Chapter Fifteen

CAMERON

 

“Hello.” Gryphon glanced at Nathen, gave him a dismissive look, and turned his attention to Cameron, who’d jumped when Gryphon sat next to them. Gryphon then inhaled deeply, his eyes trailing from Cameron’s face pointedly to his neck.

Cameron had occasionally felt like a piece of meat in nightclubs and when hanging out with his ex-boyfriend’s group of friends. He had been able to read their thoughts and, to that end, change them so they didn’t think about him in that way. This vampire obviously thought about him in that way, and he made no attempt to hide his desire.

“Hi!” Syn responded, turning sideways in her chair to put some distance between herself and the newcomer. “I’m Syn, that’s PhNyx.” She inclined her head to Nathen, choosing to use his online handle instead of his real name. “And that’s Blink.” She gestured to Cameron, who inwardly groaned. This was an inside joke from a game they played a long time ago. Cameron had been suffering from a case of pink eye that had gone around campus. They were playing a new Nintendo game and Cameron couldn’t think of a good character name, so Syn had snagged the controller and named the character after his affliction. He fixed her a look, but she remained poker-faced.

“He’s a vampire, by the way,” he informed both of them.

“Yeah, from the way you jumped, I gathered. You don’t easily startle,” she responded.

“I hate not being able to sense them,” Cameron admitted grumpily.

Syn was partially amused but emotionally hugged Cameron. “Thank you for coming. We’re expecting one more…person.”

Nathen shrank, staring straight ahead. He hated social situations with new people, especially knowing this was a new vampire. How to act? What to do? He busied himself with wrapping his fingers around his cup, distracting himself with the warmth of the drink within. Cameron blanketed him with feelings of serenity.

Gryphon pursed his lips with obvious judgment, appraising Nathen. “You said you would need protection for a night agent and two day agents. I’m assuming that means the three of you.”

Cameron swallowed hard. “Yeah. Um…uh…can I get you something?” he asked, waggling his own cup.

“No, thank you. I ate before I came,” Gryphon replied with an unamused look.

Cameron chewed nervously on his lower lip. This new vampire was incredibly attractive, and he found himself aroused by him, and then immediately embarrassed by it. He draped his arm around Nathen, both as a signal of protection and to show he was taken. Gryphon made a subtle shrug of unspoken acquiescence.

Suddenly, another man sat at the end of the table as if he had always been there. Syn pushed against the window, startled, as Cameron yelped loudly and stood abruptly, knocking his chair over, sending it clattering behind him. Nathen and Gryphon calmly regarded the newcomer, though Nathen quickly returned to staring at his coffee. Cameron closed his eyes for a moment and turned everyone’s attention away from them, successfully making the group invisible and plucking the scene he had caused out of everyone’s minds before righting his chair and sitting again. He sat sideways, with his back to Nathen, partially to protect him, though he knew it was futile.

“I’m…I’m sorry,” Cameron muttered, his heart racing.

Syn rolled her eyes at Cameron before greeting the newcomer. “Welcome. I’m Syn, that’s PhNyx, and Blink. You two are our hires. We definitely appreciate this. We are going into an unknown situation, and we are very grateful that the two of you can help us.”

Gryphon and Sefu nodded at each other, sizing each other up.

“Been around a little while?” Sefu asked Gryphon. “Certainly not part of this group.”

“I have traveled a lot,” Gryphon acknowledged quietly.

“You smell mostly like the New World,” Sefu observed.

“It’s true that’s where I started,” Gryphon replied without defensiveness.

“Okay. Well, Syn, what are we doing?” Sefu asked.

Syn responded, “What do we call the two of you?”

The two answered in unison.

“I am Sefu,” the man with the scar replied with a welcome smile.

“I’m Gryphon,” the long-haired man humorlessly introduced himself.

Nathen wrapped his arms around Cameron’s waist, pulling him against his side. This was not Nathen’s usual social anxiety, but a combination of a myriad of feelings about the two predators whose power he could sense being in proximity to them. Cameron lightly rested his arms on Nathen’s and cupped his hands around his. The blood that Nathen had given him coursed through him making him feel reckless though he held it in check. “It’s okay, gorgeous. These guys are here to help. We’re paying them, after all.”

“Our friend Kat has been taken. We think she’s alive, hope she’s alive. But she might not be. If she’s not, we need to find proof of her murder, and if she is, we need to rescue her. This is what’s happened…” Syn paused and regarded each one, Gryphon and Sefu in turn, before spitting out fearlessly, “I’m assuming you’re both vampires, right?”

