by Fall, Carly
A couple of taps later, the screen flickered, and the parking lot to Walmart came into view. A few more keystrokes and the screen broke up into four frames, each showing a different area of the inside of Walmart, as well as the parking lot.
“Not a lot of cars in the parking lot because it's close to dawn,” Cy mumbled as he took control of the camera perched on top of the building and began to zoom in and look at the cars. "Not too many people except the tweakers, stoners, and maybe a vampire getting ready to turn in for the day."
“She took the blue Range Rover,” Emily said quietly from behind Aiden. He felt her hand rest on his shoulder, trying to comfort him.
“Nothing,” Cy said, looking at Aiden.
Aiden stared at the computer screen, gnashing his teeth. She wasn’t at Walmart. Then a thought occurred to him: she wasn’t at that Walmart. Who was to say she didn’t go to another one? It was a long shot, but it was all they had. Hell, she could have been lying and not gone to Walmart at all, and just got in the car and took off. He had to be sure, because he felt the panic clenching his gut, his sixth sense coming online strong. Something wasn’t right. He began to feel the certainty that she hadn’t left and she was in a shitload of trouble.
“Check every fucking Walmart in town,” Aiden growled.
Cy began typing away, and ten minutes later and three store parking lots, she hadn’t been found. As Cy put in a few more keystrokes, he mumbled, “Last one in town. If she isn’t here, I think we can assume she jacked the car and took off.”
The screen flickered, and the parking lot came into view. “There it is,” Thaddeus said gravely. Aiden sat forward as Cy maneuvered the camera to do a quick look at the license plate. “Confirmed,” he said as the plate came into view.
“Get into the security footage for the past three hours,” Aiden barked.
A few minutes later, they watched the feed as the Rover pulled into the parking lot. Holly got out and walked hesitantly into the store.
“Find out where she goes once she's in there,” Aiden demanded.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
The footage was grainy, but Aiden would have recognized Holly anywhere. He recognized the sway of her hips as she walked into the store. Then she ran her hand through her hair, and if there had been any doubt in his mind, that alone would have cemented the fact that yes, that was Holly.
They watched as she entered the store, and then caught her again on a different feed as she headed for the back of the store. She passed the toys, the paint section, the towels and turned into the aisle with the big Sporting Goods sign above. Right in front of the basketballs, she stopped and looked around. She waited for a moment, and then a male approached her. The male was dressed in a dark suit and had darker hair, his skin coloring was white, and he seemed to move a little slowly, as though he had something wrong with him. They talked for a moment. Holly’s body language said that she was terribly uncomfortable. The male grabbed her arm and dragged her toward the door marked Employees Only.
Aiden could feel his body begin to vibrate. No one, no fucking one handled his female like that.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
The view changed again, and they watched the feed from the employees' camera feed. Holly looked around, and then looked directly into the camera. She began to run, and the male tackled her from behind, sending her to the ground. Aiden sprung out of his chair as if the thing had goosed him, his fangs punched through his gums, and a low, deadly snarl passed his lips.
“Em, get the kids out of here,” Thaddeus said in a low voice. “Hugo, go with them.” Aiden barely heard the shuffling as the four left the room.
Aiden watched as Holly was dragged to her feet. She looked back up to the security camera, and then kicked something under a pallet.
“Rewind that, Cy. See if you can get in closer,” Thaddeus said. He put his hand on Aiden’s shoulder and told him to plant it. Aiden obeyed, and Thaddeus leaned in over his shoulder.
When they zoomed in, they saw it was a cell phone that she had soccered under the pallet. Cy cut the frame tight to Holly’s face. She looked as if she were pleading with the camera. She then mouthed, Help me. The male dragged her out the back door, and the camera caught her being thrown into the back of a van before the back door to the building closed, blocking their view.
They all backed away from the monitor.
“Okay,” Thaddeus said as he began to pace around the large conference table. “Let’s go over what we know. Something had happened that caused Holly to leave the house on her own volition and meet whoever that was on the camera in Walmart."
