Darlings of Paranormal Romance (Anthology) (188 page)

"Probably to keep a sterile
environment." Cody walked around checking out the
monitors.

Jewel whispered behind her, "Are they
nude?"

Tessa leaned in for a closer look.
"Yes, they are. Completely."

"Oh Lord." Jewel gasped and closed
her eyes briefly. Looking very pained, she added, "That’s a lot of
flesh down there."

"No. It’s a lot of human suffering.
That’s all I see." Tessa strode over to the computers. "Are these
monitoring the people’s vital signs? Like an alarm system or
something?"

"It is a control center but I'd think
a backup one. There should be a main system close to the rows of
people for medical and security personnel to use." Cody stopped in
front of one monitor. "Look, there's someone in a bed."

"Maybe a new arrival?" David
suggested.

Tessa raced over to see if it was
Jared. "I can't make out his features."

"Could also be someone sleeping off
shift." Jewel shivered and stayed close to David.

"Look!" Tessa pointed at the farthest
monitor to the left. "There’s someone walking around down
there."

David joined them. He pursed his lips
then tapped the screen. "It could be a doctor or nurse. They appear
to be checking on that person. It’s probably like a first aid
station or something."

Cody tapped a screen. "Where’s the
security?"

"There may not be much." David
glanced over at her. "Look around this place." He motioned at the
computers and monitors. "It practically runs itself. No army needed
here. No need for high security either. No one knows it exists, and
even if they did, who could find it?"

"So where are mom and the others?"
Tessa wandered around the large room.

"I’m searching. I can sense her and
Goran, both of them, but can't reach them mentally." Serus studied
the last row of monitors. "They could be almost anywhere. I doubt
the entire place is under camera scrutiny."

Tessa walked around the room,
overwhelmed at the concept and sheer size of the operation. "Is it
even safe to unhook all these people? Will they die if we
do?"

"I want to know what they are doing
with all the blood. I’ve hardly tasted human blood and didn’t like
what little I did have – so who is getting all this? And how? Do
they have some sort of milk truck or something for storing and
moving it all?" David studied the monitors, fascinated.

Cody wandered around.
"The logistics required for an operation of this size would be
unbelievable. It can’t be just Moltere. There have to be dozens of
people and vampires involved, possibly hundreds. What if we’re the
ones in the minority outside? And everyone around us outside is
involved?"

"No." Serus’s voice brooked no
argument. "The black market is huge, but that doesn’t make those
involved the majority. This sophisticated system shows years of
planning and execution."

"How could no one miss these humans?"
Jewel stared in horrified fascination at the rows and rows of
suspended people. "How could all these people disappear and no one
care enough to search for them?"

"They could have been kidnapped
anywhere around the world. You hear about human smuggling all the
time. There is the huge network of smugglers, then there are
thousands of runaways and the masses of homeless on the streets."
Tessa pulled her jacket tighter around her belly. "I don’t think
there’s any shortage of unloved humans – unfortunately."

"That’s horrible."

Tessa glanced over at
Jewel’s face. Tears glimmered on the other girl’s cheeks. She was
glad to see such compassion and caring from another vampire. "Yes,
it is. Jared might have been targeted for that reason alone.
Although, he also might have become a target after seeing the
vampires' faces at the movie theater."

"Doesn’t he have anyone that cares
about him?" Jewel cried out in horror.

"Apparently not." Tessa couldn't
remember Jared's exact words, only something about how his uncle
wouldn't care if he ever showed up again.

"Could the vampires have contacts
within the human population? Human contacts giving over their own
people?" Jewel’s eyes glistened with fresh tears.

David wrapped her up in a warm hug.
"We’re going to help them. Don’t worry. We’ll get to the bottom of
this."

Tessa watched the two of them. So
that's how it was. She hid her grin. Then she caught Cody’s eye.
She smirked at the look on his face. He already knew.

Then Cody winked at her.

Her eyes widened. Oh my goodness.
Cody actually winked at her. She could feel heat climbing her
cheeks again. She bent, hiding her face behind the fall of her
hair.

Her stomach danced with
butterflies.

No. She admonished herself for losing
focus. Jared first. Then she’d sort out these confusing feelings.
These last few days a lot of things had changed for her.

That much?

Maybe. She stole another look in
Cody’s direction. He looked at her. Instead of hiding, this time
she straightened and smiled at him directly. His eyes widened, then
he grinned.

Cool.

First things first. Spinning around,
she cornered her dad. "Who can we call for help? The Council? The
police? Someone? Anyone? This is a big operation. We need to take
down all the tentacles, not just this center."

"I know. But let's get your mother
first."

As much as she wanted her mother back
safe and sound, she needed to know that this would never happen
again. "Why not at the same time?" she countered. "We should call
people to come as backup and to help clean up while we go in and
save mom and the others. These people are going to need
help."

"They could be past that point, you
know."

"I know, but I don’t want to consider
that right now. We need humans to help us. This is too much for us
to handle on our own."

Her dad frowned. "I don’t think it’s
that simple."

"It’s only difficult if we make it
difficult. Come on, Dad. This is beyond us."

Cody nodded. "Tessa’s right, sir.
Even if we take this place down, the head honchos are just going to
set up shop again somewhere else. They aren’t going to give up
something this lucrative so easily."

Jewel gasped. Everyone spun around to
look at her.

"Please tell me they don't have
vampires hanging here?" Her voice rose in horror.

