Her Mortal Mate

Chapter Seven: Warning

Sargent Moore

"Here ya go Sarg." Lana handed me a cup of coffee.

"Thank you, Lana," I said, setting my headphones aside to scrub my aching eyes.

"Think fast!" She tossed something from her desk drawer at me. I caught it right before it hit me square in the forehead. It was an new pack of Visine eye relief.

"You always have the most useful things on hand," I said gratefully, ripping open the package of eye drops to help sooth my aching, dry and tired eyes. There was no rest for the weary, or wicked. There was a life on the line and we had all the leads to follow and so much more video footage and audio to sift through. While we were tired, we were all excited and focused because we weren't left high and dry on this one. We wouldn't be going home for a while, at least until we ran down all the leads and had nothing else to follow. Soon, I would start rotating a person out for an hour or so to take a break and get a short nap in. I didn't want my people dead on their feet, because vital information was missed that way.

She shrugged before taking a seat in her chair. "What can I say, I'm always ready?"

I looked down at the time and sighed. It hadn't been that long. It had just been over an hour since I'd tried calling Jadea. Briar and Derrick should be returning anytime now. I was almost done with the second, and shortest, recording of the group. There wasn't much on it other than little snippets of sound or distant conversation that had been hard to decipher, even using the audio software.

Right as I was going to start the third recording, Briar and Derrick came trotting in. "I was beginning to worry about you," I said to them.

"It took a little longer than anticipated. We did a more extensive search for video footage than Jadea had initially asked for," she shrugged.

"I'm shocked, Sargent Moore!" Lana noted in a teasing, surprised tone. "You're ever the straight and narrow kind of man. Yet, you're allowing them to collect evidence illegally?"

I sighed. I had been afraid something like this would happen, but had been hopeful. And even though I knew this would come up, I still hadn't really figured out a good enough excuse for their behavior.

"We are private investigators," Derrick said.

"On top of your current career of being one of the top bands in the world?" she asked testily, crossing her arms.

Briar, the little spitfire, stepped in front of Derrick and squared off. "We did have a life before the band, and we do have a life outside of the band. We," she indicated Derrick over her shoulder, "Decided to get into the private investigation business."

I wasn't sure if Lana would take it. "You have your papers?"

"I've got them online. If you want to look at them, I can access them?" he asked, his posture and tone sounding more bored than bothered. It was then I realized they were dressed and I had to wonder how they retrieved them without racking up an indecent exposure charge.

"Where are the others?" Lana demanded.

"Following up on a lead that's taking them south," Briar deadpanned.

Lana considered everything before nodding. She must have reasoned that demanding such information would only delay us more and, while what Briar and Derrick had done wasn't necessarily something a private investigator should have done, it would help us in the long run. When Briar realized Lana had backed down, she turned to me and continued. "Then we went back to Adam's to make sure we hadn't missed anything, and to hack into his computers to check recent documents and emails."

Smart. "Did you find anything?"

"Sadly no," she huffed and I saw her shoulders droop. "Were you able to find out anything?"

"Yes. But, you'll need to give us about five minutes to follow up on a few things before we can share."

"Fair enough. That will give me a chance to go pee." She skipped off to the restrooms while Derrick sat down at one of the empty desks and clicked on the computer.

"Y'all have five minutes before we play hot potato!" I announced loudly and everyone went scrambling.

"Is there a way to sign in as a guest?"

I rolled over to where the larger than life Derrick was at and, with a few clicks, had it unlocked for him. "Where are all the videos?" I'd been expecting some kind of hard evidence.

"Destroyed."

Hold up. "What?” That didn’t sound right. Had they somehow gone through the tapes out in the field somehow? Or had they used Adam’s computer? “Then how--

"On the phone," he interrupted gruffly as if I should have known that, pointing to a phone they had to have bought from a general store. It looked very plain and new to be something major rock stars would be carrying around.

Alrighty then. I was curious as to what kind of voodoo magic they had up their sleeves that allowed them to store vast amounts of video on such a device.

"Don't ask. I'm not the magician," Derrick groused. "And I'm not sure Briar will be able to explain. Her brother is the genius of the group. He told her what to do to make it do this."

Could he read my mind?

They were werewolves but, I didn't think that was something that was normal.

Derrick smirked. "I can guess what you're thinking by your expressions, and body language."

Hmm. Dangerous and smart. "Good to know."

"Ya have to be in order to be in the business we are in," he grumbled just loud enough for me to hear.

