Tangled Blood Lines

by Deborah Noel

  “My friend, welcome.”

  “This is beautiful.”

  She smiled, “Still needs a few more touches of magic, but it’s comfortable. How can I help you?”

  “I need a truth serum to give to Remmie.”

  “Oh?”

  “I don’t think I will need it, but I would like to be on the safe side.”

  “What are we trying to get him to tell you?”

  “Well, I remembered when you told me he knew answers and could help us. I asked him questions about his life and he revealed he was hired as a cleaner to, well, basically clean up after messy vampires. I showed him Natalie’s picture and he said that was one of his jobs. I had a premonition that we were going over cases; I was showing him photos of the unsolved murders and he was telling me details. I just want to make sure he doesn’t lie to me and tell me what he thinks I want to hear just to get what he wants.”

  “Which is?”

  “A picture of the vampire Rage, so he knows what he looks like.”

  My witch friend thought for a moment. Shane joined us. Brae quickly brought him up-to-date.

  Shane rubbed his hands together, “You need an anti-lie serum. I will whip one up and bring it to the conference room in five minutes.”

  I smiled at them both. “Thank you.”

  I turned to leave when Brae grabbed my arm, “Hold on, let me grab some copal and I will go with you.”

  I waited while Brae disappeared through one of the beaded archways. Seconds later she came back with a small brown vile.

  We went to the conference room and Brae set up an incense warmer and emptied the vile of oil in the bowl above the votive candle. With a snap of her fingers, the candle’s wick began to dance with flame.

  “This is copal oil. Once the room’s aura includes the smell of copal, if they try to lie, they will expose themselves lying or will do something that will let you know they are lying, maybe like twitch as they are lying. With this and Shane’s anti-lie serum, Remmie should tell nothing but the truth.”

  Shane brought in a black coffee mug filled with a sweet smelling tea. He set it on the table. “I checked the monitors in Sam’s office, and he and Declan are bringing Remmie up now. Brae, we should go. Cianna, have him drink this tea.”

  “Thank you.”

  He nodded and led Brae by the hand back to their new home. She stopped to hand me a new amulet. This one was hanging from a silver chain. She leaned and whispered, “You’ll know what to do with it if the time comes.”

  I quickly hung it around my neck, “Thank you.”

  I took a seat on the far side of the long oak table. I put the folders containing the photos of the murders in front of me. I placed my laptop next to me and opened up WORD. I started to type in the personal questions I was going to ask Remmie, filling in the answers I already knew.

  Declan and Sam escorted Remmie in and offered him the seat across from me. They sat him in the chair and laid a silver chain over the top of his thighs, attaching it to the side of the chair. They each took a seat, on either side of him. Sam offered him the mug Shane had brought in.

  Remmie, handcuffed in silver cuffs, lined with fabric to keep the silver from actually touching his skin, took the cup in his hands and brought it up to his nose for a whiff. “Sweet.”

  I smiled at him, “A special blend, just for you.”

  He smelled it again and drank it slowly.

  When he was finished he thanked me. “So what can I do to help?”

  “Well, remember when you told me that you were sent to clean a few jobs and you couldn’t because the police were already there?”

  He nodded.

  “Well, if I show you some pictures, can you tell me if you recognize the scenes?”

  “Sure! Piece of cake. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

  “Before I show you any, will you tell me what details you know about the, let’s call it job?”

  “If you promise to show me a picture of Rage, I will tell you all I can.”

  “Fair enough.”

  I pulled to the top if the pile a file folder filled with the photos from the first murder scene I ever investigated. The MacNamanus family.

  Remmie sat up very straight and became extremely serious. “I must be honest, anything I may be able to tell you will be total speculation on my part based on rumors that I have heard or stories I have been told. I haven’t really followed through on investigation. That wasn’t my job; I was hired as simply a cleaner.”

  Sam nodded. “We understand.”

  Declan extended his hand to Remmie, “Thank you for doing this for us.”

  The vampire winked, “It isn’t without its price.”

  “Right, image of Rage.”

  “Yes, sir,” he rubbed his hands together. “Well, let’s get to this, aye?”

  I opened the folder and spread out the photos so they were facing Remmie. He looked them over carefully.

  “This one was particularly brutal,” Remmie remarked. “He spent some time at this place.”

  “How can you tell,” I asked.

  “The animals hanging around. He spent time feeding here. He must have been injured and needed time to heal.”

  “Why feed on animals when there were people here?”

  “His job was to send a message by killing the humans. He couldn’t drain them - well, feed on them. That’s why he wasted the blood though between you and me, I’m sure he took a taste or two. I would have.”

  “What rumors did you hear on this one?” Sam asked.

  “Well, truth of the matter is that a prominent vampire progeny, as we call our children, wanted vengeance for feeling neglected by those around him and hired another new vampire to take out the few he felt threatened by. This family was one.” He pointed to the man hanging in the shower. “He was the intended target. The woman and children were what we call a bonus.”

