By the time Sanchez got back with the wheelchair, which bore a striking resemblance to my old one, Mikki had me out of the jeep and ready. Luckily, there weren't any news vans around, so no one got a glimpse of me being carried around like a baby. Or better yet, imagine if the cops weren't here already and I had to call it in. Wouldn't that make a great headline? ‘Crippled Ex-Cop Rolls Over Body'.

The three of us walked up to the right address and it was just a basic storefront. There were no flashy signs or bright colors and he didn't even have a stupid name like ‘Wheels on the Go' or something. It was just called ‘Spelmann Custom Wheelchairs'. I bet it took him awhile to come up with that one.

The police and detectives on the scene were just like all the other crime scenes that I attended in the past. That is, there were way too many for what needed to be done. They parted for us as we approached, just like the Red Sea did for Moses. Everyone stared at us as we passed through the crowd and went into the store. I don't know if it was because Sanchez was such a commanding presence, or because of the sight of me being pushed in a wheelchair by my girlfriend.

I was going to bet on Sanchez this time, because I was neurotic enough about the chair as it was. I looked around as Mikki pushed me past the detectives in the hallway and into the main part of the store. There wasn't a single thing that looked out of place. No broken lock, no forced entry, and no damage to the store at all.

Sanchez noticed what I was doing. “Any thoughts?”

“There wasn't a break-in.”

“You've always had an eye for detail.” Sanchez smiled.

“No, just for the obvious.”

“Well, any ideas?”

“He either knew the perp, or perps, and let them in... or he was tricked into letting them in.” I said.

“In what way?”

“Do I really have to answer that? It's not like we all don't know the answer.” I responded.

“Humor me.”

I let out a little sigh. “A vampire used mind tricks to get in.”

“Why?”

“Oh, come on Sanchez.” I said, almost in exasperation. “I've been off the force for years; but, I'm not stupid. They didn't want it to look like there was anything wrong here, so no one would find out what actually happened.”

“Bingo.” Sanchez said.

“Apparently, that didn't work because you guys are already here. So what tipped you off?”

“A neighbour noticed the lights didn't come on last night. She said they would come on every night, because she can see them from her front window over her television set.”

Now it was my turn to take the bait and ask stupid questions.

“Yeah, like that would get the police down here. What really tipped you off?”

Sanchez almost laughed. “The silent alarm was triggered on the back door of the building around the same time as the witness's call.”

“So, there's a back room to this place?”

“Yep.” Sanchez waved towards the back of the room. “Step right up and behold the wonders of... uh, sorry.”

“It's okay, Sanchez.” I said and as we neared the entrance to the back, I smelled it. Raw meat. I don't know why I couldn't smell it until then, since it seemed so prevalent, now that it had invaded my nostrils. It was that smell that let me know exactly how bad it was going to be back there.

“Wait.” I said, and we stopped just outside the door. “Can you smell it?” I asked Mikki as I looked up at her.

“I can.” Mikki said with a nod.

“You have to stay out here.” I said.

“But, what if...”

My power spiked a little as I spoke. “I'm fine.”

“I'll wait here, then.” Mikki said with a hint of a smile.

“Thank you.” I said as I took over control of my wheelchair before Sanchez could offer, then I rolled into the back room. I thought for a moment that everything was painted red, at least until my brain made sense of it. Paint doesn't run unless it's wet, so this had to be... blood. A lot of blood.

From floor to ceiling, wall-to-wall, the whole room was covered in blood. Bits and pieces were scattered around the floor with nothing bigger than a finger. With that revelation, I noticed it. A finger lay on the table next to the door. I thought I had all the horrors I could manage in my head, but here was another one, even more gruesome than the last.

The worst part about it was that my stomach fought itself over what I saw. Half of it wanted to chow down because it smelled so good, which shocked me... and gave me an inclination about what Jeanette meant about me having a bond with Natalie.

