by Tina Folsom
There was a click on the line before Katie acknowledged the order.
Luther took the receiver from her and replaced it on the cradle, noticing that Katie’s hand was trembling. He clasped it, but didn’t say anything, only conveyed with his eyes what was on his mind: whatever the kidnapper wanted, Luther wouldn’t allow Katie to be harmed in the process.
Five minutes later, after changing into different clothes, Luther drove Katie’s Audi out of the garage, Katie in the passenger seat. The sun was just setting over the Pacific, and by the time they got to Scanguards’ headquarters in the Mission district, night had descended.
Katie directed him to the entrance of the parking garage beneath the building, and when they reached the gate, it magically opened. Luther glanced at the camera and the red light on it that indicated that somebody was watching them. He drove into the garage.
“Second level, spot B5,” a male voice said over a loudspeaker.
Luther followed the instructions and parked in the indicated spot. When he killed the engine, it was silent for a few moments, and all he could hear was Katie’s thundering heartbeat. He met her eyes.
“I won’t let you out of my sight,” he promised.
He opened the car door and exited, waiting for Katie to do the same. The elevator doors opened when they reached it. Taking Katie by the hand, Luther entered and looked at the buttons. The one to the top floor was already pressed, and the doors closed.
In silence, they ascended. The elevator barely made a sound. After a soft ping, the doors opened, and they stepped into a hallway.
Before Luther knew which way to turn, a male voice penetrated his skull like a dagger. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
37
Luther whirled around, instantly ready for the coming assault, and saw Samson rushing toward him. He looked as if he hadn’t slept in days, but that didn’t diminish the murderous look in his eyes.
“I warned you!” Samson growled, almost upon him.
“Samson, wait, I can explain!” Luther lifted his arms in defense.
Though Samson aimed his fist at Luther, it didn’t land in his face, because Katie jumped in front of him, blocking Samson’s approach, shielding Luther with her body.
“Katie, nooooo!”
In horror, Luther grabbed her shoulders and jerked her to the side just in time to prevent Samson’s claws slicing into her. Instead, the blow hit its intended target after all, if only marginally. Samson’s fist swiped Luther’s shoulder, just as he turned his back toward Samson to protect Katie.
“Damn it, Samson!” Luther cried out, glaring over his shoulder, Katie pressed to his chest. His heart pounded out of control at the thought that he could have been too late. “I don’t care what you do to me, but if you hurt Katie, I’m gonna kill you!”
To his surprise, Samson froze in his next movement. His fists were still raised, his fangs still extended, and his eyes glared red. But he was hesitating.
“Stand down!”
Luther recognized Blake’s voice. From the corner of his eye, he saw the young vampire run toward them, several other men following him.
“Samson, don’t! I asked him to come,” Blake continued as he reached them.
Behind him, Luther recognized Haven, Eddie, and Grayson. Footsteps from the other end of the corridor made him toss a quick look down that end: Amaury, Zane, and Gabriel were approaching from there, followed by several vampires Luther didn’t recognize immediately.
Samson shot Blake a look of annoyance, eyes narrowed. “You did what?” he snarled.
“What the fuck!” Amaury echoed Samson’s words, venom spewing from his eyes, eyes that were pinning Luther just as surely as if he were using a stake.
“You’d better have a bloody good explanation for that, Blake!” Samson growled. “Or I’m gonna rip your head off just as soon as I’m done with him.”
Surprisingly, Blake didn’t even flinch at his boss’s threat. Instead, he inserted himself between Luther and Samson and braced his hands on his hips. “I suggest we assemble in the conference room to discuss this further.”
Samson went toe to toe with his employee. “And I suggest you tell me now what’s going on. My patience is at its end.”
Blake nodded. “As you wish.” He took a step aside and motioned to Luther. “Luther is responsible for us knowing who has Isabelle. He risked his life to get us the lead.”
