by Tina Folsom
“And as we all know, you’re speaking from experience.” Samson’s voice remained even, though his jaw seemed to tighten.
“Listen, Samson, I just want to make sure that what happened down there was real.” He turned to Blake. “You said you piped back the video feed to HQ?”
“We did.”
“With your permission, Samson, I’d like to have a look at that. I want to see Forrester with my own eyes. Peace of mind, you know.”
After a few seconds, Samson nodded. “Fine. Blake will debrief the team anyway. You can join them and see for yourself that it was Forrester.” He smiled at his daughter and pressed a kiss on the top of her head. “He won’t hurt you anymore, Isa.”
“I can’t wait to see Mom.”
“She already knows you’re safe. She can’t wait to hold you in her arms. She’s meeting us at headquarters.”
43
Luther followed Blake into the situation room, where they were greeted with cheers by Scanguards’ inner circle. Blake was instantly surrounded by several young hybrids, Gabriel, Amaury, and Zane as well as a few other vampires.
Several monitors graced one wall, replaying different parts of tonight’s rescue mission.
“Well done!” Thomas said, nodding at Luther.
Eddie walked up to Luther, slapping him on the shoulder. “It all went smoothly. Thanks for helping us.”
“Does Katie know yet?”
Eddie nodded. “We called her the moment we knew Forrester was dead and Isabelle safe. She’s very relieved.”
“Good.” He looked past Eddie. “Are those all the recordings you have from the mission?”
Thomas joined them. “Yes, why?”
“Can you show me the beginning? I want to see Forrester.”
Thomas raised an eyebrow, but motioned him to the console that controlled the monitors. Eddie followed them.
“Is there a problem?” Thomas asked quietly.
“I’m not sure. I just want to make sure it’s him. From where I was I couldn’t see him.”
Eddie nodded. “I know. We watched your movements via your camera.” He pointed to Luther’s jacket, reminding him that he was still wearing the hidden camera.
Thomas pressed a few buttons and pointed to one of the monitors. “I’ll feed everything we have that shows Forrester’s position into here.”
Luther lifted his head and examined the images on the screen. The action started when the helicopter touched down and somebody jumped from it, either Blake or Samson. Moments later the frogmen appeared from the other side and were caught in Blake’s camera angle. Then the shooting started. One camera zoomed in on the window. The light from the helicopter hit just right, suddenly illuminating a face. Forrester. Luther recognized him from the picture Thomas had distributed before the mission. There was no doubt.
Luther watched as Forrester opened his mouth as if to scream.
“When he started shooting, we had to act quickly,” he heard Blake say to his colleagues.
Luther spun around. “Are you sure Forrester shot at you?”
Blake nodded. “Yeah, we heard the shots. Wasn’t one of our guys. They had strict orders not to shoot until I gave the okay.”
“That’s impossible.” Luther pointed back to the monitor. “Where’s his gun?”
For a moment Blake said nothing.
“Did your guys remove Forrester’s gun before I walked into the building?” Luther asked.
“No. Nobody touched anything until after you and I left.”
“Then how could he have shot at you when there was no gun? The explosion wasn’t strong enough to pulverize his weapon. Hell, I saw parts of a radio and some metal bits. But nothing that looked like a gun.”
Blake ran a hand through his hair. “Fuck!”
Luther turned back to the monitor, staring at it again. He felt the other vampires in the room come closer, also looking at the monitor.
“Play it again from where we see Forrester’s face.”
Thomas followed his request and replayed the image.
“It looks like he’s screaming,” Eddie said next to him.
Luther looked over his shoulder at Blake. “Did you hear him scream?”
“No. Not a sound. And we were close enough. We would have heard him.”
“Thomas, can you zoom in on his mouth?”
Luther focused his eyes on Forrester’s mouth as Thomas increased the image by two hundred percent. That’s when he saw it.