Ohhhh, shiiiit. I thought and managed to not shake my head or give any outward sign of what my brain was having a difficult time processing. Unfortunately, the other half of my stomach, the still human half, wanted me to see what I had for breakfast a second time.

I held down my gorge as I scanned the room, and my eyes picked that time to notice the pretty color. My power flared like a heartbeat; going thump, thump, thump. My eyesight went into what I affectionately call hyper-focus. It was the same thing that had happened yesterday morning when I had fallen and seen Mikki rescue me.

Right now, I could see every detail in the room. It used to take me several minutes to piece together a crime scene; but, with this eyesight and my previous knowledge of anatomy and other crime scenes, I could tell what was missing. There weren't any organs. I told Sanchez this and he stared at me like I had two heads.

“How do you know that?” Sanchez asked.

How do you explain that you can see that there were pieces missing? I asked myself. You improvise of course. “There's lots of blood, which tells us that he was killed right here, but there isn't enough...” I waffled my hands in the air a bit. “...mass to account for a whole person.”

“That's what the forensics team said.”

“What?” I looked at him with surprise on my face.

“They said that the remains were only tissue from the outside of the body and that no organs or brain matter were found.”

My power started to ease off, which was also a surprise. “You mean I've been wasting my time here?”

“No. I'm just telling you that you were right.” Sanchez said.

Oh. That's ok, then. I thought, then my eyes caught a glint of something. “Did they see that?”

“See what?” Sanchez asked and tried to see what I was looking at.

It looked like a small diamond, perfectly cut, laying inside a crack in the floor next to the worktable.

“Has the lab taken pictures and video? I don't want to disturb any evidence.” I said.

“Yeah, they just finished before you called.” Sanchez said.

“If they're still here, can you get them to take a picture of the floor near the left front table leg?”

“Sure.” Sanchez said and stepped out of the room. “Hey, Bill. Get your ass in here for another picture.”

I was going to say something else, then the man in question popped into the room and Sanchez pointed to the left front table leg.

“Get me a close up picture of that, will you? Near the floor.”

“Sure thing, Sergeant.”

When the flash went off, both Bill and Sanchez noticed the reflected glare of the diamond.

“Well, I'll be damned. How the hell did you see that, David?” Sanchez asked.

“I'm a lot closer to the floor now.” I said to explain away my heightened sense of sight.

Sanchez laughed and patted Bill on the back. “Thanks, Bill. Get that and the other pictures developed as soon as you can.”

Bill nodded and left.

“Good thing you were here, David. We might have missed this.” Sanchez said as he bent down to pick up the stone with his rubber gloved fingers and placed it in an evidence baggie. “You see, we still need you on cases like these.”

“Yeah, it's just too bad my services are no longer required.” I said.

“Yeah. Hey, look. It's against company policy...” Sanchez said with a huge grin. “...but, I'll call you if anything pans out on this little rock here, Ok?”

“Thanks, Sanchez.” I said, then a wave of tiredness hit me. I barely managed to roll myself out into the main room to a patiently waiting were-cat.

Mikki brightened up as soon as she saw me. “Ready to go?”

“Take me home.” I said.

Mikki pushed me out into the daylight and down the street to the car without saying a word. I didn't even ask if anyone minded if I kept the wheelchair. I just took it and left.

When Mikki and I arrived home, Natalie already had dinner waiting. Natalie always knew when I needed to eat lately and now that I had an inkling why, it didn't worry me as much as the reason. Of course, I don't think I could remember a time when I came home and she didn't have something ready for me to eat.

Natalie noticed that the wheelchair wasn't the one that I had gone out to get and didn't say anything. I knew she would get the whole story from Mikki later, so I didn't say anything. We sat at the table and enjoyed a nice home cooked meal of steak, potatoes, and vegetables. I could do without the veggies most of the time; but, I have to keep my strength up, now that my mobility had been drastically reduced.

We talked about what Natalie was doing that day, and she started needling Mikki for details about my wheelchair. I just finished my steak and half of my potatoes when the phone rang. Natalie got up to get it since she had already finished eating.