“That’s a fair assumption.” Sefu chuckled good-naturedly.

“Cool. Honestly, a month ago we didn’t even know vampires existed. Then our friend PhNyx here shows up and tells us otherwise, and we’ve learned all kinds of stuff has been going on. Do you both know of the ransomware attack at the hospital?” she asked.

“Yes,” Gryphon said, his eyes narrowing curiously.

“Not really, only what I’ve seen on the news,” Sefu admitted.

“We started investigating that,” Syn continued, “on our own because it’s wrong. But in so doing we may have gotten ourselves in trouble. Kat and another friend of ours went into the hospital to investigate, and night before last, they were attacked at this coffee shop early in the morning. They took Kat and our friend got away. He pulled down some footage.”

Sefu’s attention shifted around the shop with a frown marring his disfigured features. “It’s interesting that no one seems to be paying attention to this unique conversation. Indeed, they are giving us a wide berth.”

Syn chuckled without going into detail, acknowledging, “Yeah.” And then she went on, placing an iPad in front of both Sefu and Gryphon and began the videos, stopping with a closeup of Mathis. “This guy is a vampire. He works for a company that turned him into a vampire.”

“A company?” Sefu asked dubiously.

“A company,” Syn acknowledged. “A company now known for making vampires. They take people—”

“Wait,” Sefu interrupted. “Like this one?” he thumbed toward Nathen. “Because that barely counts.”

Syn glanced at Nathen, asking Cameron and Nathen through their open channel, “Is it okay to tell them?”

“I’m not supposed to talk about it. So if Impetus is listening, they might kill us,” Nathen related.

“Good to know,” she said mentally, and then to Sefu and Gryphon, she replied, “Maybe. Hold on guys.” She dug in her pack and pulled out a scanner, running it over both Sefu and Gryphon to check for bugs. Satisfied that neither of them were recording, she went on. “In any case, what we know is that there was a van, and they dragged her to it. If they had wanted to simply kill her, they would have left her body.”

“Not always true.” Sefu explained, “Maybe they wanted to dispose of the body someplace more convenient.”

A pang of unease engulfed Cameron from talking about Kat like that, and he chewed on his lip and took comfort from Nathen’s embrace.

“Maybe,” Syn sighed. “But she has abilities. And I assume you two can smell Blink here? She’ll smell like him. So don’t bite her. Or him!” She wagged a finger pointedly between Sefu and Gryphon. “Anyway, this guy is a mechanic and owns this house.” She slid her finger across the screens to show the men Mathis’s home, floor plan, and finally, neighborhood. “We tracked them via a number of means and saw them move her into the house. We haven’t seen her leave or them carry a bundle out the front. But we don’t have access to views of the backyard. She might still be in the house or might not be. What we do know is these last couple of nights there’s been a lot of activity of people coming and going, which is not the same as in prior weeks. Shortly after they arrived, this guy pulled up.”

She swiped on the iPads to bring up the driver’s license and pictures of the car. “This is Dr. Charles Manchester, chief surgeon at San Francisco Hospital. He owns a blood bank that, coincidentally, supplies blood to the company the abductor, Mathis Davidson, works at. Then there are these others. Two women—each came to the house at night with men who drove them—and one man who came with another man and woman in his Range Rover. None of them seem to be related to the others, but we think it’s strange they only come at night, so they might all be like you. There’s one man who came and went from the house during the day on his motorcycle and an older woman who came and went during the day using the pickup. None of these other people work for either Impetus or Paradigm as far as I can tell. This woman owns a bookstore and her boyfriend owns a dojo in Berkeley. Pretty boy here is an out-of-work actor who is active on social media and, by all accounts, looks like a loser. He’s dating the student here who also seems like a huge loser as she’s a self-proclaimed “mystic” on all of her social media profiles. The big guy is another mechanic, so maybe that’s how he knows Mathis? I couldn’t find anything on either the girl or guy who arrived with him.”

“Who owns the house?” Sefu asked.

“Mathis Davidson’s mother, Carla Starly, who died over a decade ago, though the house has remained in her name with all the bills still in her name, being paid for out of Mathis’s account. It seems to have been a family home, in Carla’s family for generations. Any of these people could be there tonight. How any of them are involved, I have no idea. They don’t seem to have very much in common with each other aside from the obvious couples and people arriving together. Interestingly, I have watched security cameras from around the area that show there are dogs living there. There are two that come and go with the “mystic” and her boyfriend, but I have seen three running around in the front yard from time to time.”

“The question is, are they enchanted dogs? Or can they be taken out before we get there?” Gryphon asked.

