Flawless Dreams

by Hadena James

  I sat on the floor of the lobby and rocked back and forth with my phone between my hands. My phone rang and Gabriel’s number showed up on the screen.

  “Ace,” it was Gabriel’s voice, he sounded distressed.

  “Where are you?” I asked.

  “He wants you to come alone, don’t do it.” Gabriel told me. I was planning on bringing the Marines with me, but I didn’t tell Gabriel or his capture who I was sure was listening in that.

  “Where?” I asked. Lucas was instantly by my side and listening at my ear piece.

  Gabriel rattled off an address and the line went dead. I looked at Lucas. Lucas shook his head.

  “I have to go, follow me in another car, stay back though. Use Fiona’s new GPS toy to keep an eye on me. He may have killed Gabriel’s family before showing up here.”

  “When would he have time?” Lucas asked.

  “I was in the hospital for five days. If he arrived late the day before Nathan’s body was found, he could have tried to kill them, hopped on a plane to San Diego, killed Nathan, and been done by dinner.” I stood up. “Lucas, he didn’t kill Gabriel’s sister and niece, he just left them to bleed to death. If I hadn’t called this morning to have them do a wellness check, they wouldn’t have stood a chance. Which reminds me, the San Antonio police are supposed to call back with status reports, switch me phones and take the call.”

  “You Tasered me,” Malachi hissed as he spoke.

  “You needed a nap,” I answered. “I’m about to do what this guy wants and meet with him. It is about our only chance to get Gabriel back, alive. When he killed Christian Hunter, he rammed a Claymore through his body and into the metal of my car. Do you understand what that means?”

  “Yes,” Malachi stood up. “The Tasering might have helped some. Do you want me to hide in the back?”

  “No, you will be seen. This guy has been stalking Gabriel and I for a while and we did not notice. I have to think whatever we attempt, he is going to be watching. I am going to walk out of here, alone. I need you to be with Lucas. You will not be able to see me, but you should be able to follow the GPS on the car.”

  “For the record, I hate this plan.” Malachi told me.

  “Duly noted, I would say I felt bad for you but we would both know it was a lie. When you have your own fully functional team in a few weeks, you can call the shots. Until then, I get to be the one with the power and you get to ride with Lucas.”

  “You specifically word things to irritate me, it is one of my favorite things about you.” Malachi touched my shoulder and handed me an extra knife with his free hand. “Never know when you might need another.”

  I nodded and exited the lobby. Fiona was already putting the new GPS tracker chip in it. She didn’t look very happy about it either. She was frowning heavily.

  “Stay in a car behind Lucas and Malachi. They should be out the door first. Caleb after them. Xavier last. Everyone else in the middle. Do you understand?” I asked her.

  “Yes, but you are a shitty negotiator. I’d feel better if Malachi went in your place.”

  “He wants me. I do not know why yet.” I told her.

  I drove with the digital GPS providing me with the only spotter I had. It was an eerie sensation to know I was literally walking into a trap. About half way there, I took out the GPS chip Fiona had installed and tossed it out the window. I had been instructed to do this in a text message, which meant he somehow knew I had switched phones. I doubted Lucas had told him.

  That meant he had to be watching me, even in this godforsaken car in the middle of the freeway. I wasn’t sure how that was possible, but I didn’t understand how he was appearing and disappearing into thin air either. I needed to talk to Alex, but at the moment, I had bigger problems.

  A large abandoned building showed up in front of me on the road I was on. I was sure that was my new destination, but I wasn’t sure what I was going to find. If I was lucky, I would be able to trade my life for Gabriel’s. I wasn’t feeling very lucky though. I parked and got out.

  There were several heavy fire doors. The first one I tried was unlocked. I pulled it open and felt Lucas’s phone begin to vibrate. My number appeared on the screen. I put the phone down on the ground and slide it close to a wall with some old dirty carpets. If nothing else, maybe they would find our bodies.

  The building smelled of industrial chemicals. They made my nose burn. Under it was the smell of blood, lots and lots of blood. I followed that scent.

