“Would that be the best scenario?”
“For the sake of argument, let’s say it is. I don’t know how I feel about converting. Another team member told me that he converted and lost his family in the process.”
Micki sighed. “OK. So if this man, who you currently are not dating, were to ask you to marry him, he may never ask you to convert.”
“Oh, I think it is important to him,” Alex said.
“OK. What else is important? Does he want children? You always told me you want children one day.”
“He has a child already. I think he’d be open to having more children.”
Micki’s eyebrow rose under her bleached bangs. “Is he divorced?”
“Widowed.”
“I see.” Micki said in a hushed tone. “Is his child young?”
The question took Alex a bit by surprise. She didn’t want to focus on any elaborate lies. “He’s older. Out of the house. Really a non–issue.”
“Children are not so easily dismissed, Alex. I assume his son is very important to him.”
“Yes.”
Micki simply nodded. “If you and Michael had children, what religion would you raise them as, Alex?”
Alex thought back to the conversation she had with Sterling the first time she had met him. “Oh, they’d definitely be his religion. No question about that.”
“They’d be your kids too. They don’t have to be his religion. This would have to be negotiated by the two of you before any marriage and definitely before any planned pregnancy.”
“I wouldn’t mind them being his religion. Actually, it’d be great if they did have his religion and lived such long happy lives.”
“So your husband would be this religion, your children would be this religion, your household would embrace this religion. I’m curious. What issues exactly would prevent you from converting to this religion as well?”
Alex bit her lip and sat deep in thought. Finally, she said, “That is an excellent question, Micki.”
“But I want you to understand something. You’re putting the cart before the horse. You said you were not dating him at the moment. And are you willing to risk this promotion over him?”
Alex focused on that and took a deep breath. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
CHAPTER THIRTY–SIX
Dixon walked Matt and Brandon down to his office. “I’m so glad you boys were using your head and keeping your eyes open. This is a good find. Could be a security leak.”
Brandon and Matt shared a triumphant look with each other as Dixon led them down the hallway. They had found an abandoned janitor uniform at the State Dinner’s new place, and thought the outfit could be part of a plan to harm the President.
The uniform contained no embroidered name tag, but that was standard issue at the hall and not alarming. Being stuffed in a cabinet in one of the first floor’s mens rooms was what made it suspicious. Another worry for Dixon was the size of the uniform. It fit a large man, one over six feet in height, and a very lean one at that. The accompanying shoes were size fifteen mens.
A database search had already been conducted to find out how many custodians in the employ of the hall would fit the suit. Surprisingly, three men had the correct build – and they were all human. None of them could account for the lost, or perhaps stolen uniform. Raymond had already questioned the three men, but found them to be hard–working men with no qualms about the President or his administration.
Forensics inspected the items. Any prints, hair, or DNA they retrieved were dead–ends in the system. The items were now in Dixon’s office, lying in a box on top of his desk. Any story they may have would have to be told by Sterling’s special ability.
The three entered the office where Raymond and Sterling waited. Sterling was already touching the article of clothing, carefully reading the fabric, the buttons, and zipper. His eyes were closed in concentration, but opened when the doorknob turned and the men entered.
“Smith. Jones,” Dixon said to Raymond and Sterling, “These are the men that found the uniform. I told them you wanted to talk with them.”
Even before Dixon closed the office door, Raymond recognized the two men.
“Oh, hell no!” Sterling furrowed his brow and shook his head. Raymond knew that Sterling had wiped the shorter man’s mind so many times over the last several years he wasn’t sure if the man’s mind could handle much more. Hell, Sterling had wiped the man’s mind just yesterday morning.
“Hey, Detective Smith! Nice to see you again!” Brandon, the shorter human, said.
Raymond’s eyebrow rose as he looked from the human to his son. “Interesting,” he said. “You remember working with Detective Smith before?” he asked Brandon.
