like a second father to me, before he had robbed Hannah's Antique Shop.
Adam rose to his feet, his familiar voice as soothing as always. "I didn't do it," he told me. As I looked into his eyes, I swore I saw only the truth. Adam McAlister was a lot of things, but he was no liar.
"What are you doing here?" I asked, wrapping my arms around myself for comfort and warmth. Adam slid off his jacket, slipping it over my shoulders, before turning to my father's old desk.514Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhLI57bdr3H
"I need to find something, to prove my innocence," he told me, opening one of the drawers, and digging around. I should have stopped him, but this was Adam, and if he said he didn't commit the crime, then he didn't do it. The question was, who did?. And what did it have to do with my father?
"There's nothing in there besides his old work papers," I told him as Adam cursed, running his fingers through his hair in frustration.
"No, its in here somewhere."
I then heard a click, and moved to Adam's side, wondering what he had found. I watched a secret apartment appear from the back of the drawer, flipping down to reveal a small silver box. Gently, he pulled the box out, opening it to reveal stacks of photographs. There, laying on top of the stack of photographs was the diamond necklace stolen from Hannah's. With shaky hands, I removed the necklace, setting it on the desk, before lifting the photos up and flipping through them. Many of the faces were unfamiliar, until I say one of a girl I had gone to school with. Sally had been my best friend until 4th grade when she disappeared. The bottom of the box held newspaper clippings. I flipped through them, my hand shaking. They were crime articles: small robberies, missing children, arson. My father had done all this.
'We need to leave now," Adam said, stuffing the items back into the box.
"Oh, but you can't," a voice said from the doorway. I turned in time to see the barrel of my father's pistol pointed at my face. "You see, no one can know I committed these crimes, or that I was the real criminal."
I heard a loud bang, then felt extreme five-like pain explode in my chest as I collapsed. Adam wrapped his arms around me, lowering me to the ground. I screamed in pain as he stared at my father. My vision was going blurry as I saw my father pull back the hammer of the gun.
"Now they will know who killed all those children," he said. "And me, I tried to save my daughter, but he shot her. I had no choice but to kill him." With that, I heard the pistol fire again, somewhere in the distance, saw Adam's body fall, as if he was miles away. My last thought was that I knew who the real criminal was, and Adam and I would take that to the grave
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