by Tami Dane
If not, we were hoping Gabe, Fischer, and the chief were getting somewhere.
When we stepped into the PBAU, the chief waved us over.
“Status meeting in five,” she told us.
We dumped our stuff on our desks, grabbed pens, paper, and our notes on the case, and headed into the conference room.
“I know all of you are horrified by the tragedy of this case,” the chief began as she took her position at the front of the room. “And I hate to add pressure, but I need to tell you that it’s getting increasingly difficult to keep a lid on this one. The media is all over it. Because it involves pregnant women and infants, they aren’t backing off. If anything, they’re getting more aggressive. Fischer’s doing his best to feed information to the right people, and to keep what needs to be kept quiet from leaking out. However, if we don’t get some movement on this case soon, one of them is going to bust through, and then it’ll be panic. I’m sure you all can imagine where that’ll lead.”
I had a vivid imagination. All sorts of possibilities played through my mind.
The chief continued, “We need this case wrapped up yesterday. But we have a problem.” She paused; and once again, all sorts of possibilities played through my mind. Surely, the FBI wouldn’t shut us down already? While we were in the middle of such a horrific case? “It’s something of a good problem. We have a second case, this one in California. I need to split up the team.” She looked at me. “Skye and Thomas will stay here and keep working the Baltimore Vampire. Fischer is needed here, to keep the media out of the way. And Hough’s out on medical for a few days. That means I’ll be going to Los Angeles with Wagner.” She stood. “Wagner, wheels up in a half hour. Fischer, Skye, and Thomas, I’m counting on you to handle things here.”
I hoped we wouldn’t let her down.
“We’ll do our best,” Fischer promised.
“That’s all I can ask.” She looked at me one last time. “Skye, do you need anything from me before I head out?”
“No, Chief, I don’t think so.”
“Very good.” She gave a little nod and left.
Wagner glanced my way and grinned. A couple of weeks ago, he would’ve made a smart-ass comment about my new, rotund physique. Not today. He just said, “Good luck, Skye,” and left.
I turned to JT. “What’s wrong with Hough?”
“Nothing serious. She just needed some rest.”
Sitting on the opposite side of the room, Fischer moved closer. “We’ve got one hell of a job to do.”
“That we do,” I agreed.
“When the chief was talking about the press, she wasn’t exaggerating. We’re days from a huge media shit storm. We need to get a profile to the Baltimore PD before that, or we’ll lose her.”
“We’re trying,” JT said. “We’re just hitting a lot of brick walls.”
“Let’s talk through what we have,” Fischer suggested. “Maybe we’re closer to the answer than we realize.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice,” I said, flipping open my notes.
“First, I think we can all agree, this killer is showing no signs of any thrill-seeking or power-and-control behaviors in her killing,” JT began.
I added, “She’s a female. Killing for personal gain. Possibly material too, depending upon what she’s doing with the infants. The babies could also be taken as trophies. She’s organized. She’s selecting her victims with some care, determining whom she’ll choose by some criteria we haven’t completely figured out yet. And she’s leaving the crime scene with very little evidence. That means she’s intelligent.”
“Her MO,” JT said, “is to hunt at night, taking advantage of an open window or chimney to gain access to the victim. She is adopting the form of some kind of flying creature—we think it’s a bird—and uses a long, flexible proboscis to drain the victim’s blood and somehow extract the child from the deceased mother. We’ve recently noticed a pattern that could be helpful, but we haven’t verified whether it applies to all of her victims yet.”
“I think you should take your preliminary profile to the Baltimore PD,” Fischer suggested.
I wasn’t sold on that idea. “But we haven’t identified the species of the unsub yet, which makes it difficult to know how to stop her.”
“It’s enough to be helpful, especially if you can verify that pattern you discovered,” Fischer said.
“I’ll get on that today.” JT scratched some notes down; then he pointed at me with the end of his pen. “Meanwhile, Skye, I think you should dig deeper in your father’s research and come up with a list of possible matches.”
“Okay.”
Fischer grabbed his cell and started dialing. “I’m calling McGrane and setting up a meeting tomorrow. We’ll present what we have then. That gives you roughly twenty-four hours to finalize what you can.”
Knowing what we had to do, we split up. On the way back to the rental house, I called my mother. She answered on the first ring.
“Sloan, I’m ready. What do you want me to make?”
I sketched out what I needed; then I thanked her and hung up.
Determined to find the answer to the fifty-thousand-dollar question, I headed into my home away from home.
This Malaysian vampire was going down.
Several hours later, I’d sorted through roughly three-quarters of the files I’d brought over from my apartment. I’d found some interesting stuff about the Brazilian lobishomen, the South African impundulu, and the Yara-ma-yha-who from the “Land Down Under,” but nothing about Malaysian vamps. I was beginning to question whether he’d researched them.
Stiff and slightly headachy, I checked the time. It was almost eight. I hadn’t heard a peep from JT since I’d left the unit, and I was starving. Just as I was about to call JT to see how much later he would be, my phone rang. It was my father.
“Sloan, I just received a call from Dale Nessinger, the television producer. She said you hadn’t canceled tonight’s meeting. Did you change your mind?”