Brandon glanced over to Raymond, then back to Sterling. “Um, yes. I guess,” he stammered. He studied Sterling. “We worked together on … well, the case was a while back on … something.” He shook his head, not remembering any specifics. He looked over to Matt for help.
Matt held out his hand to Raymond. “It's a pleasure to meet both of you. I believe this is the first time we’ve met.”
Raymond shook Matt’s hand. Matt stood taller than Raymond at a height of six foot five. For a human, he was quite tall. The mental patterns from Matt were even and calm, like a glacial lake. There was no recognition from him as to the vampires’ true identities. The two shook hands, “I’m Agent Jones. Nice to meet you.”
Focusing now on Brandon, Raymond read his thought patterns. They were confusing to say the least. The man’s thoughts were clear, but his patterns were choppy like a record that had been scratched too many times – which was a sign of having been compelled too often. Raymond sighed. Brandon’s mental record was not broken, but he was nearing the point of not being able to be compelled anymore.
Sterling continued inspecting the clothes. His bare hands ran up and down the sleeves, and around the back and collar. In the high–pitched vampire speak, he talked with his father. “The little one is a problem. His mind is nearly Swiss cheese.” When his father merely nodded a reply, Sterling added, “Either we should offer full disclosure or transfer him to another department.” He reached for the boots in the box, “I don’t like the man, so you can guess which choice I prefer.”
Raymond put his hand to his mouth to hide his moving lips, “Sterling, full disclosure is not an option. Not until we can’t compel him anymore. His security clearance is not high enough.” The protocol was clear, and his son should know it. Only the President, the Vice President, the Speaker of the House, Colony Director, and now the Director of Homeland Security were privileged with the knowledge of the vampires. A few others knew, but only because it had been a last resort due to their mind's inability to handle a vampire’s touch.
Matt and Brandon watched intensely as Sterling reviewed the boots. Sterling’s fingers worked down the laces, swiped over the tongue, and felt the sole and heel of each boot.
Brandon lacked expertise in evidence preservation, but obviously guessed that this was not a standard technique to preserve evidence in a case. “Excuse me. Smith? Shouldn’t you be putting on gloves to touch evidence?”
“And shouldn’t the gloves be rubber?” Matt added, noticing the cloth ones on the desk. He and Brandon exchanged knowing head nods at each other like they had both seen the same episode of CSI.
Sterling ignored all the questions from the humans.
“What are you hoping to do with those boots?” Brandon asked.
Sterling’s jaw tightened. he took a deep breath and now bothered to look at the humans. “I’m going to scour the kingdom looking for the foot that it fits. … Dad, wipe them!”
Raymond’s face flushed red. The look from the two humans questioned as to why he was being called “Dad” by a man clearly older than he was.
Before the two could ask any questions, Raymond said, “Fellas, I’m going to need you to look at me for a moment.” As they did, their faces paled and their eyes grew dim. “You two found no
thing unusual at the hotel for the State Dinner.”
“We found nothing,” they said in unison.
“And as always, you can trust that Dixon will get to the bottom of everything. So, please contact him if you notice anything out of the ordinary. Now get back to work.” Both Brandon and Matt looked around the room. “We should be heading back to work.” Matt said.
“Ya, think!?!” Sterling snarled without even looking at them.
Dixon opened the door and let the two men out. “I’ll be here in my office if you need me. Thanks for coming by.”
Now with the privacy of Dixon’s office restored, Sterling set the boots back in the box, sat in Dixon’s chair and placed his hands on the armrests. His hands tightened and his knuckles whitened. His breath grew even as he took slow and methodical breaths.
“Are you in pain?” his father asked.
“Not more than usual.” Sterling raised his hand and pointed towards the box. “There’s nothing on these clothes. They’re old, at least a couple of years.” He stood and grabbed his gloves from the desk. “This isn’t evidence. All I’m getting is a headache from touching them.”