“Oh? You think the occultist has control over the dogs in some way? Like she’s for real?” Sefu asked.

“Maybe. I’ve seen stranger. Or maybe they’re shapeshifters hanging out with these guys for some reason,” Gryphon suggested.

Sefu raised an eyebrow. “In all of my years, I’ve never heard of shapeshifters cooperating with vampires, but then again—” He eyeballed Cameron and Nathen. “—I’ve also never seen what is obviously something strange going on between these two either.”

“Yeah,” Gryphon snorted, a look of disdain for Cameron and Nathen. “Or maybe they’re dogs that have had vampire blood and are now protectors,” Gryphon opined.

Cameron perked up. “Wait? We were told that giving humans vampire blood kills them. Wouldn’t it do the same with animals?”

Gryphon acknowledged, “It does kill dogs pretty fast, but a year of enhanced dog protector is a nice trade-off.”

Sefu’s attention shifted from Gryphon to Cameron. “In general, one who does not know how things work should probably not be accepting blood without knowing its properties.”

Cameron agreed, and then the realization that Sefu had to know that he had drunk Nathen’s blood sank in. Turning a brilliant shade of red, he asked, “How does he know?” to Nathen who projected a mental question mark.

Sefu pulled out a ring, necklace, and a pin, each with a small ruby in them, and dropped them on the table. “Okay, so each of you needs to wear one of these for the duration of our time together. In case you decide to do something particularly foolish, it will help me to determine who took you and where you went, so I can track you.”

Syn took the necklace, pulling it over her head. “Okay, and these are for you two.” She pulled out two disposable phones and slid them across the table to Gryphon and Sefu. “They’re set to ring to our phones if you find her. This”—she returned to the iPads—“is Kat, who we’re trying to go in and rescue.”

Cameron took the pin, handing the ring to Nathen, which he slipped on.

Syn swiped to the floorplans. “There’s a lot of stuff we’ve figured out that is beyond this mission. A lot of bad shit going down in the world. I’m curious how much you two might know about fae?”

Gryphon held out a splayed hand and Sefu stated, “Enough to know that you probably shouldn’t mess with them.”

Cameron snorted, “Yeah.” His gaze drifted from Syn over his shoulder to Nathen.

“You don’t do this often, do you?” Sefu observed.

“What do you mean?” Cameron asked.

“There’s six people within hearing range of us. You are clearly either the best or worst actors in terms of expressing yourselves, and so far I haven’t really heard much about whether we want to incapacitate, kill, or capture any of these people.”

“I don’t care if you kill them. You can kill them all,” Syn growled vehemently. “We just want to get Kat back.”

Cameron groaned. “Listen, I don’t care. These guys took my friend. We know Mathis took her. I don’t care if he dies or not.”

Sefu cocked his head to the side, his intelligent gaze sizing Cameron up.

“Are you prepared to take the collateral damage when you get your friend back and the corporation comes after you?” Gryphon asked. “They obviously took her for a reason.”

“I don’t know why he took her. I assume it’s for her blood,” Cameron said softly. “But…we have it on good faith that the corporation didn’t sanction it. So take them all out. If it’s no extra charge and you guys don’t care.”

“That was probably a given anyway,” Sefu explained. “His actual question, posed a different way, is these people seem to have resources that extend beyond what is in this house. How do you know that the corporation won’t come after you?”

Syn spoke up, “We’ll be fine.”

“To be clear, my rate is for a grand total of ten days,” Sefu stated. “And no more than two tasks. If you want me to be here for longer than that or do more than that, you’ll have to reach out to me.”

Syn gave a curt nod and continued. “So this is the floorplan that PhNyx pulled up. Mathis’s family has owned this house for the last eighty years, and he’s lived here his whole life. As far as I can tell, he’s never been married.”

The group studied the pictures of the house from all the angles Syn pulled up, and the older floorplan that Nathen had found.

Syn went on, “I get the sense that Mathis isn’t all that bright. Because while they had a van that they abducted her in, interestingly enough, the van was a rental that we tracked to the Japantown parking garage.”

She showed the video from the coffee shop that depicted the abduction where the windows burst in by two men wearing masks, their guns blazing. Theo and Kat were sitting together; Theo tapped on his watch, and Kat sat staring at the men. One man fell over before a blur shifted everyone’s focus. Kat disappeared while another man continued shooting and pulled the man who had fallen back into the late model van. At that point electricity poured into the man with the gun, and he dropped as the van took off. The whole thing took place in less than thirty seconds. “They have a rental agency on the upper level, and the van that was taken is from here. We found the security footage in the garage itself that showed the rental van as it pulled up next to Mathis’s Infinity. Mathis got out, went to the back of the van and unloaded a bundle that looked suspiciously like a wrapped-up body. He then put it into the trunk of his car. Then the van was left in the rental agency slot. I don’t know who the two guys with Mathis were, but the one who didn’t die walked away from the garage on foot.” She switched to show the garage action.