“It was obvious she was waiting for him,” Cy said.
“So he contacted her,” Thaddeus said, still pacing.
Aiden felt the anger roll through him, making his bones shake. No one handled his female like that. No one. And no one took her from him. If she were to leave on her own, that was one thing, but for that cocksucker on the camera to forcefully take her, it went beyond unacceptable.
“So why drop the phone? It looked pretty obvious that she hoped the camera caught it all,” Thaddeus mused.
Besides the anger, Aiden’s sixth sense was going off, and the ring-a-ding ding in his head was almost deafening.
Holly had hoped that they would check the security cameras, of that he was certain. She kicked the phone under the pallet so that if they were smart enough to get to step one, checking the security feeds, they could get to step two, which was getting that phone. There was something on that phone that she wanted them to see.
“She wants us to get the phone,” Aiden gritted through his fangs. He looked at the clock hanging on the wall that read seven in the morning, and felt like ripping the thing from its perch and decimating it.
They would have to wait until nightfall to go and get that phone, or they would go up in smoke. Aiden couldn’t imagine waiting the full day to head down to Walmart. But wait, where was that angel fucker, Mark? He could go. He asked no one in particular.
“He left and said he didn't know when he would be back,” Emily said, coming in the room. She took a chair at the table, worry creasing her brow. She looked at the computer monitor and squinted. She got up from the table and went over to the monitor to take a closer look.
"Cy, can you make this any clearer?" she asked.
Cy mumbled and slid his fingers over the keyboard. "That's it. Best I can do."
"Aiden, Thaddeus, come here," she said. She stood up and tapped the screen, Aiden and Thaddeus each looking over her shoulder. "That, I am eighty percent certain, is Victor Marano."
Aiden wanted to scream. He wanted to kill something, or multiple things. Victor Marano strikes again. A second strike against Aiden. The first, according to Mark, had been Natalie. Mark had told Aiden that Natalie had been killed by Victor. Now he had Holly? His Holly? Oh, shit just went nuclear critical.
"Call Mark, Thaddeus." Mark had been hanging around doing nothing but drinking vodka for over a week now, and then he decided to up and leave when he could actually be doing something productive and important? Aiden thought he would go completely mental.
“Call him,” he snarled at Thaddeus. “Track that pain in my ass down and tell him to go get that phone.”
Thaddeus dug into the pocket of his camos and found his phone. He dialed. “Nothing. Straight to voicemail.” Aiden was certain he was levitating off the ground at that point. There was no way such rage could not be bending time or some shit like that.
“Keep trying,” Aiden hissed.
Thaddeus looked at him hard. “You need to chill, my friend,” he said softly.
“Two words, Thad. Two words. Fuck. You.”
With that, Aiden turned, and left Central Control, heading for the bedrooms. He went to Holly’s room and shut the door. He would spend the day in here. He had to be near her things, near her scent. He had to keep the rage in place, because if he didn’t he knew he couldn’t handle the pain that was on its heels. It would take him down and make him immobile. And
for Holly’s sake, he couldn’t be immobile. Her very life may depend on it.
Aiden spent the day going from lying on the bed, to pacing from the length of the room, over and over. At one point he started going through Holly’s things. He felt like such a bastard, but as he surrounded himself with her things, he felt calmer.
He took out a t-shirt from the dirty clothes hamper and held it to his nose. The light lavender smell of Holly soothed him, and he went to sit on the bed. He closed his eyes and saw her navy blue eyes staring at him, and he could almost feel the softness of her skin. He lay on the bed and turned his head into the pillows. For a moment, he let the fear in. He couldn’t image a world without his little hellcat. With that thought, he felt the fear tighten his gut, and he felt like he might throw up, if he had anything in his stomach to evacuate. He had to stay tough, stay strong. He had to get his Holly back. She was kind, strong, beautiful and everything that was right in his world. He sent up a little prayer to The Creator, asking for her safe return.