  I was amazed, but Remmie had just verified what Declan and I had concluded some time ago. “How can you tell?”

  “He’s a vampire.”

  The three of us said, “What?” at the same time.

  He moved the photo of the foot sliced open away from the others. “When a vampire slays another, to make sure there is no chance of healing, its feet are sliced open across the bottom to make sure all of its blood is drained.”

  “Interesting,” I uttered and quickly made a note of that fact on my laptop. Then I remembered what Jondra said about the henchman that sliced the bottom of her grandmother’s feet. I looked at Declan. He nodded silently in agreement.

  Declan gathered the photos and put them back in their folder.

  Sam spoke up, “So do you know whose work this is?”

  “Well, I heard Bernard tell of a big job this his brother, Leonard, did. These photos match his story.”

  “How do you think he was injured? By the other vampire?”

  Remmie smiled, “No, the dog.”

  Declan and Sam exchanged an agreeing look. I knew they were having a conversation telepathically, but I didn’t listen in.

  Keeping in line with my theory, I opened the folder with the Chamber/Fitzgerald murders. Declan looked at me and held my gaze for a moment.

  Remmie again carefully looked over the photos. He looked up at me, then over to Sam, then Declan.

  I asked, “What can you tell us about this one?”

  “Honestly, it’s another message sent.”

  The corners of my lips curved upward into a victorious grin. “Please, continue.”

  “Again, this is the work of Leonard. According to Bernard, he was hired to do two big jobs. This was his second and his last.”

  “Oh?” I questioned.

  “Well, you caught his remains smoldering in the fire pit here,” he pointed to the picture.

  “Who would have done that? Killed Leonard, I mean.”

  “Rage for sure,” he answered matter-of-factly.

  “Did Bernard turn his brother?” Sam asked.

  “Yes,” Re
mmie answered. “And I created Bernard. We went to school together and I contracted the flu. I was turned first, and then I turned him.”

  “Who is your maker?”

  “I honestly do not know. My mother paid a vampire passing through our town to save me from death. She never told me her name. She gave her all of our money and told her after I was turned that if she ever came back for me, she would expose her to the world.”

  “She never raised you nor contacted you?”

  “Not in 90 years.”

  Declan returned the conversation back to the photos, “Who was the target in this grouping?”

  “Hmm, hard to tell, to be honest.” Remmie deliberated with himself as he picked up each picture. “This is proving difficult.”

  As he took his time evaluating the images, I took the downtime to plug in the information about Bernard and Leonard into my laptop.

  After some time Remmie picked up one specific photo, “This one. He’s the target.”

  He was holding the photos of Declan’s brother’s severed head.

  Declan quickly asked, “What made you choose him over the others?”

  Remmie cleared the photos aside. He laid down Mallachy’s picture and picked out the other photos of each of the other victim’s decapitated heads.

  “Look at the facial expressions.”

  We all did.

  “His is the only one that lacks fear. He was killed first. Leonard called his name and when he responded, Leonard beheaded him.”

  I looked over all the images again. “How did I miss that?”

  “Too close to home,” Declan answered me.

  Ignoring us, Remmie continued. “There are two assassins here.”

  Sam asked how he knew that.

  “Brutality of the slayings. The target was the only one Leonard killed. A simple beheading. The rest were dismembered and the fear in their eyes tell me they had little time to react. A professional killed Leonard right after he killed the target and then focused on the rest of the humans. They were frozen in their fear. They were easy kills.”

  “Wow, you are good,” I complimented Remmie. “I’ve been reviewing these pictures for years and never saw what you did.”

  The vampire sat back in his seat and smiled contently. “All in a day’s work. Next?”

  Declan put away those photos, while I opened another folder. This one held the call center murders. While Remmie was looking over the new scene, I typed as fast as I could everything Remmie had said. I would arrange things in order later.

  “I was hired to clean this job. I took two others with me.”

  Sam chimed in, “Let me guess, Tomos and Bernard.”

  Remmie looked at Sam and simply nodded.

  “When we got there, we saw a dark figure coming from the ladies’ room. It spotted us and took off. I sent Bernard and Tomos after it, but it eluded them. I found a man lying in the hallway and instructed him to stay where he was. Workers began coming back so we left quickly.”

  “So you got there before the vampire was finished?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did you know to go there?”

  “My employer guessed that this particular target was next in line and sent us there. I didn’t ask questions.”

  I looked at Remmie. “Who was the target?”

  He immediately pointed to a young girl.

  “Do you know who she is?”

  He shook his head no.

  Declan questioned Remmie as to who his employer was.

  “I don’t ask. Anonymity is crucial in the cleaning business, it doubles the paycheck.”

  Once more I input the notes into the laptop. I jotted a note to myself to find the name of the girl in the picture Remmie indicated as the target.