All the air rushed from Samson’s lungs. His eyes darted past Blake and landed on Luther. Luther now turned fully, finally releasing Katie from his protective embrace. He waited silently for Samson to digest the news, just as everybody else in the hallway refrained from talking to give their boss the time he needed to come to grips with the fact that his enemy had helped him.
“I don’t want a thank you,” Luther said into the silence.
He knew how hard it would be for Samson to force words of thanks over his lips, and he wasn’t going to put his former friend in that situation. If he were in Samson’s shoes, he wouldn’t want to be obliged to thank his enemy either. “Katie was the one who put me on the right trail. You should thank her.”
Samson gave a stiff nod to Katie. Then he looked at Blake. “Conference room. Now.” He glanced back at Luther. “You, too.”
Like the leader he was, Samson marched down the corridor and disappeared through a double door to the right. Several of the vampires followed. Luther exchanged a look with Blake.
“Sorry, Luther, but I thought it better not to tell him in advance, or he might have prevented me from getting you here.”
Luther shrugged. “Hey, he didn’t kill me. Not a bad start.” He took Katie’s hand and walked in the direction of the conference room, when Amaury stepped in his path.
“He’s not the only one you have to convince that you’re worth keeping alive,” Amaury said.
“I’m aware of that, brother,” Luther said.
Amaury opened his mouth for a retort, but Eddie gripped his shoulder.
“This is not the time. We’ve got more pressing things to discuss. If you’d like to beat the shit out of my sire once all this is over, I’ll be the first to stand back and watch. But if you touch him now, I’m gonna have to hurt you—brother-in-law or not,” Eddie warned.
Nodding a thanks to his protégé, Luther walked around Amaury. He caught Haven’s eyes zooming in on his and Katie’s joined hands, before he lifted them toward Luther’s face. Luther hadn’t even noticed that he’d taken Katie’s hand, but he couldn’t let go of it now, not when Haven silently challenged him on it. Instead he met Haven’s look stoically, not giving away his feelings. With a resigned sigh, Haven turned and disappeared in the conference room.
Moments later, almost everybody was seated around the large table: the full contingent of the upper echelon of Scanguards. Gabriel, Amaury, Zane, Yvette, Quinn, Thomas, Eddie, Haven, Wesley, Grayson, as well as John, who he’d met during the raid on Forrester’s house. Several other vampires sat among them, but Luther didn’t know them. Samson was leaning against the wall, and Blake stood at the head of the table.
Luther pulled a chair for Katie and motioned her to sit down, before taking the empty seat next to her. The tension in the room was punctuated by the silence and the looks the other vampires and hybrids gave him. Any other man would have felt nervous at so much scrutiny, but Luther ignored it. He needed to keep a cool head.
Blake knocked on the table to draw everybody’s attention to him. “I want everybody on the same page. So, here’s what we know so far. We know that Isabelle was kidnapped by a vampire named Antonio Mendoza, who was hired to abduct Katie, but mistook them because they wore similar clothes and hairstyles, and had changed roles. Mendoza wasn’t privy to the fact that Isabelle is a hybrid and Katie a witch, or he wouldn’t have made that mistake.”
“We already know all that,” Zane grumbled under his breath, clearly impatient.
Blake shot him a displeased look, but continued, “When Mendoza tried to pass Isabelle to th
e man who hired him, he was killed.” He pointed to Luther. “Because of Luther’s and Katie’s efforts we know now who this man is.”
He clicked a small remote control in his hand and stepped to the side so everybody had a view of the large monitor behind him. The headshot of a man was displayed on it. He had short dark hair, brown eyes, an oval face, and looked to be in his late thirties.
“The perpetrator’s name is Cliff Forrester. He was released from the vampire penitentiary near Grass Valley nine days ago. Letters he wrote to Katie seem to suggest that he was planning for a long time to kidnap her once he was released.”
“Why wouldn’t he kidnap her himself, and instead hire Mendoza? Seems odd, considering he was released from prison and could do it himself,” Gabriel said.