“Oh shit!” Luther slammed a fist on the desk. “You know what this is?” He pointed to the charred looking inside of Forrester’s mouth. “Forrester’s mouth and throat were burned with a UV ray gun to prevent him from speaking.” He pivoted, facing the other men in the room. “Forrester was a patsy.”
“But how?” Blake stared at him in disbelief.
“Get Isabelle in here. She can identify her kidnapper,” Luther ordered.
Gabriel rushed outside, leaving the door open.
“Thomas, put the photo of Forrester up on another monitor.”
Without a word, Thomas executed the command and displayed the picture. Footsteps came closer a moment later and Luther looked to the door. Samson rushed in, followed by Delilah who had her arm around Isabelle. Samson’s two hybrid sons were behind them.
“What’s going on?” Samson asked, his voice tense.
“I believe Forrester was a scapegoat.” Luther looked at Isabelle. “Isabelle, was this the man who kidnapped you?” He pointed to the screen.
Isabelle took a few hesitant steps closer, clutching her mother’s hand. Her eyes moved, looking at the picture on the screen. Then she met Luther’s gaze. “No. That’s not him.”
Luther felt as if a vise was tightening around his heart and squeezing all life from it. “Shit!” The wheels in his head began to turn. There had to be a way to figure out who had been using Forrester to lead them on the wrong trail. “Thomas, you said you had a recording of when the kidnapper killed Mendoza and took Isabelle. Let me hear it.”
“Give me a sec.” Thomas clicked on an icon on the computer, then opened various folders, until finally, he clicked an audio file and turned up the volume for all in the room to hear.
“Here she is.”
“That’s Mendoza,” Thomas said.
Somebody grunted. “Who the fuck is that? That’s not Kimberly Fairfax! What am I paying you good money for?”
“That’s him,” Isabelle said, her voice shaking. “That’s the man who took me after killing Mendoza.”
Luther’s heart turned to ice. “Turn it off, Thomas.” He stared at the people in the room. “I know him. It’s one of the guards from the prison. It’s Norris.”
No wonder he’d been able to use Forrester. Norris knew everything about him. It all made sense now.
“He would have known about Forrester’s obsession with Katie, but I don’t think Forrester was the one who wrote the letters. Norris was. He set it all up. Forrester had movie posters with Katie in his cell. Maybe Norris saw her there for the first time and developed his own obsession.” Luther ran a shaky hand through his hair. “Norris went on leave the night I was released. He must have hired Mendoza to snatch Katie for him, and then when he realized that Mendoza got Isabelle instead, he changed his plan and grabbed Forrester.”
“But why?” Samson asked.
“He knew he needed to do an exchange. And he needed a fall guy for that. So he got Forrester, tied him up and let us believe he was the kidnapper.” Luther pointed at the monitor. “I saw something blink silver in the light when I was in the storehouse where Forrester supposedly blew himself up. There were remnants of a speaker or a radio. My guess is that Norris piped all the sounds in remotely via a radio, the gunshots you heard. He must have been watching via a camera. He made us believe that Forrester spoke to us and shot at us. That’s why there was no gun. Forrester was a sitting duck. Norris waited for us to get close enough and then blew him up. And so Forrester couldn’t warn us, he singed his mouth
and throat with UV rays.”
Luther had done the same to Bauer in the prison, so he knew it worked.
“Shit!” Samson cursed. “But how did he know that Katie wouldn’t be there and we’d be sending a vampire disguised as her?”
“He was counting on it. That’s why he gave us so much time to tell us when the exchange would take place: so we would come up with the idea to send in a double.” He shot a look at Blake. “Who’s with Katie?”
“Wesley,” Blake replied. Then he motioned to Eddie. “Send reinforcements to her house immediately. And warn them. Now!”
“I’m going there myself,” Luther said and charged toward the door, when he almost ran into Wesley. “What are you doing here?” He looked past him, but he was alone. “Where’s Katie?”
