Standing Before Monsters (Vorans and Vampires) (39 page)

Nick wasn’t positive what he would do if they didn’t cooperate. Dealing with human parents of a newly deceased and returned daughter was likely to be uncomfortable to say the least. It was probably another reason why the coven didn’t take people who weren’t willing to join them. By now most of their families were gone, of course, save for descendants; so it was no longer a worry. He wondered how many had ended things with family while human before being turned. The voran had never been as deep inside the circle of vampires as he was now. Such things dealt with in the past, Nick had mostly ignored but having Sami as his responsibility was new for him and could no longer be disregarded.

Joining the ladies shortly afterward, Nick looked at the time and could tell that Charlotte was beginning to tire. Her cycle followed daylight, the other girls the night. After a little time enjoying the club, the four returned in his car. The werewolf went to bed immediately almost as soon as they returned, while Nicola and Sami entertained themselves watching TV and talking to each other.

Nick ignored the girls as they continued to bond as he searched the database for missing persons. It didn’t take much to find out that her parents and police were looking for the girl. A book bag had been discovered where she had dropped it, so foul play was assumed.

Moving to sit cross legged on the couch beside him, Sami leaned her head to look at the write up. Her bare leg rested on his. He thought she looked ready for bed, though the sun was still a few hours away. Wearing her underwear bottoms and a tank style top with spaghetti strings looped over her shoulders for support, the girl had certainly become comfortable already. With Nicola dressed similarly, he guessed Sami’s new role model wasn’t exactly helping the situation for him either.

The other vampire sat on the other side of him looking at the screen as well, while Sami commented, “Now why did they use those pictures?”

One was most likely her school picture from a couple years ago. Metal braces on an uninhibited grin were obviously out of date.

“I’m fifteen and they act like I am ten or maybe twelve on a good day,” complained the little blonde as she brushed her bangs away from her forehead looking unhappy.

“Does that mean we shouldn’t even bother bringing our plan to your parents?” he asked both worried and vaguely wishing that they didn’t have to try.

Shaking her head, Sami replied, “No, I actually think that if we reason with them and show them what I am now, they will understand and let me go with you.”

Nicola added, “With movies that show vampires as killing machines, I doubt that they will want you living under their roof anyway.”

She hadn’t meant the words to be hurtful but Sami let out a little groan that conveyed her wish that Nicola hadn’t said that.

Nick spontaneously reached up to mess the girl’s hair and reminded her, “Nicola’s right that movies make vampires out as monsters, but not every one is the same, just like people. We’re glad to have you around anyway.”

Still in the database, Nick flicked to other reported cases of missing people around the same time. Sami had rested her head against his shoulder and suddenly sat up straight pointing at the screen. “He was in the basement. I saw him when I was brought inside.”

Another missing person found, Nick thought sadly. As they went through the rest, the girl identified three more from the list. Since not everyone was reported right away and Sami hadn’t seen very many faces well enough to identify, especially once she was in the dark basement; it was likely that a few more of the bodies would eliminate more of the list.

Once daylight had come, Nick would need to figure out how to reveal the lost and dead. No single serial killer could be linked to the deaths. Also grouped in one spot, it would be hard to disguise much of the truth. He wanted those families to be able to grieve and not just be afraid for their loved ones, but sometimes the dead remained lost because it was likely to be too
incendiary to find them again.

He was going to need to return to the site and see if he could figure something out. Calling one or more of his police contacts was going to be necessary as well.

Nicola could tell what he was thinking and asked, “Where does that sewer room tie into the tunnels beneath the city?”

Comprehending what she meant, Nick did a quick search and found a grid of the sewer system under Chicago.

The vampire added, “If a big storm comes along, how many of those bodies would simply float away? Once a body bloats, would they move with the sewers towards a treatment plant or something?”

Sami made a disgusted face as she said, “They might think any torn flesh was rats or something.”

“Most of the sewer water goes through one of a couple massive treatment plants. Only when the system can’t handle all the water would anything escape into the lake, in theory at least,” Nick stated as he skimmed through a couple articles quickly. “Perhaps simply dumping them into the sewer would serve the same purpose.”

Nicola placed her hand on his arm and reminded him, “I know you want the victims’ families to know what happened to their dead, but letting the police find them in one spot might lead to other problems. You probably know better than me though.”

“I’ll talk to a couple of the detectives in the morning and see what they think.”

Sami left the couch stretching as she went into the kitchen looking for something to drink, which left Nicola with him for a moment. The vampiress smiled and said, “Well, when do we find her parents and try reuniting them?”

“In the evening,” he said. “It’s better to get this over with and find out one way or another how they will handle it.”

Sighing, Nicola nodded before placing her head on his shoulder.

Chapter 22- The Award Goes to...

The day had been filled with calls to his police contacts, so he held back from returning to the derelict furniture store. Discussing a site of interest and possible information on missing persons in as abstract a way as he could, Nick would meet Detective Tucker and Detective Sinclair, who had helped him in returning Lena to her family.

It had been a different type of situation with Lena. At least she could return from the werewolves and still seem human; because Lena was a voran she basically was human. They had also had a scapegoat,
the dead werewolf who had kidnapped her. It deflected more serious inquiries and returned the girl to her life in college in hours, though her kidnapping could still make people ask what had happened to her.