  Hanging from a platform were several bodies. They all had milky eyes and sunken skin. Dried blood stuck to their cheeks and hair as they remained perfectly still in rancid vacant building. On the floor was a large bucket and a paint roller. Both with dried blood on them. The bastard had hung them upside down and slit their throats for their blood. It was like walking onto the set of a horror movie. I took a shallow breath and looked around. My eyes found the message in the dim light of the room:

  Haha! Nice Try! I wouldn’t give’m back that easy. The Search Continues Aislinn Cain.

  It wasn’t a trap, it was him gloating. I swore loudly, disturbing some nesting birds in the rafters. He hadn’t been here for a while if the birds had come back to roost. He was lightning fast and always one step ahead of me.

  He also had Gabriel and I had no idea where. I wasn’t sure anyone would be able to tell us where. I stomped back over and picked up the phone. It was still vibrating. It had over a dozen missed calls from me.

  “He isn’t here,” I told either Lucas or Malachi. “He nor Gabriel, but we need some crime scene techs, because he left us another message and do not even begin to lecture me on what I did.” I hung up and went outside so the cell phone was easier to track.

  I was sitting on the roof of the car when Malachi and Lucas arrived. They both looked like they wanted to say something to me, but neither did. I pointed towards the building.

  By the time night arrived, we had learned almost nothing except that our wendigo had Gabriel, he was definitely a murderer, and he’d eaten part of a victim hanging inside the building. We were also back on a plane headed home. Someone had reportedly found a dead body matching Gabriel’s description in a park. We couldn’t tell from the photos since his face was gone, but they were running DNA. If he had beaten us back to Missouri, that could only mean he had a plane. As we began our descent into the airport, I made a call to get all private flights in and out of the airports in the surrounding areas for the last three weeks. I wanted to see the repeats.

  “Marshal Cain, this is Captain Wheeler in San Antonio, I have an update for you,” the captain I had spoken to earlier in the day said as I answered the phone.

  “Please tell me it’s good news,” I tried not to sound as tired as I felt.

  “Vivian Cook is going to make it, but she is heavily sedated. When she came around from surgery, she started screaming the name Gabriel and then passed out. Her mother, Mary, didn’t make it. Her older sister, Liberty, is in stable condition, but she is not going to be talking anytime soon. He ate part of her face off. Lee Cook was pronounced dead at the scene. Any luck finding your missing marshal?”

  “Not yet, Captain, thank you though. I’ll let my team know and I will send someone to protect the two girls.” I hung up and called Alex. “Tell me you found anything, anything at all, even if you don’t think it matters?”

  “I found an abandoned house. If you drive it, it’s maybe a twenty minute drive from where you found your car. If you cut through the field and the trees, it’s maybe a ten minute hike, you could make it quicker if you ran. There was no real signs that it was being lived in, but there were some shoe prints in the dust. Big shoe prints, Ace, size 17. I found a similar size near the railroad bridge where the word Wendigo was painted and one in the grass near where you were hunkered down when Christian Hunter was killed. Whoever this guy is, he is good at moving quietly and quickly. I also found it one other place and you are not going to like it.”

  “Will it give me some help w
ith his identity?” I asked.

  “No, because I found it months ago in the snow outside Nadine’s house after a dinner party that you and Gabriel attended. At the time, I thought it was probably mob related, but now,” Alex didn’t finish.

  “Damn it, thanks.”

  Twenty-Nine

  I stared at the shoe prints in the dust. He had hidden here while we searched for him. The dogs hadn’t alerted to him because of his smell. Even days after he left, I could still smell the dog urine in the house. He had smelled like another dog. Who did that? Who covered themselves in dog piss? Survivalists running from dogs did that.

  I hung my head. It had been three days since Gabriel had gone missing and we had heard nothing from his kidnapper. We had no clues except these stupid shoe prints and a connection to a thirty year old case that Gabriel could barely remember.

  Not to mention dead bodies and injured young ladies that had screamed for Gabriel. And his reflection while in a dog cage. And a twin with a different physical makeup than him. And a guy smart enough to track us using our cell phones.