“Oh, shit!” I glanced at the clock on my phone’s display. “I can be there in an hour, if she cares to wait. Please, please tell her I’m sorry. We’ve been working this case—”
“Not a problem. I’ll let her know.”
“Thanks, Dad. I owe you one.”
“I say we’re even, after everything you did for your mother and me.”
“Fair enough. Gotta go. Bye.”
“Um, Sloan?”
“Yeah?”
“I ... love you.”
The words sat on my tongue, but I just couldn’t spit them out. “I ...”
“Don’t say it until you mean it. Bye, Sloan. Good luck tonight.”
I ended the call, feeling a little guilty, a little confused, and very pressed for time.
We can be knowledgeable with other men’s knowledge, but we cannot be wise with other men’s wisdom.
—Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
21
Dale Nessinger was nothing like I’d imagined. Because she was a television producer, I’d expected her to be tall, movie-starlet beautiful, and bedecked in the latest fashions from New York, Los Angeles, or Paris.
In reality, she was as Jane Average as me. This immediately put me at ease.
“Thank you for meeting with me.” I shook her hand.
“I’m very sorry I was late.”
“My pleasure. It’s not a problem.” She glanced around. “Where’s our prince?”
“He should be joining us at any moment.” I glanced at the window. “The sun must be completely set.”
“Ah, of course.” She followed my gaze. “I guess we can start without him.”
“Sure. I can get him caught up when he arrives.”
Nessinger flung one leg over the other. “Your idea for a television series intrigued us.”
“I’m very glad to hear that, but I have a question.”
“Of course.”
“Do you work for a network? Or do you produce the program and then
shop it around? See if you can get a taker? My father didn’t specify.”
“I work for WIMM. It’s a network that airs and produces programming for paranormal, fantastical, folklore, and supernatural creatures.”
“No kidding? I had no idea there was a network for supernatural creatures.”
“Absolutely. We’re the only one. WIMM is a subscription-only network, available through cable and satellite providers. And we only accept paranormal and supernatural subscribers.”
“Interesting. How would you know if your customer is either?”
Dale Nessinger opened a drawer, pulled out a color brochure, and handed it to me. “We work a little differently than most subscription channels do. Take HBO, for example. A mortal customer who wishes to subscribe to the network simply contacts his cable provider, letting them know he would like to add the channel to his lineup, and the cable company adds it, then handles billing. To subscribe to our channel, the customer must enroll with us and then we contact his cable or satellite provider and have the channel added to his service.”
“I see. So you’re able to pick and choose who subscribes.” I flipped through the brochure, skimming its contents.
“Exactly.”
“Is it fair to ask how many subscribers you currently have?”
“We currently have twenty million subscribers.”
My heart did a little hop in my chest. I hadn’t realized there were that many supernatural beings out there, walking the streets, living the lives of the average mortal Joe and Jane. Suddenly the likelihood of finding Elmer a wife didn’t seem so remote. “That many? Twenty million?”
“That’s just in the United States. We’re in negotiations with several cable and satellite providers in Europe, Asia, and South America, which could potentially increase our subscriptions to over a hundred million.”
Taking a look at the programming, I noted a distinct lack of reality-type shows. “You think your viewers would have an interest in a reality dating program?”
“They’ll eat it up, pun intended.” She winked.
I forced a chuckle and closed the brochure. “So what’s the next step?”
“Our legal department has already drafted a contract.”
“Oh.” This bothered me for some reason. Call me a skeptic, but when anyone is that eager to shove a contract under my nose, I get a case of the what-the-hells.
She withdrew a folder from her desk drawer, opened it, and handed a bundle of pages to me.
I accepted it with a thank-you.
“What’s this? Did you ladies start without me?” Elmer, the soon-to-be star of a reality television show, said behind me.
Dale Nessinger beamed, stood, and extended a hand to him. “Dale Nessinger. Glad to meet you at last.”
“Your Royal Highness Elmer Schmickle the Third, at your service.”
Schmickle? I swallowed a guffaw. He’d never told me his last name. It was no wonder.
His Royal Highness Elmer Schmickle slid a raised brow glance at me, flicking his eyes at my fake belly before turning his attention back to Nessinger. He asked, “Are you really going to put me on TV?” He gave Nessinger’s hand a hearty shake before taking the chair beside me. He set the briefcase he’d been holding between our chairs.
“I’m hoping to. I gave a copy of the contract to your ... partner? Agent?”
“Manager,” I said.
“Manager,” she echoed.
“We’ll need some time to look this over,” I told her as I skimmed the first page.
“Of course,” she said, staring at Elmer with glittery goggle eyes. “You are really the prince of the Sluagh?”
He nodded. “Yes, I am.”
I swear she did a happy-girl sigh. What the heck was she seeing that I wasn’t? Dollar signs, perhaps?
“I’ll need verification of your identity.”
“Not a problem. I figured you’d ask.” Elmer pulled the briefcase onto his lap and fished several documents out of it before snapping it shut. He handed the papers to her. “If you don’t mind, I’d prefer it if you kept these documents private?”