“Hey Syn, let them know that there are likely cameras all over the house that Impetus has set up. Like they did at my house?” Nathen added.

Syn relayed, “We should let you know that there are likely cameras in the house that I haven’t been able to tap into yet. So when we get there, PhNyx is going to try to remotely access them to see what’s going on before you guys go in. I think you’d want to do some recon before we go in anyway.”

“Sure. We should terminate power before we go in,” Gryphon said.

“That’s easy enough. I can do that from here if you want. And PhNyx can turn off their Wi-Fi and phones if you want,” Syn explained.

“Are you anticipating they will be shooting guns?” Sefu asked.

“Probably,” Syn shrugged.

“The question is should we go in silent?” Gryphon clarified.

“Well, this is a family neighborhood. So yes, as silently as possible since we don’t want to alert too many people,” Cameron’s voice had dropped to a whisper due to his increased anxiety.

Syn glanced around the coffee shop on alert. “Is there anything else you need, or any other information that you’d like us to look up?”

“So,” Gryphon opened, “to break it down, there could be up to ten hostiles with most of them being dark agents with at least 50 percent of them armed.”

The discussion of hostiles and weapons and the entire situation was getting to Cameron. His leg bounced and the geared-up feeling radiating from his core threatened to overwhelm him. He impulsively leaned over his shoulder and kissed Nathen, rolling his tongue over Nathen’s and inwardly sighing as it calmed him.

Gryphon watched the exchange without amusement. “And if you two can’t separate, I don’t see how we can take you in with us.”

“Huh?” Cameron asked, bewildered.

“I assumed they were sitting outside anyway,” Sefu said to Gryphon.

“Well, I hope so. Because if we take them in, they’re just going to be meat puppets,” Gryphon grumped.

“If there are possible unknowns, like Dr. Manchester and the older woman, who is the housekeeper, or any other individuals who are not threats, do you want us to neutralize nonthreats as well?” Sefu asked.

“No,” Syn explained reluctantly. “If they’re humans, we can take care of them. They will be nonthreats.”

“Even humans with swords and guns?” Gryphon retorted moodily.

“If there’s a little old lady hiding in the closet, and she’s not a threat, you can ignore her,” Syn stared at the man pointedly, spelling it out for him.

“That’s assuming they won’t come after us from behind,” Gryphon growled.

“If they attack you, feel free to kill them,” Syn replied, as she stared down the vampire. “But we don’t even know if all these people know that Kat is there. If she is still there.”

Gryphon snorted, “Oh, I am sure they’re all in on it.”

“Maybe,” Syn sighed.

“It hardly matters. We will defend ourselves if we have to,” Sefu said.

“So the question is, do we go in with guns or blades?” Gryphon asked Sefu.

“Both?” Syn said. “But start quiet. And if you all find Kat and tell us where she’s at, we’ll go in and get her out.”

“I suspect that will be best saved until we have neutralized all threats,” Gryphon explained.

“Okay, well, anything else?” Syn asked.

“Seems fairly standard,” Sefu said.

Gryphon nodded agreement.

Syn pulled out her phone and tapped. “Oh, good.” She gathered up the iPads and tablet. “Well, the Uber should be here in about a minute.” She stood, followed by Cameron and Nathen.

“Uber? You’re taking a traceable car service to a place you’re going to commit a crime?” Sefu asked, his eyes wide with disbelief.

Syn was about to explain as they filed out of the store when Gryphon declared, “I’ll be following in my own vehicle.”

When the rented SUV pulled up, Cameron and Nathen got in the rear seat, surprised to find the driver unconscious and laying between the seats and Sefu sitting behind the wheel.

“Umm, I could have taken care of that for us,” Cameron offered quietly, shooting Sefu a look.

Syn climbed into the passenger seat and groused at the man lying between the seats. She pulled out her GPS and gave Sefu directions, and they waited until a sleek Mercedes pulled in behind them and flashed his lights before they made their way to within a few blocks of Mathis’s house. Once there, Sefu parked, and the Mercedes coasted to the next block.

Sefu, Syn, Cameron, and Nathen got out of the SUV and Cameron asked, “Do we want to leave this guy here or is he free to go?”