Wesley’s eyebrows snapped together. “At home, why? I left when we got word that the mission was a success and Forrester was dead.”
“Oh fuck!”
“She’s not answering her phone,” Eddie said from the other end of the room.
Thomas dialed on another phone. “I’m trying her cell.”
Luther’s blood froze in his veins. For a few seconds there was no sound in the room. Only a faint ringing sound coming through Thomas’s cell phone. Then it went to voicemail. A look of regret colored Thomas’s eyes as he shook his head.
Luther felt a cold shudder race down his spine. “Oh God no, he’s got her. Norris took Katie.”
44
For a few seconds, Luther was in shock. He’d failed to protect Katie. And now she was in the hands of a madman.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Wesley cursed.
Gasps and curses flew through the room. Isabelle started to cry.
“Ok, everybody listen up,” Blake said loudly. “We’ve gotta find her.” He looked at the clock on the wall. “We have less than one and a half hours until sunrise. We need to find out where he’s taking her before the sun comes up or we risk losing them.” Blake started to issue orders. “Wes, scry for her. Now!”
“I’ve still got some hair from her in my office,” he mumbled to himself and ran down the hallway.
“Thomas, get us everything you have on this Norris.”
Thomas nodded. “Already on it. My team just hacked into the prison authority’s computer system. We should have all they have about him in a few moments.” He motioned to Eddie and the two started typing away on their computers.
“I’ve already sent two guys to Katie’s house,” Amaury confirmed. “They’ll call us in case she’s still there.”
Luther knew it was a long shot, but Scanguards was thorough and couldn’t just dismiss the possibility that Katie was asleep and had switched off the ringer on her phone. In his heart though, he knew that Norris had snatched her while all of Scanguards had been occupied on Alcatraz. He would make good on his threats now: to take Katie away.
All of a sudden remembering something, Luther said out loud, “He’s sailing into the sunset with her. That’s it! The marinas!”
Blake and several others looked at him. “What about the marinas?” Blake asked.
“Norris told the other guards that he was going to leave everybody in his wake. That’s a nautical term. And in the letters he talks about sailing into the sunset with Katie. He’s gonna be on a boat.” He walked to where Thomas and Eddie were sitting. “Can you find out if he has a boat registered to him?”
Eddie looked over his shoulder. “Already on it. Give me a minute.”
Luther looked back at Samson and Amaury. “How many marinas are along the Bay?”
“Too many,” Samson said instantly. “Sausalito, Larkspur, Oakland, Alameda and a few others on the East and South Bay. There must be around a dozen.”
Luther shook his head. “Forget everything but San Francisco. He doesn’t have time to cross any of the bridges. He planned this ahead of time. He knew he only had a short window of time to grab Katie. He wouldn’t risk having to drive through half the city. What’s the closest marina to Katie’s house?”
“Thomas?” Samson asked.
“Monitor four,” Thomas said.
Luther looked at the screen, where suddenly a map appeared. A red dot was blinking in the Haight Ashbury area: Katie’s house. Blue lines flashed from her house, all leading toward the water. Then one line turned bold.
“South Beach, the yacht club behind AT&T Park,” Samson said.
“I got a photo of Norris,” Thomas announced and projected it on a monitor.
Luther looked at Isabelle. “Do you recognize him?”
Shivering visibly, Isabelle nodded. “That’s him.”
Eddie swiveled in his chair. “No boats registered in Norris’s name. Sorry.”
Luther cursed. Nonetheless, he knew his hunch was correct. Norris was going to take Katie on a boat.
Somebody stormed into the room. Luther spun around. It was Wesley.
“I’ve got an approximate location, but she’s still moving.”
“Where?” Luther asked frantically.
“On Bryant Street, driving toward the water.”
“He’s heading for the marina. Let’s go. We’ve gotta reach him before he can leave with the boat.” He looked at Samson. “Can we take the helicopter?”