  I was such an idiot. The answer had been staring me in the face the entire time. Raphael had taken Gabriel.

  He had tried to kill him when they were young and he was going to do it this time. I grabbed my cell phone and dialed. Nothing happened. The call dropped and I tried again. Still nothing. Something moved behind me and I realized exactly why Vivian had yelled Gabriel’s name. To her, it probably looked like Gabriel was trying to kill her. Just like to Gabriel’s young terrified mind, it had looked like his impression was staring at him.

  “You must be Raphael, I would say I have heard all about you, but until you killed Nathan Green, I did not know Gabriel had a twin. He only mentioned that he had a brother.” Raphael Henders looked exactly like Gabriel. The same red hair, the same smattering of freckles across his nose and cheeks, the same blue eyes, the same perfect smile, beyond that, it was like looking at Gabriel in a fun house mirror. Raphael Henders was the tallest man I had ever met face to face. Even Alejandro hadn’t been as tall as Raphael. He was lanky, like Malachi, making him thinner than Gabriel. The limp Gabriel said he had didn’t exist as far as I could tell.

  Raphael Henders might have had some genetic differences from his brother, but it wasn’t because of a twinning gone wrong. Raphael was a full-fledged psychopath with no life in his eyes and no vocal cords to express his pleasure at meeting me. The sociopath in me pointed out to my other half that it had been right and Raphael wasn’t just a psychopath, he was a super psychopath, hence the genetic anomalies. The side of me that wanted to survive told me I should turn off the emotions and desire to be right and just start putting bullets in him. If I did that, I wondered if I would ever find Gabriel alive. I was betting the answer was a no.

  “I’d suggest making a deal, my life for Gabriel’s, but you ate your own niece’s face off, so that seems ridiculous. Instead, I will make you an offer, if Gabriel is alive right now and you can prove it, I will not empty both clips into you,” I pulled out my own twins, Beretta nine-millimeters that I was beginning to think about trading in for bigger guns that made bigger holes. My phone instantly began to ring. The number was one I didn’t recognize.

  “Hello?”

  “Aislinn, he’s going to kill us both, just shoot him, just shoot him and end it.” Gabriel shouted into the phone.

  “I will take it under advisement.” I told the voice.

  “No, Ace, this is a direct order, shoot him,” Gabriel continued to shout.

  “Sorry, you are not in charge right now, I am.” I hung up on my screaming boss. “Fine, he is alive. How do I get him back?”

  Raphael began to furiously type into his own phone. After a moment, an electronic voice came alive.

  “You and he have to survive,” it told me.

  “Survive what?” I narrowed my eyes at Raphael Henders. “Survive what?” I repeated.

  “Whatever,” the electronic voice told me.

  “Fuck you,” I pulled out my Taser. “I will just make you learn to talk.” I pulled the trigger. I felt the Taser come to life. Raphael Henders looked at me and smiled. He crossed the space between us in two steps. One long arm grabbed the baton attached to my belt and I felt it jerk away. Before I could reach for my gun, the other arm grabbed hold of me, pulling me into a bear hug. I flailed against the bigger man and realized too late that I had met my boogeyman. His forehead crashed into mine and the world went black.

  Eric

  “We know who has her and Gabriel, if they are still alive, we should just go get them,” Malachi told Peter West.

  “We are trying, but they aren’t at the cabin on Snell Grove Lake. They aren’t in the cabin that Gabriel was held at as a kid either. We are checking every property holding ever listed under the last name of Henders, Mantan, Blaylock, and Colpus, but so far, we haven’t found them at any of those properties. Wherever he took them, he disappeared once he got there.” Peter argued back.

  “This is bullshit, Pete and you know it,” Malachi shouted at his cousin.

  “Look, we are doing everything we can. I mean everything.” Peter gave Malachi a very pointed look.

  “Not everything,” Malachi answered.

  “We can’t release one serial killer just to find another, we tried that and Patterson escaped. Eric would be next.”

  “You and I both know that Eric isn’t going to escape. We also know that Patterson had help escaping from you.”

  “Are we talking as SCTU/Board of Monitors or as cousins?” Peter asked.