As he and his father left Dixon’s office, Sterling looked back at Dixon. “Keep an eye out for ‘Bert and Ernie’ there Dixon. We don’t need them turning up any vamps on their own.”
CHAPTER THIRTY–SEVEN
The next morning Fang Manor was quiet. Too quiet for Raymond’s tastes. Sulie and her team left early for the trip to Austin, Texas with the President for his energy speech to the University. Raymond remained in D.C. to take care of security at home because of the upcoming dinner, but he’d rather be seated next to Alex aboard Air Force One. Being separated from her pained him, even for a day. It was hard for him to even comprehend that it had only been a week since he first met her.
He had fallen hard.
He sat alone in his bedroom and reached into his small refrigerator to retrieved his breakfast. He stretched out on the bed while his breakfast sat in the warmer and his thoughts went to Alex, which didn’t help the current flagpole situation where his manhood was concerned.
He fed himself the blood and enjoyed the warmth of it as it entered and surged in his body. This morning however, when he closed his eyes and allowed himself to get carried away with the bliss of the blood, his thoughts were of Alex, the way she felt, and her scent. It was her name he growled as he came.
*******
Visions of Alex consumed Raymond’s thoughts, and he found it difficult to sit idle just missing her. He busied himself with work in an effort to keep his mind occupied. With the team separated, he volunteered to work a double shift and spent the day with William and Ben at the White House. The three hid away from prying human eyes by sitting in the Cave. Ben sat at the small table, the other two on the hideous green couch. The large panel screen on the wall buzzed with nine monitor feedbacks in what looked like a White House Hollywood Squares.
The video feed the Colony received split off from the monitors the human team viewed. The human team watched the visitors down in the W16 security room and relied on facial recognition programs to detect potential threats. The vampire team filtered their incoming images with an infrared scanner. Today the team performed two tasks—their daily task of checking for vampires trying to infiltrate the White House, and also monitoring for the woman whose picture was on one of the forged security pass they had retrieved only days earlier.
Raymond and William sat side–by–side, dwarfing the small couch and causing its springs to buckle in the middle. Each worked on a laptop and typed away on their keyboards as Ben sat at the desk viewing bank and phone records for Verna Foiles. Raymond had just signed into a secure vampire database, one in which he was allowed to access as a member of the North American Vampire Council, and searched for a woman matching the picture from the security pass. The computer slowly did its magic as it scanned all the database entries. Again he found himself sitting idle, and again he thought of Alex.
Waiting for any response, and doing his best to keep his head in the game, Raymond looked up at the video tick–tack–toe board showing him the nine different views of rooms within the White House. The images were a light green hue, standard for infrared sensors. “Has the intern, Verna Foiles, come in for work today?” he asked.
William stopped typing on his keyboard. “Woman isn’t supposed to be here today, not according to the schedule anyhow. Lady’s been out the last few days though. She missed her last two shifts. If she’s a vamp, she’s dust by now. Else she’s swimming with the fishes somewhere. That’s my guess.”
“No.” Raymond shook his head. “Her image was on one of the passes. I’m betting she’s still alive. With the President out of residence today it’s a good time for whatever they may have in mind.”
Ben glanced over at the two, “She should cover her tracks better. Not calling in about her missing work just sent flags up to the humans. They’ll be on alert the second she logs in for work.”
The changing screen on Raymond’s laptop caught his attention. He looked down and saw the results of his search. No female vampire matched the facial recognition from the ID pass on any vampire database he searched – which included the family line database, the eligible bachelorette vampire database, and the known missing rogue database. Of course, she could be an independent and not registered anywhere, or perhaps she was registered in the European, Asian, or other vampire databases. Unfortunately, he had limited access to those databases.
William noticed a message on his computer. He clicked a button and focused on the computer display. “Wait up. The badge reader just signed her in.” William adjusted the image on his computer and shot it up to the big display on the wall so Raymond and Ben could see. “This is the feed from the kitchen entrance. She’s not coming in through her normal door.”