  “Who do you think was the murderer?” I asked.

  “Looks like another execution carried out by Rage to me. We saw only one figure leave. He mostly works alone. A standard rule of thumb us vampire assassins follow is we have a back-up supe come with us.”

  “Supe?” Sam asked.

  “Sorry, I forgot I’m talking to humans. Supe is slang for supernatural.”

  “I knew that, Sam,” I joked with him.

  “Okay, so why does a vampire need an accomplice?”

  Remmie looked at Sam, “Don’t your police have partners?”

  Next was the Mehoff murders, the elderly couple left laying on their front lawn sliced open for the passers-by to see.

  Remmie told us that he was in the shadows of the bushes when we arrived. All he knew about this one was that the humans were killed for a bounty that had been placed on their lives. He didn’t know who ordered the hit or who collected the cash for the completed job. Remmie found it odd that no real details ever surfaced about this particular murder.

  The next collection of photos was of the three young men who were killed from behind while they walked home from a local pub. The target, according to Remmie, was the Casalle boy. His friends were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. He had heard little on the streets about this one. All that he was ever able to ascertain was that the boy was the son of a highly regarded official who had pissed of the wrong vampire and ended up on a hit list.

  Something struck with me about that, though my mind was cluttered with the information Remmie was quickly spewing out.

  The final scene was that of the lone old man. Remmie turned the pictures over so they were all facing down. “This one is my fault,” he confessed.

  We all wondered what he meant by that. Sam questioned Remmie, “You killed this man?”

  “No,” he denied quickly. “But Tomos and Bernard met a local vampire one night at an afterhours bar. They were being loud and obnoxious. I left them at the bar to go for a walk to get away from their childish antics.”

  “Go on,” Sam instructed him.

  “This man was in the bar. Apparently, he angered Tomos, which wasn’t hard to do. Their argument escalated and my associates were asked to leave, which they did. Instead of causing a scene, Tomos, Bernard and Reginald, the local, left the premises but waited for the old man outside. They stayed in the shadows while they followed him home. This was the end result. If I had been there, this wouldn’t have happened. I tracked them to this location by following Bernard’s scent. I gave them flack, threatening to abandon the mission and return to Oxmeade and tell him of them almost jeopardizing our secret existence. They all promised nothing of the sort would happen again. We then staged the scene to make it look as close to a murder carried out by another human as we thought it should look.”

  I chimed in, “I interviewed many people and no one ever mentioned him being in a bar that night.”

  Remmie shrugged his shoulders. “I’m telling you what I know.”

  I entered more notes in my laptop. We had covered all of the unsolved murders.

  “Okay, my turn,” Remmie announced excitedly.

  I nodded and excused myself from the room. I went into my office and pulled the folder of Shane’s drawings from my filing cabinet in the corner. I returned to the conference room and put the folder in front of the vampire.

  He looked up at me.

  I smiled, “As promised.”

  Declan put his hand on top of the folder before Remmie could open it. “These are as good as we have to offer. I promise you, they are an exact duplicate of what we actually saw.”

  Remmie’s eyes lit up, “You saw him too? You were there as well?”

  “Only once,” Declan answered.

  My husband flipped open the folder. If a vampire’s face could light up, I’m sure Remmie’s did. He slowly looked at all of the colored drawings. A smug smile crept across his face. His eyes seemed to glass over. He said nothing as he went through the images again and again, carefully taking in every detail. He stopped at the close-up sketches of the wild beast. He lingered, staring for several minutes. Then he put all of the pictures back in the folder and closed it. He sat back in the chair and closed his eyes. Finally he exha
led and whispered, “Thank you.”

  He sat up suddenly, causing us all to jump. “I want to help you find him.”

  “Who?” we all asked at the same time.

  “This beast,” he put his still handcuffed hands on top of the folder.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because you won’t be able to do it on your own. I have connections, I have tracking abilities, military experience. I make the playing field more even. None of you would stand a chance against him. Besides, I am much older than all of you. And I am like him.”

  His last commented made my blood run cold. “Like him?”

  “Duh, I’m a vampire.”

  We all exchanged looks.

  “We will take it under advisement and let you know,” Declan spoke up.

  “Look, who here knows how to hunt a vampire?” Before any of us could answer, Remmie raised his own hand, “Um, I do! Look, I cannot return to Oxmeade now. That would only sign my own death warrant. I’m not stupid.”

  He looked around at each of us, then held my gaze. “I give you my word, I will not hurt any of you. I promise.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him, “What’s in it for you?’

  “A good ol’ fashion vampire hunt.”

  Declan and Sam took the silver chain from Remmie’s lap and helped him to his feet. “We’ll discuss it and let you know our decision.” They ushered him out of the conference room and back down to the holding cell. Before he stepped out of the room, he swung around to face me again. “Please, I beg of you. That girl on the beach was my great-granddaughter. You told me you would help me.”