With a regretful sigh Samson shook his head. “The pilot already parked it in the hanger in South San Francisco. We don’t have time to bring it back.”
“I’m parked out front,” Wesley said, already running toward the elevator. “Let’s go.”
Luther followed him, his heart racing. He had to get to Katie before it was too late. He owed her that. She’d trusted him to keep her safe. And not only that: he needed her to be safe. He needed Katie to be alive and happy. He regretted now not having told her how he felt. Regretted having been a coward and not having confessed that without her he was nothing, just an empty shell, because she had crept into his heart and made herself at home there, without him even noticing at first. But once he’d realized it, he’d done nothing to push her away. Instead he’d started craving that feeling she gave him, the feeling of being worthy of love. Katie’s love.
“I’m coming with you,” Blake called after him, then barked more orders to his team. “Check who’s on patrol in that area and send them to the marina at South Beach Park. Then alert our contact at the Coast Guard. And have weapons ready for us in the lobby.”
The elevator doors parted and Wes stepped in. Luther was on his heels. Blake came running and jumped in just before the doors closed.
All three exchanged concerned looks.
“Can’t you put a protection spell on Katie?” Blake asked Wesley.
Katie’s brother shook his head. “Takes too long. I don’t have all the things here that I need for that. We don’t have that kind of time.” Wes hit his hand against the wall. “I shouldn’t have left her alone.”
Blake grunted. “You couldn’t know.”
“He fooled us all,” Luther said. “But I swear, Norris isn’t gonna get away with this. He’s not gonna take Katie away from me.”
When Blake and Wes stared at him in surprise, Luther realized what he’d said. But he didn’t back down from it now. He wasn’t going to deny any longer that his heart belonged to Katie.
“I’ll kill him.”
The elevator stopped and they exited on the lobby level. A vampire was waiting for them, handing them a bag. “Your weapons.”
Blake took the bag. “Thanks, Rob.”
Luther charged out the door ahead of the other two. He looked over his shoulder at Wes. “Which car?”
Wes pointed to a BMW, clicking his key simultaneously. The lights of a black BMW seven series blinked. “Hop in.”
Luther marched toward the car, when two vampires stepped in his path.
“Luther West,” one of them addressed him. “You’re under arrest.”
The other stranger jumped behind him, slammed him over the hood of the BMW, and cuffed his hands behind his back so fast Luther could barely comprehend what was h
appening to him.
“Shit!” he cursed. “Let go of me!”
“What’s going on here?” Blake interrupted.
Luther twisted his head to the side. “Tell these idiots to let me go. I need to get to Katie.” He pushed back, trying to get the vampire who’d cuffed him off his back, but the guy was of massive proportions. He knew exactly who these two were: trackers sent by the council to apprehend him.
“Stop struggling, West! Let’s go!”
The other tracker addressed Blake, flashing him a badge. “We’re from the council. Enforcement Division.” He jerked his thumb in Luther’s direction. “West broke into the prison and assaulted several guards. We’re taking him back to charge him.”
“You can’t do that!” Blake protested. “We’re in the middle of a rescue operation. A woman will die if you don’t let him go.”
“Nice try,” the vampire said.
“He’s telling the truth!” Wes shouted and charged at them. “Let him the fuck go, or I’m gonna turn you into a toad!”
“Fucking witch!” was the tracker’s reply.
From the corner of his eye, Luther saw the guy aim his weapon at Wesley.
“Don’t, Wes!” Luther warned and kicked back, using the vampire’s momentary surprise at seeing a witch to push him off his back. He managed to stand up and barreled against the tracker brandishing the gun at Wesley.
“Stop! Drop your weapons!” Samson’s authoritative voice sounded from behind them.
The eyes of the other two trackers widened instantly. Luther looked over his shoulder and saw Samson, Amaury, and Gabriel standing in a line, all of them armed with semi-automatics pointed at the two vampire enforcers.
Luther breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank God you’re here.”