“Have him go,” Syn instructed. “We’ll head out on foot.”

“Can one of you do something to his memory?” Sefu asked, looking pointedly at Cameron, who blushed, unable to make eye contact.

“Yeah,” he muttered, pulling the driver into his seat and locking the seat belt around him. He implanted the memory of a call that was cancelled. Cameron systematically made the neighbors fall asleep, assuring that none were watching the group on the street.

Syn tapped on her computer. “Gimme a second.”

Sefu sniffed the wind and turned toward where Gryphon had parked. He pointed out, “We need to do something about these lights. Otherwise they can find us by the security cameras.”

“Got it,” Syn said. “All of the cameras in the area are off.”

After walking up to the house across the street from Mathis’s, the group found partial cover by ducking behind the neighbor’s low-walled fence. Nathen focused on the house for a minute, before he shifted to staring at his phone. Cameron recognized when Nathen entered the internet, something he was impressed that Nathen was more and more adept at doing.

“Just like in my house, there are company cameras in there. I’ve put all of the cameras on a feedback loop. There are nine people inside with four on the first floor and five on the second. Upstairs, three are having sex and two are sleeping. There are also four dogs downstairs.”

Cameron started at the images floating through Nathen’s mind. Sefu blurred away, and he lost track of him. However, he did see the aftermath as car after car from the people they had researched sank down, tires having obviously been tampered with.

Seconds later, Sefu returned to the group, so Cameron explained, “There are cameras that show nine people inside the house, four on the first floor, five on the second, and four dogs downstairs. Three people upstairs are in that front left room, umm, busy with each other. We’re working on getting the cameras turned off.”

“Do you see your friend?” Sefu asked.

Cameron regarded Nathen who was deep in concentration. “No. She’s not visible.”

“How many are armed?” Sefu asked.

Cameron translated as Nathen fed him information. “There seem to be guns laying all around, but no one is holding a gun. The people downstairs are watching a ball game. No one looks like they are worried about anything. Oh shit!” Cameron dropped to the ground, pulling Nathen down on top of him. Nathen fell over stiffly into Cameron’s lap, but didn’t lose concentration with his phone. Syn dropped too. Gryphon and Sefu remained standing, ignoring the other three.

Cameron peered over the wall to see a man step out onto the porch of Mathis’s home and light up a cigarette.

“Do you want upstairs or downstairs,” Sefu asked Gryphon.

“Dealer’s choice,” Gryphon smirked, his eyes alight with the possibility of imminent carnage.

“How’s this? I’ll go upstairs and deal with the five up there and start making noise to draw some of the others up the stairs. You come in from behind and get the ones left on the first floor, and we can close them in on the staircase.” Sefu suggested.

“You three stay here,” Gryphon instructed.

“Blink, how many humans in there?” Sefu asked.

Cameron concentrated on the house, trying to ignore how observant Sefu had swiftly worked out his abilities.

“Yeah, that guy smoking is human,” he whispered up at Sefu and Gryphon, who didn’t seem to care about stealth or a desire to crouch down. “And two others on the first floor are human and two of the people sleeping upstairs, one each in the front right and back left bedrooms. The rest are likely vampires.”

“Any chance that guy has a sudden desire to maybe leave right now?” Sefu asked.

Cameron shrank from the intense stare from the hauntingly handsome vampire whose scar shone under the fluorescent streetlight. “Sure.” Cameron reached out to the man and gently plucked memories from him, caressing him to a different life’s plan. He was thrilled to realize the ease at which he was able to do it. The man smoking snuffed out the cigarette with disgust, walked over to the motorcycle, started it up, and drove away. “Do you want the other two downstairs to leave now too?”

“No, that will draw suspicion,” Sefu said.

Gryphon asked, “The two sleeping—can you keep them asleep? Push them even further down?”

“Yes,” Cameron said shyly, holding Nathen in his arms, unable to maintain eye contact with either Sefu or Gryphon. Syn and Nathen were the only two people in the world to ever know about or see him use his abilities before this night, and his emotions were still raw due to Nathen’s blood. With intent, he mentally stroked the sleeping minds, assuring they would not awaken.

“So that’s only three upstairs and three downstairs,” Gryphon said. “And the dogs.”

“Actually, the dogs might be a good distraction. Once they sense me, they’ll come upstairs,” Sefu opined.

“You ready to move?” Gryphon asked.

“Call if you find her and when you want us to come in,” Syn suggested.

The mercenaries disappeared, and Cameron sighed in relief.