Now he had to cover up not only vampires killing humans, but other vampires killing them and leaving evidence behind. Using the silver sword minimized what had been left, but puncture wounds on dead humans and torn flesh would be harder to hide. The vampire blood would burn off with contact from silver and the temptation to use the kasha’s supply of silver nitrate spray was tempting, but would raise similar questions while the sword or similar pieces of silver would at least leave no extra clue. Unfortunately finding all the blood that way was unlikely to be perfect and police inspecting a site wouldn’t leave much unturned.

Now Nick was driving to the near northwest side with Sami and the girls to talk with her parents. West of North Milwaukee Ave and to the south of the Avondale area, her parents had a home at the edge of a popular Polish community. It was a bit out of the range he would have expected for the store which was a few miles to the south, but with modern transportation and a vampire that might know the area, anything was possible.

The houses were packed side by side with little space between them as they drove down the street to her house, Nick noticed. Sami pointed out her friend’s house that she had been returning from that fateful night and the police tape gave away where they had found her backpack. Only a block and half between houses, the young girl had been intercepted by the predator.

Nick looked at the black, metal fences and occasional low bushes under trees that were spaced intermittently. During the day they would cast some shade, but it was hardly the heavy canopies of some of the suburbs. During the evening, which was when Sami had been grabbed up; the path was in sight of windows lit up but often obscured by blinds and drapes. The residents’ need for privacy left unwary pedestrians easy targets. They didn’t need high shrubs and privacy fences. All they needed was darkness.

Glancing at Sami in the rearview mirror, he wondered if she was emotionally ready for this. She stoically looked out the window at the sidewalk she had walked, a path she had walked hundreds of times before safely. While he knew that the girl had the breakdown with Nicola the previous evening, she had remained strangely strong emotionally. For a fifteen year old, who had gone through so many horrible things, she was holding up remarkably well.

By the time, they parked in front of her parents’ home; however, the girl’s eyes were leaking tears.

They all exited the car looking around for any eyes that might be looking their way, but even after the girl’s kidnapping, the neighborhood still went about its normal business and closed away the outside world. It made their approach to her house uneventful, but as he rung the doorbell, her mother answering the door spotted her daughter’s face and cried out in shock.

“My baby, where have you been? Who are these people that have brought you back home to me?” the woman questioned almost hysterically.

“Can we come in, mama? I’d like to sit down,” Sami asked from within a crushing hug from a woman no taller than her daughter, but heavier and middle aged.

More faces and the sounds of footsteps rushing towards the door meant the rest of Sami’s family had heard her mother’s cry. Nick was hoping to do this inside and was glad when they were finally able to direct Sami’s mother inside with the girl. Unlike the stories of vampire’s needing permission to enter a home, they had merely needed the woman to move out of the way.

Nick had barely closed the door behind them before the girl was lost in a mob of people who looked very similar to Sami. Since she had told them of her family, a father and mother still together with three sons all older than their only girl and the baby of the family; he and the other girls had been
prepared. She had some more family in the area as well, so the extra faces were likely those who had come in support of her parents in this time of distress.

The common question of where she had been among others was thrown around so fast and loudly that Sami couldn’t even answer as she was also buffeted in a wave of hugs from her family. Often involved in being shaken or picked up, Nick thought she looked a toy being fought over by a pack of dogs.

Finally they were able to push past the entry and questions of who the three strangers were began to add to the questions of Sami’s disappearance. As her family allowed the girl to sit, her mother on one side continually hugging her as if to make sure the vision beside her was real, and her youngest brother on the other side; Sami was finally able to settle them with her hands pressing down on the air.

“Ok, everyone let me introduce you to Nick and Charlotte, who found me and saved me. She’s the pretty, dark haired one and Nicola is his girlfriend.” Shaking her head at the potential slight from her words, the girl added, “She’s also very pretty, of course.”

“They saved you?” her father questioned even as her mother started to cry out again. “What did they save you from?”

Sami looked to Nick unsure of what to say, so the voran tried his best to ease them into the truth. “Sami is just one of several people who were kidnapped by a radical faction that were in the area,” he said starting as vague as he good could think of and wished that he had maybe rehearsed for this conversation.

“Terrorists?”

“Kidnapping maybe for the slave trade,” one of her older brothers suggested. “I’ve heard stories of kidnappers taking girls and selling them overseas. They like pretty white girls especially.”

Her mother looked horrified and asked in a raised voice, “Did they... take you against your will... sexually?”

Shaking her head quickly, Sami tried to soothe her mother by saying, “I’m still a virgin, though if I hadn’t been saved in time one of them seemed interested in me that way. They touched me there a couple times, but fought each other without deciding to do more than touch with their fingers.”

The girl turned red and looked at Nick again to save her.

“The kidnappers who took her aren’t your typical type of men. They do it for different reasons and they take men and women. To them it doesn’t matter if you are a cute girl,” he gestured with an open hand to Sami, “or a man. They take them because of their blood.”

Expected confusion came to their faces as did the questions of disbelief. Her elder brother looked at Nick as if he had been revealed to be insane. “Are you trying to say that they are trafficking body parts or do you want us to believe that they are vampires? Maybe they’re just a strange sect of cannibals grabbing people to eat them?”

Giving him a patient smile, Nick let the disbelief cushion the blow. As the family took a moment to refute such ideas, the voran prepared to shift their perceptions gradually. The girl sitting beside her mother was clad in shorts and a sleeveless blouse. Since the women hadn’t taken the girl out for more shopping a white shirt underneath kept her covered the way her mother would expect.