“Good question,” Blake said. “We believe that Forrester was afraid that due to his stint in prison he might be recognized by council agents who keep tabs on released prisoners for a while. We must assume that he believed it was safer to have somebody else handle the kidnapping. He must have known that there was a chance that the kidnapper would be caught on security cameras.”
“Any news from the council agents about where Forrester is?” Amaury followed up with a question.
“Regretfully, we have not received any cooperation from the prison authority or the council agents.” He motioned to Thomas. “Do you want to update us on that?”
Thomas stood quickly. “In light of the fact that the prison authority is dragging its feet on providing us with the information we need, Eddie and I have taken the issue into our own hands and have our team working on hacking into their system. We’re close and should soon have everything on Forrester, including recordings of his voice as well as his fingerprints, so we can confirm that the letters were written by him, and the voice on the recording we found at Mendoza’s house was indeed Forrester’s. We should know more in a few hours.” He sat down.
“Thanks, Thomas,” Blake said. “But we won’t have time to wait for that confirmation. Forrester made contact.”
A collective mumbling went through the room. Samson pushed himself away from the wall, his hands clenching, his jaw tightening. His lips moved. “Finally,” he murmured.
Luther felt Katie tense next to him and instinctively reached for her hand under the table, squeezing it in reassurance.
“We know that Isabelle is alive. He let her speak to me. He wants to exchange her for Katie. But he didn’t give us any information yet as to where this exchange will take place. Only the time: two hours before sunrise.”
Luther exchanged a look with Katie. She appeared calm and collected. She had expected this, maybe even prepared herself for it mentally.
“Did you get a trace?” Zane asked.
“He didn’t stay on the phone long enough for us to trace the call. And most likely it would have only led us to a burner phone anyway.”
“What are we doing now?” Gabriel asked.
“Now that we have a picture of the kidnapper, thanks to Luther, we have patrols everywhere in the city, canvassing, searching for every possible hiding place. They know not to engage in case they endanger Isabelle’s life.” Blake glanced at Samson, before continuing. “But we’ve had no luck so far. We’ll have to do the exchange. It’s our only way to get Isabelle back.”
Before anybody else could say anything, Katie said, “I’ll do it.”
Haven shot up from his seat at the same time Luther did. “There must be another way,” Haven pleaded, looking at Samson and Blake.
There was a sad look on Samson’s face. “I wish there were. But you heard it yourself. We’ve got nothing. We don’t know where he’s hiding her. She’s still a child, Haven! Can you imagine what she must be feeling?”
“Yes, I can,” Haven ground out and glanced back at Katie.
Luther knew what was going on in Haven’s mind at this moment. He was remembering Katie’s ordeal. And he didn’t want Katie to go through the same horror a second time.
“There has to be another way,” Luther interjected, drawing everybody’s attention on him.
Samson tossed him a defiant look. “And what would that be, huh, Luther? I’m afraid there are no more prisons you can break into.”
“It worked, didn’t it?” Luther ground out. “Listen, Samson, I know you’re upset, but don’t allow this guy—” He pointed to the picture on the monitor. “—to cloud your judgment. You know as well as I do that there are always several solutions to a problem. I learned that from you! Don’t let him defeat you into thinking you have to follow his plan.”
“You wouldn’t be saying that because you shacked up with Katie, would you now?”
Luther sucked in a breath of air and glanced at Blake. But the young vampire seemed as surprised as Luther himself that Samson knew about him and Katie.
“Goddamn it, Luther, I can smell her on you from across the room!”
“Samson,” Haven interrupted, “this has—”
“Stay out of this, Haven!” Luther snapped, before addressing Samson again. “It doesn’t matter what’s between me and Katie. It’s none of your fucking business. And it has no bearing on how I feel about this situation. But I’m not going to let you trade one innocent for another. That’s not what you stand for Samson. You know it. Would you be able to live with yourself if Forrester harmed Katie? And every time you looked at your daughter, would you be able to forget what you had to do to get her back? To sacrifice another innocent for her?” Luther shook his head. “That’s not the Samson I remember.”