“It's the police.” Natalie said.

“But I thought...” Mikki started to say.

“Me, too.” I said as I went to the phone and found out that it was Sanchez. I was surprised to hear his voice. He had told me earlier that he would call if anything interesting about the diamond came up; but, I didn't think he would discover anything this soon. He informed me that some diamonds have a serial code laser etched onto their surface to mark where it was originally from. Luckily, the diamond I found was one of them and it was traced to a jewellery shop in Washington, DC.

I was about to comment that it wasn't feasible for me to follow up on it when Sanchez said he had already pulled some strings and found out the stone was from a special batch ordered by the military for its special forces team rings. I asked him if he was kidding. He said no, that there were over a thousand rings made with this particular stone setting.

Well, damn. I thought. “I suppose you have a list of everyone who got one?”

Sanchez laughed. “That's the best part. There are no official records of who got these rings.”

Double damn. I shook my head. “So much for me finding that one special clue.”

“I'll call if anything else develops.” Sanchez said and hung up before I had a chance to say good-bye. I chuckled, because he was definitely taking phone lessons from the squad captain. I went back to the table and finished eating. Even the veggies.

Natalie got up and cleared away the dishes from the table and gave me a kiss. She had to get ready for work that night and said she would finish washing the dishes later. She had been off work for a while and needed to get back to the bar to keep her job. There was only so much leeway one could have with taking care of a sick family member, even if you were using up your vacation time to do it.

Natalie grabbed her things after changing for work and picked up the phone to call a cab. I told her to go ahead and take the jeep, since I wasn't going to need it anyway. Mikki pointed out that she was home and that we still had access to her car if we had to go anywhere in a hurry, so Natalie gave me a kiss, took the keys, and left.

Mikki and I planned to spend the rest of the night alone, maybe with a bath and some snuggling later. Plans were made to be broken, however. Actually, rules are; but, I don't really have a lot of those left right now, despite having a ton of them before.

I've had lines that I thought I would never cross and I've crossed almost all of them. I swore I'd never maim or torture anyone, and I did. I swore that I would never sleep with more than one woman, especially at the same time, because nice guys didn't do that, and I did. I also swore that I would never, ever, sleep with someone after they had shape-shifted. There was just too much of a chance to catch their ailments from sharing bodily fluids, and I've done that, too.

So, my personal barriers have all come crashing down around my ears, especially now that I suspected that the last time Natalie and I slept together, she gave me a lot more than just her love. I couldn't even be angry at her about it, because it had been my choice... and she looked so damn cute at the time and I couldn't help myself.

Oh, god. I thought and shook my head. The next full moon is definitely going to be interesting.

The phone rang again and this time Mikki answered it. “It's Jeanette.”

“Why is she calling me now?” I asked as Mikki handed me the receiver. Did I just say that out loud?

“My darling?” Jeanette asked as if she hadn't just heard me say what I said.

“Yeah.” I responded.

“Are you well?”
”No, Jeanette. What do you want?”

“You sound irritated. Perhaps I will call at a more opportune moment.”

“I don't think there will be a ‘more opportune' moment. You just caught me at a bad time. What's up?”

“What case are you working on for the police?” Jeanette inquired.

“I'm not working any case for them.” I said, then sighed. “I assume you heard about Mr. Spelmann.”

“Yes. My contacts in the area pointed out his gruesome death to me.”

“I know you know him; but, did you talk to him personally, or did one of your flunkies have contact with him?” I asked.

“One of my ‘flunkies', as you so kindly put it, did.” Jeanette said, almost with a laugh.

“So, you don't know whether he was alive or not at the time.”

“Yes, he was alive. Although I did not speak to him directly, my ‘flunky' did.”

“For some reason. I don't think that's why you called.” I said.

“No, my darling. Some of my vampires have gone missing.”

“What do you mean, gone missing?” I asked with concern.

“Yesterday, at dusk when most of my family awoke, I could not feel some of them.”

“But, that would mean...”