Raymond stared at the image. “No infrared heat signature. She’s no longer human.” Newly turned — it confirmed the lack of results he got from the vampire databases.
Ben added, “She also got a bleach job to disguise herself. Which department does she normally work in?”
William pulled up a second window to the large screen to view the work schedule. He scanned back and showed the schedule for the last three months, her name highlighted in the roster. “Speech writing, some work with the environmental groups — grunt work mostly.” He brought the camera images to the forefront of the computer screen. “Woman is heading towards the Oval Office.”
“Let me guess, she’s never worked in that wing of the White House before,” Raymond asked.
“Nope. And I don’t think she’s there to work today,” William said.
Ben had been overseeing the human team’s activity on his personal laptop. “Human guards are on the move,” he said standing up. “I’ll get them first. She may be newly turned, but she can still wipe them out easily enough.” He ran out of the room at vampire speed, the papers on the small desk he was using picked up in the breeze.
The display on the wall monitor was of the cameras in the West Wing. “I have her passing the Oval Office,” William said into the com unit. “I think she’s heading to the Situation Room downstairs.”
“Stay here and monitor her.” Raymond adjusted his earpiece. “Ben, I’m heading to the Situation Room right now.”
William texted all Colony members the status.
*******
Raymond received a text from Sterling indicating he was minutes away from joining the party. Raymond texted back, “solo fem vamp blond in Sit Rm. W8 4 me. No hostility so far.” He sped down to the basement of the West Wing to catch Verna, taking three to four steps at a time at super speed. He caught the scent of another predator once he neared the Oval Office and pulled out his silver flex whip and his SBC Launcher, also known as a silver bolt cannon. Through his earpiece Ben said that another set of human guards were already in the Situation Room and were now in jeopardy.
Sterling started receiving the audio signals on his secure c
om link once he breached the White House perimeter. “I’m outside on the grounds,” Sterling announced. “I tripped the underground sensors. It should keep some of the guards busy. William, make it look like an equipment error in a few minutes.”
“No problem,” William replied in the com link.
Raymond descended the stairs to the basement. A group of human guards lay unconscious on the floor in the hallway just before the Situation Room. He knelt next to one of them and noticed they were still alive, only asleep. He breathed a sigh of relief as he looked into the President’s personal command center, or Sit Room, as it was often called. Verna wasn’t in the main conference room area, but the glass to the Director’s Office was fogged, signaling the motion sensor had been triggered. “She’s in the President’s private office,” he said into his earpiece in a whispered voice. He watched as she left the small room and entered the main conference room, with no knowledge that Raymond lay in wait for her.
Her focus remained on her task at hand, or she would have noticed another predator so close by. She walked to a painting which hung on the wall, and place what looked like a bug within its large wooden frame. She did the same with the other two smaller paintings in the room before looking closer at the heavy wooden desk which took up most of the space in the room. Its dark red varnish was reflective, and Raymond could see her look of concentration even though her back was to him. Next she pulled out one of the black leather chairs and began to inspect it for what Raymond thought would be another place to hide a bug.
Overall, her plan was ridiculous. This room had built-in sensors to detect bugs. Of course, the general population wasn’t privy to such information. Hiding the bugs on picture frames? Raymond didn’t even want to think of how obvious that was.
Sterling appeared at the bottom of the stairs with Ben, just a few feet away from the unconscious guards and the entrance to the Sit Room. They approached the room with caution, but they must have affected Verna’s senses because her eyes darted towards the door. Her focus was no longer on the bugs she planted, but probably on escaping and perhaps hurting one of the team members on her way out. She looked towards the door away from where Raymond hid. He had a good shot of her and took it. He discharged a silver bolt from his SBC Launcher and the bolt passed through her body without harming her. She dodged behind a chair on the far side of the large conference room table and pulled out a gun, taking two shots at Raymond.
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