Right. They did hunt evil immortals for a living, which meant they were placed in precarious positions. They had to be able to read not only the situation, but the vile immortal they were hunting.

When Briar returned, I checked my phone and called out once again. Everyone rolled out with their chairs and we sat in a circle. Briar and Derrick turned in their seats but didn’t join the group. I grabbed the soft child's potato toy, that had a whacky funny face on it, from my desk drawer and tossed it to the person directly across from me, who happened to be Lana. Basically, we would toss the potato around and report what we knew. The one who had the most significant information to share at each round of hot potato received a little extra, under the table bonus at the end of every quarter. It was one of the ways I kept my crew from becoming stagnant.

"Lana?" I prompted.

"I have a list of all places where quads are sold in the following counties: Stanislaus, San Joaquin, Sacramento, Contra Costa, Alameda, Solano, Santa Clara, Merced, Mariposa, Tuolumne, and Calaveras. I have their business names along with their phone numbers all put into excel so I can easily note who I have talked to and if I have received their sell records. As for rentals, I am starting with Stanislaus, San Joaquin and Merced counties first with their business names and numbers on a spreadsheet as well. Since we have most of the information for the vehicle, it shouldn't be hard to find."

"Overachiever!" one of the guys coughed teasingly.

She didn't hesitate. She chucked the potato at his head and it rebounded off of his face.

"Ow!" he shot while the rest of us laughed. He grumbled something as he reached down and picked up the child's toy. "There isn't much I can report from the videos I've been staring at this entire time. Our suspected vehicle hasn't popped up anywhere."

"Wow, so informative," someone groused, unimpressed.

"Hey, hey. Calm down now," I warned.

The potato was passed. "Well, unlike someone else," Nam said pointedly, "I've been able to locate the hotel they were staying at. And I have a name."

My heart jumped in excitement. Briar and Derrick sat up a little straighter.

"The rooms were under the name Jericho Williams."

I looked at Briar and Derrick, waiting for some recognition to pass over their expressions. But there was nothing. Briar held my gaze and shook her head indicating she didn't recognize the name.

Nam gave the name of the hotel. It was a small, run down place that was on the outskirts of the city. A place that wouldn't draw much attention if there was some suspicious activity going on. "And, based off of what the receptionist said, they haven't checked out yet."

Odd...

Briar and Derrick shared a concerned look too.

"Good job, Nam."

A few of the others had seen the vehicle in question on streets leading to the hotel. But they hadn't spotted it since.

When the potato was passed back to me, I gave a quick report on what I had been working on and what I found out. Mainly, I stated everything because Briar and Derrick hadn't been here for what I'd initially found. My group already knew what I had found: the information pertaining to the vehicle; the calls to the police that Adam had made; the description of the vehicle. "I haven't heard back from the officer that was dispatched, but I know one was sent to check up on the calls."

"The receptionist did say that an officer had stopped by earlier asking if someone at the residence had been in distress. If someone had shown some odd or unusual behavior or if someone had come in asking for help. They hadn't noticed anything. The cop had walked around the complex, but hadn't found anything out of the ordinary."

Damn! That was disappointing. He had been so damn close...

"Well, I believe Nam wins this round." I marked a tally on the small whiteboard where their names were written down. It helped me keep count of the bonus amount that was owed to each member. "Great job everyone! Why don't you all take a half hour break. Get something to eat. Drink. Nap. Don't care. I'll see you back here in a bit."

Once everyone had filed out, I turned back to Briar and Derrick.

"There was something else, wasn't there?" Briar asked knowingly.

I nodded at her question. "In the first recording, Adam had caught one of the perps talking to someone else on the phone. They had gone to Mrs. Lindsay's with the intent of killing her and Adam's children."

I saw Briar's expression fall and Derrick rested a supportive, comforting hand on her shoulder. I couldn't quite explain her devastated, forlorn look but it made me uncomfortable.

"And," I continued after a few moments to allow her to get her composure back. "From what I understood, Jadea is being set up. The speaker--who I am assuming for the moment is Jericho--said that she wouldn't be able to help but follow the trail down to SoCal. They are walking into some kind of trap."

Briar didn't wait. She stood up and paced. In the silence, I swear I felt some kind of disturbance in the air. Like a buzz of some kind. Was she talking telepathically with Jadea?

"We don't need phones to communicate," Derrick confirmed, a smirk on his face. "She's telling them what you've found and warning them. You've done a fantastic job, Sargent Moore. Thank you."

"Don't thank me yet. We're not done. Adam hasn't been found."