“Yes, my darling. Either someone is powerful enough to have hidden them from me, has taken them from the city, or...”

“...or they're dead.” I whispered. “Their second death.”

“Correct.” Jeanette said, her voice subdued.

I couldn't resist asking the next obvious question. “Who's missing?”

“Do you really want to know?”

“You wouldn't have called me if you thought I didn't.”

“Ah, you know me well, my darling. Hephastus, Apollo, and surprisingly Kratoa.”

“Yeah, that is surprising.” I said as I did my best to remember them. “Hephastus and Apollo are two of the family's bodyguards, doing their duty as muscle for the next fifty years. They are young and not really powerful. Kratoa however, is pretty powerful, so he doesn't fit in with the m.o. of the other two. Especially since he's just visiting your territory.”

“The m.o.?” Jeanette asked.

“The Modus Operendai. It's the rules a criminal will stick to no matter what. They might be his own rules, with his own reasoning, or someone else's rules; but, they're still rules that they have to follow. Unless he's a nutcase, then the rules don't apply.”

“Perhaps you are right. Kratoa doesn't fit at all.”

“Thanks for letting me know, Jeanette. I'll get right on it.”

“My darling, I did not call you to get you on this ‘case', only to inform you of the disappearances and to be careful.”

My new self figured that was its cue and decided to let Jeanette know that it wasn't happy being dictated to. I pumped my power into the slightly damaged bond we shared and I heard the receiver hit the floor. After a moment, I felt her compose herself and pick it up.

“Very well, my darling. I did not mean to dictate how you would handle the information.” Jeanette said, almost as an apology.

I calmed down and my power receded. “Thank you for letting me know, Jeanette.” I said and hung up the phone without saying goodbye. I sighed at the oversight and thought about calling her back, then shrugged. I told Mikki about the side of the conversation that she couldn't quite hear and without being asked, she loaded me into her car and somehow managed to get the wheelchair in her trunk.

I wanted to go see Apollo and if he had actually disappeared, so we pulled up to the outside of Apollo and Hephastus's house. It was just what you would expect a middle class medium income family home would look like. It was a small one and a half story split level home, painted eggshell white, with blue trim, blue shutters and little flower boxes under the two front windows. It had a small walkway across the lawn, and a small concrete step with a brown ‘Welcome' mat on it.

Who would have thought Apollo would go for something like this? I asked myself as we got out of the car and Mikki helped me into my chair. I didn't bitch and complain about it, because my new self just loved it when I got angry and I needed to keep it under control. In retrospect, I think it was a bad choice when I gave it my anger as fuel. Oh, well. It wasn't like I could change it, now that I know.

Mikki rang the doorbell for me and we waited. I knew it was just before dark, but I had to check anyway. I pushed my power into Apollo's house, almost like radar, and searched for him. I had always been able to find the dead like that, ever since I was a kid. I felt a body in the basement, but there was no one 'home' yet. I knew it was Apollo, though. My ability with the dead had felt him as I passed by him all the times I had visited Jeanette at her family home.

I felt him return to his body as the sun sunk below the horizon and he woke up. I also felt his panic, which was a new thing for me. I hadn't had that much reciprocation with my power before. Usually, all I could feel is them being animated by whatever force that brought them back from the dead to make them vampires.

Maybe becoming a were-cat is changing my power? I asked myself. I didn't tell Mikki to ring the doorbell again because Apollo knew I was here. He also knew he was trapped and pleaded for help. “Oh, damn.” I said and looked at Mikki. “He's trapped in the basement.”

Mikki gave me wide eyes for a moment, then she nodded. “Doors are cheap.” She said with a smile and popped her palm on the door handle. I kid you not, the whole handle crumpled and went right through the hole in the door. She dug her fingers into the mangled mess of metal and pulled on the latch, then the door swung open.

“Um. Wow.” I said as I looked up at her.

“Was it really that impressive?” Mikki asked with a demure smile, gave me a quick kiss, then waved for me to go in.