"I doubt it, Jewel. Why would they?
Our blood is different." Tessa didn’t want to contemplate vampires
feeding off their own.

"Then what about him?" She tapped the
screen on the bottom corner. Everyone crowded around her. The
camera focused on one single male.

Tessa frowned. "I’ve seen him
before."

"Of course you have. That’s Daren. We
saw a lot of him before he headed to Europe after his dad passed
away a couple of months ago." Jewel’s jaw clenched on the last
words. She wrapped her arms tightly around her chest as if warding
off a chill.

David stared at the figure in the
monitor. "Then why is he hanging beside those humans?"

It was Tessa who voiced the unspoken
horror hanging heavy in the air. "Because he wouldn’t be
missed."

***

Cody watched David with Jewel. And
from the look on Serus's face, it was obvious this development was
new to him too.

Now if only Cody knew why
the hell he couldn’t take his eyes of Tessa. The kid sister of
David – the Tessie thing – had disappeared long ago…somewhere
around the time he noticed that Hooters outfit she'd worn at the
Council house. Now he had trouble reconciling the two parts of a
whole.

She kept surprising him. Like that
energy stuff she kept seeing. Damn helpful, yet way weird. And then
there was that locked-door thing. Kick yes, but in the right spot,
more than once?

Not a coincidence. At least not to
him.

He turned around in the
large room, staring and contemplating the planning and organizing
that must have gone into it. This was a professional operation – on
a massive scale. As a vampire, he could understand the lure of the
product. However, as a modern one, raised without having tasted
human blood, he abhorred the idea. He didn’t have any close human
friends. Still, he knew many. He wouldn’t drink their blood – not
if he didn’t have to for survival.

To keep these people, kids like
Tessa's friend, was just wrong. How long could they stay like this?
Imprisoned until the bodies aged and could no longer pump out rich
blood? He shook his head. This was murder. Long and slow. Plain and
simple. And yet it was also so much worse.

"What about you, Cody?"

Cody shook his head, turning around
to face the others. "What?"

"Cell phones don’t work down here. We
need a flier to go for help."

Cody frowned. He was the only flier
in the group. "I'm not leaving."

"You have to." Tessa walked over to
stand in front of him, her eyes luminous in the dark. "You're the
only one who can get there and back in any decent time. If we don't
let someone from the outside know, what will happen if we're caught
too?"

David held up his camera phone and
said, "I've taken a bunch of pictures, but can't get them out of
here."

Tessa pointed to the computers around
them. "Can you download the pictures and email them to
someone?"

"I don't have a cable with me or my
flash card."

Jewel held up hers. "I have
mine."

"Cool." David snatched it out of her
hand and went around to all the monitors, taking a comprehensive
series of shots detailing the images on the monitors. Then he
backed up to take wider shots of the control room."

"Who do I send them to?"

"Someone who can do something for us.
And not just one person."

As the others turned to face her,
Tessa explained. "We don't know how high up this goes."

Serus frowned. "Send it to Markus,
Tatia and Cleary, and better add Sian to that list. Make sure you
send a set home too."

That was good. He’d named three
ancient families. Sian and Taz could be a real help here, too.
Taz's medical expertise would come in handy with the
humans.

"Do you have their email addresses?"
David checked the desk computers looking for a model not used for
running the monitoring software. At the back he found one. He
booted it up. "This one might have the Internet, if
not..."

"Jewel can try to send the pictures
over her phone, but we won't know if they've gone out
properly."

"It's no longer a problem," David
crowed. "This computer has Internet. Makes sense, they have to
connect to the outside world somehow."

He brought up the browser then headed
to his email account. Taking the flashcard out of Jewel's phone, he
quickly downloaded the pictures into a specific folder and then
compressed them. Within minutes he had everything attached to
emails. "Okay, now what do I say?"

Everyone chimed in over and above
each other as they brought up points to mention.

He read the draft aloud.
"Good?"

"Yes, send them." Tessa couldn't help
but glance around, a sense of urgency building inside her. "We’ve
taken too long already."

"Done."

"Good. Shut down the machine and
let’s go find your mother." Serus strode to the door, then turned
back to David and asked, "Can you hide what you just
did?"

"To a certain extent. I just cleared
the history and the cache and deleted the pictures. I'm shutting it
down now. Hopefully, that will fool anyone not specifically looking
for trespassers. At least for a little while."

"Let's go then."

Everyone walked to the door. Tessa
blurted out, "Do we all go? Shouldn't someone stay behind – just in
case?"

"I'm not staying here." Jewel stood
as close as she could to David without being on top of him. "I
think we're better off sticking together. Safety in numbers and all
that."

Serus nodded. "We'll stay together.
It might take all of us to save your mother, as it is. If we could
find Goran, he’d be a big help. The more on our side – the better
the odds."

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

Tessa hated to think of everyone
walking into a trap.

With those pictures and the email cry
for help, someone should come to their assistance soon enough. At
least she hoped so. Taking a deep breath, she nodded. "Fine. Let's
go."

Her dad gave her a long look then
nodded, as if satisfied. "Everyone, quiet."

Tessa rolled her eyes.

He rolled his eyes back
at her. Then he opened the door. The corridor on the other side
appeared to be similar to the stone walls and floor they’d already
passed.

They walked forward cautiously. The
lack of ventilation or lighting added to the weirdness factor. A
series of doors connected shorter hallways. The temperature dropped
a bit lower in each one. By the time they'd entered the hallway,
the atmosphere had cooled considerably.