Aiden thought over and over about the tape. Victor fucking Marano. The vampire was everywhere, his fingers in everything. First he had taken his Natalie, killing her just as she was about to give birth. Then he had sired how many countless kids—including Emily's Brandon—with human women, only to kidnap them and give them shots to draw out their vampire DNA. Now Holly. Brandon had said that Victor was creating his own race, and the only way Holly fit in there made his gut coil. He wanted to use her to make more for his little sick army of vampires that didn't uphold the Behavior Doctrine. This Victor guy had broken both rules countless times. He had no regard for the Doctrine. He had no regard for human life.
He had taken Holly a few hours before dawn. Victor knew that she had some vampire help on her side, and he knew that at dawn she would be his.
The next thought made him sit up on the bed. For her to offer herself up like she had, Victor had to have something important to her, like the friend that Holly tried to contact. The revelation brought another round of vicious curses and more pacing.
The endless loop continued all day. He paced. He lied down. He smelled her shirt. He went to the bathroom and smelled her shampoo. He paced more. He went back to the bed and tried to rest, but his body and soul were separated by an ocean from the country of Ease.
He looked at the clock and saw that it was finally one hour before nightfall. This may have qualified as the second longest day of his life. The first being the day Natalie was taken. He remembered the worry and panic that filled him as he waited for the sun to go down. And here he was again. Trapped by the sun.
He looked over at the pile of weapons on the chair and began rehearsing in his head how many ways he could kill that male in the surveillance feed, if it indeed was Victor as Emily ascertained. Then there was a soft knock on the door.
“Come in,” Aiden bit out.
His heart warmed as his son entered the room—his tether to the Earth, to his own special form of sanity. He smiled at the boy.
“Hey, Dad,” the boy said, shutting the door.
“What’s up, my man?” Aiden asked.
Robert looked around the room and then back at Aiden who was at the bed stage of his endless routine for the day. Robert walked over and sat down next to Aiden and looked his father square in the face.
“Dad,” the boy began softly, “I know you’re going to find her. I know it." The boy paused.
"I'm going to do my best to find her, Robert," Aiden said. He could tell the boy had more on his mind, and allowed the silence to stretch so that Robert would have a chance to say his piece.
"She said that if it was okay with you . . . she would be my mom.” The boy looked down at his hands. “You have to find her, Dad.” Then he burst out into tears.
Aiden pulled his son against his huge chest, and felt the pain wash through both of them. He had a passing thought that he was glad Robert hadn’t had to go through this the first time, with his real mom. He felt like his innards were being cut with glass, or a slow death by paper-cuts. Something long, brutal, and painful. He couldn't tell his son how bad he had messed everything up with Holly before she disappeared. Aiden couldn't tell him that it took her being abducted and put in mortal danger for him to accept that he was in love with Holly, and he would cut off his right nut to make sure she came home safely.
Home.
She had been at Thaddeus's house a mere two days, and he already considered this the place where she belonged. Where he and Robert belonged. Where they all belonged together—Home.
To make himself feel worse, he didn't know that Robert had cared that he didn't have a mother. He supposed he had never encouraged talk about Natalie because it hurt too much. Aiden was struck with the realization that he had been very, very selfish. He should have shared his memories of Natalie with Robert so that he would have something of her. Instead, he had kept them to himself, not wanting to relive the good times because it had been so painful to think about. And now, Robert had gone and asked Holly to be his mother. Aiden closed his eyes and had a brief vision of the three of them together as a family. It felt right.
How could he have screwed things up so badly? Why didn't he have as much steel in his spine as Holly?
He put his cheek to his son’s head, feeling the soft, dark hair against his skin. He found his strength. “Robert, on my word, I'm going to do everything to get Holly back. What happens after that is up to her, but I'm going to find her.”