“You’ve been gone for a long time, Luther. I’ve changed. I’m a father now. I have other priorities.”
“Other priorities, maybe. But other values, other morals? No.” Luther sighed. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life. My biggest one was not to trust you and Amaury. Because deep down I always knew you were steadfast, the rocks I could rely on for anything.” He glanced at Amaury, then back at Samson. “I regret what I did to both of you and your mates. I regret every single second of it. That’s why I came back. To atone. To make good the wrongs I committed. That’s why I was there the night Isabelle got taken. To talk to you and Amaury and ask for your forgiveness. But I’ll be damned if I’m gonna ask forgiveness of a man who’s prepared to deliver an innocent into unspeakable horror. I will not stand idly by and let it happen.”
There was no sound in the room. Nobody spoke. Nobody as much as breathed.
Samson’s nostrils flared as he visibly tried to control the emotions warring inside him.
“You have the greatest minds at your disposal here,” Luther said, making a sweeping motion with his arm. “Think for a moment. There must be another way to get your daughter back without putting Katie in harm’s way.”
Samson pointed at him. “You and me. Outside.” Samson marched to the door and opened it.
Luther followed him outside and closed the door behind him. There was nobody but the two of them in the corridor.
“If you’re playing me, Luther, you’re a dead man.”
“I gain nothing by playing you.”
Samson scoffed and motioned to the conference room. “Don’t lie to me. I’m not blind. Katie shielded you as if you meant something to her. You’re doing this for her, not because you can’t stand the fact that an innocent might be harmed.”
“Let’s not fight about who’s got a nobler motive. It doesn’t matter. If you’re worried that you’ll have to tolerate me once all this is over, don’t be. I’ll be leaving once your daughter and Katie are safe. I never intended to stay in San Francisco. All I wanted was absolution for my sins so I could start a new life somewhere else. I can see now that you’re not able to grant me that.” Luther looked down at his shoes. “Doesn’t matter now. I still want to offer you my help saving your daughter.”
“While protecting Katie,” Samson added.
Luther lifted his eyes and met Samson’s gaze. “Yes. I owe her that. She showed me that there is hope even for somebody like me. And while you ma
y never believe me, those twenty years in prison changed me. I’m not the same angry man anymore.”
Samson nodded slowly. “And Vivian? Have you forgiven her?”
“I can’t blame her. She had nothing to live for. I wasn’t the husband she needed. I was the husband she got.” Luther sighed. “You’re a father, Samson. A good one from what I can see. I’m not like you. I could have never been the kind of father my child deserved. Vivian was right to leave me. I’m only sorry that I didn’t see it earlier and that I put you and Amaury through so much pain. I understand why you can never forgive me.”
“You want your slate wiped clean?” Samson asked.
“Yes.”
“Then help me get my daughter back safe and sound. You were always one of the best. I hope you haven’t lost any of your skills.”
38
Everybody was talking over each other, voicing their opinions on what the next plan of action should be. Katie eyed the door through which Samson and Luther had left a few minutes earlier. Were they arguing? Or even fighting? She couldn’t hear anything. The conference room was soundproof since confidential things were often discussed inside its walls.
“Hey.”
Wesley’s voice made her turn her head. She watched him as he sat down in the chair Luther had occupied only moments earlier. He grasped her hand with both of his.
“I’m prepared to do the exchange,” she said.
“I know that, sweetheart. But as much as I hate to agree with Luther, he’s right. We can’t just exchange one innocent for another. We won’t gain anything by doing that. On the contrary: as soon as he has you, he’ll disappear. At the moment he has to stick around, because he wants you. Once we give him what he wants, we’ve missed our chance to capture him.”
“But Isabelle. She must be out of her mind by now. I know how scared she must be. Wes, I can’t let her suffer in my stead.”
From her other side, Oliver turned to them. “You know what I find odd? That Forrester would tell us so far in advance when the exchange will take place. Why even tell us? Doesn’t he tip his hand by doing that and giving us time to prepare?”
