As we all returned to the hospital room we found the children missing and a single sheet of paper lay on Arthur's bed with messy writing scrawled on it and drenched in tears.

I had a bad feeling about this as we tried to fight back the steadily increasing fear and reached out for it with shaking, trembling hands.

_______________________________________

If you are reading this then we are long gone by now. I heard you talking with the doctor and found out that you really didn't want us anymore.

I am sorry for being a bother and wasting your precious time. I will go far away so you won't have to see us ever again.

Please just don't look for us anymore.... You won't find us even if you do.

I know that you don't feel the same but I really liked you all and thought you were nice people. No one was ever this kind and nice to me without wanting anything in return.

I will take Jonas and Luna with me. They will be in a safe place where no one will ever hurt them again.

I will be the bestest big brother in the world and since luna doesn't have a family now... I will...
We will all be a family that will care for each other.

I know you just saved us because of your job but there was no need to act so kind to us.

I don't understand why you were so nice and it hurts a lot when I know that you didn't really care but had to act nice to us.

Please... If you hate us... Just say you hate us... That would hurt less than showing love till we realise that we were never really loved.

Goodbye and thank you for everything you have done for us.

Jonas.

P. S. We had already told Amy about everything that happened to us so you don't have to look for us to ask questions.

_______________________________________

And.... No matter how much we looked after that...how much we searched for the children... To explain just how wrong they were....

.....We couldn't find them anymore. They were truly gone. Disappearing in thin air.

They were not there when I had lost everything one day in a living nightmare.

The day I lost both my beloved wife Lavinia and my dearest daughter Amy.

The footprint near the window that I had ignored came back to haunt me...as I realised what it meant.

......My family was being watched all this time by a man seeking revenge for loosing his son, a criminal that was killed by me during a shootout.

If only I knew back then.....

When I came back home that day to my family...the only thing that came to greet me was an unearthly, eerie silence.

As I looked for them....there were no smiles or laughter... Nobody was there to hold me in a tight embrace and greet me... No daughter who ran towards me with toys wanting to play with her tea party set.....

All I found were two corpses together with the older one holding the younger one in a protective embrace with dried up tears on her cold, pale
face and the younger one with eyes wide in horror and fear staring at me unblinking and still.

Lavinia and Amy were gone from this world forever and there was nothing in the world that I could possibly do to save them.

They were my world... And now they were gone.

My world was shattered and all I could see was darkness.

It is only when you lose something precious that you know the true value of it.

I didn't realise it when I answered a phone call and cried and begged to bring them back....

I didn't hear the police sirens nor did I hear my team rush inside with a look of horror on their face as they saw me and the bodies that I held before me.

All I saw was my love, Lavinia and my daughter Amy as I held them both close to my chest and begged them to wake up as I could only sob as a child.

I didn't understand why they were not moving... Why they won't wake up....

This can't be real... It had to be a nightmare...

Something this horrifying can't be a reality... Please... God!... Let me just wake up from this nightmare.

It felt like living in a nightmare... But it was once from which I couldn't wake up.

I didn't hear the condolences and sympathy of others during the funeral.

I was empty... And felt broken as I watched my family return back to the earth.

Even hours after everyone had gone... I just stood there and lost track of all time.

What is the value of time...if there is no one left to spend it on.

My knees felt weak and I collapsed not being able to stand.

I wept like never before, and my tears  wouldn't stop.

I screamed till my throat was sore and words won't come out anymore.

"I am sorry...Please don't leave me... Please come back.... I love you... Always loved you Lavinia.. Amy... Please wake me up.... Please come back... I am sorry." I repeated such words like a mantra begging them to come back from the grave they lied in.

The two graves lay close together just like they were when they were gone.

Lavinia Marcus Caruso
Beloved wife, caring mother and an embodiment of eternal love and kindness.

Amy Caruso
Loved daughter of Marcus and Amy Caruso. An angel who walked amongst us now in heaven.

The words inscribed did not even begin to describe just how much they meant.

I was all alone.

The mourners had already left.

Wait... My team... They were still here behind me.

In my despair, I hadn't even realised they were there.

Never noticed as they held me in comfort as I screamed and yelled.

Didn't realise as they cried with me.

"Thank you...for you know..." I turned back and looked at them in gratitude and began.

"We know."
"It's alright."
"You... No.. We will get through this."
"You always will have us by your side."

They all comforted me with either words or a fierce hug and compassion.

I felt a burning passion and fury ignite inside me. The anger swallowed me as I thought of the person who did that.

I will find him... And kill him.
Give him a death that's far worse.
Stab him again and again.
And again. And again.
And.....

"Marcus. He's already dead."

What?

I hadn't realised that I had spoken my dark thoughts aloud.

They all held me and wept with me.

"Shot himself after he... You know..."

"I.. It's all my fault that they are gone... He wanted me. Why are they gone. They didn't do anything wrong. Why didn't he kill me instead?" I asked weakly.

"Please don't do this man...Guilt will just eat you alive."
"It's okay now.. No... It will be okay. Just don't do this to yourself. Please."
"It's not your fault. It was his. And he is gone."
"Lavinia and Amy... They are watching over you from amongst the stars. They wouldn't want you to do this."

"Really?" I asked weakly looking up at the night sky and seeing two stars shining brighter than others.

"Yes. They must be up there amongst the stars... That's what I like to think." Miranda said softly looking up at the same stars as me.

The stars twinkled as I reached out my hands towards the sky like they were trying to reach out to me too.

"I love you both..." I whispered to the stars.

Getting revenge wouldn't be what they would have wanted... Not that I could since he was dead.

But that didn't mean I would just give up on them.

I will find Arthur... The boy who can understand and speak to ghosts.

I will find him wherever he is.. No matter how long it took and tell Lavinia and Amy how much I love them.

And I did find him... Many years later in a different way than I imagined our reunion to be.

I would later find him several years later....holding a gun to my head as he takes me as a hostage.

The boy I had once known would have grown up but had the same cat like green eyes....but the intensity of the gaze was not that of a broken and innocent child anymore.