Robert cried for a couple more minutes, and then nodded. He looked at Aiden, hope springing eternal from his eyes. “You’re gonna get her, Dad,” he said with such conviction, Aiden felt in his soul that the boy was right. What condition he found Holly in, and what had been done to her, was up for anyone's guess.
A small knock came on the door, and it opened. Emily stood in the hallway with a tray.
“Aiden,” she said softly. “I brought you some food. Please eat. You have to be strong for tonight.” She came in and brought the tray to the table by the sitting area, looking expectantly at him, her kind, green eyes willing him to move from the bed over to the food.
He knew she was right. Rest had not come to him during the day, but he could fuel his body for whatever battle lay ahead of him in…he checked the clock…forty minutes. Forty minutes and he was all over that big box called Walmart like ants on a picnic.
He nodded, got off the bed, and Emily left. He sat down in front of the tray and dug into the best damn pork chop he had ever had, as well as a vegetable medley and…hot damn. Cheesecake. If they were all going to get fat, at least it was on really good chow.
When he was done inhaling the food, he looked over at Robert, who was watching him with a grin. “Hugo’s a good cook, huh Dad,” the boy said.
Aiden smiled and nodded.
Aiden had seven minutes until the sun went down. He headed for the elevator. He checked his weapons again, and ran his hand through his dark curtain of shoulder-length hair. He checked the clock again. Five minutes. If that fucking pallet had been moved, he was going to rain down hell on the employees of Walmart. He assumed that being an employee of Walmart was kind of a hellish experience to begin with, but again, if they had moved that pallet and that phone was gone, they had no idea what the definition of a bad day entailed.
He hit the down button on the elevator and heard someone come into the room behind him, but didn’t check to see who it was. As the person stood behind him, not saying a word as if they were waiting for the elevator as well, he had a feeling it was Thaddeus. He turned slightly and looked out the corner of his eye, and saw the black leather trench coat and the blonde wavy hair. He could feel the blue eyes boring a hole through the back of his head. He turned, again thinking that Thaddeus belonged on the pages of some fashion magazine, not weaponed up and ready to get dirty.
Despite that, he said, “Thanks, man.” Thaddeus nodded, knowing what Aiden meant. Aiden appreciated the backup. Actually, Aiden appreciated someone coming who could put the leash on his d
og if things got out of control. And frankly, the way Aiden was feeling, he could see himself killing a human or three without much provocation. At this time, he walked a very precarious edge.
The doors opened, and Thaddeus and Aiden stepped in. Once in the garage, they took the Lincoln Navigator and sped out of the dirt road, the heavy silence a third passenger.
Chapter 28
Holly woke up with a headache. Her shoulders and wrists hurt, and it felt like her fingers were asleep. When she tried to move her arms to relieve some of the pressure from her shoulders, she realized that they wouldn't move. Her eyes flew open and she saw that her arms were shackled to a steel ring in the wall above her head. She looked around the room; she was sitting on a white tiled floor. The walls were white as well, and on the opposite side of the room there was a doctor's table like you would see at a gynecologist's, complete with stirrups. At the head of the table, there were more restraints in the wall, so that if someone were to be laid out on the table, their hands would be shacked above and behind their head. On the other side of the room, there was a small, dark wooded table with two chairs.
She swallowed, feeling fear ripple through her. She recalled going to Walmart and meeting that male who called himself Victor Marano. As she stood up, she felt her ribs and back begin to holler, and she remembered how he had thrown her to the ground when she tried to run. She hoped that the cell phone had stayed under the pallet of dog food where she had kicked it. That had been a gamble, but she figured there wasn't any way in hell that male was going to let her keep her cell phone. She hoped that the people at Thaddeus's house cared enough about her to try figure out where she had gone. She was certain Cy could hack into any system, including surveillance systems, and she just hoped that they had thought to look at all the Walmarts, not just the one by their house. She hoped that they would go find her phone and be able to trace the number that Victor had called from. It was a long shot, not to mention a lot of hope, she knew, but it was the only thing she could think of. She took a deep breath and tried to calm herself.