  “I only ever talk to you as my cousin.”

  “Fine, I would love to release Eric and send him to get Gabriel and Aislinn back. That would make me jump for joy. However, if I do it, I’m pretty sure I’m going to be fired on the spot, probably imprisoned, and if anyone has half a brain, tortured for information.” Peter shook his head. “I’m not you Malachi, I can’t take the pain that you can. I will crack under torture and there is a lot more at stake than just Aislinn and Gabriel. I’ve sent Apex to see what he can dig up, that is about the limit of what I can do on my end. You want to find her, then do what you do best, lead the SCTU and go get them. Everyone thinks he took them back to Canada, but there is no record of him flying back. I think they are here, in the US, somewhere. Raphael and Gabriel didn’t come about because of parthenogenesis, they had a mother and other relatives. We’ve searched for it, but it would be easy enough to hide a property, even a large one. And for Christ’s sake, be resourceful. The SCTU has a lot more things they can do than the VCU did. Including hiring contractors and private investigators and kicking in doors even if they don’t know for absolute certain there’s a killer on the other side. We didn’t bring you here to follow the laws you followed at the FBI.”

  “But Eric had an idea about Gabriel’s abductor, I’ve seen the file from his interrogation.”

  “Yes, he did. You want to talk to him, fine, but he doesn’t leave custody, do you understand?” Peter’s look would have wilted flowers, but it was lost on Malachi and Peter knew it. “6341 Dandelion Rd, Blue Springs, MO.”

  That made Malachi react. He swiveled his head quickly and stared at Peter. Peter shrugged, let tip for his coffee and left.

  Malachi Blake drove to the FGN like his life depended on it. In a way, it did. Aislinn could survive without him, but he wasn’t sure the reverse was true. He needed her to remind him about himself once in a while. At the gate, he smiled and waved to a few guys that he knew. They hit some complicated series of buttons and the large steel reinforced gates opened. He drove past the houses designated for the SCTU and followed Bluebell Drive around a corner. This part of the neighborhood was still under construction. Houses were still being built. A few lone houses were finished, but no one lived in them. Eventually, they’d house families and kids would play in the yards during the warmer months. Right now though, even the finished houses didn’t even have grass.

  He made a right hand turn onto Dandelion Rd. It
dead ended at the only finished house on it. A large two story that was painted a pukey shade of green with white accents. Malachi wasn’t sure about the green color or if Peter had given him the right information. If he hadn’t, Malachi would be angry, but he wouldn’t do anything about it. There was a car in the driveway with government plates. As Malachi got closer, a man stepped out the front door. He was wearing jeans and a polo, but had guns strapped to his hips in a gun belt, along with handcuffs, a Taser, another set of handcuffs, and several zip cuffs. Despite the casual dress, he looked out of place.

  “Can I help you?” The man asked.

  “Peter West sent me,” Malachi said getting out of the car. “I need to have a conversation with the occupant.”

  “Mr. West just called and told me to escort you in,” the man said. “I will need to see ID to confirm though.”

  “Really?” Malachi asked but pulled out his wallet. “I didn’t even know this house was back here.”

  “We’d like to keep it that way,” the man looked at Malachi’s badge and identification card. “Do not rile him up. I’m aware that his sister is missing, but sometimes I think he stays because he can, not because of anything we do.” Malachi could relate. Eric Clachan was not someone to be messed with and finding out his sister was missing was going to do more than rile him up.

  “Coming from me might soften the blow,” Malachi nodded a few times, unsure why his head was doing such a stupid gesture when he body was humming with unused energy.

  The guy led Malachi into the house, past the living room where his partner was reading a book on the couch, and over to a set of stairs. Malachi looked down into the basement. He imagined there was a large steel cage down there with electricity running through the bars, enough to kill a horse if it touched it. It might knock Eric off his feet.

  “I was told I was getting a visitor, but I expected someone else,” Eric frowned as a he sat down at a small table that had legs poured into the foundation of the concrete. Malachi looked around. There was no cage, just some furniture, all of it poured into the concrete like the table. Probably to deter Eric from using it as a weapon.