“Not a problem. Let’s see what we have here.” Nessinger glanced down at them. “I’m sorry to have to ask for documentation, but we’ve had similar offers before and in every case the individual making the request wasn’t what he claimed.”
“If you need more proof, I’d be happy to provide it.” Elmer motioned toward the pages in her hands. “Those copies are yours to keep.”
“Thank you.” Nessinger set them aside. “Now, just to summarize what we were offering, WIMM Productions will be doing all the writing, casting, directing, filming, and distributing of the show. In return, you will be paid one hundred thousand dollars for each episode filmed.”
Elmer wheezed. So did I.
“In addition, we are willing to offer a substantial bonus if you conclude the season with an engagement that leads to a wedding.” She tittered like a bird, flipping her hand in the air. “Our viewers just love their happy endings.”
“Hey, I’m in this for real. I want to find a wife as much as the next guy. And the cash would come in handy. But you understand all applicants must be full-blooded elves,” Elmer said.
“Yes, of course.”
“Then we have a deal.” He shot to his feet.
I jumped to mine. “Wait a minute. We should read this contract over first—”
“What for? I have nothing to lose in this deal.” He snatched the contract out of my hands. “Where do I sign?” he asked, flipping through it.
“The last page,” Nessinger told him, sliding a look at me.
I tried to stop him. “Elmer, you don’t know what you’re signing.”
“It’ll be fine,” he said. “What are you worried about? Afraid I might actually find someone I like better than you?”
“Of course not. I want you to find a wife. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have set this whole thing up—”
“There you go.” He handed the signed contract to Nessinger.
Nessinger slid a somewhat chilly glance my way. “I’ll go ahead and sign now, and then my office will send your copies to you tomorrow.”
“Perfect.” After waiting for her to finish up, Elmer offered her his hand, which she shook.
“Here’s to the success of So Who Wants To Marry An Undead Prince?” Nessinger said excitedly.
“That title’s a little long,” Elmer said, grinning from ear to ear. “What about The Bachelor: Dark Prince?”
Nessinger bounced excitedly. “I like it!”
To me, he said, “If this doesn’t work, nothing will. Thanks, Sloan. I owe you.”
I had a sick feeling he was in for a whole lot more than he bargained for. “Don’t mention it,” I grumbled.
After thanking Nessinger, and giving Elmer one last farewell, I headed back to the rental house. I’d been worn-out and ready to quit plowing through my dad’s stuff before I’d rushed out to this meeting. However, I was ready to give it another hour or two before turning in, once I returned home.
No doubt because I was petrified to go to sleep.
When I walked inside, JT was sitting where I’d been, bent over a file. He gave me a questioning look as I joined him.
“I forgot I had an appointment to handle a personal thing,” I explained. “How’s it going? I left a stack that looked promising off to the side.”
“It’s going good. Here.” He handed a file to me. “Tell me what you think.”
I read it in minutes and smiled. “That’s it.”
“And I’ve also verified the link between the doctor’s office visit and the victims’ deaths. Tomorrow you’ll present the profile to the Baltimore PD.” He reached for me but then pulled back. “You’re damn good, Sloan.”
I grabbed my protruding faux belly and gave it a shake. “Does this mean I can ditch the pregnant suit? It’s hot and uncomfortable.”
“Not if you want to catch her. I’m recommending you remain undercover and work with th
e Baltimore PD on apprehending her.”
“Sure. But should I be seen going into the police station, then? And what about tonight? We don’t have a trap yet. I’d give just about anything to sleep on my stomach... .”
“Just about anything?” JT echoed.
I shot him some mean eyes.
JT shook his head. “This marriage stuff is for the birds. Okay, I’ll give you one night.”
Upstairs, I double-checked the window locks, then shut the drapes. Confident there’d be no nocturnal visitor, I went into the bathroom to shower and change. By the time I had sudsed up, rinsed off, toweled off, and dressed, JT was lounging in bed, reading.
I gave him a what-are-you-doing look.
“She’s still out there somewhere. I’m not making the mistake of assuming anything again. So, whether you like it or not—don’t tell me—I’m spending the night in this bed. Even with the windows shut.”
“Fine.” I flipped the covers up and climbed in.
I closed my eyes.
The gears in my mind started spinning.
What if ... she comes back?
What if ... she finds my window locked?
What if ... she kills some other, unsuspecting woman?
I rolled out of bed.
“Where are you headed?” JT grumbled.
I barefooted it across the bedroom, toward the door. “I’m putting the suit back on. Open the window.”
When I returned to the bedroom, JT was situated next to the window, in a chair. He was holding a set of barbeque tongs. He waved them. “It’s the best I could come up with. I made a promise. I’ll sit awake all night, if that’s what it takes.”
Now that was one determined, dedicated bodyguard.
“Thanks, JT.”
“It’s nothing. Sweet dreams, Sloan.”
After rolling from my left side to right and back again, I slipped off to dreamland.
The next morning, JT looked like death. Although I was still sporting my pregnant belly, and I hadn’t been able to sleep in my favorite position, I looked fresh and rested.
Yes, I most definitely felt guilty about that.
“You need a nap,” I told him as we drove to the Baltimore PD.
